Yay! I'm going home tomorrow. Okayama airport to Seoul, Seoul to Heathrow, Heathrow to Ilford (OK, so the last bit isn't a plane journey, but I am doing my best to make it sound glamorous. It's been a busy 8 days with lots of going out, and as usual, lots of last minute shopping (my organisation genes are obviously suffering from some unfortunate syndrome. Again.) And unlike most weeks here, the nights haven't been fillde with booze. This is because I've realised the anti-histamines (which I've been taking for over a month now) have been working with the alcohol to make me an even cheaper and somewhat nastier date (cheaper in the sense that 4 drinks gets me smashed and nastier in the sense that 6 drinks gets me vomiting.) I am beautiful no matter what they say, etc, etc... I wouldn't bloody mind but I'm still itching all the bastard time (please repeat in grumpy Lily Savage style voice.)
Anyway, here's an abridged version of the week's events:
Thursday 9th December: Evening spent at Japanese friend Nao chan's house where she cooked an excellent meal, and my new favourite- agedashi tofu- and her husband got very drunk and knocked a pot of sho-chu over so that it went up the walls into the living room, all over the floor and soaked the tatami. Oops...
Friday 10th December: Baking cookies with 40 kids (and only 3 toaster ovens) at Katsuyama elementary. Successful though- no hot-plates. Evening spent in Okayama at Fiona's.
Saturday 11th December: Doctor's, visit to the orphanage where Abslance was Mrs Claus and Jez was Santa. Very funny. Went to eat with Betsy , Winkie and Ellison and we had those print club stickers done (photo stickers of yourselves.)
Monday 13th December: no classes at school, but in the evening- Dance Class! Went to a street dance lesson (means street style dancing as opposed to Martha and the Vandellas style dancing in the street). I thought I could move well, but blimey, the first hours was pilates-like stretching and was v. hard. Will never be able to do splits or put legs behind head no matter how hard I try or drunk I get. Second half of class was learning a routine at lightning speed. Or not-learning in my case and flailing about like a fish in a frying pan. Will go again, if only because I liked the music during the first hour, and spent much time singing like a loon.
Tuesday 14th December: Preparing for classes at school. Then an end of year party for English conversation class at a really good Chinese restaurant in my town.
Wednesday 15th December: Many lessons and a near baking disaster at Tomihara primary school (Master Baker Chris to the rescue)Then in the evening a meal with Christine and Johanna where we figured out some of the meals on the menu and I ate a whole roasted bulb of garlic. A double layered one too. It wasn't long before a smell wafted from me. And the garlic seemed to take on a bean like effect and kick start the old digestive system. Again, I am beautiful, no matter what they say etc, etc...
Thursday 16th December: 3 lessons at Junior high, unaccompanied by teacher, piano or orchestra. After school, met Nao chan and Johanna and went to Kuse for a meal and then to Karaoke! Johanna and I performed our professional-like duet of Wilson Phillips' "Hold On" for Nao chan, and then dazzled/ appalled her with our abilities on a variety of other hideous anthems. And I sang "All I Want For Christmas Is You". Again.
Friday 17th December: 3 lessons at Junior high and the bus to Okayama where Johanna, Saddam, Abslance and I porked out on tasty Japanese food, and I introduced Saddam to the delights of Agedashi tofu (mmm).
Saturday 18th December: Trip to the doctors (good value in Japan) and then bumped into Winkie and Ellison in Starbucks and had a good chat and coffee and cake before going to meet Chad and we went to another coffee place and had a good chat and an ice cream sundae and then met Johanna and Abslance and we went to Baskin and Robbins and had a chat and some ice-cream. And we then did some Xmas shopping. Had tea at a sushi restaurant in Kurashiki and Abslance took us home.
Sunday 19th December: Tidying up, preparing and Christmas shopping.
Monday 20th December: No lessons at school (preparing), but the third grade all made me Christmas cards. Went Christmas shopping in Kuse in the evening and did most of my packing. Made tomorrow's school lunch for the first time in three months.
Tuesday 21st December: 2 lessons, more cards from the third grade (thank you and Merry Christmas), updated web log.
That's it so far, tonight will go to Okayama and stay at Fiona's, tomorrow will fly!
See you all soon, and as I may be a) too busy, b) too drunk or c) too itchy to update this soon, I will say now Merry Christmas!
Tuesday, December 21, 2004
Monday, December 13, 2004
A time for rejoicing...
Hallelujah!
Hallelujah!
I have found a toilet duck type product in the supermarket.
Now my toilet is not just nearly clean, it's really clean.
Hallelujah!
I have found a toilet duck type product in the supermarket.
Now my toilet is not just nearly clean, it's really clean.
Thursday, December 09, 2004
A whole new me.
After 4 months of drinking and laughing and teaching, I think the zen may have hit me. Or something anyway. Things have changed. In a very odd way. I feel like Madonna when she launches a new album. I have a new image. And it was damn hard work. I have carefully crafted an image of artistic-ness and sportsmanliness. I'm not sure if I want it, but that's not the point. Anyway, in best cheap magazine style, here's how you can create a new image in three easy steps:
How to create new image
i) Teach unfamiliar things
Tip: Practice hard
So my English Conversation Class wanted to do cooking. I decided we would cook scones as most had heard of but never eaten them. And bloody hell it was not easy. Ovens are a mystery to people here, and houses are fitted without them. No one bakes anything and roasting would be a dirty word if it existed in the language.
As I have no recipes with me, I asked my Ma to send me a scone recipe. And proving well and truly that we are related, unbeknown to me she lists the ingredients for pastry and the method for scones. So before thanksgiving I practise cooking scones in a convection microwave oven (the very same one which nearly started a house fire three weeks ago when it decided to obliterate an expensively imported bagel at 7am.) Not surprisingly, they stiffed. Literally. Like board.
Then, Ma sends the right recipe, but it requires self-raising flour. And this is also not a common thing here (I'm led to believe it exists, but I nor no-one I asked has seen it.) So due a baking powder mishap I end up with huge vinegary doughy lumps on the Sunday. On the Monday, with further assistance from Ma and the Dairy Book Of Home Cookery, I get it nearly right, but figure it'll have to do for class. No-one will know if we put loads of jam on.
Tuesday comes, and I buy enough stuff so that 12 people can each make scones. And what happens? Only 7 turn up and they decide to make two groups and work together. Oh well. But the scones turned out okay. Thank God, Ma and the Dairy Book of Home Cookery.
This led me to undertake further cooking with my students at elementary school. I have now made four lots of sugar cookies, an American recipe I got from the internet. The kids are always excited as they have never done anything like it before, and, it seems, neither have the teachers. This was proven when, at a school I was at two days ago (Tuesday), the teachers insisted on cooking the cookies on a hot plate. Despite my saying no. Fortunately they only did a few as they came out like burnt cakes, and a couple of other teachers cooked the rest of the mix in an oven.
ii) Research
Tip: make research fun by only researching things you like.
I have been watching films again. Last Wednesday Johanna cooked me tea and we enjoyed Bridget Jones. This week I have enjoyed "About A Boy", but didn't enjoy "The Order". Why? Because it was crap. Avoid it like you would avoid eating live shrimp. Enjoying is a very Japanese thing. In schools in particular, any word can follow the phrase "Let's enjoy" regardless of whether it is grammatically correct or makes sense, eg "Let's enjoy conversation", "let's enjoy English", "lets enjoy marathon", and "let's enjoy eating grey unrecognisable food for lunch".
iii) Impress people with your skills
Tip: any old skill will do, just do it in front of kids.
As it's Christmas, we can do themed lessons with our classes. So I have taken the opportunity to teach Christmas words and then have the students make Christmas cards and cut out snowflakes (although I have now given up teaching the word snowflake-it's just too hard. Reindeer I could understand them finding difficult- one class kept saying greendaa- but snow flake I don't get). Student's are consistently surprised by the fact that a) I can draw snowmen b) I can make snowflakes out of paper and c) I can write with chalk (?!?) I am not sure what else you do with chalk, but when I have used it to write on paper it's caused more of a stir than my eating with chop sticks (or chip chops as one of my favourite teachers translated them).
iv) Travel
Tip: travel anywhere, there's always someone who hasn't been there.
This weekend I went to Okayama again and stayed with Fiona and saw the doctor again because I am scratching more than a hooker with the clap. So she gave me stronger pills and some stronger creams. Still itching though. 14 weeks and counting...
Anyway, after a quick whiz round the shops and an essential visit to Starbucks (mmm, real coffee and soya milk), I headed to Fukuyama in the next prefecture (Hiroshima) where I met Saddam (Sarah). The weather was shocking- raining and cold- so we met in Starbucks and spent much time talking. After looking round the shops for a while we headed back to Kasaoka where Saddam lives and met RayVon for our tea (nice curried fried rice and tofu). Then we put up Saddam's Christmas lights. What we thought was a string of 10,000,000 lights (and what we thought would take 4 hours) took 10 minutes to put up as it turned out to be a net of 10,000,000 lights. She now has a wall of lightbulbs which is OK only because her house is made out of plastic like mine and not paper and chip chops like Johanna's. Upon my return, Amy, an assistant language teacher, came to stay overnight and we had a good old chat and ate loads of food, healthy and not.
Actually, travel only contributed to my image because one of the teachers hadn't been to Kasaoka and seemed surprised. I didn't mention Fukuyama because you're supposed to bring back gifts for everyone at work when you leave the prefecture (sweets or something) and I'm too mean.
v) Challenge yourself
Tip: don't actually offer to do things, do what you can't get out of.
So, in further restructuring of my image, I have been involved in sports. At school on Tuesday one teacher roped me into playing baseball at playtime. Initially appearing as useful as a can of pop in a house fire I convinced one of the kids to play football instead (well, I actually said, we don't have baseball in England and they brought out the football), although for the life of me I can't see that this was much better. Although the teachers proved that either a) they are blind or b) that they are liars, as they told me I was talented at football (is there anything I can't do? Don't answer that).
And today I have been practising for some marathon with the elementary kids. What marathon I do not know. And I will not be running, so I don't care. What I do care about is the practicality of running around in a sandpit with sensible shoes on for 10 minutes. I don't think that'll help my image at all...
Yes I realise that's actually five steps rather than three like I said, but I promised cheap magazine style, and only cheap magazines would make such mistakes (I'm thinking Bella, Take A Break, and the God of cheap magazines That's Life- sample piece of advice "instead of throwing away old scouring pads, I put them in my shower and my family uses them to exfoliate!")
Anyway, I shall finish this like I finish my emails. I am at school allegedly preparing for tomorrow's lessons, so I have to go in case they think I'm not busy. I have an image to maintain after all.
How to create new image
i) Teach unfamiliar things
Tip: Practice hard
So my English Conversation Class wanted to do cooking. I decided we would cook scones as most had heard of but never eaten them. And bloody hell it was not easy. Ovens are a mystery to people here, and houses are fitted without them. No one bakes anything and roasting would be a dirty word if it existed in the language.
As I have no recipes with me, I asked my Ma to send me a scone recipe. And proving well and truly that we are related, unbeknown to me she lists the ingredients for pastry and the method for scones. So before thanksgiving I practise cooking scones in a convection microwave oven (the very same one which nearly started a house fire three weeks ago when it decided to obliterate an expensively imported bagel at 7am.) Not surprisingly, they stiffed. Literally. Like board.
Then, Ma sends the right recipe, but it requires self-raising flour. And this is also not a common thing here (I'm led to believe it exists, but I nor no-one I asked has seen it.) So due a baking powder mishap I end up with huge vinegary doughy lumps on the Sunday. On the Monday, with further assistance from Ma and the Dairy Book Of Home Cookery, I get it nearly right, but figure it'll have to do for class. No-one will know if we put loads of jam on.
Tuesday comes, and I buy enough stuff so that 12 people can each make scones. And what happens? Only 7 turn up and they decide to make two groups and work together. Oh well. But the scones turned out okay. Thank God, Ma and the Dairy Book of Home Cookery.
This led me to undertake further cooking with my students at elementary school. I have now made four lots of sugar cookies, an American recipe I got from the internet. The kids are always excited as they have never done anything like it before, and, it seems, neither have the teachers. This was proven when, at a school I was at two days ago (Tuesday), the teachers insisted on cooking the cookies on a hot plate. Despite my saying no. Fortunately they only did a few as they came out like burnt cakes, and a couple of other teachers cooked the rest of the mix in an oven.
ii) Research
Tip: make research fun by only researching things you like.
I have been watching films again. Last Wednesday Johanna cooked me tea and we enjoyed Bridget Jones. This week I have enjoyed "About A Boy", but didn't enjoy "The Order". Why? Because it was crap. Avoid it like you would avoid eating live shrimp. Enjoying is a very Japanese thing. In schools in particular, any word can follow the phrase "Let's enjoy" regardless of whether it is grammatically correct or makes sense, eg "Let's enjoy conversation", "let's enjoy English", "lets enjoy marathon", and "let's enjoy eating grey unrecognisable food for lunch".
iii) Impress people with your skills
Tip: any old skill will do, just do it in front of kids.
As it's Christmas, we can do themed lessons with our classes. So I have taken the opportunity to teach Christmas words and then have the students make Christmas cards and cut out snowflakes (although I have now given up teaching the word snowflake-it's just too hard. Reindeer I could understand them finding difficult- one class kept saying greendaa- but snow flake I don't get). Student's are consistently surprised by the fact that a) I can draw snowmen b) I can make snowflakes out of paper and c) I can write with chalk (?!?) I am not sure what else you do with chalk, but when I have used it to write on paper it's caused more of a stir than my eating with chop sticks (or chip chops as one of my favourite teachers translated them).
iv) Travel
Tip: travel anywhere, there's always someone who hasn't been there.
This weekend I went to Okayama again and stayed with Fiona and saw the doctor again because I am scratching more than a hooker with the clap. So she gave me stronger pills and some stronger creams. Still itching though. 14 weeks and counting...
Anyway, after a quick whiz round the shops and an essential visit to Starbucks (mmm, real coffee and soya milk), I headed to Fukuyama in the next prefecture (Hiroshima) where I met Saddam (Sarah). The weather was shocking- raining and cold- so we met in Starbucks and spent much time talking. After looking round the shops for a while we headed back to Kasaoka where Saddam lives and met RayVon for our tea (nice curried fried rice and tofu). Then we put up Saddam's Christmas lights. What we thought was a string of 10,000,000 lights (and what we thought would take 4 hours) took 10 minutes to put up as it turned out to be a net of 10,000,000 lights. She now has a wall of lightbulbs which is OK only because her house is made out of plastic like mine and not paper and chip chops like Johanna's. Upon my return, Amy, an assistant language teacher, came to stay overnight and we had a good old chat and ate loads of food, healthy and not.
Actually, travel only contributed to my image because one of the teachers hadn't been to Kasaoka and seemed surprised. I didn't mention Fukuyama because you're supposed to bring back gifts for everyone at work when you leave the prefecture (sweets or something) and I'm too mean.
v) Challenge yourself
Tip: don't actually offer to do things, do what you can't get out of.
So, in further restructuring of my image, I have been involved in sports. At school on Tuesday one teacher roped me into playing baseball at playtime. Initially appearing as useful as a can of pop in a house fire I convinced one of the kids to play football instead (well, I actually said, we don't have baseball in England and they brought out the football), although for the life of me I can't see that this was much better. Although the teachers proved that either a) they are blind or b) that they are liars, as they told me I was talented at football (is there anything I can't do? Don't answer that).
And today I have been practising for some marathon with the elementary kids. What marathon I do not know. And I will not be running, so I don't care. What I do care about is the practicality of running around in a sandpit with sensible shoes on for 10 minutes. I don't think that'll help my image at all...
Yes I realise that's actually five steps rather than three like I said, but I promised cheap magazine style, and only cheap magazines would make such mistakes (I'm thinking Bella, Take A Break, and the God of cheap magazines That's Life- sample piece of advice "instead of throwing away old scouring pads, I put them in my shower and my family uses them to exfoliate!")
Anyway, I shall finish this like I finish my emails. I am at school allegedly preparing for tomorrow's lessons, so I have to go in case they think I'm not busy. I have an image to maintain after all.
Friday, December 03, 2004
"Uh-oh uh-oh uh-oh no no-no"
As said by Beyonce. And very fitting it is too. This week's instalment will be in two parts (the second will probably be written next week, and will therefore become next week's instalment and I will look stupid. Again.) This is because no matter how small the place I live, I manage to run around like a headless chicken creating excitement for myself by fannying about as much as possible and dithering wherever I can. This seems to create a sense of drama and makes me feel like I'm living a normal life. Albeit one without H&M, HMV, H. Samuel, and H out of Steps.
This week has been the same old fannying. Last weekend was our big thanksgiving weekend, and was in Abby's town, Shingo, which is 1 hour west of my town. Only I had to go to the Doctor's in Okayama Saturday morning, so it was the bus to Okayama on Friday night whereby I continued my psychotic hunt for fairy lights and failed because all bar three shops were shut. So I went to Fiona's, she cooked us tea and we put on a video but talked all the way through anyway. I remember informing her at one point that I'd got over the shopping thing, and didn't really need to buy much right now, other than Christmas presents. I did believe this when I said it, but within 12 hours I was in Tower Records buying two (not one, but two!) Kylie DVDs and the new Destiny's Child album. I wouldn't have gone to the shops you understand, but my Doctor's is near the shopping area and I had to go and pick up my plane tickets as well...
So, Fiona and I set off for Niimi, bumping into Jeremy (Christine's boyfriend who has recently moved to the city for work). We read the timetable for trains and decided to get off the next train at Kurashiki so that we could meet RayVon and she travel with us. So we got off the train, and 2 minutes later, RayVon was with us. Hurrah! Jolly hockey sticks, etc... And Hurrah! Jolly hockey sticks etc, there was another train withn 15 minutes. Eerybody onboard! Sorry Fiona, what did you say? We're getting off? OK. Oh, this one doesn't go to Niimi. Well, there be one in a couple of minutes. Let's check. Oh. Oh dear, that can't be right. There'll be one in 75 minutes. What are we going to do for 75 minutes? Oh, hurrah! Jolly hockey sticks etc... the vending machines sell alcohol!
And so started our first Thanksgiving. We were at the hall for an half hour preparing food, then an hour eating it (Leejay, Abby and English miss Amy had been theremost of the day and hordes had joined as we'd gone on, some bringing dishes, like ChoLyn and her excellent Pumpkin pie). After we'd eaten, we had to rush to clear out, as our party was in a community hall which closed at 6. Oops. So we carried on eating and drinking at Abby's and had great fun, but it all got a bit messy. Some evil, cruel person made a video of it and showed us the next day. I am never drinking again. It made my hair look awful.
Well, much of Sunday was spent recovering, cleaning up Abby's flat, and then cursing the highly efficient public transport system (efficient in as much as they don't waste time putting trains on the tracks). And eating. There was so much food left over and well, you can't waste it can you.
Right, I am leaving school now, so I will finish this at some point- maybe Sunday, maybe next week. Who knows? Who cares?
This week has been the same old fannying. Last weekend was our big thanksgiving weekend, and was in Abby's town, Shingo, which is 1 hour west of my town. Only I had to go to the Doctor's in Okayama Saturday morning, so it was the bus to Okayama on Friday night whereby I continued my psychotic hunt for fairy lights and failed because all bar three shops were shut. So I went to Fiona's, she cooked us tea and we put on a video but talked all the way through anyway. I remember informing her at one point that I'd got over the shopping thing, and didn't really need to buy much right now, other than Christmas presents. I did believe this when I said it, but within 12 hours I was in Tower Records buying two (not one, but two!) Kylie DVDs and the new Destiny's Child album. I wouldn't have gone to the shops you understand, but my Doctor's is near the shopping area and I had to go and pick up my plane tickets as well...
So, Fiona and I set off for Niimi, bumping into Jeremy (Christine's boyfriend who has recently moved to the city for work). We read the timetable for trains and decided to get off the next train at Kurashiki so that we could meet RayVon and she travel with us. So we got off the train, and 2 minutes later, RayVon was with us. Hurrah! Jolly hockey sticks, etc... And Hurrah! Jolly hockey sticks etc, there was another train withn 15 minutes. Eerybody onboard! Sorry Fiona, what did you say? We're getting off? OK. Oh, this one doesn't go to Niimi. Well, there be one in a couple of minutes. Let's check. Oh. Oh dear, that can't be right. There'll be one in 75 minutes. What are we going to do for 75 minutes? Oh, hurrah! Jolly hockey sticks etc... the vending machines sell alcohol!
And so started our first Thanksgiving. We were at the hall for an half hour preparing food, then an hour eating it (Leejay, Abby and English miss Amy had been theremost of the day and hordes had joined as we'd gone on, some bringing dishes, like ChoLyn and her excellent Pumpkin pie). After we'd eaten, we had to rush to clear out, as our party was in a community hall which closed at 6. Oops. So we carried on eating and drinking at Abby's and had great fun, but it all got a bit messy. Some evil, cruel person made a video of it and showed us the next day. I am never drinking again. It made my hair look awful.
Well, much of Sunday was spent recovering, cleaning up Abby's flat, and then cursing the highly efficient public transport system (efficient in as much as they don't waste time putting trains on the tracks). And eating. There was so much food left over and well, you can't waste it can you.
Right, I am leaving school now, so I will finish this at some point- maybe Sunday, maybe next week. Who knows? Who cares?
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