Snoring, Leotards and Huge Apartments.

As quickly as a flash of lightning, I finished my spring break, roared through my first three weeks of classes and am somehow on vacation again.  It takes time to adjust to having nine weeks of vacation a year I guess.

So anyhoozle, the last half of my spring break was pretty pleasant.  I did an overnight trip to Takayama, a city in the far north of Gifu.  It is renowned for its mountain scenery, it’s preserved historic district and its ratio of 18 foreign tourists per local resident.  There were literally more foreigners per square meter than Tokyo or Kyoto.  It was quite a shock as I was expecting an isolated town in the heart of the mountains.  I stayed in an interesting hostel that provided me with a screened off sleeping room.  So it was totally private except I could hear everything happening in the other 19 sleeping pods.  One guy was snoring so badly I thought aliens might be sucking his brain out.  Hostels are hit and miss.

After coming back I started teaching with all-new students and coworkers.  Classes are much smaller, I have lots of materials, and I see the same students every week, so this is promising to be a much better year.  I get to work one day a week in Nagoya, the big city 45 minutes away.  Unfortunately it looks like our branch there is going to close this fall, due to lack of students.  My boss told me (no joke) that he is transferring me to work in a gymnastics center on Wednesdays.  Details TBD but hopefully I get to wear a leotard to work.

Outside of work, it seems like we have a pretty good group of Americans this year.  Last week we had our annual tradition of watching wrestle mania together.  It’s has become something I can only enjoy under very specific circumstances, specifically with fried chicken, beer and a very nice couch.  We’ve also been watching movies and hanging out in the apartments which has reignited my desire to get a less crappy room.  The land lady showed me an apartment next door that has four rooms and is on the fifth floor.  I can get it for only $100 more per month, but I’m not sure what I would do with basically two empty bedrooms.  We’ll see.

Starting today, I’m on vacation again!  Woo, Golden Week!  On Monday I’m flying to the big island of Hawaii to spend 5 nights with my parents.  They are desperate to get away from the Minnesota weather, although I don’t think Hawaii will actually be that different from Japan.  It’s been 60’s and 70’s here for what seems like forever.  Summer is sure to be upon me soon though.  Tomorrow I am going to pack up and then go on a date with a non-English speaking dentist.  Wish me luck!

Okay thanks for tuning in again guys and gals.  See you next time!

Spring Break!

Welcome back folks!  The school year is over and I am on an extra long two week spring break!  Somehow I survived the final weeks of a dismal school year, and I am now looking forward to starting fresh next Monday.  My last week passed with little fanfare, and I can’t say I’m sad to leaving any of the branches I taught at this year.  It didn’t seem like many of the other teachers even knew I was leaving.  Had I stayed, the majority of my students would have changed anyhow.

So after my classes wrapped up I had a week to shadow teachers and train for my new classes.  Next year I will be back in Hellos, which is where I originally taught from 2009-2011.  I have met most of my students, and there doesn’t seem to be any major problem in any class.  I am especially excited to teach high school students that actually speak in conversational sentences.  The only class I am worried about is a preschool class I’ll be taking over with one 3 year old girl who I’m pretty sure is 1 foot tall (I’ll measure her and get back to you.)

So the school year ended, we lost one American teacher and two new female teachers joined, one Japanese and one from Texas.  I got a chance to meet them both this week and both seem fun and uninhibited.  I feel astonished that new teachers are now almost 10 years younger than me!

So I’m on spring break, yay!  This weekend I went on a three day trip around the Kii peninsula.  It’s the largest peninsula in Japan and located directly south of me.  It’s almost all mountains, forests and little fishing villages that dot the rugged coastline.  There is a train line that runs along the coast around the whole peninsula, and I spent two days riding slow local trains from town to town.  It’s fun to see what life looks like when you’re 5+ hours away from the nearest big city!  People are friendlier in rural areas, although to my disappointment there were many other foreign tourists, so I didn’t get to be the first ever American in any town I went to. 

So I basically spent two days hiking around, riding very slow old trains and taking pictures of cherry blossoms which are in full bloom at the moment.  It’s been a very warm spring, with temps in the 70’s for the last week, so the blossoms are about a week early this year.  It’s wonderful now, but I am dreading summer.

I crashed in a cheap hotel the first night, but couldn’t find a place the second night.  I intended to stay in Wakayama, a large city 90 minutes south of Osaka, but I couldn’t find a single room.  On my way in to Osaka, my phone died, which left my roaming the city at 12am.  Finally I found a 27 story hotel with one non-smoking room left for $150.  Oofda.  But better than sitting in the station until the 5am train!  The hotel in Osaka doubled the cost of my entire trip!

Anyhow, I’m back home now in Ogaki.  Today I helped train the new American teacher.  Because she didn’t get her visa in time, she is doing all her training over break and will not even get a chance to observe a class before she starts.  Yikes!  Then I’ll five more days of vacation until I start 100% new classes.  (Yikes again).  Stay tuned and wish me luck!