Finally, to Work
I completely forgot to mention this in the last post, but at the beach there were some incredible sand sculptures I took mediocre photos of. The first is of two with anime themes, the second is one with regional icons, and the third is beach/summer themed! They look a bit rough around the edges but they’re still really neat.
The next morning I made my way to the middle school, my “base of operations” for the time I’ll be here as I’ll spend most days helping with the classes here. It’s about 5 minutes by bike from my apartment, an absolutely brutal change from walking next door to town hall. After the customary greeting I was led to my desk in the staff office and got to know the Japanese teachers of English (JTEs) I would be working with. One of the first things they explained to me was how they hadn’t expected me to speak any Japanese, and had told the students such, so they made it very clear that I’m expected to play dumb and talk to the students only in English. Well, this should be a fun secondary work objective. I wonder how long it’ll take for my cover to be blown.
Oh, and for the time being the air conditioning in the staff room is broken. So I take back what I said about the garbage system being the worst thing here. At least I’ve been able to get a hang of that and haven’t upset anyone yet (as the stereotypical foreigner does, the improper sorting of trash is usually given as a big reason Japanese landlords will often refuse to rent to foreigners). As for the heat and humidity, it just does. not. let. up. I am in constant need of a shower, and not having any lighter work appropriate clothes has been pretty rough (I need to wear an undershirt to both stop sweat stains and the see-through exposure of nipples in the workplace).
I’m not sure how well known this is, but the Japanese take punctuality extremely seriously. I have always been aware of this and how it might be the greatest cultural gap I’ll have to adapt to while I’m here. On my second day I stopped at the conbini for a coffee and to pull out some cash from the ATM on the way to the school. I accidentally took out 50,000 yen (about 400 dollars) instead of 5,000, so after redepositing the extra cash anxiety began to fill my brain. I strolled into the staff room and greeted my head teacher, and with her quick glance at the clock I knew I was finished. I looked over to it myself with the final hope that I might be reading the situation wrong. 8:31. What a shameful display. I stayed a few minutes late that day and showed up a few minutes early the next to try and make up for it, but I think that relationship might be in an irreparable state (I’m not serious, but I definitely don’t want to make that a habit).
At work I’ve been busy making my self-introduction lesson with input from the JTEs, and helping them make some tests and worksheets. The school semester starts next week, so there’s plenty of time to get things smoothed out and ready to go in the meanwhile. I’m looking forward to it!