Joey in Japan

I’ve now been in the town of Shimizu for one whole week, and so far I love it. This town is, for lack of a better word, cute. Everything seems miniature size, even my house. I always have to duck underneath all the doorways. Japan was not designed for people over 6 feet.
I have about 2 weeks before I start teaching. The students are on there summer break, yet all us sensei’s are stuck at school with a variety of tasks. Lately I’ve been doing a lot of reading, and trying to brush up on my Japanese. Wow, I’ve forgotten how complex this language can be. I’ve memorized 2 out of 3 alphabets, and have almost no trouble understanding one of them, yet the third alphebet will take anyone a lifetime to learn. I think I’ve memorized around 50 or so characters out of 30,000+. You thought I was joking, didn’t you. Lately I’ve been working on my survival Japanese, which mostly entails being really really polite, and apologizing a lot. Japanese people often express gratitude through apology. Half of what I hear in the staff room is, excuse me, thank you, sorry, I apologise that I’m leaving earlier than you, excuse me as I enter the room, excuse me as I exit the room, etc. I feel like everyone must think I’m the rudest person ever for not knowing all the different time of when to say which one! There is also a lot of bowing. There’s three bows that I know; there’s the 30 degree bow, the 45 degree bow, and the 90 degree bow. The lower you bow is in accordance with how important the person your greeting is. For men, there hands have to be at there sides while they bow, and for women, its infront. Japanese people are amazing at it too. I said good afternoon to an oldman working in his garden, and he was still able to do an amazing bow while crouching in the dirt. I don’t think I’ve shaken one Japanese persons hand since I’ve gotten here.

Since I’ve gotten to Japan, I’ve constantly, yet inadvertently, been comparing this experience with my teaching experience in Indonesia. About 4 years ago, I went to Indonesia for one year to teach English to Elementary school students. I have been reflecting a lot on my Indonesian experience and am so impressed with the way that I had survived at 19 years old, with no teaching experience, and not having lived abroad by myself before. At the time, I was living with two girls, both from Winnipeg. I now realize what a blessing this truly was. I don’t know how I would have survived that year without having someone else to speak English to, and the fact that they were both from my city was a plus. Looking back, I also can begin to appreciate the things that I have here in Japan. My main school is only 2 minutes walking distance from me, which is awesome. In Indonesia, I would sometimes take an hour in a half to get to school in the morning. I would also have to wait for my housemates to finish their classes, at different schools, so I would wait in the hot car with my driver until they were finished, which was sometimes 2 hours, and then it would be another hour in a half to get home.
I will be teaching at 2 other schools in the next towns once a week, yet I think that I will be taking a train there. I am hoping that this won’t be too much of a problem in the winter. Hokkaido apparently receives a lot of snow in the winter months, and can get pretty cold, yet compared to Winnipeg, it’ll feel like spring!
I have also taken by bike with me to Japan. This has been awesome for getting around, buying the things I need for my house, and just seeing and experiencing the amazing landscape here. In Indonesia, I bought a brand new bike for around 50 Canadian dollars, which was also great for getting around on, yet it just wasn’t the same. I think that’s what really compelled me to bring my own bike this time. No regrets!
As far as housing goes, I’m really content. Its quite a bit bigger than I expected, and actually pretty big for a Japanese house (for one person anyways). I have a living room, shower room, toilet room, kitchen connecting to the living room, and three bedrooms, all lined with tatami mats. They are traditional Japanese (washitsu) rooms, with the exception that there are no traditional paper windows (Shōji). To make the room complete, I bought a Japanese style futon. This isn’t like the futons that we’re used to at home where the couch folds down into a bed. Instead it’s just a foldable mattress that lays on the tatami mat floor. Tatami is amazing by the way. If you ever want to cover a floor in anything, tatami is the way to go.
The staff at my school have been very friendly and helpful. So far I’ve met the music teacher, two of the English teachers that I will be teaching with, the agriculture teacher (I didn’t know you could take agriculture in high school…) the Japanese teacher, the calligraphy teacher, the home economics teacher, she’s hot! (did I just say that?), and the science teacher, who sits beside me and loves trying to have conversations with me, despite our lack of comprehension in each others respective languages. Tomorrow I will be going to the town hall to introduce myself and tell everyone how great I am… We’ll, maybe not the latter, cus I’m not that good at Japanese yet…