Yochien

Today I went to MyTown's Kindergarten to be teach all kinds of interesting things to the Rodents of Unusual Size (Read: Kindergarteners).

I discovered, however, that what Kindergarteners really like has nothing at all to do with English…

Though they were pretty into the English thing… Especially the puppets that Maia so lovingly loaned me (Thank you, dear! :D)

I sat in the guest lounge chatting with the headmaster (Who speaks even less English than the kindergarteners… that was a challenge). And in comes a plethora of small human beings carrying gifts for the new English Teacher…

I can TOTALLY hear the discussion before coming into the guest room:

Rodent 1: Hey look! It’s the new English Teacher! I love English Teachers, let’s welcome him with a gift!

Rodent 2: I agree, I don’t have any cockroaches, but we do have three Japanese Fighting Beetles!

Rodent 1: Perhaps he’ll love that!

Rodent 2: Perhaps!

I turned around many times to a plethora of very unhappy legs attached to a very unhappy beetle at least three times…

I should be awarded a purple heart for this job…

The amazing thing; I never once yelled, jumped, or even had a look of disgust on my face… I just said, “That’s okay, you keep him!” To the kids and smiled… I even patted on of the rodents on the head… while the beetle writhed away in his little hand…
These are the hazards of my job…

---Me...

1st Quarter Review:

It’s amazing to me to think that I have been here for an entire quarter. It seems like just yesterday I was still in Colorado watching the snow fall, packing my apartment, and thinking of where I would be come June…

Now, I look over the last three months and realize some of the more amazing things I have done:

I have seen Tokyo from the observation deck of Tokyo Tower (I have pictures, I’ll post them).

I have walked the grounds of several beautiful Japanese temples.

I have listened to Buddhist monks chant.

I have heard a Buddhist Gong ring.

I have watched the Sakura bloom, and seen folks participate in the Sakura Matsuri.

I have walked in a snowstorm of Sakura petals.

I went to a fun party with a whole bunch of people from around the world on Children’s Day

I have had my picture in a Japanese newspaper while wearing yet another newspaper on my head… (Yeah... I’ll post about that too…)

I have survived 9 earthquakes… most not even really worthy of reporting, but a couple bad enough to make things fall over.

I have walked in the Japanese Space Station module (Well, a mockup therein, but who’s counting?).

I have been the lesson and have heard 40 Japanese children proclaim, in unison, that they are me.

I have observed two girls walk into the teachers room and ask for something... in perfect unison.

I have performed the “Introduction ceremony” with all the proper Japanese actions.

I have had an lovely old lady offer me a rice cracker.

I have been to restaurants where the food still has eyes… And in some cases was still alive less than a few seconds before it was on our table.

I have walked along roads that may be thousands of years old.

I have walked along a beautiful river and listened to a saxophone being played in a drainage gully.

I have driven on the wrong side of the road… a couple of times… and survived.

I have eaten at places called “Tabehodai”, “Nomihodai”, “Kaiten-Zushi” and “McDonalds”.

I have talked to a Policeman about busses and failed to get my point across, then I talked to my teachers about mathematics and mostly got my point across, then I talked to a banker about opening a bank account and we talked about the primary exports of my state and city and T-shirts with funny slogans… in Japanese.

I have talked to Brazilians in Japanese, because they don’t speak English and I don’t speak Spanish.

I have friends from all over the world, and a lot of them have never so much as stepped foot in the United States, nor have I in their country.

I have taught 100 9th graders to nod and smile when foreigners start talking too fast for them instead of looking thunderstruck and freaking out.

I have drawn pictures of animals with the art club, and never once said anything more complex than “Do you like cats?”, and found that we are really no different at all.

I have eaten things with spots… I have eaten things with suckers, I have eaten things with scales, I have eaten things that looked like it came from a blowout on the freeway…

I have eaten corn on my Pizza… and mayonnaise…

I have an ID card that I cannot read.

I have a sink on the tank of my toilet, and a sink inside my shower.

I have a washer, but no dryer. And my washer looks like R2-D2…And sounds like him too…

I have eaten soy beans raw, cooked, boiled, fried and rotten… and I’m sure I have not found the end of the ways that Soy beans are served.

I have been swept about in a tide of humanity in a train station that is far more crowded than Grand Central Station has ever been… and I never worried about my wallet.

I have drawn Totoro characters on the chalkboard during a lesson and had my students all demand that it not be erased.

Now let’s see what happens in the second quarter…

---Me.

One more time...

Okay, so after the little lesson earlier in math, Mr. Language Arts and I were a little leary when Mr. Science Teacher showed up with yet another math problem.

But he assured us it was solvable.

To make sure, though, I have solved it (And I got a cool "Well Done" sticker from Mr. Science Teacher to prove it. :) )

So, here's the problem;

1, 2, 4, 6 = 10

Make this true, you may use any of the four standard operators (+, -, x, \) and you may use brackets or exponents (As in you may place the numbers in a bracket (2+1)+(4+6)=10 or you may use the numbers as exponents (1^2x4^6=10). But you have to make it true.

By the way, Mr. Language Arts and I are very proud of our "Well Done" Stickers... as he admitted he sucks at math too :D

---Me.

P.S. Patsy, if you use Sebster, you have to wait for someone else to get the correct answer before posting it, because that kid is freaking smart ;)

The day the 2nd years beat the 3rd years...

This is a long story. Go get some cocoa, sit back, turn on some music, and relax, `cause we are going to be here for a bit…

This story started way back in week three or so, when Mr. 2nd year decided to break his English classes into three parts: Slow, Medium, and Fast. He took the Slow class, Ms. 1st year took the Medium class, and Ms. Team Teacher and I were given the Fast class. The amazing thing is; He let them choose. This may sound like a natural thing for us Americans, but for Japan, that is mostly unheard of (In fact, this rather freaked out the PTA a bit, and we dodged the bullet on that one… read previous post for more information on the disposition of the PTA…)

Ms. Team Teacher is a nice lady, but she has a very, very soft voice. I can’t speak Japanese yet (Not enough to command a class of rambunctious teenagers, anyway), thus we make a great team (I am very good at “LOUD”.).

Shortly thereafter, Ms. 3rd year decided to join suit, and suddenly I had a bunch of Fast 3rd years followed by a batch of Fast 2nd years as the last two periods of the day on Wednesday.

Woah… I had my own class (Mostly)… I was jazzed!

Until the first week. Ms. 1st year set us up with a gazillion worksheets to fill out. And announces that she will be teaching the 3rd year Fast class… Which meant that both Fast classes were boring as hell… Actually Hell is probably more interesting than that first class ended up being… It was awful.

So, the next class I decide we are going to play a game in 2nd year Fast class… at least Ms. Team Teacher is all about it.

I design this game in which a series of toy cars (With magnets on them, so they stick to the blackboard) “race” around a track drawn on the board. I roll a very large, fuzzy die, the children answer questions in English, and I move the car that number of spaces around the track.

It took most of the class to finish the worksheets that Ms. 1st year assigned us… so by the time I explained the rules of the game to the children, the bell rang and class was over.

So that’s two strikes against my teaching of my own class…

Then, the following week, Ms. Team Teacher gets sick and has to go home at noon. Suddenly, I’m the only one teaching the class…. To make it more interesting, Ms. 1st year has decided to leave both Fast classes to us… so now I’m teaching both classes.

I actually, for the first time since I started this job, operated a class exactly as my company trained me to do…

I tossed the dice to a kid, He had to say the number the die read (In English, of course), then toss it to another kid, who did the same thing, then tossed it to another kid, and so on… then I said “Color” and they had to read the color of the face of the die. Then after our warm up, we went right into the lesson, all in English. My 3rd years took some time warming up, but they got there, and then we went into the game.

My 2nd year girls are dangerous, they beat the boys by a mile… 3rd years didn’t fare so well simply because they needed to have the instructions explained to them and all…

It was rough, but it was my first game, and the first time I actually did what I am supposed to do.

This week I had a doosie. You see, yesterday was the birthday of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, and in his honor I made the Sherlock Holmes game.

Here’s how it went:

I stand in front of the classroom: “Last night at 10:00PM the Museum was robbed and a necklace was stolen.” I hand out a sheet of paper with 4 suspects’ pictures on it, “These four people are suspected of being the culprit.” I had out a series of clue pages, with “Interviews” from various people giving clues to whodunit. There are 4 different pages of clues, and you need all 4 to figure out who did it. So the kids are going to have to work together…

This is the setup (ALL in English, mind you):

Suspects:

1) Mike Brown, Age 30, Car: Red Van
2) Sally Green, Age 25, Car: White Van
3) Ben Smith, Age 20, Car: Blue Van
4) Judy Taylor, Age 33, Car: Black Van

Here are the clues:

1)A yellow van with spots was at the museum from 7PM to 10PM
2) (This was a trick question) a Blue van was at the museum last night from 7PM to 10PM.
3) A Brown van was at the museum from 7AM to 10AM
4) Judy Taylor was at the Museum last night.
5) The Brown Van is now red
6) The yellow van with spots is now white
7) A Black Van was at the Museum from 6PM to 8PM
8) The purple van is now blue
9) Judy Taylor is at the Stadium
10) Sally Green is at the Library
11) A purple van was at the museum from 3PM to 7PM
12) Ben Smith is at the school
13) Mike Brown is at the Airport
14) (This is the other half of the trick question) The woman with the cat (#2) is lying.

There were two “Picture” clues as well; a high-heel shoe found at the scene, and a photo taken of the museum depicting a polka-dotted van sitting in front of the museum at 10:00PM.

Now, the goal of the game is to “Arrest” the culprit. So I laid out 4 envelopes, marked Library, School, Airport and Stadium. And they had little badges I made for them (Which said “Fast Class Detective” embossed on a picture of a shiny deputy’s star… I’m still a Graphic Artist in my soul). When they figured it out, they had to put their badge in the correct envelope.

The grammar point here is the conversion of the “Be” verb (Is Are Am, was were, Will Be, etc). Hence the changing of the van colors and having to arrest someone now…

Okay, so I show this to Mr. 2nd year and he starts laughing…

“I think that’s too difficult.” He says, “But you should do it anyway! It’ll be fun!” (Did I mention I love this guy?)

I’m heartened by this, so I go into my 3rd year Fast class.

They suck at it… it’s awful. One cluster of girls gets the correct answer and then everyone figures out which folder the girls put their badges in and it was a rush to the front of the class to put the badges in the right folder…

Now, in my defense, it was 5th period (The one right after lunch), and this is the first day back to school for my first years since they went to Kyoto… So they were not into school at all…

Then it was time for my 2nd years.

They get right on the puzzle…

Learning from the earlier mess, I kept the folders with me, and asked them which folder they wanted, when they said which one, I opened the folder and let them put their badge in…

Every single one of my 2nd years translated the text (Exactly as it is written above), and then unraveled the puzzle.

And I’ll be darned if they all didn’t get it exactly right. Every single one of them.

Take that, Ms. 1st year when you say these kids aren't advanced enough.

I am so proud of my 2nd year Fast class (I’d be proud of my 3rd years too, but they were sleeping this round out).

Ah… well, it was too difficult… but, apparently my kids were totally up to the challenge.

Here's the kicker: the 2nd years loved it and want to do another one...

So, I made a game that was too hard, they did it anyway, and they want me to do it to them again...

My kids are just cool.

---Me.

No wonder we all live in fear...

The PTA here is much like the PTA in the US, the squeeky wheel gets the grease... Which means we all work from that one parent that is never happy...

I swear it must go something like this:

Parent stands up: "We have been hearing that our children are having fun in English class. That has us a little concerned. I mean, what about all those other children who are suffering in their English classes. Also, is your Japanese class fun? What about the Math class? Are the children having fun there? I didn't think so. Is it really fair to make English stand out like that? Is it fair to the children? What about High School? Is English fun in High School? I think we are setting our children up to have a terrible fall when they enter High School... And think of all the work they go through only to find out that High School isn't as fun as your English class... Is that really fair?

"Also, we are Japanese. We have been suffering in school since before history began. It is what builds our character and makes us good members of society. Remember that Junior High School isn't for learning, it's for making good members of society. We want English to be a torture chamber of unhappiness. Please tell your teachers to stop having fun..."

Okay, so that hasn't happened yet... but I wouldn't put it beyond them... We actually have had the PTA complain about foreigners teaching in school (Luckily, not MY PTA... but it has happened in other schools), which, I guess, resulted in the loss of the contract and the teacher being removed from the school... simply because he was a foreigner...

Kinda Scary...

---Me.

A bad sign...

Okay, here's the game:

_ 1 _ 2 _ 3 _ 4 _ 5 = 2

Now, using only "+" and "-" to replace the "_"s, make that a true statement.

Mr. Language Arts gave that to me during lunch today after one of our science teachers gave it to him...

He and I are STILL working on it... (Actually, I believe Mr. Language Arts gave up just as I was leaving today... but Mr. Teacher Leader took it over and was working intensely on it as I walked out the door...

Shane, James, Mal? You guys are the heavy number crunchers here, got any ideas?

Tio Pat? Got any tricks up your sleeve for this one?

I think the Science Teacher has us beat...

--Me.

I'm still here!

It's just been a very busy week. After I go to work tomorrow (Sunday), and get that mess over with, we should be back to normal again, and I can continue my posts as normal... Until then... Rats, I wish I could at least put elevator music on this bloggie thingie...

Be back!

---Me.

Reality Check: Surrealist Age

Some things still amaze me about how long I've been wandering this Earth. I know that relative to many folks, my life isn't very long, but as Dad always says; "Everything is Relative"...

I get these "Reality checks" in strange ways, as many of us do... This one started when I was checking in on the flight schedules of the next shuttle launches and a little window in the right-hand corner of the webpage was talking about a Shuttle Flight for Discovery in 1985...

Then I realized we have just passed the 20th anniversary of Challengers' destruction...

I was a "First Year" when that happened. I remember it very clearly...

The same age as the children I am teaching today...

Then I think that I was in College when these children were born (The oldest would have been born in 1992), and if I had managed to come over here when I originally intended (1994), they would have been a mere 2 years old... And my first years still yet to be born...

There is no deep significance to this realization... The significance is in the how I had the realization; coming about from the space program (Memories that are, in me, as young as the children I teach), and seeing that realization played out through my children.
It is surreal. I know someday I'll look back on this realization and laugh at it's simplicity... but for now, it's truly a stunning observation for me.

---Me.

Me 101

Often during class the Japanese teachers love to use me as an example, often using my name in the course of a grammar point or what have you.

This week has been “Are you …?” And “ You are …” as the grammar point…

Of course, I am the example, with my name plugged in to the “…”

So here I have 40 Japanese thirteen year olds declaring in unison that they are, in fact, me…

That’s a little surreal.

And here’s another thing that is strange:

I am learning Braille… Both Japanese and English Braille… Not intentionally, mind you... Quite incidentally...

I can tell you that Braille was invented in 1826 by Louis Braille, a Frenchman. And that it was brought over to Japan in the Meiji era (1880-ish) where it was modified for Japanese Kana (One of their alphabets), and implemented shortly thereafter…

I can even write “se” in Japanese-Braille … All but the lowest left dot is raised… (There are 6 dots in Braille, laid out like the 6 on standard gambling dice…)

Why, you may ask, do you know all of this information?

Well, it is lesson 1 of my third year textbook… We have been on this one point for two weeks now, and I have reread the section for every third year class (4 classes) at least 4 times per class for the last two weeks... and if I have to repeat that information one more time… I believe I shall start tweeting like a songbird…

There are strange drawbacks to this job… Really strange…

Or maybe that’s a plus… I’m not really sure…

Tweet… tweet…

---Me.

The roar of the Mouse…

We have a series of interesting classes that don’t fit inside our normal curriculum. Indeed, they are unique even in their numbering scheme (They are classes 5 and 6… but there are no classes above 4…)

I remember my first day asking what that meant and the answer was… “They have a weak heart…”

This is Japanese for “Mentally retarded”.

And I have come to really love these kids…

I don’t know what it says about us, but they are the most American kids I have…

I don’t have any real feel for class 6 yet, they seem to be just frustrated (It should be noted that with the exception of one young lady, none of these children are actually retarded in the sense that Americans put them in, they are simply slow to process… I guess in Japan that is enough to put you in the severely retarded category).

Class 5, however, consists of two kids, both 1st years. A boy and a girl.

The boy’s major issue (Besides the fact that he is obese… which is odd in this society, but not entirely rare) is that he speaks his mind… he is slow, but he is just a riot. When I got into a discussion with the teacher, he said, bluntly; “Sensei, we are in a class here…” This, ironically, is refreshing to me. He’s awesome. I call him “Direct-Kun”. He is very slow, and it takes a long time to get through a lesson with him because he does need help all the time… he rarely gets the instruction on the first try and Ms. 1st year has to go over it many times for him to get it.

But as wonderful as he is, he isn’t the puzzle that the little girl is. I shall call her Mouse-chan. She has an awful speech impediment, which prevents her from being able to pronounce the first sounds of her speech (In Japanese that would be all of the consonants), so all you get are the vowels. She has a scar (A light one, not ugly) on her face that runs from her eye down her cheek to her chin… and she has a pronounced under bite. It should be noted that she isn’t an ugly girl by any stretch, and since she’s still a child (Read: tiny), she is actually rather adorable.

She sounds bad and I can’t understand a word she says in either Japanese or English, but I noticed last class that she is writing English just fine. In fact, her handwriting is better than mine ever was. She’s not the fastest child I have, but she certainly isn’t the slowest. I’m not sure she even belongs in “Weak Heart English”. She is doing as good as the average 1st year…

But one must understand the way she has been treated…

You see, someone like this in America would be laughed at and their heart would become a cold, bitter place by the time they reach 7th grade.

Not in Japan.

Here, if you are deformed in some way, everyone treats you like fine china. And they patronize you in a non-condescending manner… It’s surreal. They just know that Mouse-chan is a lost cause and so they are doing their best to make her as comfortable as possible while they can…

It’s as if she is going to die…

She, of course, isn’t. I might add, that except for the fact that her social skills are of an elementary school child (She was drawing pictures on my back and having me guess what she was drawing during art club this evening… a flower, a hart, etc), which is likely a direct result of being treated like an elementary school child, I don’t think she is missing much intellectually.

When some of the girls in the art club decided that while I was in the club, they would just call me “Guy-san”, dropping the “Sensei” part of my title… Mouse-chan would not have it. She got downright adamant about my title, declaring (I believe, normal Japanese is hard for me… her Japanese… virtually impossible) that I was still a teacher, even if it is after school. She even pointed out that they had to call Ms. Art sensei even if it is after school.

Ironically, Mouse-chan and Direct-Kun are the only students who actually treat me like all the other teachers.

Even among my fellow teachers, I’m sort of treated as mentally slow… mostly because my Japanese is really bad (I don’t get that response from the English department, they know I’m thinking… It’s just all the other departments).

But, like Mouse-chan, they just can’t see what is going on in my head.

Well, Mouse-chan, I hope I stay here long enough to see you roar.

…I certainly intend to.

---Me.

We knew this might happen...

And so it did…

I’m in a struggle… my struggle is with Ms. 1st year… it so happens that she is in charge of the English department… I’m also in a struggle with the PTA…

A few weeks back, Mr. 2nd year had this brilliant brainstorm. He split up the 2nd years into three groups; slow, medium and fast. He gave the slow group to Ms. 1st year, he took the medium group, and he gave the fast group to me.

The trick that made this so revolutionary is that he let them choose which group they wanted to be in…

So I’m prepping a game for my fast group. It involves little cars on a race track… they have to change the “Be” verb from one tense to another and then they can roll a die and move the car that many spaces (It’s a little more complicated than that, but you get the idea): Thus I say: “He was a doctor…. FUTURE TENSE” And they have to reply: “He WILL BE a doctor” to get their little car to move. First team to the finish line wins.

Hey, it’s my first game, so it’s not terribly creative yet, and nothing explodes… but I figure I had time…

I was wrong…

First, the PTA cannot stand for the fact that there will be a group that will be learning faster than the mentally retarded children in our school, so all three groups will be moving at the slowest groups speed… thereby effectively eliminating any benefit to being in the “Fast” group.

Then, as if that wasn’t enough… Ms. 1st year has pretty much poo poo’d any games… because that’s not the Japanese way. I have to drill these things, you see… I have ideas, but Japanese children aren’t the same as American children, they have more discipline (Ouch…that hits near home, doesn’t it?)…

Of course, she’s conveniently missing the fact that half her children are asleep before her class is out… at least they are sleeping with great Japanese discipline…

Now, for tomorrow, well… the game was set up and is already in progress… so she can’t stop that one… but I may not be so lucky next week.

Everything about this job is really really good; The kids are cheerful, happy, I already feel accepted by some of my staff. The city I live in is quaint and quiet, and I like the school in general…

But if the next three years will consist of me standing in front of the class reciting the text in the textbook 16 kagillion times, I may have to consider a mid-mission reassignment…

Which would really suck… Because everything else is so very good…

Perhaps this is a lesson I need to learn: How not to teach a class…

Who knows…

The saddest thing is I am starting to see Mr. 2nd year lose his drive too… She’s getting to him as well…

Now, I'd like to add that Ms. 1st year is a sweetie, really... but she's a hard-line sweetie. Really nice to talk to, makes jokes, etc... but everything ends with "I'm so sorry but we can't do that..."

*Sigh* Well, I have my work cut out for me, don't I?

---Me.

Orbit was here...

Wish you were beautiful... :)

I went to the Tsukuba Space Center today...What? I've been here a month, you think I'd leave a space center unvisited that long? :)

---Me.

All hail the Silent E

A very very important message from me...

The 14th International Space Station crew has been announced:

"NASA astronauts Michael Lopez-Alegria and Sunita Williams and Russian cosmonaut Mikhail Tyurin have been named as the 14th crew of the International Space Station. Expedition 14 is scheduled to begin this fall."

What's the signifigance of this, Guy, you may ask: Let me tell you.

Since the Columbia disaster, it was a mandate that as long as the shuttle was grounded there would be only two people stationed aboard the ISS...

You'll note there will be three in the next flight...

NASA has faith that Return to Flight really will this time. :)

--STS 121 (Discovery OV-103) Mission 2 in Return to Flight. Launch pad: 39B, Kennedy Space Center, Florida. Mission: Assembly, ISS ULF1.1 Launch Date: 1948 GMT (3:48 p.m. EDT) July 1, 2006.

---Me.

We are Patrol

Every day is an experience for me. Sometimes they are bad (Squid rings come to mind-Exactly like onion rings... except without the onion part...), but most of the time they are very interesting and good.

Today, my friend the Language Arts teacher (Whom I erroneously reported earlier as a science teacher) suddenly walked up to my desk with keys in hand just as the 3:00 bell rang and said:

"Time to go! I'm driving!"...

Okay, I'm game... So I go change shoes into my outside shoes (It should be noted this is still a procedure for me, while the other teachers can do it with amazing speed...), and I walk outside just as Language Arts Teacher is pulling up.

I hop into his car along with another teacher who gets in behind me.

"Patrol" he says, "We are patrol".

And off we go, into the streets of MyTown.

Like most of Japan that isn't Tokyo, Kyoto or some other big city area MyTown has streets that are simply too small for a subcompact to drive on... these streets usually subdivide rice fields that have been the same rice fields for probably 500 or more years. Thus the road of which we are driving on was originally designed to carry one person and a small cart (Japan didn't get horses until a little later in their respective history), with just enough room for them to dodge a passing Samurai... Japan has been Japan for a very long time... The roads are paved now (And have "Stop" painted on them at intersections)... but they are no larger than they were 500 years ago.

So, here we are in a subcompact driving on these roads... I'm looking for Samurai, personally...

Then we come up on a clutch of 2nd year girls on their bikes.

The teacher in the back rolls down his window as we pass the girls; "How are you doing?" He asks, the girls respond "Okay." "Be careful" he instructs, the girls nod and continue on.

"Do you know "Chikan"?" My Language Arts Teacher friend in the driver seat asks as we pull past the girls and drive into what must be a very ancient bamboo forest (And very small, I might add). I wrack my brain... "Chikan" is the word a woman is supposed to yell on a train when she is being groped... That's not good...

"Pervert?" I ask (In Japanese).

"Yes, this is dangerous area. Many pervert here. We are patrol for pervert."

I'm dumbfounded... I mean, yes I guess there are perverts everywhere who will want to do horrid things to 14 year old girls... but I guess it never occurred to me that it would happen here... in the middle of nowhere-Japan... Tokyo, okay... MyTown? Woah...

We come up on another group of 3rd years (Note that for the most part all of our children ride bikes)... they are stopped ahead... We come up behind them and stop as well... this is like a scene from COPS... the girls turn to notice us as we get out of the car and walk up to them...

"Are you girls okay?" Asks the Other Teacher.

"She is looking for her K-tai" (Cel Phone) says one girl... we are out in the boonies of Japan... in a bamboo forest that was intentionally planted right here some 600 years ago which is rife with perverts and this 14 year old is looking for her cel-phone... you can see why I am often completely lost in the irony of this place?

"Can you move along, though?" Asks Language Arts Teacher, "This isn't the best place for you girls to stop..."

"Sure... sorry." Says another of the 3rd years. We get back into the car and follow them until they get out of the forest and back into open rice fields.

"asdlkgjas alkjfglaegiaj aa alkbjte ai Conbini" Says Language Arts Teacher as we get back into more normal city streets (Two sub-compacts can ply these roads... which is why I'm always unnerved when a semi-truck passes...). I know the word Conbini... that is "Convenience Store". Language Arts Teacher follows that up with "I hear Conbini calling me." In English.

Ah... I get it now... We are all the same... no matter what country.... :)

From the back (In excellent English, I might add) Other Teacher adds: Excuse me, I seem to have forgotten my wallet." Which incites a laugh from all of us in the car.

We stop real quick at a 7-11 (Yes, they have 7-11's here...), and go inside. We all pick up something, and then Language Arts teacher grabs everything and pays for it... I protest, and he says: "Patrol pay"... He is a good man.

We go outside and Other Teacher (I will figure out what he does someday... I'm still learning their names, however) starts singing "Take me home"... Language Arts teacher joins him, and they both start to sing (Not loudly, mind you... they are just singing)... we get to "West Virginia", and I am helping them out... then we get to "Mountain Mama..." which dumbfounds them...

"Mountain... Mother" I say in Japanese... ""Mama" is like Mama in Japanese" I add in Japanese. (In just English, however, that sentence sounds really strange :D)

So we resume our patrol, and come up on a group of 2nd year boys, who look like they were thinking about brawling... we break that up (We are still teachers out here), and we continue on..

We come up on a lone 1st year girl, walking along a rice field (Those rice fields occupy anywhere a building does not... and vice versa... with a slight peppering of bamboo forests here and there...). We pull up behind her and she suddenly notices us... We startled her (our first years aren't used to patrols yet, I guess). We go down the script:

"Are you okay?"

"Yes."

"Please be careful."

"Okay."

And she watches us as we toodle along our merry way...

"We surprised her" I say in Japanese.
"I think she was more surprised to see her English teacher." Language Arts Teacher says, laughing.

We all laugh...

Many of my fellow English teachers talk about their bonding experiences with their respective staves which involved lots of alcohol and singing really bad karaoke.

Language Arts Teacher didn't have to bring me along (In fact... I can't say "Are you okay?" "Be careful" etc... Because I can't understand their answers... so I'm not really all that useful yet at all... perhaps someday, but not yet)... but he did bring me along.

My bonding experience did involve singing... but it was much more important.

Because we were Patrol.
--Me.