I'm officially rubbish at this blogging malarky, but as I find myself without internet at school today (the wireless router is playing up and no amount of meddling on my behalf will fix it) I find myself able to tell you about, well, me :)
*The lack of internet means that I also forgot to upload this when I got home. Hence it being two days old now...*
The title could apply to me as I've yet again been busy busy busy but not really done anything worth writing about.
The title is actually more concerned with a couple of children in one of my sixth year classes. They're a bunch of zombies at the best of times, but just as I was getting them to arrange their desks for a game there was some kind of dispute and two kids were holding each other's clothes, with only the desks between them to stop it turning into something more.
Obviously I stopped the lesson, thinking it would be over in a few seconds. A few seconds later I realise the teacher is struggling to try and wrestle them apart. Now, legally, I'm not even meant to touch the children, beyond a shaking of hands. In practice this is just not possible in Elementary school. And tickling them is a great way to bridge the language barrier. Anyways, I decide to lend a hand to separate the two kids and, after a bit of fussing, we succeed. The girl on my side of the desks sits down without a fuss while the teacher tries to take the boy outside for a minute. On the way he lashes out at another boy. Being a boy he obviously lashes right back at him. I race round the desks to stop him while the teacher continues her struggle to get the other one outside. And you know that's not the end of it...
The title is what you say when you meet people who you haven't seen in a while. Seems appropriate as I've been bad at keeping this little shrine to me active...
Well for the longest time it never seemed that I'd make it as far as buying my tickets home, but I finally have.
Of course I haven't sorted out the visa malarky yet, but that's why I'm spending several hours on the train tomorrow to go to the immigration office.
So, dates:
I'm coming back to the UK on Wednesday March 21st and leaving for Japan again on Friday March 30th. Despite all my pleading I wasn't allowed to take off the week after that as well so 9 days is all we've got. As I'm only at home for one weekend that's going to be family time, so let me know when you're free the week beginning March 26th.
I'm guessing I'll have to just do evening things as people will be working. And probably two of them, one in London and one up in Manchester.
Well let me know.
Laters xx
I can't believe how bad I've been at keep this blog up to date. I bow, while kneeling, till my forehead touches the ground in apology.
I'm still worryingly busy with things like visas, cars, apartments and the like. Little things keep popping up which throws everything out. Like needing to get an offical translation of my driving license before I can get it converted into a Japanese one.
On the nicer side of things in life I had a nice afternoon on Monday. As we are nearing the end of the school year, the current sixth formers are busy preparing for life in Junior High School (JHS). This seems to involve a graduation ceremony in the last week, but also a multitude of other events in the weeks leading up to it. Monday I was at my smaller school and they had an 思い出（おもいで - o mo i de) assembly-type thing. It translates literally as just 'memories' so it was an excuse to look back over their six years at the school and saying thank you to parents and teachers. There was a slide show displaying photos from the last six years, which were numerous (this is Japan after all, land of the happy snappers). After this, the mothers of the children did a Hawaiian Dance, in plastic, home-made skirts. Most ammusing as you could tell which mothers had come up with the idea and which had been press-ganged into doing it.
Then the teachers (myself included) sang a song, which is aparently well known in Japan. I'd been given the music the week before so the tune was no problem, but my reading skills were pushed to their speed limit. And don't even ask me what it meant. I only understood two words, 'flowers' and 'sea'.
Then the kids did some kind of display, I think talking about things they've learnt to do and enjoy at school (football, volleyball, calligraphy etc).
As teachers we all got a bunch of flowers and what I thought was a box of chocolates.
The flowers are currently sitting in a two litre water bottle I hastily converted due to an unsurprising lack of vases in my apartment!
Closer inspection of the 'choclates' revealed that it was in fact a small photo album inside of which were not photos, but handwritten cards from all the kids. They'd all written mine without the use of Kanji (as I can't read them) but that still doesn't mean I understand it! The general gist of them was about how much fun the lessons were, how they'll remember their English when they're in JHS and how they'll 'do their best' (a very Japanesey thing to say). I think only the teachers that had taught the kids got one of these albums, the others got chocolates.
As I'm useless with names/faces, I'm going to print out pictures of all the kids and put them in the album with the corresponding cards.
Well it's already late as I've spent the evening writing emails to various people trying to figure out how to do the impossible.
I should, hopefully, book my flights home tomorrow or the day after so I'll be able to start taking bookings on my time after that.
Laters xx
So, as most of you know I've always been planning to come home at the end of March. This is still happening, don't worry. But I have decided that I will be coming back out to Japan for another year. I have no job (or even job idea) to come back for in the UK and Japan is treating me well.
I'm still not entirely sure about the dates of my brief spell back in Blighty. I'm currently waiting to hear if my holiday request to skip the last two days of term has been allowed. Also I'm trying to make my company see that having me be in school for a whole week before lessons actually start is a waste of time. Time which could be much better spent at home in the UK!
So, as it stands at the moment I'll be coming back on either the 21st or 24th of March and flying back out on the 31st March or 7th April. Hence I haven't booked my flights yet!
I'm also slightly panicing about visas. I've had the forms to apply for the extension for a while now, but hadn't sent it off as I was waiting on confirming the above dates. This evening, on closer inspection I discovered that I don't need those dates for the extension form, just for the re-entry permit. This leaves me with three weeks until my current visa expires. In that time my company will take five days to get everything together and then I have to go the Immigration office and apply for the visa and cross my fingers it's all done in time. I can be such an idiot at times...
I also have to find a new apartment (I need a kitchen), buy a car, convert my driving license to a Japanese one and arrange my tickets home. All in three weeks. EEEEEEEKKKK.
In light of all this information suddenly taking hold of my brain I've just returned from the supermarket where I bought chocolate and am currently eatting it. It doesn't make my to-do list any smaller, but I can't do anything else this evening.
Laters xx
So, only a month after the holiday I've finally got around to writing up the final day. Just think of it like the anticipated final section. It wouldn't have been half as interesting if you'd had it all at once...
ごめんね、みんなさん。
今週と先週は忙しかったです。京都の休みの四日の書きは忘れませんよ！でも、たくさんしゃしんがあります。。。そして、まいよるだいつかります。
じゃあ、まった。
Sorry everyone.
This week and last week I've been really busy. I haven't forgotten about the fourth day of my Kyoto holiday. There are lots of photos and I've been tired every evening.
Till next time.
Laters xx
Unfortunately the updates aren't for my own site (I know I've still got the last day of Kyoto to write about, but I've been busy busy busy).
My bro, Si, asked me to make a few changes to his website before the weekend when he has a big arty farty fair coming up. This very quickly morphed into a complete redesign (and therefore rewriting from scratch). The results of the last two days of my life are now available for everyone to see now.
Feel free to coment with what you think of it. Of course if you want to comment directly to my bro there is a contact page on the site too.
The pic below is a preview to entice you in:
Laters xx
Day 3 started by me hanging around the train station waiting for the others to get there from their hostel. This gave me the opportunity to click a few pics.