Heading to a seminar in Osaka Sunday morning generally isn’t my idea of fun. It usually doesn’t hold a lot of promise for me as a day of entertainment. But sometimes, things work out well.
Nozaki sensei asked me to attend the seminar on teaching English to young children, but apologized that it was being held on Sunday from 10-3. I didn’t mind, but I got up that morning pretty early, and dragged my sleepy ass to the train station – something I haven’t done in a long time.
The ride into Osaka was about an hour long, and from the station it was about a 15 minute walk to the building where the seminar was being held. On the way I walked under the Umeda Sky Building. Directly underneath they were setting up for a concert and what turned out to be a Hawaiian Fair. There were quite a few people wearing Hawaiian shirts, and it looked like they were even setting up some barbecues. I was already looking forward to my lunch break.
I was a little nervous walking into the seminar building because it looked like more of a designer studio/karaoke bar. I did find a sign on the outside saying that I was in the right place, so I went in and followed to signs to the seminar room.
I had imagined a very large venue, with about a hundred attendees. I was talking with Kuniko earlier, hoping out loud that there would be at least one other foreign teacher in the group so I wouldn’t stick out so much.
Unfortunately it was a very small venue, a group of only 10 teachers, all female, and they were all really nervous having me there. The teachers were all private teachers, used to teaching in a classroom usually based in their home, and so seeing me there made them think really hard about their English. They didn’t know me, so they didn’t know if I’d suddenly stand up and shout “You mispronounced “mouse”! What kind of teacher are you?”
I was able to restrain myself throughout the seminar, and luckily the seminar instructor was really professional and did a great job. She came over and asked me if I was OK to do the seminar mainly in Japanese. Nice of her to ask my permission. The whole point of the seminar was to use “all English” in the classroom, so there was a lot of English spoken that day.
The teachers in the class warmed up to me little by little, and there was something about having everyone dance together while “wiggling your hips” that bonded us a little bit. Most of the seminar was about teaching English to the youngest students, so we had a lot of singing, gestures, dancing and goofing around. The seminar instructor knew all the dance moves and was really entertaining to watch. Unfortunately for me it wasn’t about watching – more about participating. We would often play the role of the student, and so we’d be pretending like we were three year olds, and acting appropriately.
We had a one hour break for lunch, so I walked over to the Sky Building with seven of the other teachers. The place was packed with people, and on stage they had lots of people dancing traditional Hawaiian dances. The tents were serving up Hawaiian food, and one tent even had Hawaiian beer. I was excited to try some new foods.
The other teachers in my group looked around and decided that it was too sunny, too noisy, and they started looking for a traditional family restaurant where they could eat safe, familiar Japanese food. Come on ladies, do you want to live forever? I told them that I’d see them back at the seminar and waded into the crowd.
It turned out to be a great decision. I ordered up a BBQ chicken fajita at a stand that was also selling Kona beer. I didn’t order a beer (the sacrifices I make for work) but I talked to one of the employees about where I could buy some in Japan. A long time ago Carrefour had them for a while, but then they disappeared. At 400 yen a bottle (about $3) they are expensive, but pretty good compared to the usual beers I find.
The guy didn’t know anything about where to buy Kona beer, but he was a cool guy and we chatted for a while. I think he was just a student being paid to sell stuff. Note to Kona Brewery: train your employees better. I headed over by the park and sat down on a bench and watched the dancers for a while. Everywhere people were walking around and I got a big culture shock when I smiled at a bunch of hula dancers walking by – instead of giggling and walking away they giggled and walked over. Turned out they were actually from Hawaii and in town for this festival as part of some community group in Hawaii. There were 12 girls all together, mostly in their twenties. I talked with them for a while and it was nice to use English at full speed after the first few hours of the seminar.
I wished them a good time in Osaka and gave them a few things to try (okonomiyaki and takoyaki), and then they headed backstage to get ready for their dance. Since it was my big chance to eat more Hawaiian food I went back to another booth and ordered a “Hawaiian burger” that was like a fat pita roll, filled with potatoes with some kind of yogurt sauce, spicy ground beef, salsa, and a big slice of spam. Yum. To top it all off I got a shaved ice from two bikini wearing sisters that were attracting a crowd of horny men.
So it was time to head back to the seminar, and I’d be lying if I told you that I didn’t think about skipping the second half of “wiggling my hips” with a bunch of nervous older women. The temptation of hanging out backstage with my new hula dancing Hawaiian friends was great, but in the end of course I went back, and settled in for the rest of the afternoon.
The rest of the seminar went well, and I think I picked up some good tips. The seminar was run by the publisher of some of the textbooks, so of course they want you to buy and use their textbooks for your classes. Some of the ideas were nice general ideas, and so I think it was a pretty positive experience.
After it ended at three o’clock I found that I was the only one heading out the door. The other teachers were sitting around socializing and I really felt like an outsider then. I thanked the organizers of the seminar, and headed back to the station.
In order to get there I had to cut through the Sky Building once more, and this time the place was even more crowded with people watching the dancing and drinking the beer. As I walked through the crowd I felt a hand on my arm, and when I looked back there was a couple of guys holding TV cameras and asking for an interview. One of the guys I recognized from the Kona beer booth – I guess he had vouched for me.
I said sure, so we stopped in the middle of the crowd, right in front of a food booth and we did an impromptu interview. They asked about where I was from, what I was doing, and some background questions. I just joked around with the interviewer for a while – it was fun.
During the interview I talked with the guy that I had recognized from the Kona beer booth, and I told him how much I liked his beer, and said that we should go back there and have one. He misunderstood, and bought me a beer from the stand right next to us – a Suntory lager. So they filmed me drinking a cold beer, and I gulped that thing down in two swallows. It hit the spot after the long seminar.
Nothing attracts a crowd like a TV crew, and before long a group of people were standing around trying to figure out if I was famous or not, and we started to create a traffic jam. Two of the girls that I had met from Hawaii earlier came walking by and said hello, and I tried to pawn them off on the interviewer, but they were smart and kept moving. Finally we wrapped it up and I told them I had to hit the road. They offered more beer, and it was tempting but I declined.
On the way home I stopped at the bookstore and bought the new Dick Francis paperback book and Candy Land (the board game) to play with my students sometime. From there it was an hour long train ride home. I met up with Kuniko on the train, and we came back and had cheese, crackers, beer and wine for dinner.
It turned out to be quite a day, and a lot more fun than I expected it to be. This week will kind of pale in comparison, but I gotta bring home the bucks…
