I am from the city of Corumbus in the state of Oreo

Last week the students had exams every day. That was great because I didn't have to teach and had plenty of time to plan this week's lessons and study Japanese. The exams, however, did not go so well. Most of the students did not study at all it seems. And if they had studied, English would not have been at the top of the list. There are good reasons for this though. A day in the life of one of my students would go something like this:

Go to school at 7:00 or 7:30 am to practice his/her club activity. Club activities here are generally sports, but can also be kimono club or English club. That last one is kind of a joke because only four students belong to the club, and only one ever shows up. Yet we still try and meet twice a week. Every student counts apparently.

Practice club activity until 8:15 when school begins. Classes end at 3:10, followed by a 10 minute break, then cleaning for 20 minutes. Yes, I said cleaning. At most Japanese schools the students do the cleaning. This includes sweeping, cleaning the bathrooms, and taking out the trash. One of my extra duties is to act as a "volunteer" to help the students with the trash. It is very complicated here and has to be separated into five or six different bins, which include burnables like food waste and paper; plastic bottles; cellophane and similar plastics; metals; and glass. I help make sure that burnable trash is not put into the bins for plastic, etc. Not my favorite thing, but whatever.

After cleaning go to club activity and practice until 8:30 or 9:00 pm. Students are at school for 13-14 hours during the week! Even on the weekend they generally go to school to practice their club activity or have a match.

After club activity, go home and maybe study. But what probably happens is that they eat, take a bath, and go to bed. They seem to be exhausted every day and for good reason. They are at school for so long that they generally don't have time to study and, as I said before, if they did English would not be at the top of the list. You're required to pass an English exam to get accepted to a university in Japan, but 75% of the students at my school won't go on to university. So not only is English not a priority, but it's a pain in the butt and is being forced upon them for no reason.

So, back to my test... My students are at a fairly low level of English comprehension, so I have to make my lessons and tests fairly easy. As I was grading the tests I realized that a couple of the questions were a bit too hard, so I felt kind of bad. But the other questions were not and I was very disappointed in the overall scores.

The test material included my self-introduction and greetings from around the world. One of my self-intro questions was "Kate is from the city of Columbus in the state of Ohio." The "l" in Columbus and the "hi" in Ohio were left blank. Students had to fill in the letters. These sounds, especially the "l," are very difficult for them. Still, I thought that this question wasn't too hard since most of the word had been given to them. I was wrong because quite a few students left that question blank or gave the wrong answer. The funniest answer was "Kate is from the city of Corumbus in the state of Oreo."

One of the greetings from around the world questions included a map of the world with a few countries numbered, including the US. Students had to label the US and a few of them could not do this. Instead they labeled it as Canada, South America, and even Tibet. I was baffled as to why 100% of them did not answer the question correctly. I guess that kids can be ignorant everywhere because many American students probably can't point to Japan on a map.

We'll see how the next test goes...

Let them eat pancakes!

I had my first visitors a week ago when my sister's friends made a stop in Kanazawa. (See pic below with two guys on the left.) I had never met either of them before, but agreed to meet up with them for dinner and what turned into a fun night of karaoke. I can't believe I typed those words, but yes, I did have fun at karaoke. I won't sing by myself, but will scream along to "Say It Ain't So" and "Total Eclipse of the Heart" when prodded.



My friends and I took them to an okonomiyake restaurant for dinner. Okonomiyake are Japanese "pancakes," but are nothing like American pancakes. These are made of flour, water, shredded cabbage, ginger, egg, and the meat, seafood, vegetables, or tofu of your choice. They are so yummy and it's fun to show newcomers how to make them.

One of my friends will show you step-by-step how they're made:



First grease up the grill, then mix your ingredients thoroughly, otherwise your pancakes will taste like crap. We found this out the hard way our first time.





Then put half of your mixture on the grill with your meat, seafood, or in my case tofu, next to it. You can see an egg is also cooking next to one of the pancakes. This was a bit premature and is not recommended until after the pancake is nearly finished.





Next put your cooked meat, etc., on top of the cooking mixture, followed by the remaining mixture.





Make sure your pancake is nearly ready on both sides, then cook the egg next to it. When the egg is ready, put it on top of the pancake, then top with a soy-based brown sauce and mayonnaise. (I skip the mayo because I am not of fan, especially of the Japanese kind.)

I'm a believer in the problem solving powers of Starbucks

I never frequented Starbucks while at home, but have found myself there quite a bit since arriving in Japan. There seems to be one on every block in the city center (just like home) and it's become a super convenient meeting place. The workers at one particular Starbucks also seem to have the ability to solve a variety of problems—even though they barely speak English and most of my friends and I barely speak Japanese.

I went to a furniture store last weekend to buy a few things so I wouldn't feel like I was living in some guy's apartment, which I basically am since the last couple teachers in my position were men, and the apartment and the crap in it have been passed down with the job. (By crap, I do mean crap, but will get to that in another post.)

My friends and I do not have cars and are at the mercy of public transportation or our bikes. This can be a problem when purchasing large objects or just a lot of stuff, which we did at this place. One friend can speak Japanese fairly well, so she was able to arrange to have our stuff delivered. Amazingly I only had to pay $9 for that service! It was worth it, except for the hassle a couple days later when all of my stuff was delivered except for a large mirror. I was able to speak enough Japanese to communicate that the mirror was missing and understand that I had to call a number the next day to sort it out.

So I left my apartment to meet friends for dinner. We were meeting at Starbucks, of course, and I received a phone call from a man who did not speak English right before I arrived. I told him in Japanese that I did not speak Japanese and he, in turn, told me in English that he did not speak English. We weren't able to communicate anything else, but he would not hang up. I arrived at Starbucks while on the phone with him, passed the phone to my friend who does not speak Japanese either, then started asking everyone there if they spoke English. One high school student said he spoke a little, but wasn't able to help after I passed him the phone.

Finally a Starbucks employee who spoke a "little English" came over. I gave him the phone and hallelujah! he was able to translate enough to tell me that another driver had shown up at my apartment with the mirror and wanted to know when I would be home. We sorted out a time and I was able to get my mirror that night.

The moral of the story is that not being able to speak the language of the country you're living in stinks, but fear not! Starbucks may be an evil organization in some ways, but can help with much more than coffee. This is not the first time Starbucks has saved the day. And I'm sure it won't be the last.