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Sarah
December
10 – 10:40pm
I am settled
now into my apartment in Matsue. I thought I would be living in a hotel room
until Neal (the guy I’m replacing) left next weekend, but he’s gone to a hotel
instead. I spent last night and this morning unpacking and getting it organized
to my satisfaction. It is much bigger than I had been led to expect, I guess
because Matsue is a smaller city. I have access to it up a flight of cement
steps, and enter into the narrow kitchen with a tiny fridge/freezer, a large
stainless steel sink and a two-burner natural gas stove unit with a tiny broiler
built in. There is a washing machine, a shower room, and a separate toilet
(which, although it’s the size of a small, small closet, still has slippers at
the door, of course). There are a good selection of mismatched utensils and
dishes (the collection of several AEON teachers over the years), a kettle and a
frying pan/wok. Then you step through a door into the living room, into which I
have put the desk (under the window, so it gets good light – the window is
stippled glass, so it is opaque, but still lets in lots of light). In the centre
of the living room is a low coffee table, with a heater built into the
underside; as you kneel at the table your feet and legs stay warm. It’s
remarkably cozy, and has been a tradition in Japan for a long time. The bedroom
off the living room has sliding doors, a large closet for storage and a dresser
and metal unit for hanging clothes. It also has a small balcony overlooking a
parking lot and the backyards of other houses. Every room has electric or
kerosene heaters; although the bedroom has a heating/air conditioning unit, I’m
told it’s expensive and not very effective, so the heaters are
recommended.
So what
have I been doing since I wrote on Thursday? Hmm. We finished our last practice
lessons on Friday night. Again, I felt a little off, but got good feedback.
Then, we went out for karaoke. Karaoke in Japan is different from at home; it
was a busy Friday night, so we waited a while in a lobby with lots of other
people. Next door there was a pachinko parlour, which was as bright and noisy as
Las Vegas stuffed into one building with lots of anime pictures of girls in
bikinis. After about a half-hour, we went to our bright red karaoke room, where
nine of us (me and Josh,
Tim and Mimi,
plus a bunch of teachers from the Okayama
School) squeezed into a booth in front of the massive karaoke screen. We could
plug in our selections on Etch-a-Sketch sized electronic screens, and we got the
room for two hours. The background videos for all the English songs were really
cheesy. I was exhausted and a little intimidated at first, but soon got my
second wind. And then the drinks started to arrive. Did I mention that this
karaoke place was All-You-Can-Drink? So I had a fair amount of beer, and sang my
first karaoke ever, easing into it on the chorus of “Bohemian Rhapsody”, and
singing “I’m Holding Out For a Hero” (Bonnie Tyler) and “Cabaret” (Liza
Minnelli, but I thought of you, Mum).
Josh, who can’t sing and drank wa-a-a-ay too much,
ploughed through some Eminem and other rap tunes. One of the Japanese
teachers, who just goes by “Go-Sensei” because apparently his name is too
complicated for gaijin to remember, sang really well in Japanese. Perhaps you
remember my crack about AEON teachers looking like Mormons? Well, Go-Sensei
is a Mormon, but I think he’s the only one.
We ended
up going to The Aussie Bar after that, where Tim and I beat Josh and Brian
(another teacher) at darts. Tim was the star player, but I didn’t do too badly.
Josh started to suffer at this point, so I took care of him, mostly fetching him
back into the bar after he repeatedly stepped out “for some air”, which meant
falling asleep in the driveway next door. Tim and Julie Ann, the head teacher in
Okayama, came with us as far as the station, and then I had the thankless,
though entertaining, task of getting Josh home. When we got back to the dorm, he
kept trying to fall asleep on the steps, saying “Just two minutes…” every time I
pointed out his room was only a floor away.
Our last
day was really only a half-day. We got to the training centre by 11am, but
immediately took lunch because some of us (not me – I just had a little
headache) were in terrible shape. I pulled everyone along to Mario Dessert,
which has tickled me ever since I first got here. It’s a European-style cake
shop, with cute young Japanese women in crisp white uniforms with blue aprons
and Christmas hats. The mall surrounding the train station has the most
incredible food smells, from syrup-soaked waffles to sushi and fried fishcakes
to French bakeries smelling of fresh bread and rolls – very hard to
resist.
There
have been some people on the streets wearing medical masks covering their mouths
and noses. At first I thought it was bird flu paranoia or something, but Mimi
explained that it’s common for people with colds to wear masks to prevent other
people from getting sick. Obviously a flu bug is going
around.
We
finally got down to business after lunch, covering private lessons and non-AEON
textbooks we sometimes use, then all the last miscellaneous details. Then we had
our exit interviews. Tim didn’t have a lot of feedback, except to say he thought
I’d be a strong teacher, and he answered a few questions I had about the next
few days and about teaching. Then good-bye to the training centre (and its
bathroom, with its heated toilet seats and complex instructions in Japanese) and
off to the train station with my extremely heavy luggage (Tim helped; Josh had
to nap before going to his welcome party), where I boarded the 5:50 train to
Matsue (pronounced, by the way, like this: MA-tsu-eh). I’m disappointed
that I have yet to see the Japanese countryside; my ride from Osaka to Okayama
was in the dark, and this one was as well. I saw some shapes like mountains and
bodies of water as we passed, and small towns (and, weirdly, occasionally a
white-lit, disembodied vending machine would seem to drift past). I gave up
looking out the rain-streaked window. The trip took 2 hours and 40 minutes, so I
dozed a bit, and looked over some of the notes I gotten. My colleagues sent me a
welcome sheet, with cartoons of all the teachers and little personal notes of
welcome. When I replace Neal, we will all be women. Ryoko is the manager; she
introduced herself to me while I was in Okayama, when she came up for a meeting.
Her assistant is Mayumi, and another Mayumi is the head teacher here, as are
Masako, Reiko and Yuri. Melanie Thout is the other foreign teacher here.
Mayumi,
the head teacher, met me at the station in the rain, and despite being a tiny
little woman, helped me drag my luggage across the street to the AEON office,
where I met Ryoko and Melanie. Ryoko is very friendly, and Melanie is a bundle
of energy. She had lots of questions, and they sat me down with a cup of tea in
the office. Melanie is from Montreal, and I could hear her French Canadian
accent as we talked. She has dark brown hair, and brown, sparkling eyes, and I
can tell she’ll be a lot of fun. She divides her time between Matsue and Yonago,
a town about 30 minutes away by train. Ryoko has been to France and travelled a
bit. Mayumi (who did the cartoons) had a folder for me with a map of the city
with useful places like supermarkets and dollar stores marked out, tourist
information about Matsue, my schedule for the next few days, a calendar for the
next year, lesson plans for the next week or two, and counselling information on
all my students. Wow! It was a little overwhelming. The others had waited late
after work for me, and were keen to go home, as was I. Mayumi drove me around
and gave me a five-minute tour of the city. Then she left me here in the
apartment with some light refreshments to get settled in. It was hard, at first;
I was keyed up, and in a new place, and the rooms were bare and unfamiliar. But
finally I slept.
This
afternoon, I went for a 3-hour walk, taking in the downtown and figuring out how
far I am from the office (it’s a 15-minute walk). There was a Winter Fair in the
mall near the station, and I was lured by the sound of entertainers in
traditional Japanese minstrel costumes playing instruments and performing
tricks. They all wore wigs. There was a drummer wearing a contraption of three
or four drums of different sizes, and a musician playing something like an oboe,
and a man and woman wearing traditional kimonos. I couldn’t tell what they were
saying or doing, but the music and costuming fascinated me. I crossed several
bridges (there are a river and a canal nearby), holding my map, and found my way
to the castle. Matsue Castle is amazing from the outside (this was an
exploratory trip, so I didn’t go in, but you can go to the top and see the whole
city), and the grounds and nearby neighbourhood are stunningly beautiful.
Tomorrow I will walk up to the AEON office at the university, where I also
teach, and maybe get to the lake, although that’s in the opposite direction and
may have to wait for another day.
I’m
meeting Neal, whom I’m replacing, tomorrow at the apartment, and he’s going to
show me how to use things in the apartment and maybe show me around. I might get
his bike from him; I hope there’s a private place where I can learn to ride one
properly and without embarrassment, although that’s
doubtful.
After
trying to order food today (at a McDonald’s, of all places!), I am determined to
learn more Japanese. There is a Japanese language test next fall – both Tim and
Mimi said that if I practice frequently I could go for sankyu (third
level) by then. Something to aim for. Previous teachers have left Japanese
language books in the apartment for me to use, and I brought some from home.
Someone also left Memoirs of a Geisha here, and I’m devouring
it.
I hope
you are all doing well. Hopefully I’ll get the Internet at home soon, so it will
be easier to write to people individually. Till then, take care. I’m thinking of
you all!
Sarah
Sarah
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