One more year in Japan

I've heard that it’s been raining like no tomorrow in Vancouver. It doesn't actually rain too often here in Japan and its going to be interesting getting use to the rain again when I come back. Well February is decision month for all JETs, as they have to decide if they are going to re-contract for another year or return to their home countries. After the first few months, I was pretty certain about re-contracting and staying another year in Japan. There are pros and cons, as sometimes certain situations in class have me thinking..omg, I have to do this for another 1.5 years- like when I get Kancho! or my elementary teacher as no clue what I’m saying. But after much thought, I have decided to re-contract and stay another year. A year is just to short of a time, and I think 2 years will give me ample time to visit all the places I want to see and give me a better grasp of the language. It’s actually surprising how many JET’s, even in their 3^rd years can’t speak a lick of Japanese- hopefully I can improve. So I’ll be here in Japan until the summer of 2007. JET’s are allowed to re-contract for up to 3 years- and even more bearing special circumstances. But two will be more enough for me. Amazingly, out of the 17 JET’s in Kure, only 4 are staying next year- Masato, Mel, Me and this other Jet named Brian. So it's going to be interesting next year.

The past few weeks have been pretty mundane. Nothing overly exciting has been happening. I did invite my favorite English teacher, Ms. Murayama and her husband and son over for dinner. We had a traditional winter meal called nabe (hotpot) and I had a good time chatting with them and playing with her cute son, Sougo. He loves Thomas trains, so I picked him up this Thomas traveling pack and he had fun playing with that. He’s a great kid, with a mischievous streak- and he kept on pulling his pants down- and cracking us up, as he said it was a “service” to us. How the thinks of that I have no idea, but it was a fun night and I look forward to visiting Ms.Murayama when she gives birth. Hopefully to a baby girl, as that’s what they want. (Picture below: Murayama sensei, her husband Shinji and her son, Sougo)

School is going pretty fast as it's the 3rd years graduate next month- I’m sure that half my teachers have party hats on, just waiting for them to leave. But, lately when I’ve taught them they have been pretty good and have completed the lessons. Even though some kids are little shits in class, outside of class they are still pretty sweet kids. Though once in awhile I wouldn’t mind throwing a few of them out the window. I also had this one lesson where I have to write my age on the board before hand, I even ask the students what they think my age is, and they screamed out “34, 32, 28”. When I wrote 23, they all yelled “USO” –it’s a lie, no way. I was definitely crushed, do I really look that old? I’ve convinced myself that they just assume that teachers are old, and it has no bearing on how I look, yes…that’s what I believe and I’m sticking to that.

Last week, we had the annual mid-year conference with the Hiroshima JETs and it was full of workshops and presentations. Some were quite useful, and as usual some were not. All in all it wasn’t too bad, and it ended with an amazing Taiko performance by a local group. They were great to listen too and they even allowed some of the JET’s to jump up on stage and practice with their drums. The rest of this past week was spent eating dinner in Kure, with Pete and some other JET’s, as Pete’s girlfriend is visiting from Taiwan. It was also Asuka’s birthday on the 31^st, and we had just had dinner at home. She turned 24 and she is older then me- even though she likes to point out that with her youthful looks and my more “mature” looking face when divided by 2- then we look our age. (Picture below: Masato and I eating fresh oysters)

I haven’t been traveling much lately, though there is an oyster festival and a ski trip this month that I look forward to going. This week is also the Sapporo Ice festival, which is something I’m dying to go see- since I won’t do it this year, it’s definitely on my to do this next year. March will be a fun month, as the school year ends and Joel will be coming to visit me in Japan. By chance there is going to be a sumo tournament in Osaka and we’ll also get to see a Samurai parade in Miyajima too. I’ll finally get to visit Kyoto, Osaka, Nara and the Ninja village of Iga too, which is something I’m looking forward to. (Picture below: Okonomiyaki- Hiroshima's most famous dish)

Japanese factoid# 15, Well it’s flu season in Japan- as it is in Vancouver too. I was sick for a few days last week, but luckily fought it off quickly. But a lot of my students are absent, as one kid gets sick and it spreads pretty quickly to neighboring students. The interesting thing is the Japanese called the flu, “Influenza.” Not being well versed in medical terms, when the word Influenza kept on popping up when teachers announce to the horror of fellow colleagues, that another 5 students have come down with “INFLUENZA” and then rushed to the front of the board to write their name on this Big white board of absent students…sort of like a death list, I was scared it was like the avian flu or SARS. Seriously, it’s like Harry Potter and Lord Voldermort’s name and when said, all teachers nod and share their apprehension of the disease and their current luck of avoiding it. When I asked Asuka, if it actually was just the flu- she adamantly said that it’s not the common flu, and it was something more sinister and lethal. After weeks of arguing with her how “I think it really is the common flu” and wondering what the hell influenza really is, I finally went on wikipedia and typed in Influenza, defined as “commonly known, the flu or the grippe.” So now I know I won’t be dying of some weird foreign disease, but I’ve also never heard of grippe. Actually, just at this moment typing this, I realize that the word flu is actually in influenza, huh..go figure. I wonder how many more common illness have sinister names, like if you tell someone you have an intestinal infection, its sounds a lot worse then just saying the stomach flu.

Well I hope you all aren’t flooding to death in Vancouver and hopefully the Canucks pull some trades soon. It should also be an interesting Super Bowl too, my dad actually saw the NFC final in Seattle and he said it was crazy. I like the Steelers, but I got to cheer for the Hawks- even if Mike-san doesn’t agree. So go Seahawks!