my last two and a half weeks

so a ton of stuff has been going on lately, but very briefly:

- Two and a half weeks ago on a Sunday, i left my island for the first time since my arrival to go to Nagasaki city for Prefectural Orientation. i was in the city till Sunday, but in that time, i had a chance to see a "big city" for a little bit, meet a few more JETs in my prefecture, see the Nagasaki Peace Museum, visit a Uniqlo (only my favorite clothing store in the world), and fall in love with the Nagasaki Harbor. most people probably don't find it all that impressive, but i dont know... i love harbors. just the way the water glittered during the day... how the lights of the surrouding buildings reflected off of it at night... i know i sound cheesy, but there's just something i find very romantic about that place. Being that it was an orientation, it was of course boring and quite useless at times, but hey, my Board of Education treated me to a free trip to the mainland. I'm not complaining =)

- After returning from Nagasaki on Tuesday, my boss/supervisor picked me up from the airport, and in that car ride, i discovered that i got 3 extra days of vacation in the month of August like many of the other Nagasaki JETs. we get 20 days of vacation time throughout the year, but these 3 days are in addition to that. If we didn't take it, we'd lose it (it had to be taken before the end of August). So, deciding to be wild and spontaneous, i decided at the last minute to take off Mon-Wed last week and head back to the mainland (Kyushu that is) to explore Kumamoto prefecture with a friend.　during my 5 day vacation (i left Saturday morning after only returning from Nagasaki on Tuesday evening), i saw Kumamoto Castle (still think Himeji Castle is my favorite), Kurokawa Onsen (a town made for Japanese style vacations.. nothing but traditional hotels and hot springs there... very beautiful, but only go if you're willing to spend A LOT of money for quality relaxation), and Aso Mountain (Japan's largest active volcano). Afterwards, we visited Unzen in Nagasaki, which is known for its hot springs as well, and also known for Hell. Yes, that's what i said. I've been to Hell (har har har). The place reeks of sulfur and is damn hot. I'm pretty sure people set up the place because it definitely has an eerie Hell-ish feel to it, and there's steam constantly rising from the ground. Charming really. No worries, pictures of Hell are coming soon. On my last day, we headed back up to Fukuoka so i could catch my ferry back home. I ended up getting back at my island around 1:10am, and as luck has always been on my side, i had to walk 20 minutes in the rain back to my apartment, lugging a rolling suitcase behind me, with my hooded sweatshirt hiding my misery, and my capri pants and three dollar shoes getting soaked to the core.

- In the few days i was back on my island between the time i came back from Nagasaki and left for Kumamoto, i started visiting each of my 15 schools. I have 11 elementary and 4 junior high schools in total. i got through about 11 or 12 schools in those three days, and i visited the remaining ones once i returned from Kumamoto last week. My poor boss played chauffer to 14 of those 15 schools, and let me tell you, it is no joke driving out to my schools. if you look at a map (which i know you won't =P), i sort of live on the northeastern side of my "town", my town which is the southern end of the island. however, Tsushima being 89% forests and mountains, that translates to 1) many many windy mountainous roads, 2) many very very NARROW roads (the "two-way" mountain roads have no median, about as wide as maybe a freeway lane in the US, and "gaijin traps" on generally one side of the road which are these 2 foot deep ditches all along the side of the road for what i can only guess is collecting rain water), and 3) me having to spend a lot of time traveling to each of my schools since several are 20-50 minutes away. The upside to visiting all my schools with my boss is that i got to see a lot of Izuhara scenery, Izuhara being my town in Tsushima the city. The downside was that i went to so many schools in such a short time, that i have no idea which school is which in my head, and no idea which teachers i've "met" already.

- Last Friday. Tsushima ALTs gathering! 8 of the 9 of us ALTs got together in Mitsushima (neighboring town) at a beer garden and ate ram meat and veggies. Surprisingly very good. Afterwards, we migrated to Izuhara (my town) for the Second Party, where we went to a snack bar to karaoke and get very wasted. Cheapskate i am, i chose to keep my 10 bucks and save getting plastered for another day.

- Saturday. Sylvia, an ALT two towns over, and David, my fellow Izuhara ALT, spontaneously dropped by my house asking me if i wanted to go swimming. Sure, what the hell! So we went down to Tsu Tsu where two of my schools are to check out the southernmost point in Tsushima, then went to Ayumodoshi Park (i've posted pictures of them before) to swim in the freshwater pool. Soooo refreshing to swim there. Cool water, no salt or chlorine in my eyes.... wonderful wonderful.

- Then there was this Monday. My first day at school! I visited one of my "base schools" called Izuhara Junior High School, which is the largest junior high in Tsushima at 234 students. All junior highs in Japan have 3 grades and are called first years, second years, and third years. High school is also 3 years, so junior high would be our american 7th through 9th grade, and high school would be 10th through 12th. So get this: Friday was the first day of the 2nd semester for all Tsushima students, and they all just got back from their summer vacations. Guess what many did on Friday, Monday, or Tuesday (or some combination of the three)? Take tests! Each junior high student had to get tested on 5 subjects (japanese, english, math, history, and social studies). i inquired as to whether or not students took tests at the end of the first semester. apparently they do. then what are these tests for? "To make sure they did their summer homework. And they had a LOT of summer homework," said my Japanese Teacher of English (JTE). Sooo, since my Monday school had to take tests all day, all i did was give my brief English introduction in front of the entire student body with my JTE translating my speech each step of the way (i'm trying to hide the fact that i can speak Japanese for as long as possible... i hear that once students know you can speak Japanese, they refuse to try speaking in English). As the teachers walked into the teachers room where i was camped out for the day, they kept saying "Gambatte kudasai" in reference to my speech in the morning. Honestly, after all the presentations and school plays and speeches i've been forced to do throughout my life, standing in front of 250 odd people was really no big deal. and plus, after watching both GTO and Gokusen which are about untraditional teachers in Japan, i sort of had an idea what it would be like to stand in front of what looks like lines of soldiers all perfectly spaced out and dressed the same perfectly groomed way. I can honestly say that not for a second was i nervous about my speech, even though my JTE was nervous about talking in front of everyone (although you'd think that she wouldn't be since everyone knows her and she stands in front of the classroom everyday...). I think i've finally purged stage fright out of my system. yay me!

- Day 2: Sasu Junior High. About 40 minutes from my home. out of 6 periods, i got to go to 3, where i did my self introduction for the entire period. That's right. all about me for 50 minutes. Times 3. I was quite sick of talking about myself by the end of the day, but then i realized i have to do this at least 20 more times, so hey, better stay positive about being myself, right? heh. I mainly got blank stares from them, but i have to admit, everyone's attention was peaked when i put up pictures of arnold schwarzenegger during his body building days and the logo for the Hanshin Tigers followed by pictures of Akahoshi. That's right kids -- you know you love Akahoshi too!!

- Day 3 (today): Sasu Junior High. Today was the first day of covering actual ground in English. I had prepared questions for this Baseball Game my JTE described. Kinda complicated, but it makes the students practice spelling, filling in the blank, and translation. All in all, very fun for both teachers and students alike. All three classes were in the morning, and lunch was right after. Now, my biggest challenge for the last three days has been finding ways to get my students to talk to me, especially during lunch when i'm eating with them. They've in large part ignored me. SInce this was my second day at this school, and each student (the entire student body is only 46 people) came up and shook my hand after saying their name at the beginning of each class, i felt like it'd be more likely for them to strike up a conversation with me. right? wrong. Refusing to go home a failure today, i chose to be more aggressive and just walk up to people and try to get them to talk to me. Using mainly the "your name is ___, right?" tactic, i got people to stop and actually try to communicate with me. By the end of the lunch hour, i had found several favorite students because they persevered and communicated with me when they thought i couldn't speak any japanese (muahaha). yay them!

Tomorrow, or should i say today, is my first day at elementary schools. I'll be visiting two today, including my smallest school at *drumroll*..... 4 students!! Absurd, don't you think? 4 is the smallest, followed by 6, then 8. yup. i think i'm going to really get to know those students. All the better! Bed time. I'll be putting pictures up soon. Look out for them!

--Evelyn