I'm Cool in Japan

Japan treats foreigners as exotic gifts. When you first meet someone, they marvel at your white-ness and are in awe over your speaking and chopstick abilities. Then as you get to know them, they like to bring you to parties to show you off like an expensive tequila. Because I am not fluent, it's hard to determine if I'll ever have my whiteness over-looked. Only time will tell, but I do know one thing: I'm a freakin' rock star to my elementary school students.

Today after lunch, I went into the gym to play kick ball with a group of kids. I was up to kick, and the ball goes soarin into the air and gets stuck in the gym ceiling supports. I don't know what the height of the ceiling is, but it's no different from gyms back in America, so you can imagine it was tall enough that I would need about 5 ladders stacked on top of each other to even begin to reach it. When the ball got stuck, the whole group of kids let out a big sigh of, "Awww!" (Some phrases are just universal.) So I grab a mini basketball and begin launching the ball trying to un-lodge it.

The kids are totally into it. Every throw gets a gasp out of the crowd, and I start to get nervous at the thought of failure. A couple of times, the basketball hits a dangling light, which caused it to shake, freaking everyone out including myself. I began to sweat, my arm started to hurt, and my throws were getting weaker. I let out a few choice words that would have gotten me fired in an American elementary school, but these kids don't understand it anyway.

Just as the group's interest, including my own, begins to wander, I give a final hurl, and the ball hits the other ball perfectly, causing both balls to fall back to the ground. I surprised myself and give a whoop of success. And when everyone realizes that I had done it, they all rush me, cheering for me like a man who had made a come back win in a sports game. I could almost hear the Rudy soundtrack in the background. I was on top of the world. It's the little things, right?

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Went to Iriomote two weeks ago with Yuka and about 10 other JETs. Will post pictures soon.