Today all of the teachers were at school, because we had a mandatory meeting at 10 a.m. Some of the teachers I hadn’t seen in a long time, and so it was nice to catch up with everyone. Mr. Kimura came in, and he looked pretty bad. His mother passed away just before the holidays, and now his household is just him, his brother, and his father. Mr. Kimura was lamenting the fact that there are no women in the house, and I think that is a big problem for their family. Women are seen as the natural caretakers of the home, and the Kimura family males are now having to do that for themselves. I suppose that if you have never had to do it your whole life, it must come as a bit of a shock. Regardless, you could definitely tell that Mr. Kimura’s head was somewhere else.
During our meeting, we were told that we will have two new students starting here in the middle of the school year – they are identical twins from Tokyo. All the teachers got a big laugh – I guess they are a bit of a handful, and it will be interesting to see how everyone deals with them.
After the meeting, several teachers geared up to go out to lunch. As we were getting ready one of my ESS students came in and was getting yelled at by her homeroom teacher. It was weird, but I felt like I wanted to help her out. I know that she probably deserved it, and I’m sure she was expecting it, but I just felt like I should do something to show her that it was going to be OK, even if it was only a smile from across the room. In the end I didn’t do anything – when you can’t understand the situation at all, it’s probably best not to get involved.
After a big lunch I spent the next hour or so kicking around the teacher’s room. Miss Kageyama came in at Mr. Hayashi’s request to go over some homework, and she looked terrible. She said that she wasn’t feeling well, and she looked it. I chatted with her a little while, but her heart wasn’t in it. We were supposed to go out for a movie tomorrow, but I’m not sure that will happen – she may need some time to get over whatever is ailing her.
After work, I met Yasu at the yakitori, and boy can he eat. He ordered eight different dishes, and we washed them down with beers. The yakitori was dead, so the master appreciated the business. We talked about all kinds of things – Yasu is planning on taking the English STEP test this month, so he’s been practicing his English very hard. I gave him some good practice tonight, and I hope it helped him out.
Tomorrow is the big assembly for the students to welcome them to their next term, and after that they will go home. I’m stuck at school doing nothing in particular until three or four p.m. I’m planning on creating some lessons and then decorating my classroom a bit. Woo hoo!
