One-Month Mark

I went to Tokyo this weekend to visit friends. The big, bustling city life appeals to me on a temporary level but in the end I feel it's too crowded and rushed for me. The frenetic pace, crazy high amount of people and consumerism EVERYWHERE is exciting, but I actually feel overwhelmed by it after a short amount of time. I grew up in cities, but obviously none this big. New York City affects me the same way.

BUT, I was immensely happy to see friends from many different walks of life who all found themselves in Tokyo. :) And after a day of the big city, I was happy to stumble upon Inokashira Park in the Kichijouji area of Tokyo, a brilliant glimpse of nature in the metropolis.

And let's not forget about the HAMMOCK CAFE:

School is in full swing, so to speak, and while I do find myself experiencing the phenomenon known as trained-teachers-find-JET-too-confining, for the most part things couldn't be better. My students are absolute ANGELS, the schools and their surroundings are beautiful, I'm developing good relationships with my JTEs and other coworkers, and the summer mushiatsui swelter is beginning to cool off into a cool suzushii. (Not that that makes me any more excited for autumn's approach...my favorite season is coming to a close. But, thinking about the green leaves actually turning red/yellow/brown is exciting nonetheless.)

I also started my Japanese conversation "class" at the community center this week. It was me and five Japanese people having a choppy conversation, no joke. But more foreigners will come next week (so I'll have some support), and it's just another great opportunity for all-Japanese conversation practice for me. It's easy to get deluded by every other Japanese person saying "Ohh you're so good!!" every time a single word pops out of my mouth, but really, I'm still such a beginner and have so far to go. And I'm not just saying that because I'm humble or whatever, I'm truly still a beginner, despite what the love-to-humor-you Japanese people may have to say.

I'm also learning that it's okay to make cultural mistakes and that I am expected to, so it's not a shock or surprise or catastrophe when I do. It's not my fault or anyone's fault, it's just part of life. And in general Japanese people are very nice about it. But that's a catch-22: as part of my acclimation I've got to learn to read in between the lines and figure out what people mean and not what they are saying.

You're looking at my junior high school, facing west. (If you couldn't tell by the lowering sun.)

(BTW, every single time I write on this blog, I feel like it's so boringly serious, because I can't be myself, because that wouldn't be professional/mature of me [typing in caps, swearing, etc.] and I can't bring myself to do that on this public blog-for-the-archives. -_-;;)

English has so many arbitrary-yet-important conventions that I'm continually becoming aware of. Like above there, I used brackets inside parentheses. Because that's what you do. And my students like to reach the end of a line and just continue their word on the next line, mid-word, no matter where they were in that word. I could teach them about hyphenation and syllables but it's too complicated (literally the entire concept of syllables is different in Japanese) so I just told them never to break up a word between lines. You gotta pick your battles because if you fight them all your end result will be much worse than if you only fought a few.