First Day at School

Hey everyone,

So, these past couple of weeks have been pretty boring. Mind-numbing, actually.  It's difficult to sit around thinking of lesson-planning ideas when all I want to do is leave school because I'm the only one at work. Well, yesterday and today were different! Yesterday I finished my introduction lesson plan and showed it to one of my JTE's (Japanese Teacher of English, these are the people whom I will be working with) and she thought the students would like it. I also showed it to one of the other JTEs today (my caretaker/supervisor who I don't teach with) and she seemed happy about it as well. Japanese adults don't seem very animated...so I wonder how they act in the classroom. There's one really genki (energetic) teacher who the students love! It makes me wonder how the students receive this behavior. Do they like it? Or do they probably not care and sleep through the class regardless of whether I'm uber-genki or not?

Today, I had to make 2 speeches in front of people! I went to the early morning teacher's meeting at 8:30 and was seated next to the Kyoto-sensei (vice-principal). He made his speech and then asked me to introduce myself. My caretaker told me to make the speeches very short...30 seconds or less ("The shorter the better"), so I introduced myself, they clapped, and went along with the meeting!  I could understand much less than 50% of the conversation...I need to study more :/

After that, I went downstairs and filled out a bunch of paperwork regarding my passport issues while the students were cleaning the halls. I didn't go outside to check what they were cleaning, but the cleaning process seemed loud!! Lots of clanking sounded like it was coming from a huge machine. I'll go outside to check next time for sure. But after cleaning was over, I had to go to the gym for the second term opening ceremony.

The second term opening ceremony started with the school song...and everyone sang! I felt kinda awkward just standing there not singing because I didn't know the lyrics or melody.  o_o;; After the song was over, everyone sat down and Kyoto-sensei made a long speech. He said something about the US landing on Mars and something about looking for alien life. Or not. I heard "uchujin" which is alien, so I'm guessing they were talking about that for a little bit. I wasn't paying attention because I was nervous about speaking on the stage in front of that many students haha... Anyways, time went by and they announced the section where they were going to introduce the new ALT. I followed Kyoto-sensei onto the stage and he had prepared a speech about me! He said my full name, where I'm from, hobbies, etc. It was kinda awkward...he said my full name and then the students started smiling and talking to other students around them.  Maybe they like my name? I blame Fullmetal Alchemist for making my last name popular in Japan... But yeah, everyone seemed interested in my soccer tidbits and the fact that I liked anime/manga! After he talked about me, I had to give a short 30 second or less speech about myself into the microphone. It was terrifying, but everyone clapped after I was done haha I went back to my seat and my caretaker told me I did a good job as I almost fell over in my chair. Once clumsy, always clumsy, I guess ^_^;

I talked with the JTE that I'm team-teaching the 3rd years with, and he seemed really nice! He also majored in Linguistics and seemed to have worked a lot with English Literature. I had to give him the outline for my introductory lesson and soon had to work on the next couple of lesson plans. Making lesson plans is kinda difficult... =/ While I was trying to make some on the school computer, I heard some students talking about how the Kyoto-sensei called out my name. So, I heard "KRISTIN ELIZABETH ARMSTRONG" being yelled in the halls...it was kinda creepy. I hope they weren't making too much fun of me ^^;  I felt like a celebrity after the meeting...students said hi back to me enthusiastically, and one girl kinda squealed/giggled after I said hi to her! It was cute! :] It seems the students recognize me now, and they were talking about me even after the ceremony had long passed. At least they know my name! Most of them are gonna have to deal with me for the whole year! :P

That's it for now...I've gotta get back to lesson-planning. I'll write again later!  :]

P.S.  Ah, I forgot! I was supposed to have classes tomorrow, but they got cancelled. Yay!  xD  So my first time teaching is next Monday....and I'm terrified! But it should be fun :]

More Pictures!

 The climb up to Komagatake

 It was tiring, but not even close to how tiring Yosemite was...

 Signs at Nakadake (a little over the halfway point)

 Stack of rocks

 More rocks...(what a beautiful sky)

 Nakadake

 Strange bug (there are many strange bugs in Japan...)

 More signs (top one says Nakadake)

 The fog

 Liz and another rock shrine

 Camp grounds between Nakadake and Komagatake

 The hike down

 More fog

 It was some pretty thick fog...

 A map of the hiking routes in the area

 People hiking up

 Our hike back

 Tiger lilies!  (I think...)

 Near the beginning/end of the hike

 Near the beginning/end of the hike

 Seriously...the fog was freaky!!

 Ice along the trail!

 The hike down was kinda scary...one wrong move and you're falling down the mountain...

 People on the hike down

 The hike back down

 帰りを待っている人がいる！パンプキンです！^___^

The little kid that Liz and I made faces at on the bus ride back from our hike.  We were all having fun!  :)

Tenryu River (again)

Zenkoji Temple in Nagano City

 The Nagano Prefectural office (Kencho)

 Matsuri lanterns at Zenkoji Temple

 A story of a tanuki who turned into a monk!  (or was it the other way around...?)

 More of Zenkoji Temple

 Uma at Zenkoji (prayer cards)

 Our Scavenger Hunt group!  (consisting of Chris, Sarah, Helen, me, and 4 really nice high school girls who helped us out!)

 View from the highest point at Zenkoji

 Michelin Man shrine I found on the way back home from Nagano City

 Morning Glory flowers!  One of my favorites!  :)

 Let's keep the river clean!

A river I found while getting lost today

 Same river near a traditional house

 What a view!

Last picture I took before getting completely lost and confused...

Hey everyone!

Here are some pictures of the trips I've taken around my city and Nagano City, where I went for an All-Nagano JET orientation. It was long, but it wasn't too boring, which was nice. I got to talk and hang out with some high school girls during a scavenger hunt. With my poor Japanese and their simple English, we got along well :) It was interesting to get a sneak-peek of how the age group I'm gonna be teaching soon acts in a group!

Well, that's it for now! I'll update later! :)

Despair

Hi everyone,

Today, my supervisor and I went to a pretty good Nepalese food restaurant and I ordered a really big meal. I got halfway through and I was stuffed. My supervisor noticed that I was full and told me to "take my time". Was this a warning to finish all of my food, even if it took a long time?  ... =/  After I told her that I want to take the food back with me to eat for dinner, she asked if she could try some of my cheese naan. I said ok and asked her if she wanted to try my curry so she wouldn't have to eat the cheese naan all by itself. She took my curry and I looked away for like, one second, and she had eaten the entire big slice of cheese naan and had practically finished all of my curry! She also asked me if my chicken was good and asked me if she could try it.  A little bit wary, I said, sure, you can try it! ...She then proceeded to eat the entire chicken drumstick, cleaning all of the meat off of the bone!

........

Well, there went my hope for leftovers.

Is this normal in Japan? I don't want other people to "try" my food when I want it for myself later (especially when it's expensive food)!!!  >___>;;; I don't understand what just happened, but I now understand that Japan isn't big on taking leftovers home...

Anyways, so I managed to get my bank account today!!  Yay!

Not! This was the only good thing that happened today and they JUST took that one away from me minutes ago as I'm typing this message.

絶望.....

I was unable to buy a cell phone today because we just discovered that my passport has my name misspelled. Not only do I feel like an idiot for not noticing this for 5 years, I am baffled that no one else has noticed this! I went to Japan, Costa Rica, and even got my Japanese Work Visa with this passport and no one even raised an eyebrow...

The bank let me open an account and gave me a bank card, even though they noticed my misspelled name. They called my supervisor moments ago to let her know that they need to change my name back to "Armstong" until my passport is changed....

For now, I get my salary in cash, and I've gotta apply for an emergency passport (which must be bought new, since Japan doesn't do passport name amendments/corrections for free anymore)?!

Ugh...I feel so stupid... ; _ ;

Komagatake Ropeway

Hey everyone!

Sorry I haven't posted in a while...things have gotten quite busy lately!

I've spent a lot of my time buying groceries and home supplies. Although my apartment was supposed to be 'furnished', I've had to buy a lot more things than I thought I'd need to buy. Such insanely high start-up costs! >.< To combat this, I've found that dollar stores are the best place to buy miscellaneous goods, although they are also dangerous because you often feel the need to buy stuff that you don't really need there. The 100 yen store in my area is 2 stories tall! So...much...interesting junk...

And I don't know if you guys saw the other video, but I did get a futon! I'm not sleeping on the ground anymore (although it really wasn't all that uncomfortable). Emma took me out to go get that futon and my temporary residence paper (juminhyou). It's so nice that she's willing to go out of her way to help all of the ALTs in Southern Nagano while we're settling in. She said she knows it's difficult living before you get your cell phones (etc) sorted out.

Later that day, I had my first enkai (work party). It was to welcome me and to say thank you to my predecessor, Steven.  The food was good and it was an all-you-can drink (nomihoudai). I mostly had non-alcoholic beverages, although I did try wine. I didn't know wine was so strong...not enough to get me buzzed, but enough to know that it would be potentially dangerous if I had more haha Anyways, after eating, there were lots of toasts and moving speeches (possibly alcohol-fueled). One of my co-workers, Kasahara-sensei, was very emotional! I think she's really gonna miss Steven. Anyways, I learned from the enkai that I'm going to be working with what seems like a great group of people! I can't let them down!

Other than that, Emma and Daniel took me and another ALT, Liz, to the famous place in my area called the Komagatake Ropeway. Basically, we take a long bus ride up to an area where we get take a gondola to a higher part of the mountain. From there, you can hike to the top of Mt. Komagatake! It was tiring, but not even close to how tiring climbing at Yosemite was... (I'm cringing just thinking about that...). We got to the halfway point, Nakadake, but didn't continue to the top of Mt. Komagatake because the fog rolled in. Bummer. But, this gave us enough time to go back to Mori to Mizu lake and play in the river! On the bus ride back down the mountain, Liz and I made faces at a little Japanese kid, who kept turning around and staring at us. He was thoroughly enjoying the attention haha We had a blast entertaining him, but he left without saying goodbye! To quote Liz "I thought we had something...we shared a moment!!" Anyways, after lazing around at the river, we went to Cafe Goo's again! I ordered "Indian Spaghetti" and it was really good...but nothing about it was Indian...it was just like curry over spaghetti. Someone else ordered a waffle later and let me try a little bit. I may or may not have an obsession with Japanese waffles now! It was sooooo good. I can't eat those often though or I'll get huge-normous!  >.<

Speaking of huge-normous, I found the biggest bruise on the back of my arm today.  No idea where it came from, but wow!  It scared me a bit haha   xD

These past few days at work have been very slow. Everyone is taking paid leave because of the holidays (it's Obon Period, which is a holiday to honor your elders), so many people are not here.  It's difficult to get into the English room sometimes! I'm one of the only teachers at school now.  =/ Kinda strange being at work but having nothing to do...

Anyways, that's it for now! I'll upload more pictures soon. Keep your fingers crossed that I receive my Residency Card in the mail soon!!

Tokyo and Nagano (Komagane, Iida) Pictures and Videos

Instead of typing, I'll just show you what I've been up to. Here are a bunch of pictures from my time in Japan, with a nice video of where I live (courtesy of Ryan and Kevin's curiosity lol). :) The text below the picture describes it! I can't really format how I post pictures, which is a bummer :/

 The opening speech during the entrance ceremony

 Lake Suwa, the biggest body of water in my prefecture

 Delicious beef curry

 Rice fields on the way to Matsumoto City

 My apartment complex area

 My apartment!

 I wonder if they really know what they're buying... o_o;

 Huge (and very loud) crickets in a box!

 I just barely missed the festival :( (I came a few days late)

 A view of a rice field and the mountains in Komagane

 Nee, shitteru?  MAMESHIBA IS ON FB!!!  So adorable!!!  (Although I'm not sure what a FB bean is supposed to look like.... >.>;)

 My office!

 Strange sticker on a vending machine

 

Japan is very nice to it's blind people!

 Rock climbing wall with Emma and Daniel at the park in Komagane

 Mori to Mizu Park

 Emma and the river!

Tenryu River

A play put on by Iida residents at Ringon

Hand-made floats

 There were many dance groups!

 Really?  They don't allow guns in Japan?  lol

Taiko (Japanese drumming)

Even soccer teams came out to dance!

 

Fireworks and Dancing Videos

So crowded!!

People danced with fans

 

 The dance was pretty simple, even I could do it lol

That's all for now!  See you next blog post!  :)