Friday a week ago at lunch I had a really good time eating with my 3rd graders at the JHS. At the beginning of this year I absolutely hated my 3rd graders. I didn’t hate all of them and actually it was just a few little jerks in the class that ruined it for me. However over the past month or so, I have really grown fond of my 3rd graders. The past couple of times that I ate lunch with them they actually talked to me, so it was no awkward stare-at-one-another-as-we-silently-eat lunch. One of the girls in the middle of the table started talking. She has a very outgoing personality. She’s a bit of a troublemaker sometimes, but I still like her, and I’m pretty sure that she likes me. At first she asked me the typical questions that every Japanese JHS student has memorized by heart: What sport do you play? What do you have for breakfast? What is your favorite food? Then she whipped out her textbook and tried to go for more detailed questions: Have you ever been to China? Who is your best friend? What do you do after school? The boy who sits across from her is actually really good in English, and he was spoon feeding her things to say. She had no idea what she was saying, so when she said, “Let’s make a baby together with me” I stopped mid-bite, dropped my jaw, bugged my eyes, and stared at her. The boy doubled over in laughter, and the girl realized that whatever she said was not conversational English. The boy told her in Japanese what she had said, and she put her hands up in defense. “No! No! No! No! No baby! Let’s make a baby together with Ian.” (While her words might not have been grammatically correct, she was implying that I should have a baby with IAN, not HER.) This started the whole you’re-married-why-don’t-you-have-a-baby conversation. Ugh! How many times must I explain myself?!? I know that it’s a very foreign concept for the Japanese to understand, but we are waiting to have kids, not just shot gunning kids.
On Saturday afternoon after our morning Skype dates, I went for a little walk. The weather was so nice, and I couldn’t simply stay inside. As I was walking, I saw a puppy on the sidewalk. He must have also been out for a stroll because he had this attitude of confidence. I know that he was someone’s pet because he had a collar on, and he came right up to me. He was the cutest little guy, and it made me realize just how much I miss having pets around! I can’t wait to be back at home and play with my siblings’ dogs!! :)
That night we went up to the city with Krista, Melissa, Sara, and Margo for Yusuke’s surprise welcome home party that Mary had planned. It was a ton of fun!! We got to the restaurant super early, and it was too cold to wait outside, so we walked down the street to Joyfull to get drinks. We waited there until our reservation time at the yakiniku restaurant. Mary had made the reservation for 7 PM but told us to get there at 6:45 so that we could surprise Yusuke. It was a REALLY nice place. We had our own private little room, and when we saw Mary and Yusuke pull up, we all stopped talking and “hid” as well as we could in that room. As soon as Yusuke poked his head through, we all jumped out and yelled “SURPRISE!” He was utterly surprised to see all of us. That was the first time we’d seen him since Australia. :) As far as the food goes, I’m pretty sure we all ate our fill of meat that night! For 2,500 yen we had an all-you-can-eat buffet of meat and veggies with a salad bar. Platter after platter of delicious cuts of beef, pork, chicken, onions, and peppers arrived at our table, and we had absolutely NO PROBLEM putting them away. Delicious! I’m pretty sure that’s the most meat I’ve eaten in a long, LONG time.
After dinner all of us went back to Mary’s just to chat. Since Ian and I had to go to a soccer tournament the next morning, we stayed in the city, but the rest of the gang headed back to Kuma-gun. Oh, the soccer tournament! I didn’t particularly want to go, but I felt roped into it. Stupid Japanese obligatory things. :( Ian and I woke up at 8:30 and tiptoed out of Mary’s apartment. I didn’t realize until that morning that I left the map that the teachers had given me showing me where the soccer tournament was at home. FAIL. I knew that the tournament was north of the castle, but other than that we were flying blind. I tried to look for it on Google maps, but it wasn’t there. Ian asked what my plan was. I told him that we should just go to the north side of the castle and maybe by the shear grace of God we would find it. Turns out….nope. I felt like a failure, but the truth be told I didn’t really want to go. We finally gave up looking for it and turned back to go to Starbucks for a morning beverage. (I later looked at the map, and it turns out that we were very, very close!)
As we were sitting and enjoying our hot drinks while people watching, Ian said, “Hey, look. I think that’s Shara!” It was a foreigner walking toward Starbucks, but it was too far away for me to clearly see if it was her or not. I jokingly said, “Ian, come on. Not all foreigners look the same!” (because the Japanese think that we do) However, as the person approached, I realized that it was indeed Shara! How crazy to randomly run into her up in the city!! As soon as she walked in, we waved at her to get her attention. The three of us had a lovely little chat about almost everything: spring break plans, crazy students, going home in August, life after JET, etc. It was a great lazy morning. After that, Ian and I walked around and shopped for a bit. I had forgotten that March 3rd, that day, was the Hina Matsuri (Doll Festival). There were great displays of porcelain dolls sitting out everywhere. Many shops set up the displays in front of the stores. I’m not exactly sure what the purpose of the dolls are (I think it has some historic value), but I know that A LOT of care goes into the set up and display of the dolls.
We returned back to Kuma-gun that afternoon and met up with Mollee to go to a hole-in-the-wall curry restaurant that she has been raving about. However, the restaurant was closed. Since it was mid-afternoon, we assumed that maybe the restaurant wasn’t open, and we could come back later. Instead Mollee showed us a really nice walking path along the river that she runs on frequently. It was a nice sunny day for a stroll, and it killed some time for us. Whenever we tried to return to the curry restaurant, it was still closed. Sad day. So we decided to go to the great Indian restaurant in Hitoyoshi, Everest. Yum!!!
I was really dreading going to school and having to face all of the teachers on Monday morning after the whole missed soccer tournament thing. In Japan if you say you are going to come to something, you are OBLIGATED to go. It’s extremely frowned upon to say that you’ll go to something and then not show up, so I was afraid of what the teachers would think of me. However, I totally got a free pass! The first teacher I saw was my vice principal. I met her in the office as I was clocking in, and she laughed and said, “I’m so sorry about yesterday.” I told her that I got lost and was so sorry that I missed it. She once again said sorry. SHE WAS APOLOGIZING FOR ME SCREWING UP. Then she hugged me. Yay! I get a free pass as a dumb foreigner. Hurray!
I ate lunch with my first graders at the JHS that day. They have realized that I know about Gangnam style, so they will dance around doing Gangnam style as I laugh at them. Precious. As I was setting my food down on one table, the group of boys at the next table was like, “No, Melissa-sensei. Sit with us. Come over here.” Two of the four of them are good boys who are decent at English, and I don’t think they had an alternative motive. They honestly just wanted me to sit with them. Awwwwwww!!! It’s things like that that honestly just warm my heart!! It’s a small gesture, but those kids have no idea how happy they made me by asking me to sit with them!
Alight. I’ll wrap it up and stop here. I didn’t write any blogs last week (oops) because it was a slightly different week, so that means that I have lots to write about and get you fellow blog readers caught up on! Hurray!
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