Monday 22nd January 2007

Well I have settled in to Himeji now and this is my third week at my work. It is lunch time now and then I have one more lesson to go for the day. I have a pretty easy timetable here. I get ten fifty minute lessons off a week! In Australia, I only got three fifty minutes lessons off. I have so much spare time here, but I always have something to occupy myself with. I have made lots of resources for my lessons, I check my email, I learn Japanese and I update my website! I always find something to do. It is a pretty cruisy job because I am always in the room with the classroom teacher so if I don’t understand what the students are saying, the teacher can explain it to me. The teachers can speak in English so they are fairly easy to understand. There are times though when they don’t understand what I am saying or when I don’t understand what they are saying, but most of the time, we can understand each other.

I went to a tea ceremony on the weekend and it was really cool. We got to make green tea and whisk it with a special bamboo whisk. We ate Japanese sweets before drinking our tea which were made out of bean curd. This took the bitterness away from the tea as the Japanese green tea served in tea ceremonies is very bitter. We took lots of photos of beautiful Japanese girls in kimonos as well. It was lots of fun!



I also went to Osaka on the weekend. This is about a one hour train ride from Himeji. I went with most of the Australian teachers that are here in Japan with me. It was funny when Steve told me how to say, ‘I’m in Osaka’ in Japanese which is,’ Osaka ni imas’. Then I thought I would test it on a stranger walking by so I said to him in Japanese, ‘I am in Osaka!” and he and his girlfriend laughed at me and he said, “good for you!”

I spent so much money in Osaka. The fashion is so good and the clothes are so trendy that I couldn’t resist. I have never felt so girly in my life! It was good though. I bought a couple of formal dresses that I can wear to this formal dinner I will be going to in a couple of weeks time.

There are lots of things to look forward to. I will be making a trip to Hiroshima in about three weeks with the other Australian teachers. I can’t wait for that. It will be fantastic.

I have a funny story to tell. In the morning, I ride to the Himeji Station by bike and then I catch a train at the station to work. On the way to work the other day, I had lots of things in my bike basket and I went over a bump. A little Japanese man was pointing behind me telling me that I had dropped something from my bike. I went to get it and in the mean time, my lunch fell out of my basket into the dirt, my apple rolled onto the road and another Japanese lady almost stacked it trying to dodge all of my stuff on the footpath! The little Japanese man ran onto the road to get my apple and I had half my lunch to eat that day! The day was a disaster waiting to happen!

That same day, I was showing the students some photos of my friends and I tried to say friend in Japanese, but I said, ‘tamagochi’ which is that little computer game that kids play! All the kids laughed at me and the teacher said I had said the word wrong and it is actually supposed to be, ‘tomodachi’! Well I learnt the word friend the hard way because the students still come up to me and say,’ tamagochi’ when I walk past them in the corridor!

My Japanese can only get better from here!