Entries this day: Dream Last_night Work Yumi at_Shibuya

Dream

10:10am JST Monday 5 January 2004

On a ship with a subversive plot going on, Russians and British (both groups were bad guys) each planning to kill the others after the others gave them what they wanted; lots of guns planned, and when the groups started the facade of formalities, walking through a door on the ship (isn't there a word for a door on a ship?) I was like, eeek and tried to walk well out of their way.

Talked to someone else about the ookiness of the situation and generally we were safe and stayed out of the melee.

Last night

10:17am JST Monday 5 January 2004

Last night I moved my mattress to the guest bedroom (the empty bedroom cause Dan and I have no roommate; I should add that to the State of My Life; brb; okay) because my room had accumulated some mildew from the windows (which explains why the windows had been sealed shut with plastic wrap when I moved in). I dried out the room last night and am moving back in today. It was kinda like camping to move my bed, but I was so tired that I didn't spend much time being awake in the other room.

Work

10:27am JST Monday 5 January 2004

Today is the first day back to work, but it's only for half a day and then my weekend starts tomorrow.

Nice way to ease into work. Tomorrow I'm going to look into a applying at Berlitz and Geos, the two other big schools in Japan. Actually I'll do some research to see how people like them.

10:51am

Yikes; I gotta get going.

6:37pm

Wow, jack, wow!

Before the first lesson at Kawasaki, Tomoko came into the teachers' room and asked Ali if he could cover at Hiyoshi. I'm like, "I live next to Hiyoshi; I'll go," and Ali liked the idea; I liked the idea, so bang, I got to go to Hiyoshi after teaching two man to man lessons at Kawasaki.

(Saw Yuuko at Kawasaki; said HI to her but not much more than that.)

My first lesson started out as a no-show, but I wasn't completely lucky. But it was still fun cause I kept uttering Japanese words and going "oops" and almost really meaning it except the student (はるな) was endlessly laughing at my slips. Not polite laughter either; real guffaws.

My second lesson had far less Japanese in it; the lesson was with a level 3 student named せりな but she pronounces it Serena after having lived in New Zealand for a while. I'm not sure exactly how those are related, but hey. Oh, it had a lot less Japanese because we were nearly chatting at normal speed; I didn't have time to really think of much Japanese.

After lesson number two, I saw 裕子 who waved at me (and I waved back) and I thought about waiting to talk to her but I had to zip over to Hiyoshi. I did text 裕子 on the way there.

At Hiyoshi, I hoped I would see Jen (who works there (and who lives in my building)) but it turns out I was covering for her.

Tim (who works there, lives in my building, and who was at work today) said he was leaving Nova, so I'm like, "woah" and I turned in a transfer request to cover Tim's spot at Hiyoshi.

I wrote on the transfer request that I want to work at a smaller school and that if I get to change I may stay longer at Nova than otherwise. Wrote that I'm considering working at other language schools.

Now, here's a challenge for me: not to stop working to change my current work situation if I go to Hiyoshi and still don't like working for the rabbit. (*)

Nova's mascot is a rabbit, the NOVA usagi. (usagi means rabbit in Japanese.)

Sad thing is that I'll miss Morag at Kawasaki. Good thing is I'll see あや at Hiyoshi, likely feel better about teaching (at Hiyoshi with fewer students), and be closer to home. Oh, Morag's roommate Lisa works in Hiyoshi, so I'll still get M-dawg gossip without much difficulty.

6:47pm

Right now I'm on a local train (** I live close to Hiyoshi, but forgot that today I'm going to Shinjuku to teach Yumi **) toward Shibuya, but am about to transfer to an express (crowded) train, so see ya.

Yumi

10:26pm JST Monday 5 January 2004

Lesson with 由美 was fun as always. She was there before me for once (we usually start at 7, but today due to working late (welcome back to work; it's a short schedule in the middle of the day), I had to shift the lesson to 7:30.

I taught her how to say "Aw man, that sucks, dude." and something else equally important I'm sure.

The biggest any one part of the lesson was making sentences using "since."

いろいろ

I tried to keep the Japanese to a minimum.

at Shibuya

10:39pm JST Monday 5 January 2004

At Shibuya station I decided to explore a bit. I noticed a hallway that I had previously dismissed as disinteresting, but then realized it might be interesting, so I walked down it. There are two moving sidewalks; the first is bouncy and the second is like escalator steps, but flat. This hallway leads to what's primarily labeled the Saikyu line, and also labeled the Tokaido line, the Rinkai line, and the Narita Express line. I couldn't quite figure out the signage for all those lines (or actually any of them really) but now at least I have a sense of where that hallway goes, if not how to use it (except for the moving sidewalks, which were pretty straightforward).