On our commute to work today one of the trains was delayed, so I had to find an alternate train from Sannomiya to Nishinomiya. The Hanshin line that I take has quite an array of different trains to choose from, but I found a special train that bypassed some stations and got me to school just ten minutes later than my usual time.
I had a light day at work Friday – just three classes. Soon we’ll finish with the self-introduction classes, and then I’ll be teaching new material with the teachers. I’m looking forward to that, not only because it is more interesting, but also because I’ll get to see exactly what each teacher expects my role to be in the classroom.
Things were pretty busy all day, so I didn’t have much time to study or to walk around chatting with students. Next week will be really busy – I have 21 classes. The teacher average is around 16 classes, but when you consider that the teachers are doing almost all of the planning, I think I’ll be OK. I’ll be teaching the third year students for the first time next week, and I’m looking forward to that.
After school I hustled back home, and then went on to Kakogawa to meet up with some ex-coworkers from Takasago Minami. There were teachers that I hadn’t seen in a very long time, and it was good to catch up with everyone. I spent most of my time drinking with Ageishi sensei and Matsumoto sensei – two really nice guys that are always nice to me. It was a good workout for my Japanese, although I’m sure I made lots of mistakes.
Kuniko came after she got off work, so we sat around (at different tables) and talked with everyone. The food was pretty good, and I wanted to eat a lot more of the om-soba they served – so good!
I also talked with Obara sensei, who is going to get married pretty soon. We’ll be going to her wedding, and I’m looking forward to seeing it. She was fun to talk to – she seems like a really nice person.
I took some pictures while we were all sitting around, you can see them here.
We left around eleven o’clock, and headed home on JR. Kuniko has to go into work for a little while on Saturday and Sunday, so we headed right home and went to bed. Tomorrow I need to hang out around the house to take delivery of the TV, so it should be a mellow day.
