So. it’s summer vacation now. which means, no classes and I’ve sitting on my ass all day for the last month or so. There are some kids at school, here for club activities, but not that many, so chance/funny encounters are kinda rare, and therefore there’s not too much to say.
Wednesday july 27th
lol. Imari and dan just came over to ask me for my ipod speaker… (I use it to play the songs for my music lessons cuz it’s easier than burning cds) I guess they’re going to use it to play music to unbore themselves while they count bellmarks or something… still. It was kinda random and funny :p
lol. And now (2hrs later) Dan and Kota have just returned it. Dan said “thank you very much”, and then “very much” again, with a little bow, 3 more times while Kota giggled. I think they were looking for an excuse to stay here but had nothing to say. lol.
Friday july 29th
I left about an hour early to go drop some stuff off at the BoE on Friday afternoon. School was really quiet, with no students and only about 3 other teachers in the whole school. So behold my surprise when, as I almost reach the teachers’ shoe locker room, I hear my name being screamed out and suddenly get attacked by a big yellow blob of human. I looked down at who was the little creature hugging me fiercely, and lo-and-behold, it was Shinobu! Honestly, I should’ve known because that was pretty much her exact behavior when she was still a student here. I realized that she’d popped out of the nurse’s office as Ayaka soon followed suit, and another girl whose name I can’t remember cuz I am a bad teacher. Only Ayaka was wearing a school uniform and the other two wore casual clothes, Shinobu’s being very very yellow. lol. She looked so cute and had cut her hair. They all had pretty much the same short chipped-bob haircut. we chatted a bit but I had to say goodbye quickly or I was gonna miss my train. As I was about to go, Shinobu grabbed my hand and looked at the inside of it. I had scribbled “BoE” on the inside to remind myself to go and explained to her what it meant. She showed my hand to Ayaka and went (in Japanese) “I thought it said BoA”. lol. we said goodbye and I was like “please come see me again” and Shinobu just stared at me blankly and looked to Ayaka and I shook my head and said “mata kite kudasai!” and Shinobu went “hai!!” and gave me a big serious bow. lol. Love that kid.
August 4th
Atsuya #2 (I have 2 favorite Atsuyas in 2nd grade… one is this genki little over achiever, and the other one is dumb as shit, but highly entertaining. This is the second one) is in the staffroom now. I think he’s been forced to do his history homework or something. He’s been sitting at the empty desk his front of me, twiddling his pen, tapping his fingers on the desk and alternatingly starring into space. lol. When he catches me looking at him, he gives me this dumb embarrassed grin and I just giggle. lol. Can’t help it, he’s just funny even to just look at, eheh.
August 5th
awww… on my way out after school, I ran into Aoi (chibikko… last year’s speech contest kid) and her friend at the station. She was all dolled-up and dressed up super cute and had already started growing from a little kid into a woman. When she saw me and recognized me, she jumped into my arms and I just had such an inner “aaaaaawwww!” moment. She and her friend had gone shopping at AEON and now were waiting for her mom to pick them up. She seemed really happy. I couldn’t talk much cuz the train was coming soon, but I was so happy to see her ^_^
August 9th
This morning on my way to school, some random lady doing her jogging (actually, I’ve seen her around before) stopped and started chatting to me. At first I thought she was just saying “good morning”, but no, she wanted to chat. She asked me if I was the English teacher (we were very near the school) and I said yes and she said I was very “nihongo jouzu” and asked where I was from, and then started babbling about how young and pretty I was. lol. She thought I was 21, bless her little soul. Oh well, that was an interesting encounter.
Now I get to school and Masaki – this tiny delicate ninensei boy – is sitting at the desk in front of me SEWING. lol. I’m guessing it’s a home-ec summer project, but it’s still rather funny. He’s concentrating so hard!! kawaii!!!
August 11th
Today was weird. First, all the teachers had some special meetings somewhere outside of school, so the staffroom was COMPLETELY empty, except for Kyoto-sensei and the lunch lady and I all morning. Then in the afternoon, there was a stupid inter-school (with the two elementaries affiliated with our school) volleyball tournament for the teachers. In honor of that, all the lady teachers were going to lunch together. Now, I woulda been FINE just eating my diet-proof bento in the lonely staffroom and stay there all afternoon, reading a book, but no. Earlier in the week, Hasegawa sensei came over and asked me if I wanted to come to the v-ball game. In this case “asked” means “you can’t say no”. So of course I said sure and spent the rest of the week dreading it. She said I didn’t have to play but of course that didn’t happen either. while I was there, Koucho-sensei (the principal) very nearly physically forced me to play 2 GAMES… on the “shitty players side” (there were 2 fields). Lucky for me, the other team sucked even more than we did and kept giving us points by just sending their ball into the net, so it didn’t really involve too much actual physical activity. :p
Afterwards me and Yuka went for coffee downtown and we ran into Daisuke and his friends. His friends were from another school cuz I didn’t know them, and they were all staring at me like I was a crazy person as I walked over and snapped my fingers in Daisuke’s face for him to look up (he was fiddling with his bag or something). When he saw me he went “HEEEY!” and flashed his trademark huge smile at me. I asked him what he was doing here and he said he was doing something for a Visa (didn’t really understand) cuz he was going to Taiwan. I knew some of the kids from the baseball club were going so I said “oooh!” and he went (in English) “Yes! Because, I am very very good baseball player!” lol. So I gave him a high-five and wished him luck and we left. As we were walking off, Yuka was laughing at his whole behavior and English usage. She doesn’t know him cuz she teaches first grade only. She went “yeah, you’re lucky. Students love you” :p
Other than that, nothing much happened besides me teaching this year’s speech contest kid every other day. She has the most boring personality ever, and never says anything even when I try to initiate conversation. eh. I’m glad that’s over!
