Okinawa Sakura

It's that brief time of the year again when Okinawa cherry blossoms are in bloom!

Click the picture to go to my Flickr page.

Obama in Japan

Japan is familiar with Obama for various reasons. While still running in the primaries, he received a lot of hype because there is a city in Japan called Obama, and everyone cheered him on pretty much for that reason alone. I guess the reverse logic would be true: if there was a city in the world named Cliff, I would think that would be the greatest place ever.

Adults are familiar with him now for the obvious, but the kids also know about him because there is a comedian who dresses up in a suit and pretends to be him. He goes around saying, in English, "Yes we can!". So a lot of my students are now repeating it and coming up to me asking what it means. I also sat in on a few young classes for lunch last week (1st and 2nd grade), and the kids are saying, "I know who the new American president is...Barack Obama!". I reply with, "and who is Japan's Prime Minister", which is answered with silence.

Now for a quick Japanese lesson. The word for president in Japanese is 'DAITORYO'. The word for feces (yes, as in 'poo') is 'DAIBEN'. A clever 1st grader of mine put the two together and said "Obama Daibentoryo".

*insert laugh track*

Zombie TV

I was watching a TV program yesterday that placed normal people in extreme situations. For example, there was a 42 year old who always wanted to be a pro wrestler, so they matched him up against Japan's current champion. It was funny cause he comes out to Rocky music only to find, to his surprise, that his family had been called in to watch. The champ seemed to not hold back and just whipped this guy up for a good 5 minutes. By the end, he was bruised all over and bleeding heavily from his mouth. His wife was just shaking her head and his kids had gone pale, but he was happy because he got to do something he always wanted to do.

The best skit was with a mom and her three kids, a girl who was 6 and two boys who were 5 and 3. The TV guy was interviewing them with just random kid questions, when he asks the older boy what he is scared of the most. He replies, 'Zombies!' A few seconds later, you hear screaming coming from outside. Everybody rushes out of the house to see a crowd of around 50 people running towards the family shouting 'Run away! Zombies are coming!'.

The kids run back inside, and the TV guy works to calm them down and help them set up traps in the house. The kids went along with it, looking kind of confused. They gathered a bunch of toy blocks to use as ammo, and then they set up a bucket with a cord above the front door that the girl was suppose to pull when the zombie came in.

The front door had a foggy glass pane set in, so when the zombie arrived, you could only see a pale shadow. Then the door knob started to turn. It was really scary and the camera turns to show the girl by the door holding the cord. She looked like she was about to pee herself. The zombie walks in in professional makeup, and the girl freaks out and pulls the cord early. But the zombie still stumbles on a few other 'traps' that were setup in front of the door and falls down. The kids then bolt for the bedroom to plan for the final battle.

This is where it became epic. The girl had a roll of saran wrap that her and the older brother were to wrap around the zombie's face. They were standing on the bed crying and the TV guy is telling the older brother, who is the most scared, that he has to protect his family. The zombie comes in and walks to the bed. The sister presses the saran wrap to the zombie's face, but can't get herself to stand close to him long enough to wrap it around, so she gives it to her brother and begins crying even more. The brother tries himself but is unable to wrap it around the zombie's head. The zombie, in the meantime, is just kind of standing in the room and stretching his arms out every now and then at the kids. When all help appeared to be lost, the boy sees two plastic poles, grabs them, jumps off the bed, and starts whacking the zombie as hard as he can, crying while he's doing it. He then throws them away and just starts punching and kicking the zombie screaming 'Get out!' The zombie turns around and runs away.

The TV guy begins interviewing the 5 year old with 'You did it, you saved your family.' The kid is bawling and gasping for breath in between each word. He said, 'We did it as a family. No one came to save us so we had to do it ourselves.' It was one of the cutest things I have ever seen and got me a bit choked up. When the skit ended and cut to all the TV personalities, they were all crying.

So if you are ever in a situation where there seems to be no hope, just remember about the kid who saved his family from zombies.

What I Get Away With

I wasn't too sure how to title this blog, but I find it really interesting how laid back my schools are. So I guess it is more appropriate to say, it's amazing how much the schools get away with. If the same practices were to happen in an American school, it would have to close down due to being sued every week.

Thankfully in Japan, no one sues each other. What happens is just a part of life and you have to suck it up. Take the jungle gyms for instance. Built on top of hard earth (no sand) and around 10 feet high, as the kids navigate these monstrosities of iron (no plastic here), it reminds me of a level from Mega Man, where one slip has you falling to your death on a bed of spikes.

In Kijoka (the small area of Ogimi that I live in), there is an old Swedish man who has built a log cabin from materials he shipped from Finland. It is one of the most surreal things I have ever seen, and for that reason, it makes a great field trip. So when I arrived at my Tuesday school, I was approached by my 2nd grade teacher if I would help drive the kids there after lunch.

That's right, no parent permission slips in Okinawa. After lunch, all the girls got into the teacher's van, and all the boys got into the Wonder Wagon. There were 5 of them, one in the front who I made buckle his seat belt, and then four sitting in the back seat belt-less.

And that's it. Just a moment of, "This would never happen in America." while at the same time thinking, "Maybe we just need to chill out."

Another Wedding, Running, and English Thoughts

Next July, two of my friends from Florida, Tyler and Mana, will be getting married in Tokyo. Mana's parents are Japanese and she has lots of family in the Tokyo area, so I believe the plan is to have the wedding ceremony in Florida, and then the wedding reception in Japan. The two were (are?) both active in the Japanaese Club and they credit me as the reason they met in the first place (aw, shucks).

Awhile back, I was asked to do an impossible thing. A Herculean task. They wanted me to come to Tokyo to MC the wedding in both English and Japanese.

I sat on it for a couple of months, but near the end of November, they needed of a decision. Leaning on the advice of local JET Vaughn who said, "sometimes it's good to play outside your comfort zone", I accepted. I think I have no idea what I've gotten myself into.

The only thing I have to go by is the MC I saw at the Okinawan wedding I went to, and I remember thinking, "they probably payed a lot of money for that guy".

But if he can do it, that means people are capable of MC-ing a wedding in Japanese, and since I am a person, I think statistics are in my favor.

***

And in other crazy news, I've signed up for my first race in Nago. All 10K of it!

Before coming to Okinawa, I had heard about how a lot of people get into running here. I managed to avoid it until I went to go watch a race on Ie Island last April. Being surrounded by people getting ready to run, I began feeling like a fat slot for not participating. Then in November, I went to Iheya Island to sit around and drink and watch my second marathon. I felt like a fat slob after that too.

So in London, I bought myself a pair of size 14 (oh yea!) Asics Stratus. Japanese food plus doing basketball and karate every week has kept me in average shape, but it is now time to step up my game. I started training two weeks ago and I should be more than ready for the race in the beginning of February.

***

I took the JLPT Level 2 on December 7th. Level 2 is infamous for the large jump in difficulty between it and the test I took last year, Level 3. Last year, I walked into the test thinking I was going to blow it out of the water and walked out worried that I just blew it because of the listening section. This year, I walked in thinking it could go either way, and I walked out with pretty much the same feeling. Maybe with a little more confidence on the passing though.

In 2010, they are changing the tests to a N1-N5 format (according to Wikipedia). I'm going to take N1 regardless of if I pass or fail this test. To me, why run a race over and over again just to achieve 2nd place?

***

I have decided to officially revoke the 3 years of Japanese study I took at UF. Why? Because saying I studied for 3 years prior to living in Japan is a lie. When I met Yuka's brother in London, he was practically fluent in English. I asked him how much English he knew when he first moved there, and he said he had to start with his ABCs. Yes, I'm sure he knew his colors, some animal names, and could count to 10, but that's not knowing a language. In 4.5 years, he has reached a really high level of English communication. Part of it was that he was lucky enough to meet a guy who spoke 4 languages and told him that if he's going to learn English, he has to live English. That means English everything: TV, movies, books, friends, etc.

So then what did I learn during my 3 years at UF? I would say about 6 months worth of material. I'm picking that number based on the new English teachers that arrived in Okinawa in August. A lot of them knew no Japanese, and now they know about as much as I did coming in.

Also, the JLPT tries to determine your ability, not by the number of "years" you have studied, but by the number of hours you have studied. The numbers they use to separate you is retarded, but the idea is sound.

So at UF, I probably studied...8 hours a week...16 weeks a semester...2 semesters a year...3 years...768 hours! Wow, that's a lot! Now divide that by 24 hours a day and you get...32 days. So the equivalent of living in Japan a month.

So when people ask me, how long have you studied Japanese? I will now say (as of today) 2 years. With the goal of being as good as Yuka's brother is in English by the 4.5 year mark.

*Note: The teachers at UF are awesome. I'm blaming my work ethic and just trying to develop a more accurate picture of how much I have actually studied.

***

And speaking of UF, it's so awesome to have been a part of the best university with the greatest football team EVER. A local JET who also went to UF and I are currently writing a childrens book of Tebow bedtime stories:

"And then with the other hand, he picked up the other team... and carried them into the end zone for a touchdown!!"

Weirdo

I think I have a stalker, and no, it's not Ebi-chan.

The week before London, I get a phone call from a Japanese guy who wanted to come observe my classroom. He came by on a Thursday and introduced himself as Nobu, a 50ish year old English cram school teacher in northern Okinawa. His English was near perfect. He use to work as a high school English teacher and spent several years in America getting his Master's in linguistics. He has also visited 47 states.

Having taught English at various levels, he had never seen an elementary school class. So I invited him to sit in on my 3rd/4th grade class. Everything went as normal, and I had a moment of amusement when he asked the kids what they like to do. One of the kids said, 'I like karate!', the American way. Nobu went, 'Huh?' and after the kid did a little demonstration, he goes, 'Oh, karate!, in the Japanese way.

American pronunciation - 'kuh-RAH-tee'
Japanese pronunciation - 'KAH-rah-teh

After the class, he said he was interested in seeing a 5th/6th grade class, but he wasn't able to stay today, could he come to see me tomorrow?

The next day was when it got weird. The walk to the classroom takes you by a small rock garden. As we were walking to class, he stopped and made the following reflection:

"I like nature. I have a secret place in the middle of the woods where I hide from my wife. It has a rock garden like this."

I nodded and then went ahead with my class. Afterward, he wanted to talk with me for about 20 minutes. I thought it would be about English education and the like, but it turned out to just be a casual conversation where we talked about where he studied, his thoughts on America, etc. I soon realized he just wanted to talk to me and wasn't interested in my English class at all. Finally, he asked me, 'Would you like to come visit my rock garden today?'

I politely decline because I told him I had to pack for London. 'Well, I'll contact you when you get back.'

And that's exactly what he did. I got a call from him last week. He wanted to know how to spell 'ribbit', and did I know 'ribbit' in Japanese was gero gero? Ha ha ha. We hung up, and then he called back 5 minutes later telling me he couldn't find 'ribbit' in his Japanese-English dictionary. Did I spell it right? I told him to Google it and that I had to go.

Haven't heard from him for the past two weeks though. I think I'm in the clear.

ALT For a Day

I've mentioned many times before that my job title is an Assistant Language Teacher, but I actually run the classroom since teach at the elementary level. The government, however, has decided that starting in 2012, English will be a mandatory subject for 5th and 6th graders. At that time, my job will change from teacher to assistant teacher, and the current homeroom teacher will be in change of the English. In Ogimi, this system begins this year as one of the trial villages.

Some of the head-education-honchos came to Ogimi Elementary today to observe and videotape one of my classes. For some reason, they wanted to see me teach 1st graders. Completely unrelated, but I somehow suspect the 1st grader teacher was responsible for getting her class to be the demonstration class. She is known as 'English Michiko'-sensei, because everyone, including herself, thinks she can speak English. She just knows a lot of cliched Japanese-English that she pushes on the kids and I try to tear away. One phrase is the infamous "See you!" Also, in preparation for this class, she decided to teach the kids 'What is this month?' It may be correct, but no one says that. Besides, this is 1st grade. When would I ever want to ask a 1st grader, 'What month is it?'

About two weeks ago, we had a meeting to discuss what we would do, and we had the following conversation:

English-Michiko : In two weeks, we have a demonstration class. I will be the teacher and you will be the assistant.
Me : Ok.
EM : So, what do you want to do?

I don't like the idea of changing the way I normally run a class just because some big shots are coming. I want them to see what it is actually like. I was also upset that these people would be viewing this particular class, cause there are only four kids. My average class is around ten, and that is perfect. Four is just too few. Plus, it's 1st grade, and I don't like teaching that grade level.

To make a long story short, since she said, 'What do you want to do?', I gave her the lesson plan of what I do in class EVERY WEEK and told her I wanted 1st and 2nd graders combined to make the class bigger. She had a few of her own suggestions, though, such as the "What is this month?" stuff. Needless to say, I threw that out, and in the end, she complied with everything I said. I taught the class the way I wanted to: my way with her in the background, the way it always is.

The future problem will be how long can I get my way? I know English-Michiko is going to try to be the 5th and 6th grade homeroom teacher next year, even though there is another teacher more qualified than her that would let me do what I want. But I guess it's good experience to be in a team-teaching situation with someone you don't like. Teaches you to work well with others and all that stuff.

Afterward, the big shots and all the school teachers had a meeting where the big shots tried to reassure the teachers that they are more than capable to teach English and not to worry. None of the teachers want to teach English and none of them can speak it. It would be like Florida deciding to make 5th and 6th grade have mandatory Spanish classes.

So after lots of talking and complaining, they showed a video. The video was entertaining from an English perspective. Two funny points were:

-The title of the DVD was, 'You can do it!'.
-There was a part where the kids were singing a numbers song, and the teacher crossed out all the 3's on the board where the kids were suppose to clap. So she pointed to all the 3's and went, 'crap, crap, crap, crap, crap'.

***

To pat myself on the back a bit, this same school did a student questionnaire where the kids would give their opinions on all the classes and activities they are currently doing. Guess whose class was the only class/activity to get a 100% 'fun' ranking by every student in the school (all 50 of them)? Hint: he's the tallest guy in Ogimi.