Japanastan8

March 2007

Good day all

I hope this email finds you well. It's been an interesting couple of weeks since my last little update. I have been accepted to a CELTA certification program. Basically, it will allow me to teach English in other countries. GEOS is paying for half of it, but that means that i'll be here until at least November of 2008. I'll be past thirty, so my only hope is that i'm still coherent enough to use what i've learned in Auckland.

Sooooo let's see here. I worked two Sundays at a new school in Honjo. It's about an hour and half away from Chichibu and apparently i can't pronounce it properly. Everytime i say 'Honjo' to a Japanesey they always correct me. 'HonjO!'...I guess i'm not as excited about "o's" as everyone else. C'est le Japanese. It was actually pretty boring, not much to do but make posters and chat with the two managers; Kyoko and Kame. Kame does't exactly have a command of English nor pronunciation. Which made some fun times. I.E.

K: 'When Rita observed your class, were you lovers?'
M: 'Wha-what?!'
K: 'Lovers? Were you lovers?'
M: 'Not that i was aware of...'
K: 'When I was observed, I was lovers."
M: (Banging head on the table) 'Neeeervous?"

AND

K: 'I think Ishiro looks like black people.'
M: 'Ummm...'
K: 'Black people and Ichiro look the same."
M: (Thinking) Black...brack...Brad. People...peepoo...pitto...Pitt. I get BRAD PITT!!!

'No, but Ichiro does look more like Brad Pitt than an African American."

I also discovered that my 'smart assed-ness' is even less productive in Japan. The managers were talking about boyfriends, so I was asking questions to keep the conversation. Again with Kame.

M; So, do you have a boyfriend? What's he like?
K: No boyfriend? How about you?
M: No boyfriend.
K&K: OOOOOOOOOOOOoooh! AAAAAaaahh! Who do you like? Tom-mu Cru-usu? Brad-doh Pit-to?
M: What? No! Claire Forlani.
K: But she's a girl?

No need to fear about any 'tendencies' however as i soon found when i visited the hospital recently. I caught a nasty flu and actually missed a couple of days of work. Thursday of last week, my manager finally forced me to get checked out. The doctor (female) spoke passable English and asked about symptoms. I told her i'd had a fever and was coughing a bit. So she whips out the stethoscope and tells me to take off my shirt.

This wasn't the first time i've had a doctor listen to my chest. However, they generally lift the disk and place it in the next spot. This doctor felt compelled to slide it across with her left hand and smooth out my disheveled chest hair with her right. Not only that, but i have the feeling she failed her anatomy class. The lungs were where the trouble lie; apparently my lungs are huge! She listened to my chest, and then worked her way over my kidneys, appendix and navel; all over my bulging belly. I had to explain to her that in the U.S., when a woman does that to a man, she generally places dollar bills in his belt.


Other than that, everything's going well. The too-touchy doctor was nice enough to give me some pills and they seem to have done the trick. Any recent damage done has been small and replaceable. I hope you're all doing well.

Godspeed