A bunch of little stories: My life in Japan. (Not in any order what-so-ever!)
1. We think it is hot and muggy in Ohio - wait until you visit Japan during the summer. A lot of days it is 100% humidity - yes that means it rains a lot. You may think it is uncool to wear rain boots in Ohio, but believe me, cool doesn't matter when you have to walk a mile in the rain and half of the way it is a muddy road. Boots are cool in Japan. Well, maybe not cool, but I don't care, I wear them anyway. Though I do change my shoes when I get to work. (I still can't run in heals!) I found that out the hard way, have the scraps/scars/bruises to prove it too. Though they are starting to heal so it isn't that bad anymore.
2. I was riding my bike home from my friends house the other day (a couple weeks ago now I guess) when this guy starts talking to me in Japanese and starts running after me. Well, not knowing Japanese I wasn't really paying attention, but when he started running I decided to stop and at least tell him I don't understand what he is saying. Which in this case, consisted of me saying "Eigo Only" which, for those that don't know, means English only! To which he replies "Police" while flipping out his badge. My heart immediately starts racing. I start thinking am I not supposed to be riding my bike here, no I have done it before, there are other people doing it now. (While he was showing me his badge another Police man came up and stood in front of my bike so I couldn't leave, not that I was going to.) So, this Police man starts asking me questions. Which basically translated into "Do you have key?" "Your bike?" "Where did you buy it?" "Name of shop?" And the answers were - yes I have the key to the lock on this bike (it was/is in my purse, I'm too nervous to even consider looking for it though.) yes it is my bike I bought it myself. I bought it on Humming road. No I don't know the name of the store - it was in Japanese - a language I can't speak let alone read! I didn't answer quite that way - it was basically one word answers to his broken English questions. Let me just say I was so happy I registered my bike with the police for 5 dollars when I bought it - well worth it. B/c a couple mins after the questioning started, they said ok, you can go. Probably b/c the entire time the one police man was asking me questions the other guy was looking up my number on the bike to make sure it was really registered to me. Yay, I finally got to continue home. Though I was shaking still when they said I could go, I walked my bike a good 100 meters before finally getting back on it to ride the rest of the way home.
3. We just finished celebrating Tanabata here in Japan. It is a holiday the celebrates two lovers that can only reunite one day every year 7/7 and to do it they have to cross the Milky Way. Don't worry for those of you that are probably thinking that I get more days off for Holidays than you do, this isn't that kind of Holiday, I still had to work. The English teachers however did have a special celebration for the students. For Tanabata, people are supposed to write their wishes on a piece of paper, tie it to a piece of bamboo, and then after midnight on 7/7 you through the bamboo into a river and your wishes are supposed to come true. So we had bamboo, paper, and markers ready for the students. And since they all have to take English, they had to write their wish in English. Some of the wishes that they wrote were quite funny. I will add pictures at the end so you can see what I am talking about.
4. It has been awhile, but for those of you that didn't know, after Germany, I went back to the US and then came back to Japan. Shortly after I got back, the beginning of April, my friend Jacob came to visit me. So I got to take him around and see different places in Japan. I went to Kyoto a second time. (Which people really can't believe when I tell them I have been there twice and haven't even been in Japan for a full year yet.) We got to see some really cool temples while we were there. Luckily he was nice and was willing to go to completely different temples than I went to when my parents were here. We also stopped by the Nintendo Headquarters while we were down there. I have pictures to prove that too. There are many pictures of Kyoto and the other places we went at http://www.flickr.com/photos/lalust/ There are pictures from Kyoto and Tokyo Disney. Please if you have time, take the time and look. If not, let me just tell you, you are missing out!
5. In the Middle of May, I was able to go to Korea for a week. (Pictures at the same site listed above.) I was supposed to go with my new roommate, but she ended up not being able to go, so I went by myself. It ended up being a lot fun. I got to pick green tea leaves, and I could have kept them, but they wouldn't have allowed them through the airport so I just paid 5 dollars to learn the process of drying the tea leaves (which I got to participate in) and then got a sample pack of green tea for helping them dry some leaves. Worth the 5 bucks I think. Oh and in Korea I found out that my bank card from Japan doesn't work in any ATM except those at a 7-eleven or at the bank itself. It was a real hassle - good thing I met some great people who were able to help me out and stuff. One of the girls I met, Samantha, even let me stay at her place a couple nights and showed me around Korea on her day off. Patrica helped me find places to stay the first couple nights, picked me up at the airport, and showed me around the first couple days I was there as well. The worst part about Korea was hiking up the mountain, which really wouldn't have been that bad, but it was raining - and I mean really raining - not just some sprinkles here and there, so I got soaking wet. Good thing I had an entire suitcase of clothes. I even lent some of my clothes out to one of the other girls I met in Korea. Just go look at my pictures when you are finished reading this!
6. I am now starting to get ready to move back home. After a year living here, I have decided Japan just isn't for me. Yes it is great, the people are great, the job is great, but I'm not totally happy so I am moving back home. I am pretty sure it is homesickness. I guess I miss my family and friends a lot more than I thought I would. Good news for them!
7. Also, right now, I am finishing up my second semester of teaching here. It makes me laugh when my students write things like "Perhaps, Ms Lust is beautiful" on their tests, but then again it is kind of saddening when they talk the entire class and just don't pay attention. OH well, it was a great experience. Students think I am beautiful, and they say they like my classes - so I guess that is good.
8. Funny story about my students. I like playing word games with them just to teach them new words. So in one class we were playing a game where the students had to go around the room but they had to say a word that started with the next letter of the alphabet. So if I started with A the next student had to say a word starting with b and the next c and so on. Well, I made a rule that the students had to say words that would describe movies, well, when we got to O the student said "Oppai" and they said it was part of a Japanese title, and the rest of the class agreed. But everyone also started laughing when the kid said it. That is a hint right there to any teacher that if someone says something in your class and everyone else starts laughing you know something is up. And there was something up when the kid said "Oppai." Come to find out later, "Oppia" means breast. The movie title is something like Bolley Oppai - I'm not really sure, which basically translates into "Big Breasts" so you can just imagine what was going through my students' minds. Let me just say, My boobs are probably the biggest boobs most of those kids have ever seen in person. At least one of my students was brave enough to come up to me after class and tell me what the kid said, since no would during class. Not that it would have made me mad, I probably would have laughed to. At least they new how to play the game and learned Alphabetical Order! Even if they did use Japanese words that translate into breast!
9. A similar story, a little different twist. In another class we were playing a word game kind of like Scategories, though instead of having them think of different words that fall into certain categories, I just let them think of as many words that started with a specific letter. (I picked the letters that they tend to mess up. L for R, V and B, D and T.) I was nice at one point and picked K. I had warned my students earlier that they could only use English words, but you would never believe someone wrote a Japanese word that started with a K, and not just any Japanese word, but they chose to write "Kintama." Again, none of the students would tell me what it meant during class. A couple of them were even playing rock paper scissors to see who would have to tell. Well, no one would tell, so when class was finished I called the kid up that wrote it on the board and asked him. Well, most of my students are boys, so instead of saying anything, he just pointed to the crotch of about 3 boys and said "Kintama" every time. So, ok he ended up not really telling me what it means, but I wrote the word down, looked it up in my program on my iPod, and found out it means "testicles." What in the world are they getting me into with these classes? OH well, they are still fun.
Wow, I think that is enough stories for now. If I think of any more...ok if I remember to write more in a blog here, I will! Talk to you all very soon in person!
1 comment:
Wow, those are some pretty funny stories!! I am glad and happy you wrote on your blog again!! Keep it coming!! ;)
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