I have a pen...I have a problem....

Wednesday 16^th of November

In a similar manner to when I was attempting to teach the 2^nd graders at the primary school, frustrations arose when it was time to teach the 4^th graders fruits in English.

Frustratingly "Apple" is transcribed as "apo-" in the Japanese script
Photo from: http://memeburn.com/2016/10/pikotaro-ppap-9gag-ama/

The wrath of Pikotaro is still painfully apparent in popular culture even though it has been a couple of months since the repetitive and heavily accented `PPAP` exploded onto the internet (I believe we have Justin Bieber to thank for it penetrating the Western Media). The lyrics consist primarily of ‘I have a pen, I have an apple UH apple pen. I have a pen, I have pineapple UH pineapple pen. Apple pen, pineapple pen UH pen pineapple apple pen’ setting aside how repetitive it is, the most irritating thing about this song is that it’s teaching the kids crappy grammar. Though the transcribed lyrics contain the appropriate ‘a’/’an’ preceding the various apples and pineapples – it is not particularly audible (if it’s there at all) in the actual song. It also means that when I’m trying to teach these kids pineapple and apple – they insist on saying pineapple-pen and apple-pen. If you have a minute of your life to spare here's the wee nugget of leopard print clad gold" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0E00Zuayv9Q

Konoura - feat. the local supermarket

In other grammar news – attempting to teach the junior highschoolers about superlatives ended in one kid penning the sentence ‘I am the likest strawberry’. From what I could gather the target sentence was something along the lines of ‘I like strawberries the best/ my favourite fruit is a strawberry’.

As the weather grows steadily cooler, the mid-morning break where the kids charge out onto the field to run laps for 10minutes has been substituted for indoor skipping.

Konoura

This week I was plucked out of the primary school at lunch time and driven to Kisakata with H-sensei and S-sensei to have lunch at a ramen restaurant before we had to attend yet another demonstration lesson. I got to watch the new Kisakata ALT teach though as this was my third demo class I was aware of the 90 minute meeting that would take place afterwards. As soon as I set foot in that meeting room my body decided it was time to go to sleep. Fortunately a 10 month exchange here had taught me the art of letting your fringe cover your face and resting your head in one hand while holding a pen in the other to give the impression that you’re still conscious.

I was reminded all too well of the sinking feeling in your stomach while you wait to see your grade as I watched the JHS third years come up one by one to collect their papers. While there was the standard ‘no I don’t want to show you my score I’m too embarrassed’ reactions, a group of lads marched to the back of the classroom for their own method of sharing their grades with each other. Standing in a circle they chanted ‘Isseinode HA!’ as they flipped over their papers in unison to reveal their scores. Silence as they processed what everyone had got, followed by various outbursts of joy and disappointment.

Friday 18^th November

School lunch

Another day, another demo lesson. Except this time it was at the primary school and we could choose if we wanted to attend a Maths or Japanese lesson, ie. Two subjects completely unrelated to both myself and my JTE’s. However this time we got a print out of the text that the kids had been studying in their Japanese class so while the 90 minute meeting was in process I could sit there and translate the passage while crammed into a desk and chair meant for 9 year olds.

Saturday 19^th November

Omagari weekend was finally upon us. While this town’s name is usually synonymous with the fireworks festival, this time it was simply a bunch of JETs getting together for a good catch up….and booze up.

We started at an Izakaya for food and nomihoudai (where the ladies were presented with a ‘free’ bottle of Californian red wine that tasted similar to the $8 bottles I would bring to BYOs back in Wellington, before continuing on to a bar. On the wall, of this little bar, in this fairly quiet corner of Japan, was a skateboard emblazed with the face of the ‘foursquare guy’. Little snippets of home.

The next morning we resorted to our now ritual nesting pile of humans and futons (One the floor had been myself, Cari, Isabel, Priscilla and Liam, Andrew looking down on us from his bed.

After a few episodes of friends it was decided that we were hungry enough to venture outside. We pottered down to the local mall in search of mild hangover food which inevitably led us to McDonald’s for breakfast, followed by Starbucks for coffee – what worldly little gaijin we are.

While at the mall I dived into a book shop in search of a copy of the Japanese version of Harry Potter. I’d had a slump that week where I had felt that my Japanese had hit a brick wall and my comprehension of everyday conversations was failing. During my exchange I found slowly plodding my way through Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone had been a good compromise of study and leisure and understanding the Japanese text is made that much easier by already having an idea of what is going on in the story. Isabel had had similar feelings of defeat that week so we both walked out with books in hand and new motivation.