I rabu Engrish!

Last week I started out my week by finishing school.  Make sense?    If you will remember from past blogs, I have been working on getting my TEFL certification this semester.  I started in August, took a loooooooooooooong break from the end of September-November, and finished up my lesson units in mid-November.  After that, I had to take an online test.  As soon as I download the test, I had twenty-four hours to complete and submit it.  The website said that the average person takes about six hours to complete the test.  Therefore, I knew that I couldn’t do it on a typical work day because I’m at work and have too much to do!  I also didn’t want to do it on a weekend because I didn’t want to waste one of my relax days!    For two weekends straight I said that I WOULD take it on that Sunday, but the Sundays came and went without me taking it.    I finally decided that I WOULD take it (for reals) last Monday.  Ian is never at home on Monday night because he has his class and normally doesn’t get home until about 10PM.  That meant that I would have a quiet house without interruptions for six hours….perfect!  As soon as I got home, I made myself a cup of tea, crawled under the kotatsu, downloaded the test, and started.  The test was a combination of grammar concepts and why/how they are used, lesson plans, phonology, short answer q's about teaching methods, and a lot of other stuff.  I started the test at about 4:30, and by 6:30 my stomach was growling, so I made a quick dinner and went back to work.  The longer I worked on the test, the more I wanted to give up.  I was getting VERY lethargic.  My body had forgotten what it’s like to study for and take tests!!!  Very difficult!!  When Ian arrived home around 10PM, I was about 3/4 of the way finished, and by midnight, I was sooooooooooooo ridiculously over it that I gave up and said I would finish it on Tuesday.  I was WIPED OUT.  I did finish the test on Tuesday afternoon at school and emailed it off.  I’m still waiting for a reply stating if I passed it or not.  So….fingers crossed, y’all!! 

Saturday while we were on our way back from the city, Melissa said, “Hey, check out that rainbow spot in the sky!”  It was a sunspot, and I told the gang what Daddy told me about sunspots: “It means the weather’s going to change.”  Indeed, the weather has changed.  It’s gone from cold to colder.    Mornings are even harder to peel back the covers and get ready, the school day seems longer since I spend 3/4 of it shivering, and my short bike ride to and from school is….brisk (to say the least).  On Wednesday the weather report was calling for snow.  It was all anyone was talking about at school.  If I had a nickel for every time I heard yuki, (the Japanese word for “snow”) I would have….. at least a dollar.    Since we’re so far south, it rarely snows here, but everyone gets excited for it!  I knew it wasn’t going to stick since the ground wasn’t even frozen, but that didn’t stop people from getting excited!!  However, once the clouds cleared, there was another snowfall on the top of Ichifusa.  It was beautiful!!  Even though I’ve never seen the Rockies, this is what I imagine them to look like:

    

Whenever I worked at the Parlor, I remember there being one woman who would always come in and order hot water to drink.  She didn’t want a tea bag with it—just hot water.  All of us thought it was gross—who wanted to drink just a cup of hot water….??  *sigh*  Unfortunately I have become that woman.  Since the schools are poorly insulated and rarely heated, I’ve taken to drinking hot water.  Normally I have my water bottle and fill it with tap water.  However, drinking cool tap water whenever you’re already cold isn’t the best thing to do.  All of the other teachers drink coffee or tea all day, but I prefer to get in my eight glasses of water a day.  I had the idea the other day to just put hot water in my water bottle.  It was actually wonderful!  I’m still not keen on drinking plain hot water, but it did the trick and warmed me up.  Plus I could leave the water bottle in my lap so that something hot was warming me up.

Lots of fun things happened at ES on Wednesday.  First, there was the shirt.  Lots of kids wear Engrish T-shirts, but this kid had on the Engrish T-shirt of the week!  On the front was a nice mountain scene with pine trees, a lake, and a car with a smiling driver.  The print said:

Washington: smooth roads

…….uuummmmmm…OK…  On the back it said:

Country of big bear

Ah, yes.  Whenever I think of Washington, the first two things that come to mind are smooth roads and big bears. 

Before I tell this next story, you need some back story.  Ian and I have a ice cream shaped charm on our keychain that we won at Baskin Robbins.  Last week before we left for the city, I tossed the keys to Ian, but he didn’t catch them.  The keys and charm separated, and the charm rolled underneath the car.  Since it was dark and we were running late, I didn’t stop to pick it up, thinking that I would get it later.  However, whenever I went to pick it up later, it wasn’t there.  I didn’t think anything about it—maybe the wind blew it away, the rain washed it to the irrigation ditch, it became a cat’s play toy, or some kid found it.  I wasn’t heart broken about it or anything.  However, after my 5th grade class on Wednesday, one of the girls who lives in my neighborhood brought it up to me.  I’m not exactly sure how she knew that it was mine—maybe I showed it to her before……?  Maybe she saw it in the spot where we usually park our car and she just assumed….?  Regardless, it was very sweet of her!!

My last ES story made me super happy.  Usually every week my schedule at the ES is the same:

2nd period: 6th grade, 3rd period: rotates between 1st, 2nd, 3rd, or 4th grades, and 4th period: 5th grade. 

Last week, my schedule was a little different.  Originally when I got my schedule back in August I was only supposed to have my 2nd and 5th grade classes that day.  However, since I missed two 6th grade classes in October, (one on my health check-up day and one on my Kuma-gun conference day) my supervising JTE wanted me to make up one of those class periods last Wednesday.  Therefore, I was scheduled to have my 6th graders right after lunch during 5th period….which is definitely out of the norm……but whatever.  I enjoyed my free 2nd period, but as the time got closer to go to 6th grade, a sense of dread gathered.  I don’t particularly like my 6th graders because a lot of them are at that certain age when they start to become little twerps.  When it was time for class, I went up to the 6th grade classroom……only to see that class had already started.  I momentarily hesitated in the hallway, which made the 6th grade teacher notice me.  He looked as confused to see me holding my English book as I looked that he had already started class.  I slid open the door and asked if we had English class then.  I also noticed that all of the kids had their social studies books on their desks.  His head shot back, and I could almost see the panic creeping in because he wasn’t prepared for an English class.  The kids were happy, saying things like “YAY, English!”  “English time!”  “Hurray!!”  He told me to wait a minute, so I did in the classroom talking to the kids, and when he came back, he had his schedule in his hand, showing me that there was no 6th grade English that day.  I didn’t put up a fight because that was one less class for me to teach, but I was slightly embarrassed for barging into his classroom when there was no class to teach.  Oops….

I’m a little behind in this blog, but hopefully I’ll get caught up in the next few days.  In case anyone is counting, there are only eight more work days until Christmas break!  YAAAAAAAAAAAAY!!!!