This week the third year teachers are writing examinations for the third year students. The students will start to take examinations at the beginning of next month, and there will be a graduation ceremony at the end of February. There is a lot of pressure on the third year students to do well on the tests and get out of school.
In order to prevent students from “discovering” examinations laying around on teacher’s desks, the teacher’s office is closed to students. Usually students are running around all over the teacher’s office, asking teacher’s for advice or following up on homework. It’s no quieter with the students gone – the students open one of the doors, lean inside, and try to get the attention of their teacher. If the teacher happens to sit far away, then they have to ask a teacher sitting near the door to go get them.
That’s where I come in.
I sit right next to the door – as soon as you walk into the teacher’s room there I am. Usually the students lean in, see me, and then try to get some other teacher’s attention. Today one of my students leaned in and asked me in English to come over. This was a first!
I walked over and she and her friend consulted briefly with each other before asking me where their teacher was. I answered, explaining where he went, and they left, satisfied with my answer. I was pretty happy – finally somebody had the courage to ask me, and in English no less. Nice.
Miss Yamamoto did some shopping for snacks and she found TimTams at the store next door. Some of the people on our trip to Australia had brought back tons of these things – they are apparently one of the things that Australia is known for. I tried one, and it was really good – very sweet and tasting similar to s’mores. Here they were available right next door to our school the whole time.
A good day today, but I am very tired every day after school. I think it might be the mysterious drugs that my doctor has me on – since I’m over the pain I figure I’ll ditch the rest of the drugs and get on with my life.
