This year Kuniko asked me to help out at her school by teaching a short lesson to students that are considering enrolling next year. I taught a lesson last year, however this year they were expecting a lot more prospective students. The school had created a new mascot in an effort to market itself better and increase enrollment. The visitors to the school could get a free mascot key chain, and it did have a big effect on the amount of students.
I was doing a bingo game using the alphabet, and we had a pretty good turnout. Kuniko had provided plenty of help for the lesson – we had Iseno sensei, a younger female English teacher that is new to the school, and Risa, the daughter of another English teacher that is married to an American. Risa speaks both English and Japanese fluently and without accent so she could help us out quite a bit.
The games were fun but they did run a bit short. We had aimed for a 30 minute class, but the games finished up in about 15 minutes. Still, everyone seemed to have fun. English classes can be a little scary for the kids because they don’t know if they’ll have to speak English during the class in front of everyone else. We kept that to a minimum though, and gave out lots of cheesy prizes for the bingo winners.
After class Kuniko had to run but she put Risa and I together to go get some lunch. We decided on some curry and rice and sat down together in the crowded cafeteria. Risa is going to be fourteen soon, and she is pretty mature in terms of talking about the unique issues and challenges she faces living in Japan. Although she is half-Japanese and half-American she looks foreign here in Japan, and so she gets a lot of attention.
It was interesting for me to talk to her because although we share some things like standing out wherever we go, it was interesting to get her take on living in Japan and being partially Japanese. That is something I’ll never be able to experience, but perhaps my children will.
Anyway, we talked and talked and had some good laughs. We had some yakisoba and then it was time for me to hit the road. I picked up an embarrassingly large amount of cash payment and then walked down the hill and caught a train home.
Later I met Kuniko on the train and together we went to Higashi Kakogawa station. We met Mikyake sensei at the train station, and then it was on to Nozaki sensei’s for dinner. Miyake sensei had brought some food, we had brought some wine, and Nozaki sensei had cooked a feast. There were pasta shells stuffed with a tofu version of ricotta cheese, paella, stuffed mushrooms, a citrus and avocado salad, curried pork, and plenty of wine and beer to drink. It was fun for everyone to catch up. Nozaki sensei’s houseguest (a Japanese lady named Mika that is moving to America soon) told us about her trials and tribulations in losing paperwork that is required for her visit, and she asked us about how and when we decided to get married. All in all some lively conversation.
We walked back to the station with thunderstorms on the horizon, but they were going the other way and we made it home safe and dry. Next week it is back to the books for me, and I have a pretty full schedule of classes to teach.
