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September 26, 2004
Sensei Leslie
“Watashi wa eigo no kyoshi desu.” (I that English of teacher is.) I had to memorize this one early on because everyone wants to know what the hell you’re doing in their country. The kids call me sensei. I am a sensei, did you hear that?! Now bow down and then give me 50 pushups! Actually I’m only an assistant teacher, but I still get the sensei title, and besides the kids are great. I’m based in at Tanbara West Middle School and Duncan is at East. To share the foreign-love they’ve decided that we will switch schools mid-year. We also share 5 elementary schools: rotating, switching, exchanging, bartering and swapping until I don’t even know what day it is let alone which elementary school kids are tugging at my pant legs. The job is difficult, we don’t get much direction or feedback and I’m not sure if the cause is our supervisors lacking English (not that I’m one to speak with my puff of Japanese…) or if it’s just the Japanese way. But the kids are great, I mean really amazing.
A lot of these desks have laptop computers on them, but for the most part they stay buried under the paper work, no wonder this country has so many problems with fires!
No snakes allowed at school, so this ones takes a trip up and over the fence.
The garden at my school kept me feed for the first weeks before I got my pay. How surprised was I to see okra in Japan, after having recently finally adjusted to the southern fried okra in Georgia?!
On a bus that is more than suited to the mostly older crowd that rides it (just check out those flower patterned seat covers) I am whisked away to school every morning. A board at the front of the bus shows the growing fair price from each bus stop. The view outside the bus is also rather outstanding.
The kids wear uniforms and have matching bags, hats, umbrellas and even bike helmets.
Posted by theinfonaut at September 26, 2004 09:33 PM