I wasn’t sure what to title this blog, but after I finished and read over it, I noticed a common theme with all of my points: each was about cultural differences. BAM! Blog title!
I had an idea for my adult eikaiwa students that I’m really excited about. Since it’s Christmas season and sending family and friends Christmas cards is a pretty traditional American thing to do, I decided to have my students do that and trade with my family members. I have three students and enlisted the help of Mommy, Christina, Amanda, and Kim at home to send my students Christmas cards. Last week was my first Christmas lesson with them, and I showed them all of the Christmas cards that people had sent me last year. They seemed genuinely interested in them, flipping through them to see the generic “Season's Greetings” message or running their fingers over the glittery snowfall picture on the front of one card. It’s not common in Japan to send Christmas cards, so they were really excited to see them. My students started making their own Christmas cards last week in class and will finish up next week. Once they are done, I’ll go to the post office and mail my students’ cards back to Mommy, Christina, Amanda, and Kim. By next week, I should receive the cards from home and will distribute them in class. Yay for internationalization!
Ian told me a funny story about his way home from his class on Thursday night. He had just bought a Santa hat for me (so that I could wear it in class for my Christmas lessons!) and was wearing it in the car. He was stopped at the only light in Yunomae and noticed a car pull up beside him. He didn’t think anything about it until he heard shouting. Ian even told me that if he could hear shouting over the volume of his music, they were DEFINITELY trying to get his attention! It was a group of drunk 20ish girls. This alone is quite a fluke. The fact that there was a group of twenty-year-olds in our sleepy little town was quite strange! (Our town has two age groups: either students or REALLY old people. There’s not a lot of middle ground because most people my age move away from the countryside and into the city for work.) Ian rolled down the window to see what they wanted. He said that they were shouting things like “Santa-san! Santa Claus! Santa, all I want for Christmas is you!” AHAHAHAHAHAHA!!! When the light turned green, Ian went straight as they turned.
Last Friday at the JHS, there was a fire drill. Mr. Fujiwara told me that it would happen at 3:55 and to just go out to the track/baseball/soccer/multi-purpose field behind school when the alarm rang. I waited around for it along with the other teachers in the teacher’s room, and as soon as fire alarm rang, it was like all hell broke loose. (Just to remind you…..EVERYONE knew that this was going to happen. The teachers knew. The kids knew. Everyone.) You know how they tell you not to panic during any disaster? I don’t think my co-workers got that memo. I feel like fire, earthquake, and intruder drills in Japan are HIGH TENSION, whereas in the States they are LOW TENSION. Yes, it is a very dangerous situation, but we as students were always told to NOT panic or run. Whenever that fire alarm sounded at school in the States, we would always quickly (but without running!) go to our designated exit. Here even though it was just a drill, it was a mad scramble. Each of the teachers had a designated area to check and make sure that no one was left behind. They were frantically scrambling from one room to another, opening the door, darting their gaze back and forth before realizing that no one was in that room before moving to the next one. Literally, they were running up and down the halls. I went outside to the field where the principal was waiting with a stop watch. Everyone ran out of the building as quickly as possible (Two kids injured their ankles last week and have been on crutches. I was amazed at how quickly they hobbled across the field!), and they formed perfect rows on the field. Once everyone was out, the principal gave a speech about safety and being prepared. Before everyone went back inside, we had to wash off our shoes. (Since it was a fire drill and there was not time to change into our outdoor shoes, everyone ran outside with their indoor shoes on.) Heaven forbid if you wear the same shoes inside AND outside in Japan!!
Whenever I got home that night, Ian told me a funny story. He had to do phone interviews for work. Whenever he does this, it’s for Japanese businessmen who are required to learn English for their job. Ian asks them a series of questions, things like “How are you today?” “Do you have any children?” “Was it warm in your house this morning?” and then grades them on their responses. They are simple questions that if the guys have been studying English the way they should be, they will have no problem with the questions. It just so happened that a few of the guys Ian interviewed were actually in Ohio at the time on a business trip. He asked one guy the question “Was it warm in your house this morning?” and the guy replied with “Oh, yes! American heaters are very nice. I want to bring it back with me to Japan.” AHAHAHA!!! The Japanese don’t have isolation or central heating, so I’m sure that the guy was indeed enjoying his warmth! Ian said something like “I know, right?? I’m very cold in my house in Kumamoto! I miss my American heater!”
We had to run to the grocery store that night, and we decided to pay with our credit card in order to save our money. (I screwed up at the ATM, and it fraud alerted our card. I’ll go into more detail later.) Japan is a cash based society. 95% of all transactions in Japan deal with cash. Not a lot of people use credit cards, and I’ve heard that it’s very hard to get one in Japan. They just aren’t widely used. For example, at our grocery store there is only ONE register that is equipped to take credit cards. Ian learned this the hard way one time when he tried to use credit in a different lane. Instead of refusing him, they were the nice Japanese people that they are and unplugged the machine from the normal register, carried it across two other lanes, and re-plugged it up to the register Ian was checking out at. Oops. Anyway, when we were checking out last Friday, our clerk pretty much had no idea how to swipe the card. I know that she’s not new. We’ve seen her there dozens of times, but since not a lot of people use cards, she had NO idea how to do it! It blew my mind! We had to show her which way to swipe the card. I’m pretty sure that there are CHILDREN in the States who know how to swipe credit cards. I’m not downing the clerk…..I understand that since the overwhelming majority of people use cash it wouldn’t be common knowledge for her. I was just amazed at the differences of cultures and that a grown adult in Japan would have no idea how to swipe a card when in the States, any Tom, Dick, or Harry can without any problem.
BAM! Done! …..at least with this blog. I’m still behind since I haven’t even finished with Friday’s stuff and here it is Thursday, but I’m working on it!
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