School Life

In this post, I want to talk a little bit about my experiences at school. I teach at seven different schools (2 junior high schools and 5 elementary schools) and each one is a little bit different in terms of students, teachers, rules, and atmosphere. There’s a lot to talk about but I’ll try to keep it brief and non-boring.

First, here’s what my weekly schedule looks like. I normally work from about 8:15 to 4:30. At elementary school, I normally only teach 5^th and 6^th graders as they are the only grades where English is a required subject. But occasionally I visit the younger grades as well. I typically teach 3-5 classes a day at both elementary school and jr. high. It depends on the school and the day, but it’s most often 4 classes. 

Monday

Elementary school #1 in the morning, and I visit the Board of Education office in the afternoon. This is my biggest elementary school and there are 2 classes each of 5^th and 6^th graders. Since I only go to this school in the morning, I teach my 4 classes back-to-back, then have lunch, recess, and cleaning, before leaving for the BOE. It’s a bit tiring not only because of the lack of a break, but also because the classes here are big for elementary school, about 25 kids per class. The four teachers are all nice and friendly, although their classes vary a bit. I have a couple great classes, one OK class, and one class that is very rowdy. The kids can be pretty rude, it’s hard to get anything done, and it quickly gets frustrating. I try not to blame the kids as I’m sure they must have some personal problems or maybe a bad home life, but they make me want to pull my hair out! Other than that one class though, I like this school a lot. 

Tuesday

 Elementary #2 in the morning, #3 in the afternoon. Elementary #2 is my smallest school, probably around 50 students total. The 5^th grade class is 6 kids, and the 6^th grade class is 12. I really like this school because the small size makes it easier to remember the kid’s names and talk to them. I get along really well with the 5^th grade teacher… her small class size makes it much easier to do activities and games and it’s really fun for the kids. After 4^th period at this school, I drive to Elementary #3 for lunch. This school is unique because instead of eating lunch in their respective classrooms, the kids all eat lunch together with the teachers in a cafeteria. After lunch, there’s recess and cleaning and then I teach 5^th and 6^th period. There are about 15 5^th graders and 20 6^th graders. There are some really nice teachers at this school who talk to me quite a bit in the staff room. Unfortunately I have another rowdy class at this school, but lately the principal has been sitting in on class. As he intimidates the kids quite a bit, it’s much easier to have class now.

Wednesday

Elementary #4 and #5 are on Wednesday, but which one I go to in the morning and which in the afternoon rotates every other week. So one week, I go to Elementary #4 in the morning and Elementary #5 in the afternoon, and the next week, it flips. Elementary #4 is very small as well, just over 50 kids total. For English class, they combine the 5^th and 6^th graders for a total of 17 kids. This is the only school I teach at that’s like this, and the way they teach English is interesting. One year, they teach the 5^th grade textbook and the next year they teach the 6^th grade textbook. So one of the grades learns the textbooks in sequence, and the other grade is learning it in reverse. This year, we are studying the 5^th grade text book, which means the 6^th graders learned the 6^th grade textbook last year when they were only 5^th graders. The class is pretty casual and we play a lot of games so I think the kids enjoy English. They’re all very good kids too, which makes class easy and a lot of fun.

At Elementary #5, there are around 15 5^th graders and 15 6^th graders. The two classes could not be any more different; the 5^th graders are full of energy all the time, but the 6^th graders are quite shy and quiet. Both classes have good teachers though, so they’re fun and the kids seem to like it, most of the time. Also at this school, there are a couple of 4^th grade special needs kids that I get to have class with every other week. Their teacher is a very nice lady who speaks really good English and she always organizes fun activities when I join their class. Usually we speak in Japanese, but I try to teach the kids a couple simple English words here and there. Sometimes we take “field trips” and walk to places near the school. Once we went to a beautiful shrine on a small mountain, and another time we visited a small fabric weaving and dying store. Once we even did Zumba (a kind of aerobics work out that incorporates Latin dance moves) together, which I hadn’t done since college. I always look forward to that class.  Finally, the school does something called “Run-Run Time” during the mid-morning break here, where all of the students and teachers (including the principal and vice-principal in their suits) run around the school field for about 10 minutes. It’s always fun because the younger students love to run next to me, and it’s a good exercise. For those of you who know Japanese music, we run to “Happiness” by Arashi. 走りだぜ！

Both of my Wednesday schools have a good teacher-student dynamic and friendly students overall. The small class sizes let the kids play games easily so English is more fun for them, I think. One more thing about these schools- they’re both out in the country a little ways. One sits right in the middle of about 2 km square of fields, and one is right next to some small mountains. At that school, the kids have bells on their backpacks to ward off bears (!!!) that live in the surrounding mountains as they walk home from school. Things like that really make it seem like a country school!

*Mondays, Tuesdays, and Wednesdays are my elementary school days and at elementary school, all of the students and teachers eat school lunch, called kyuushoku. I love kyuushoku! Usually it consists of rice (either plain or mixed with vegetables and meat) or white bread, some kind of protein (usually a small piece of fish or meat), a vegetable medley or salad of some kind, soup (always delicious, with lots of vegetables), and milk. It’s pretty healthy (except for the white rice) and usually chock full of vegetables. It’s also much more delicious than anything I can make, and for about 250 yen a lunch, it’s a really good deal! Once in a while they have meals that the kids absolutely love and go nuts about. One is curry and rice, which I also love :D Another is age-pan, which is a large roll of white bread that’s been deep fried and then rolled in chocolate-sugar. I’m not a huge fan because it’s basically just dessert, but it’s easy to see why the kids love it.

I eat in the classroom with the kids, rotating each week between classes. At one school, all the students eat together in a cafeteria. Lunch is always a fun time to talk to the kids and to listen to their conversations with each other. I try to pick up on their Japanese but it’s hard because they’re usually talking a mile a minute and using a lot of slang.

Here are some pictures of typical school lunch.

 

Thursday

On Thursday I go to Junior High #1, which has almost 500 students and is the largest junior high school in Yasugi. Junior high here is 7^th, 8^th, and 9^th grade here just like it is in America, but here they call them 1^st grade, 2^nd grade, and 3^rd grade (of junior high school). It was a little confusing at first when the teachers there kept referring to the 1^st graders, and I thought they meant elementary 1^st graders. Each grade at this school has 4 classes and each class has between 35-40 students. It’s impossible for me to see all the students every week so I only see one grade at a time and I teach all four classes of that grade. I’ll teach all the 1^st graders one week, all the 2^nd graders the next week, and all the 3^rd graders the next week. I teach 4 classes usually, but sometimes I am asked to help out during my two free periods in another grade or with a special needs student.

English in jr. high is completely different from English in elementary school. Now the kids are learning English much more intensely, often every day or most days of the week, as opposed to just once a week in elementary school. They learn a lot of grammar and sentence structure so I think English quickly becomes boring for a lot of kids.

I work with five English teachers at this school, all of whom are very nice. I get along with a couple of the female teachers particularly well. One of the nice things about jr. high teachers is that they speak English very well, usually much better than elementary school teachers. Elementary schools just started incorporating English for 5^th and 6^th graders a couple of years ago, and it only happens once a week when I visit, so the teachers are just getting used to teaching it. It’s much easier to communicate with my jr. high teachers, but elementary is not too difficult either.

When I first started this year, I didn’t like Junior High #1 as much as #2 because of how huge it was. I didn’t feel like I could really get to know any of the students or remember their names to save my life. Now, I like it much more. I still can’t remember hardly any of the student’s names, but there are some who I’ve gotten to know a little bit. Plus the teachers are good teachers and many of the students are pretty good at English. I’ve come to terms a bit with the huge size of this school and enjoy it a lot more now. 

Friday

I go to Junior High #2 on Friday, which is much smaller than #1 with only 120 students. I’ve been able to get to know the students a lot easier at this school, and can remember most of their names at this point. Unlike Jr. High #1, I usually see all the students every week at this school. They’re mostly good kids, although some of them clearly don’t like English very much. The two teachers at this school are both young women so I get along with them really well. They try to make class as fun as they can while still following the textbook. With the 3^rd grade class (so 9^th graders), we usually have song time at the beginning of class where I play them a popular American song while they look at the lyrics. So far, Lady Gaga has been a big hit.

Since this school is much smaller, the kids seem much tighter than at my other jr. high. Also because this is more of a “country” school, the kids act a little bit different. It’s hard to put my finger on what it is exactly, but the atmosphere at the two junior highs are definitely very different.

At both jr. highs, I’ve noticed certain differences between the three grades. The 3^rd graders are at the top of the food chain as you would expect, but are also given a lot of responsibility by their teachers. It’s the same with the 6^th graders at elementary school. Since they’re the oldest, they’re expected to set examples for the younger kids, and have a lot of expectations put on them. For example, for school’s sports festival and culture festival, the third graders are put in charge of a lot of planning and have to lead the younger students. As a result, by the time they reach 3^rd grade, most of the kids are pretty mature and don’t usually cause a lot of trouble. They also are trying to decide on their future and what kind of career they would like to pursue. Unlike in America where you usually don’t start thinking about that until the end of high school, the kids here choose a high school with their future career in mind. They apply to attend different high schools, much like we apply for different colleges, and have to take entrance exams. It’s a very stressful and busy time for the kids and really makes them grow up fast I think.

The 1^st graders, by contrast, have just come up from elementary school and don’t really know how jr. high works yet. They are also usually well behaved for this reason, and have still carried over some of their excitement about English from elementary school. They’re also still getting to know each other as they usually come from 3 or 4 different elementary schools.

That leaves the 2^nd graders in the middle. 2^nd graders are definitely the most like typical teenagers from what I’ve noticed. Being 13-14 years old, they’re full of hormones and angst and some of them have a strong dislike of school, especially English. It’s such an obvious difference when I walk into a 2^nd grade class as opposed to a 1^st or 3^rd grade class… most of the kids are either asleep or look like they’d rather stab an icepick in their eye than be at school. One other thing about 2^nd grade is that they all go on a school trip to a famous place during this year. They usually go to Kyoto, Osaka, or Nara (or all 3!) in a period of 2 or 3 days. 

WOW, this was a long post. Is anyone still reading? Overall, I really like my schools and the variety that they bring every day. Things definitely don’t get boring! Hope you enjoyed the rundown of my schools!

The Human Cost

It's been a while since I've posted on here and new posts about Japan are coming soon, I promise. But today I wanted to write about something different, something that broke my heart as I scanned the news this morning... the shooting at an elementary school in Connecticut that killed 20 children and several adults. Recently, it seems like things have gone haywire in America. So many senseless shootings on college campuses, movie theaters, churches, and now elementary schools.
I won't pretend to know much about guns or gun control, but I do know that the prevalence of guns in America and ease with which people can acquire them is surely in part to blame for these horrific tragedies. I read this article "The Human Cost of the Second Amendment" several months ago and it has stuck with me since then.

"Gun advocates say that guns don’t kill people, people kill people. The truth, though, is that people with guns kill people, often very efficiently, as we saw so clearly and so often this summer. And while there can be no argument that the right to bear arms is written into the Constitution, we cannot keep pretending that this right is somehow without limit, even as we place reasonable limits on arguably more valuable rights like the freedom of speech and due process."

Japan has virtually no guns. They are almost completely illegal here, and as a result, there are only a few gun-related deaths every year in the entire country. Sorry to flood this post with articles, but I found this really good one about gun control in Japan as well.

I think it's great that there are hardly any guns here. I think that's how it should be in America too, no matter what people say about personal freedom and the right to bear arms. How many more people have to die in these mass shootings, or just from being in the wrong place at the wrong time, before we do something about it? If the tragedy of 20 children dying in Connecticut doesn't spur us to action I don't know what will. I think about my elementary school kids and how they are so full of life. They never fail to put a smile on my face, and I always look forward to seeing them. My heart breaks for this kids in Connecticut and all the kids who have died from gun violence. It's the worst kind of tragedy, and I don't know how our country can stand by and let it happen.

Wicked Wildlife

On one of my first weekends in Yasugi, the other ALTs and I took a trip to a beach in Matsue. I was really excited because I hadn’t gotten a chance to see the ocean yet, as it’s not exactly close in Yasugi. The beach we went to was quite crowded with families, but the water was clear and the sand was nice. 

Anyone who knows me well knows that I have a big fear of sharks (I watched Jaws at a young age and was permanently scarred), but fortunately, there aren’t many sharks in the Sea of Japan. When we got into the water though, we all started feeling sharp pricking pains on our bodies. But whenever I looked down, I couldn’t see anything in the water. We had been hearing from a lot of people that August is the beginning of jellyfish season in Japan, but stupidly enough, none of us made the connection. 

But suddenly, I felt really sharp pains on my wrists and stomach and looked down to see some jellyfish tendrils stuck to my skin. They must have detached from the actual jellyfish but were definitely still stinging. It didn’t really register what they were at first, so I sort of panicked and asked my friends what they were. They told me to put my arm underwater and let the tendrils fall off (it’s important not to brush them off with your hands because you can also get stung there) but with my delayed reaction, they were on my skin for about 10 seconds. Because of this, I think the stings were a lot worse than they would have been if I had just brushed them off quickly. Lesson learned!

I got out of the water and we walked to a policeman nearby and asked what we should do. The stings had swelled up quite a bit and turned red, and they felt the same way it does when you burn your hand on a hot pan. Painful, but not unbearably so. The policeman gave me some vinegar to put on them, and said they would take a couple days to heal. Within a couple hours, the swelling had gone down and they didn’t hurt much. 

 The next day, I just had dark marks where the stings had been. I thought that those would eventually go away and that would be the end of it, but damn was I wrong!

About a week later, the stings started to itch incredibly badly, the worst itching I’ve ever experienced. I’ve never gotten the chicken pox or poison ivy, but maybe it’s something like that. The stings swelled up a lot and got very red again too. I put anti-itch medication on them as often as I could, but that only dulled the itching. It still itched constantly. That lasted a couple hellish days and then thankfully it was over. Now I just have some very faint scars where the stings were, but I wonder if they’ll ever go away completely!

Along with my jellyfish saga, I’ve had run-ins with a few other critters since I’ve been here. When I went to take a shower my first night in my apartment, a centipede came running out of the floor drain. Then the next night, it was a small lizard, chilling out in the bathtub. Both sightings led to some loud shrieking which I’m sure my neighbors loved. I’ve also seen a few snakes, far too close to civilization for comfort. The bugs here are basically on steroids… I’ve seen huge cockroaches, bees and spiders. Lots and lots of spiders. One big guy has taken over my balcony, but because he helps out with the bugs, I let him stay :)

Finally, the birds! There are so many birds here. What surprised me the most in my first couple days was the large number of egrets and herons here. At home in Minnesota, I saw those very rarely, but here, they are everywhere! There is one tree on the river bank near my house that must be the heron hangout, because every night around sundown, about a hundred gather to sit on it. It’s a crazy sight!

There is long road through Yasugi called “Swan Road” because every winter, hundreds of swans migrate to the fields that sit alongside it. I’ve seen a couple swans here and there around town already… sitting in river beds and looking for food. Three of my schools sit alongside or very close to Swan Road so I’m looking forward to seeing lots of these beautiful swans! Here are a couple pictures of the early arrivals. 

In a field near one of my schools

 

 I found this one hanging out alone in a creek bed... hope he was OK

Sorry for the lack of pictures in this post! Haven't been able to get many cool bird pictures yet, and I'm too disgusted to take pictures of any bugs or snakes :)

Festival Dancing!

Back in August, it seemed like there was a festival every other night. August is festival season in Japan, and many of the festivals center around the Obon holiday. Obon is a time when people welcome back their dead ancestor’s spirits into their home for a few days. A lot of people visit the graves of loved ones, and place flowers and incense there. At the end of Obon, they say farewell to the dead until next year. It’s a really interesting holiday to me because we don’t really have anything like it in the U.S. In Matsue, on the final day of Obon, people light lanterns that represent their dead relatives, and send them down the main river in the city. I wasn’t able to go this year but the pictures I’ve seen are really beautiful.

There was an Obon festival in Yasugi over a few days, and one of the other ALTs asked if I would like to dance in the festival with a youth group. Despite being a terrible dancer, I said yes because I figured it would give me a chance to meet some young people in town (believe me, there aren’t many). I went to just one practice before the festival, but luckily, the dance wasn’t hard to learn. The group was about 25 young guys and girls and our dance was Olympics-themed. There were some sports moves and we all dressed up like athletes. Here are some pictures from practice. 

We had people dress up as basketball, soccer, track, volleyball, tennis, judo, and swimming athletes 

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The volleyball team!

Another group getting ready to perform

The tennis wearing hilariously tiny outfits

Pre-performance huddle

A view of the street the festival was on

Our group!

Here's a video my friend took of us dancing. Thankfully they put me at the back of the group :)

There were other dance groups in the festival (including a group that danced the famous dance from Yasugi, Yasugi Bushi) but our group ended up taking the first prize! It was a great experience and I hope I can do it again next summer!

Life As I Know It

After orientation in Tokyo, we boarded a plane for a one hour plane ride to Izumo Airport in Shimane. I was beyond excited to see what Shimane was like. It was a clear day so we were able to see Mt. Fuji out of the airplane window as we passed by it (pretty hard to miss!). As we descended, I could see land and some large lakes on one side of the airplane, and ocean on the other. Even from the airplane it was beautiful, and after Tokyo, I was relieved to see a lot less buildings and civilization and a lot more mountains and rice fields. At the airport, I was met by my two supervisors (a man and a woman who both work at the Board of Education… both are very nice and friendly), and the other two BOE JETs in Yasugi. We all went out to lunch and then drove the hour back to Yasugi. We went to the BOE so I could introduce myself to the people there, and then we went to my new apartment!

Apartment

I live in the central part of Yasugi as opposed to the outer towns, so my apartment is in a pretty populated area. There are apartments all around and I’m very close to one of the main roads in Yasugi (as well as the freeway). But, there is a rice field directly behind my apartment and a large river that runs alongside it, which reminds me of how “country” this place really is. I love it though! It makes for an interesting view with houses, power lines, and a rice field right in the middle J

Here are some pictures of my apartment. I was really lucky that my predecessor left it completely furnished for me… I didn’t have to buy any essential items during my first days. Also, the building is pretty new so not many bugs have gotten into my apartment yet (knock on wood). The apartment is in a Western style rather than Japanese, so the floors are wood rather than tatami. Tatami is a traditional mat made from igusa (a type of grass) and is in a lot of Japanese homes. I really like the smell of tatami (it’s sort of earthy) and it’s more comfortable to sit on (a lot of Japanese people sleep on futons on tatami floor), but wood is easier to clean so I can’t complain.

The main room of my apartment

My kitchen... excuse all the luggage

The views from my window

The river near my house... really dry because of the lack of rain

Driving

I realized pretty quickly after arriving in Yasugi that having a car is pretty much essential here. For two days after my arrival I was car-less and so my supervisors had to drive me around everywhere. There is a train that runs through Yasugi and connects it to Yonago and Matsue, the two larger cities that Yasugi sits between. But as far as getting around within the city itself (Yasugi is about 260 square miles, but the area I mostly drive in is maybe 50 or 60 square miles), there are only buses. Most everyone drives though, because the buses are not very frequent and of course, don’t go everywhere.

My aunt who lives in Osaka has a friend who is a car dealer and he was able to find me a pretty good deal on a car. It is a kei car- kei cars are a lot smaller than the typical cars in the States (those are called white-plate cars here) and have smaller engines. Mine is about 15 years old but with only about 50,000 miles on it. I call him Trooper because although he’s not the newest car and sometimes makes creaky noises, he gets me where I need to go. Kei cars sometimes feel like toys car to me- not only are they pretty small and boxy, but because the engines are so small going up slopes always makes the car slow down considerably. Sometimes it feels like I’m driving a golf cart :D

The hill-killing machine

One thing I was a little worried about before I came is driving on the left side of the road, but it was surprisingly easy to get used to. I never went the wrong way down a street or anything, but I did accidentally hit the wrong lever many times in the first couple weeks (turning on the windshield wipers instead of the blinkers). The harder thing was getting used to the narrow roads. All the roads in Japan are much narrower than they are in America. Not dangerously so, but just enough so that you have to slow down when another car is coming towards you and pass by each other carefully. Also, the shoulders are pretty much nonexistent- maybe a foot at most. So in areas where there are no sidewalks, people just walk on the street and you have to give them a wide berth.

Finally, especially on the roads that are out of central Yasugi and towards my schools, there are slopes on either side of the road that I really have to pay attention to. If I veered off to far, I would crash into a rice field, river bed, or someone’s house, basically. There are also rain ditches (I think that’s what they are at least) about two or three feet deep on many of the roads… getting your tires stuck in one would be bad news bears.

Kind of hard to tell, but an idea of the narrowness of the roads

There are a lot of small roadside cemeteries around here

The mountain on the right off in the distance is Mt. Daisen. It looks so pretty topped in clouds

One more thing about driving… gas! Gas is sold by the liter here and right now, one liter is around 142 yen, or about $1.80. Doing the math, it’s almost $7 a gallon… ouch. My car is about a 20 liter tank, so to fill it up usually costs me about $40 and lasts a week or two, depending on how much I drive. Expensive stuff!

Overall though, I think having a car might be contributing to my loving this place. I love having the freedom to go anywhere, anytime, and find new things on my own. It’s a great feeling!

Food

Going to the grocery store also takes a bite out of my wallet; food is definitely more expensive here than back home. There is a discount grocery store in my town that has pretty good prices though, so I mainly shop there. Some differences from the States that I’ve noticed:

•          Fruit is a lot more expensive here, which is probably the biggest bummer for me. I’m used to eating a lot of fruit, but here, pretty much the only fruit I eat regularly is bananas. They’re about the same price as they are back home. Oranges are about $3.50 for 5, but apples are worse. Right now because it’s fall, they’re “cheap,” but still about $1 each. Asian pears and persimmons are also in season so I’ve been buying those lately. But anything not in season or not grown in Japan is usually crazy expensive. It’s hard to get used to paying a ton for fruit!
•           There are a lot more fish and seafood varieties here, most of which are things I don’t think I’ve ever eaten. It’s also pretty cheap, so I’m going to try and experiment with new things. Meat is also not too expensive, especially chicken and pork.
•           This isn’t really about food, but at the grocery stores, everyone brings their own reusable grocery bags. If you forget them, the plastic bags for your groceries cost about 5 cents each. It’s interesting because there are those reusable bags in America too, but I don’t see many people using them. Here, you have to use them or you pay. Really interesting to see how environmentally conscious behavior is sometimes enforced in this country while in America, it is only suggested.

Garbage

Speaking of the environment, the garbage system here is crazy! Each city has its own rules for garbage, and in Yasugi, garbage is sorted into about 16 different categories. Burnables, plastics, plastic bottles, cans, glass, paper, and many more. Milk cartons even have their own category! While I’m sure having the consumer sort the garbage and recycling makes it easier overall on the sanitation workers, I have to say I miss the simple two “garbage and recycling” categories in America. Also, all of these categories are picked up at different times and at different frequencies. So while burnable garbage (which is what leftover food goes in) is picked up twice a week, plastics and paper are only picked up twice a month.

So that’s just a little bit about my basic life here. I feel like I’ve gotten used to it for the most part, but there are still a lot of things that I have no idea about. Not being able to read kanji (the Chinese characters used in Japanese writing a lot) really makes it hard to read any labels or signs here. Combine that with my limited Japanese speaking ability, and for the most part, I’m just winging it!

Here's a few more pictures from my first month or so here. Sorry a lot of them are nature related but that seems to be the majority of what I photograph here. I can't help it! :)

If you look close in the distance, there are clouds in between the mountains. This happens often when it rains and it's so cool to see!

Matsue Castle, one of 12 original structure castles left in Japan

View from the top

Lake Nakaumi and Mt. Daisen... the perfect pair

The Nakaumi windmill

Nakaumi and Daisen again

A dam on the outskirts of Yasugi