The only things missing were my Bacchus-buddies. Not that you guys are 'things', but you understand what I mean.
Anyhoo, it's late, so just a short post tonight. Also, here's a delightful picture that I think perfectly captures the joy of aging.
Wednesday, May 17, 2006
CELEBRATE THE FLESH!
Tonight, in honor of my birthday, I went to the waterfront Brazilian Steakhouse in Kobe's beautiful Harborland district. The steak was thinly-cut and all-you-can-eat. With a gigantic, razor-sharp machete, a Brazilian waiter would slice the steak right off skewered hunks of roast beef, duck, chicken, and pig that has been slathered in garlic and other miscellaneous spices. It was superb--a true carnivore's dream. I estimate I alone consumed several acres of rainforest that had been transformed into grazing land and processed into beef, and those acres were delicious.
The only things missing were my Bacchus-buddies. Not that you guys are 'things', but you understand what I mean.
Anyhoo, it's late, so just a short post tonight. Also, here's a delightful picture that I think perfectly captures the joy of aging.
The only things missing were my Bacchus-buddies. Not that you guys are 'things', but you understand what I mean.
Anyhoo, it's late, so just a short post tonight. Also, here's a delightful picture that I think perfectly captures the joy of aging.
Monday, May 15, 2006
Saturday, May 13, 2006
Television! (Until I come up with a more creative title...)
Japanese TV can seem pretty weird, particularly when you have cable. Airing at any given moment, one could find two to three variety shows, two to three samurai movies, three music videos, five soccer games, 20 baseball games, and a near infinite number of home-shopping programs. I might be exagerrating these figures, but if I am my hyperbole is slight. My cable package also has several stations which air commercial-free American TV programs (with Japanese subtitles) almost exclusively. These can be golden oldies (Dallas, Knight Rider, and Columbo), newer programs that are recently dead in America (Ally McBeal and Dark Angel), and currently popular American programs that are a season or two behind (Lost, American Idol, and Alias).
Although it's nice to have a little slice of Americana in my living room, it took me less than a week to grow tired of the offered programming. This is largely because most popular American TV shows these days are heavily-serialized, and comprehension can only be achieved by seasons of dedicated viewership. I can watch and enjoy an old episode of Columbo, but when Alias comes on I just sit in a confused stupor, trying to follow along with the story but mostly waiting for Jennifer Garner's next outfit change.
This annoying plot-grasping hindrance could, conceivably, be alleviated by the wonders of broadband internet (which, coincidentally, has been recently installed in my own abode) and peer-to-peer file-sharing technology. If someone in Japan--or anywhere else in the wired world--wanted to, they could download almost any imaginable television episode on their computer's hard drive and play it back whenever convenient. Doing this would allow the American home viewer abroad to both play renegade station manager and feel close-to-home on days when home is sorely missed.
Since such an activity would likely violate numerous international copyright laws, I would never do it nor dream of suggesting this activity to someone else. But it's nice to know that I could, conceivably, watch any television show aired in America whenever I desired, in the privacy of my Japanese living room, across the stunning breadth of my massive high-def flat-screen computer monitor, and sonically aided by my majestic 5.1 stereo surround sound system. If only I weren't a man of such high moral fiber...
But I digress. Let us change subjects from the possibility of securing pirated television data streams to the current state of American television. I have, through unspecified but assuredly legal means, managed to get completely caught up on the new seasons of Lost, South Park, and Sopranos. Additionally, I've begun watching 24 from its inaugural first season, and I've also been watching HBO's new family-oriented drama, Big Love.
I have some thoughts:
Lost should be renamed Isle MacGuffin or Island of Implausibly Baffling Human Behavior (I don't care what you think--the latter title is quite catchy). This show itself is pretty much about convincing home viewers to watch commercials. Oh yeah, and something about some people who survived a plane crash in the south Pacific. In all seriousness, Lost has a few fine actors (notice I said "a few") and beautiful Hawaiian scenery that courageously struggle to survive insipid and moronic script-writing. Each segment tidily stirs tension to a climax right before a commercial break, and the overall achieved effect (even without having to watch commercials) is that the show becomes stiflingly formulaic. Why do I watch? Because I can gleefully ridicule the retarded parade of nonsensical events and feel like I have an IQ of 80 billion. Too bad no one is available to enjoy my loud and raucous commentary ... allow me to assure you of its non-stop wittiness and hilarity.
24, on the other hand, seems to be fairly decent, perhaps the best fare of its genre available on network television. Keep in mind that I've only seen about 3/4 of the first season (later seasons might possibly suck), but so far it manages to be intelligent, interesting, and compelling. However, dark clouds of stupidity gather on the horizon: in the most recent episode I watched, a major character inexplicably and conveniently gets amnesia. She didn't even get hit on the head--she just decided to up and forget everything she knew. Even worse, her reaction to total memory loss wasn't one of fear or frustration, but rather mild embarassment. Whoops! I don't know my name anymore! Silly me! Like she misplaced her car keys or something. Blech. Regardless, I'm giving the show the benefit of the doubt by choosing to believe 24 producers were desperate and poor and thus borrowed a writer from a daytime soap for this episode. Make no mistake, however: amnesia-as-plot-device is among the worst sins television drama can inflict on its audience--its primary effect on me is ironically one of memory loss: I usually forget to watch next week.
And that's it for the network dramas. Even without the actual commercials, network programming is still regularly putrid when you consider how the commercial break functions as the drum to which everyone--producers, writers, actors, and even viewers--march. I hate it, and I wish I weren't so morally upstanding because it would be easy for me to swipe commercial-free television and thereby do my part to deliver a kick in the crotch to the entire corrupt television entertainment system.
In contrast, the shows available on HBO should be far more popular than they are. Solid programming like Deadwood, Carnivale, and Rome demonstrate how wonderful television can be when not saddled with commercial breaks. It's wonderful to see that the first big show to prove this, The Sopranos, is still brutally plugging away, leaving a trail of body parts, cocaine, and cursewords as it swaggers into the sunset. I am of the impression that the Sopranos is collectively the finest theatric endeavor since Shakespeare's final play. It was Tempest, right?
On regular network television, shows respect only the wishes of network management, demographic analysts, political viewpoints, and, of course, advertisers. Occasionally, there will be a safely institutionalized network program (like Seinfeld or Law & Order) that places the wishes and expectations of its dedicated fanbase above all else. The Sopranos, however, is an artistic achievement of the highest order in that it respects the wishes and expectations of no one, not even its hardcore fans (if you don't believe me, you probably still think we're going to figure out what happened with the Chechen gangster) . The Sopranos, the show, seems to care only about gratifying its own mysterious, selfish desires, and it's in this crucial aspect that it mirrors its cruelly self-centered subject matter and animalistic cast of characters. It's less a show and more a raw and powerful force of nature.
So I like it.
Anyway, that's my thoughts on contemporary television. I bet you weren't expecting that, were you? You probably thought I was going to write about how my students are rapidly learning how to manipulate and tame me, their formally-fierce gaijin teacher! Or perhaps read about how I am writing my own reader text because the one available for my freshman class sucks! Ha! Not this post! I like to surprise people! Anyway, all this Sopranos talk has me thinking of gangsters, so enjoy this picture. It's entitled "Gangsterhead2.jpg" but I forget the name of the talented artist ... sorry, whoever you are!
Although it's nice to have a little slice of Americana in my living room, it took me less than a week to grow tired of the offered programming. This is largely because most popular American TV shows these days are heavily-serialized, and comprehension can only be achieved by seasons of dedicated viewership. I can watch and enjoy an old episode of Columbo, but when Alias comes on I just sit in a confused stupor, trying to follow along with the story but mostly waiting for Jennifer Garner's next outfit change.
This annoying plot-grasping hindrance could, conceivably, be alleviated by the wonders of broadband internet (which, coincidentally, has been recently installed in my own abode) and peer-to-peer file-sharing technology. If someone in Japan--or anywhere else in the wired world--wanted to, they could download almost any imaginable television episode on their computer's hard drive and play it back whenever convenient. Doing this would allow the American home viewer abroad to both play renegade station manager and feel close-to-home on days when home is sorely missed.
Since such an activity would likely violate numerous international copyright laws, I would never do it nor dream of suggesting this activity to someone else. But it's nice to know that I could, conceivably, watch any television show aired in America whenever I desired, in the privacy of my Japanese living room, across the stunning breadth of my massive high-def flat-screen computer monitor, and sonically aided by my majestic 5.1 stereo surround sound system. If only I weren't a man of such high moral fiber...
But I digress. Let us change subjects from the possibility of securing pirated television data streams to the current state of American television. I have, through unspecified but assuredly legal means, managed to get completely caught up on the new seasons of Lost, South Park, and Sopranos. Additionally, I've begun watching 24 from its inaugural first season, and I've also been watching HBO's new family-oriented drama, Big Love.
I have some thoughts:
Lost should be renamed Isle MacGuffin or Island of Implausibly Baffling Human Behavior (I don't care what you think--the latter title is quite catchy). This show itself is pretty much about convincing home viewers to watch commercials. Oh yeah, and something about some people who survived a plane crash in the south Pacific. In all seriousness, Lost has a few fine actors (notice I said "a few") and beautiful Hawaiian scenery that courageously struggle to survive insipid and moronic script-writing. Each segment tidily stirs tension to a climax right before a commercial break, and the overall achieved effect (even without having to watch commercials) is that the show becomes stiflingly formulaic. Why do I watch? Because I can gleefully ridicule the retarded parade of nonsensical events and feel like I have an IQ of 80 billion. Too bad no one is available to enjoy my loud and raucous commentary ... allow me to assure you of its non-stop wittiness and hilarity.
24, on the other hand, seems to be fairly decent, perhaps the best fare of its genre available on network television. Keep in mind that I've only seen about 3/4 of the first season (later seasons might possibly suck), but so far it manages to be intelligent, interesting, and compelling. However, dark clouds of stupidity gather on the horizon: in the most recent episode I watched, a major character inexplicably and conveniently gets amnesia. She didn't even get hit on the head--she just decided to up and forget everything she knew. Even worse, her reaction to total memory loss wasn't one of fear or frustration, but rather mild embarassment. Whoops! I don't know my name anymore! Silly me! Like she misplaced her car keys or something. Blech. Regardless, I'm giving the show the benefit of the doubt by choosing to believe 24 producers were desperate and poor and thus borrowed a writer from a daytime soap for this episode. Make no mistake, however: amnesia-as-plot-device is among the worst sins television drama can inflict on its audience--its primary effect on me is ironically one of memory loss: I usually forget to watch next week.
And that's it for the network dramas. Even without the actual commercials, network programming is still regularly putrid when you consider how the commercial break functions as the drum to which everyone--producers, writers, actors, and even viewers--march. I hate it, and I wish I weren't so morally upstanding because it would be easy for me to swipe commercial-free television and thereby do my part to deliver a kick in the crotch to the entire corrupt television entertainment system.
In contrast, the shows available on HBO should be far more popular than they are. Solid programming like Deadwood, Carnivale, and Rome demonstrate how wonderful television can be when not saddled with commercial breaks. It's wonderful to see that the first big show to prove this, The Sopranos, is still brutally plugging away, leaving a trail of body parts, cocaine, and cursewords as it swaggers into the sunset. I am of the impression that the Sopranos is collectively the finest theatric endeavor since Shakespeare's final play. It was Tempest, right?
On regular network television, shows respect only the wishes of network management, demographic analysts, political viewpoints, and, of course, advertisers. Occasionally, there will be a safely institutionalized network program (like Seinfeld or Law & Order) that places the wishes and expectations of its dedicated fanbase above all else. The Sopranos, however, is an artistic achievement of the highest order in that it respects the wishes and expectations of no one, not even its hardcore fans (if you don't believe me, you probably still think we're going to figure out what happened with the Chechen gangster) . The Sopranos, the show, seems to care only about gratifying its own mysterious, selfish desires, and it's in this crucial aspect that it mirrors its cruelly self-centered subject matter and animalistic cast of characters. It's less a show and more a raw and powerful force of nature.
So I like it.
Anyway, that's my thoughts on contemporary television. I bet you weren't expecting that, were you? You probably thought I was going to write about how my students are rapidly learning how to manipulate and tame me, their formally-fierce gaijin teacher! Or perhaps read about how I am writing my own reader text because the one available for my freshman class sucks! Ha! Not this post! I like to surprise people! Anyway, all this Sopranos talk has me thinking of gangsters, so enjoy this picture. It's entitled "Gangsterhead2.jpg" but I forget the name of the talented artist ... sorry, whoever you are!
Sunday, May 07, 2006
Hark, a Fairy Princess Yonder! (With Unicorns and Kitten!)
This is going to be a short post. I had the pleasure of having a telephone conversation with the always-funny and witty Elizabeth today. Major congratulations, by the way, are owed to her on account of her recent hiring at Toyo University in Tokyo. It sounds like a fantastic job for someone who's well along in their TESOL career, and considering this is Elizabeth's first major teaching job, her new posting is a testament to her tenacity, talent, and dedication to pedagogeratiousness (if that's a word, and, if it's not, then by the powers vested in me by the Department of English at Colorado State University, I hereby coin it). I'm super-stoked for her, and also a bit excited for me as (hopefully) the geographical narrowing will allow us to hang out a little once more.
Anyway, over the phone Elizabeth raved about all the pretty pictures I've been posting on this here blog, and she also announced that she's planning to enter the world of fantasy literature herself. In my estimation, she sounded far more excited about adventuring through books into the worlds of wizards and elf-princes than she did about going to Japan! So I figured that, for my next post, I would search for some internet fantasy art to display on her behalf. Surprisingly, I found an inspiring picture featuring a princess of some sort that looked eerily like Elizabeth! It's at the bottom. Enjoy!
Anyway, over the phone Elizabeth raved about all the pretty pictures I've been posting on this here blog, and she also announced that she's planning to enter the world of fantasy literature herself. In my estimation, she sounded far more excited about adventuring through books into the worlds of wizards and elf-princes than she did about going to Japan! So I figured that, for my next post, I would search for some internet fantasy art to display on her behalf. Surprisingly, I found an inspiring picture featuring a princess of some sort that looked eerily like Elizabeth! It's at the bottom. Enjoy!
Saturday, May 06, 2006
Golden Week!
Greetings friends! This week was "Golden Week" holiday in Japan, so my ordinarily brutal 3.5 day workweek was slashed to one day. Phew! Lord knows I needed a break. Golden Week is a big deal--people travel all over the country and do things with their family. It's kind of like Thanksgiving, but I don't hate it yet.
You might be asking, "What does Golden Week actually celebrate?" Or, "What is the history of Golden Week?" Well, the truth is that no one knows! And by that I mean only the Japanese know, and none of them are telling me. Not in English, anyway.
On Wednesday afternoon, I was sculpting a fierce turtle out of aluminum foil when I heard the rumbling of distant drums. Odd, I thought. Who's drumming? And it sounds like the drums are getting closer. Indeed they were. So I set aside my turtle, put on my sandals, and explored outside, where the answer was found not a block from my apartment. It turns out that the drums were placed inside this massive, ornate, festooned wooden shrine cart-thingy, and people were inside beating the drums and gongs and whatnot. Outside the cart were young girls swinging lanterns or fans, as well as young men strapped to the roof of the shrinne, waving sticks with colorful streamers attached. The entire shrine was being pulled by a team of drunken old men.
How did I know that they were drunk, you might ask? Well, occasionally they would take breaks and pass around cases of Asahi beer in large bottles. Additionally, the pulling people would often disappear into back alleys and discreetly vomit (I'm learning that a lot of Japanese cultural activities involve excessive consumption of alcohol and discreet vomiting) and then get back to pulling the cart. Anyway, if I got completely trashed, and spent a hot, sunny day hauling around a massive shrine/cart thingy loaded with people and drums, I'd probably vomit too.
It turns out that this cart was one of many, and they were parading all day through Mikage, the suburb of Kobe where I live. I must've seen eight or nine carts, each with their own specially-uniformed and color-coordinated crew.
Anyway, with my trusty digital camera I captured some video of the cart and posted it to YouTube.com, which, coincidentally, represents the single-greatest entertainment innovation since the advent of network television. Here's the link.
In other news, I traveled to Minoh, which is far north in the Osaka boonies. There they had this beautiful waterfall that you could get to by traversing several kilometers of beautifully lush and forested terrain. It was awesome, and I took a bunch of pictures. If you didn't get the e-mail link for the pictures, let me know and I'll send you a link.
After Minoh I went into downtown Osaka to relax at a gaijin bar called "The Pig and Whistle." There I met a really strange American guy named Bivin who was starting his own eikawa (conversation) school in Osaka which would teach Japanese students English conversational skills as well as new-agey goal-realization "philosophy". He calls his enterprise (and I'm copying directly from his business card) "Bivins EikawaPlus + Philosophy." You might notice the superfluous "plus" sign. I'm thinking that indicates a BIG addition of philosophy.
Anyway, after talking with Bivins for about 30 seconds, I realized that he doesn't know anything about philosophy. Seriously, he knows absolutely nothing. I'm no expert, but after years spent as Errol's roommate, I feel I am at a doctorate level compared to this guy. He opened his spiel with, "I think we can both agree that there are no absolutes, right?" I immediately replied with the playground retort, "I don't know if I agree, Bivin. Doesn't the statement 'there are no absolutes' indicate the existence of an absolute?" Bivin's mind was totally blown, and so was mine because I couldn't believe that he'd never been asked that before. Anyway, after several minutes of shocked sputtering, he gave me his business card (complete with his website, if you're curious), told me BivinsPlus could use a guy like me, and turned his attention to hitting on drunken Japanese women.
And that's about all that's new right now. My ankles and feet have been mysteriously swollen for a couple of days ... it's like I've been on a plane for an extended period of time, but if that were the case I would still have the sour taste of bitterness and fury in my mouth. Perhaps I was abducted by aliens. Maybe blood is pooling in my feet from sitting around too much during Golden Week. I don't know, but just in case I should get up and walk around for a while.
If something is seriously wrong with the circulation in my feet, and if my feet end up needing to be amputated, then hopefully they can be transformed into computer parts, like in this awesome but creepy CG design for a mouse, by Chris Lomaka. Enjoy!
You might be asking, "What does Golden Week actually celebrate?" Or, "What is the history of Golden Week?" Well, the truth is that no one knows! And by that I mean only the Japanese know, and none of them are telling me. Not in English, anyway.
On Wednesday afternoon, I was sculpting a fierce turtle out of aluminum foil when I heard the rumbling of distant drums. Odd, I thought. Who's drumming? And it sounds like the drums are getting closer. Indeed they were. So I set aside my turtle, put on my sandals, and explored outside, where the answer was found not a block from my apartment. It turns out that the drums were placed inside this massive, ornate, festooned wooden shrine cart-thingy, and people were inside beating the drums and gongs and whatnot. Outside the cart were young girls swinging lanterns or fans, as well as young men strapped to the roof of the shrinne, waving sticks with colorful streamers attached. The entire shrine was being pulled by a team of drunken old men.
How did I know that they were drunk, you might ask? Well, occasionally they would take breaks and pass around cases of Asahi beer in large bottles. Additionally, the pulling people would often disappear into back alleys and discreetly vomit (I'm learning that a lot of Japanese cultural activities involve excessive consumption of alcohol and discreet vomiting) and then get back to pulling the cart. Anyway, if I got completely trashed, and spent a hot, sunny day hauling around a massive shrine/cart thingy loaded with people and drums, I'd probably vomit too.
It turns out that this cart was one of many, and they were parading all day through Mikage, the suburb of Kobe where I live. I must've seen eight or nine carts, each with their own specially-uniformed and color-coordinated crew.
Anyway, with my trusty digital camera I captured some video of the cart and posted it to YouTube.com, which, coincidentally, represents the single-greatest entertainment innovation since the advent of network television. Here's the link.
In other news, I traveled to Minoh, which is far north in the Osaka boonies. There they had this beautiful waterfall that you could get to by traversing several kilometers of beautifully lush and forested terrain. It was awesome, and I took a bunch of pictures. If you didn't get the e-mail link for the pictures, let me know and I'll send you a link.
After Minoh I went into downtown Osaka to relax at a gaijin bar called "The Pig and Whistle." There I met a really strange American guy named Bivin who was starting his own eikawa (conversation) school in Osaka which would teach Japanese students English conversational skills as well as new-agey goal-realization "philosophy". He calls his enterprise (and I'm copying directly from his business card) "Bivins EikawaPlus + Philosophy." You might notice the superfluous "plus" sign. I'm thinking that indicates a BIG addition of philosophy.
Anyway, after talking with Bivins for about 30 seconds, I realized that he doesn't know anything about philosophy. Seriously, he knows absolutely nothing. I'm no expert, but after years spent as Errol's roommate, I feel I am at a doctorate level compared to this guy. He opened his spiel with, "I think we can both agree that there are no absolutes, right?" I immediately replied with the playground retort, "I don't know if I agree, Bivin. Doesn't the statement 'there are no absolutes' indicate the existence of an absolute?" Bivin's mind was totally blown, and so was mine because I couldn't believe that he'd never been asked that before. Anyway, after several minutes of shocked sputtering, he gave me his business card (complete with his website, if you're curious), told me BivinsPlus could use a guy like me, and turned his attention to hitting on drunken Japanese women.
And that's about all that's new right now. My ankles and feet have been mysteriously swollen for a couple of days ... it's like I've been on a plane for an extended period of time, but if that were the case I would still have the sour taste of bitterness and fury in my mouth. Perhaps I was abducted by aliens. Maybe blood is pooling in my feet from sitting around too much during Golden Week. I don't know, but just in case I should get up and walk around for a while.
If something is seriously wrong with the circulation in my feet, and if my feet end up needing to be amputated, then hopefully they can be transformed into computer parts, like in this awesome but creepy CG design for a mouse, by Chris Lomaka. Enjoy!
Saturday, April 29, 2006
My Job. (Really.)
OK, OK ... I really (really!) don't want to sound like I'm bragging, but check this out:
I work Tuesday through Friday. Monday is my "research day", but there are no expectations on me to research, so it's effectively a three-day weekend. Each day I work, I wake up at 6:10 AM, take a shower, and am out the door by 7. I walk to Mikage (my neighborhood) station and catch the train to Oji-Koen (where Kaisei College is) around 7:06.
On the train, I watch packs of uniformed adolescent schoolboys do knuckleheaded things to each other. For instance, on the train they play this paper-rock-scissors game together, and the loser has to sit patiently as he gets finger-flicked in the forehead by all the winners. This reminds me of my junior high days when I would play a game called "quarters" in which the last person to touch a spinning quarter must subject his knuckles to the sliding rough-edged coin hurled at him at a high velocity. It's nice to know that somethings never change.
Anyway, Oji-Koen is two stops from Mikage. Once I get out, I buy a breakfast pastry at a konbini and, whistling a happy tune, start walking up the hill toward my college. The walk itself, even though it involves a sharp ascent up a hill, is a wonderful experience that never gets old. The path I take travels alongside a babbling brook and is canopied by pink boughs of blossoming cherry trees through which the morning sunlight streams and shimmers. Even if I were blind, the floral fragrances alone would make this a wonderful stroll. As I get closer to the school, I take a path which lies on a low bluff overlooking the back of Oji-Koen zoo. 20 feet to my left, I see emus, deer, ostriches, kangaroos, wallabies, and giraffes, and I like to cheerfully wave at each beast as I walk past. As I get closer to the school, I am greeted by a granite sculpture of the Virgin Mary perched high atop on of the school's columned towers.
Once I arrive at the college (around 7:40), I am warmly greeted by one of Kaisei's uniformed security guards (I have no idea why Kaisei has its own police force, but they do...). The guard always cheerfully says "ohayo gozaimasu!" and bows deeply. I reply by doing the same. As I enter the building, I sign in at the front office, check my mailbox, and walk up a flight of stairs to my office where I consume my breakfast pastry and go over the day's lesson plans.
Perhaps I should describe the working atmosphere of Kobe Kaisei. I'll start with the command structure: Kaisei College is ultimately ruled by a mysterious cadre of elite nuns whose powerful perch is so lofty that I, from my low vantage point, am unable to perceive it. Occasionally, I see a nun walking around (a nun even--I shit you not--poured me a glass of beer at the school's semester-opening party a few weeks ago) and I wonder if she is my great-great-grandboss or something. Underneath the nuns is the president, who I recognize by his aura of professionalism and coattailed blazer. Underneath him is a legion of people who I think might be my bosses, but I'm never sure because no one ever bosses me around or even tells me what to do.
Everyone is immaculately groomed or clean-shaven, and all garments are well-pressed. Women teachers wear sharp-looking businesswoman wear, and the male teachers wear suits and ties. I, on the other hand, wear my trusty cargo pants and an untucked button-down shirt which (I think) is meant to be worn untucked. Somedays I am scruffier than others (most readers know how loathe I am to bring blade to face) and my hair is often clearly wind-blown from the walk up. I keep expecting someone to tell me I look like shit and I need to clean myself up, but everyone treats me with unceasing politeness and mention of my appearence has yet to be made.
As for the students, the person in Fort Collins who told me Kaisei College students wear uniforms was mistaken. The students wear whatever they want. Older students often wear businesswoman suits (they often have job interviews after class), and younger students wear casual clothes, with jungle camouflage being a prominent fabric pattern for some reason. A handful students regularly dress in what I call hooker-outfits (~4 inch high heels, thigh-high stockings, daring miniskirts, miniature halter-tops), which can often be distracting to any non-neutered male teacher. One student even wore a shirt that sported an image of Disney's Bambi--a frame from the scene where the young deer was trying to stay balanced on an icy surface. Above the image was printed "Face-Down, Ass-Up, That's the way I like to fuck!"
Sheesh! And there's nuns walking around outside...
The biggest challenge in this job is getting students to participate in class discussion. Japanese girls seem to be the polar opposite of Arab boys, who like to shout comments to the teacher and answer questions, and are rarely afraid to look like an idiot. At Kaisei, the students usually look at me, pay attention, take notes, nod in understanding, but never raise their hand or say a word when I ask the class a general question. Even if it's the easiest question in the world, a question I know everyone knows the answer to, they just stare at me and watch me squirm. I've been told many times that this is standard classroom behavior in Japan, but it's quite difficult to get used to.
So, a casual classroom in which students freely dialogue with the teacher and answer questions and ask their own seems to be a fond memory and an impossible dream. What I have found, however, is that putting students in groups actually works, and wonderfully so. Take three or four normally catatonic students, put them in a group, give them a task, and watch them go! I never thought I'd be a cheerleader for any form of groupwork, but in this culture it's great.
After class, the students like to come up and ask me all the questions they didn't ask in class when they were supposed to. Sometimes, they also just want to talk to me, try out their English, be friendly, and make me feel very welcome. Students are usually just being kind and friendly, but it's in these situations where most of the terrifying flirtatious attempts and bold innuendo occasionally occurs (from them, not me of course). The less mentioned about that the better, but suffice it to say I am a heterosexual male, and a solitary one at that, so, on a chemical level, it's extremely difficult to maintain a disinterested poker-face and politely shut them down. But this is something I'm getting better at--a skill I never thought I'd need to learn.
Perhaps I should shift here and describe my pay in vague terms. Kaisei College pays for my apartment and train fees. They also pay me overtime because I'm in the classroom more than my contract-mandated 16 hours a week (I'm at 20 this semester). Additionally, I can expect a hefty bonus twice a year. The kicker is that, for my first two years, this is all tax-free. My yearly salary might be average and silly-to-boast about, but I am currently making at least four times as much money as I've ever earned in a single year. For comparision, just a few months ago, I was at King Soopers grocery store in Ft. Collins, cashing in my accumulation of pennies in order to buy four rolls of cheap toilet paper.
As for drawbacks to this job, about the only one I can think of is that Kaisei College isn't a demanding or impressive institution in an academic sense. The Kobe Kaisei compound in which I work has multiple buildings, and students from kindergarten to college are taught there. In terms of prestige, Kobe Kaisei Junior High is, I'm told, the Harvard of private junior high schools in Japan. Kobe Kaisei College, on the other hand, is regarded as highly as Front Range (a very pricey Front Range). It's exceedinly rare to fail a student, and the administration discourages this. This policy, of course, doesn't mark Kaisei College as an elite institution. So once all this is said and done, I'm not expecting future employers to be awed at my tenure here.
But it does qualify as "overseas teaching experience," a critical aspect for anyone seeking to make a career in this field. Plus it pays great, has wonderful perks, wonderful students, and I'm really having a wonderful (albeit lonesome) time here.
Here's a picture of the cubicle-hell destiny I always feared I'd wind up in--a destiny it would appear that I've avoided (for now, anyway). It's a great 2D CG picture with some spiffy Cthulu imagery (again). Check the label on the printer... it and all the other minute details make this a superb and brilliant "everyday dystopia" satirical masterpiece.
Whew ... so that's pretty much my job. I hope I didn't sound too bragadocious, but I love it. Any questions? Now what do you people want to know about? I'm open for suggestions.
I work Tuesday through Friday. Monday is my "research day", but there are no expectations on me to research, so it's effectively a three-day weekend. Each day I work, I wake up at 6:10 AM, take a shower, and am out the door by 7. I walk to Mikage (my neighborhood) station and catch the train to Oji-Koen (where Kaisei College is) around 7:06.
On the train, I watch packs of uniformed adolescent schoolboys do knuckleheaded things to each other. For instance, on the train they play this paper-rock-scissors game together, and the loser has to sit patiently as he gets finger-flicked in the forehead by all the winners. This reminds me of my junior high days when I would play a game called "quarters" in which the last person to touch a spinning quarter must subject his knuckles to the sliding rough-edged coin hurled at him at a high velocity. It's nice to know that somethings never change.
Anyway, Oji-Koen is two stops from Mikage. Once I get out, I buy a breakfast pastry at a konbini and, whistling a happy tune, start walking up the hill toward my college. The walk itself, even though it involves a sharp ascent up a hill, is a wonderful experience that never gets old. The path I take travels alongside a babbling brook and is canopied by pink boughs of blossoming cherry trees through which the morning sunlight streams and shimmers. Even if I were blind, the floral fragrances alone would make this a wonderful stroll. As I get closer to the school, I take a path which lies on a low bluff overlooking the back of Oji-Koen zoo. 20 feet to my left, I see emus, deer, ostriches, kangaroos, wallabies, and giraffes, and I like to cheerfully wave at each beast as I walk past. As I get closer to the school, I am greeted by a granite sculpture of the Virgin Mary perched high atop on of the school's columned towers.
Once I arrive at the college (around 7:40), I am warmly greeted by one of Kaisei's uniformed security guards (I have no idea why Kaisei has its own police force, but they do...). The guard always cheerfully says "ohayo gozaimasu!" and bows deeply. I reply by doing the same. As I enter the building, I sign in at the front office, check my mailbox, and walk up a flight of stairs to my office where I consume my breakfast pastry and go over the day's lesson plans.
Perhaps I should describe the working atmosphere of Kobe Kaisei. I'll start with the command structure: Kaisei College is ultimately ruled by a mysterious cadre of elite nuns whose powerful perch is so lofty that I, from my low vantage point, am unable to perceive it. Occasionally, I see a nun walking around (a nun even--I shit you not--poured me a glass of beer at the school's semester-opening party a few weeks ago) and I wonder if she is my great-great-grandboss or something. Underneath the nuns is the president, who I recognize by his aura of professionalism and coattailed blazer. Underneath him is a legion of people who I think might be my bosses, but I'm never sure because no one ever bosses me around or even tells me what to do.
Everyone is immaculately groomed or clean-shaven, and all garments are well-pressed. Women teachers wear sharp-looking businesswoman wear, and the male teachers wear suits and ties. I, on the other hand, wear my trusty cargo pants and an untucked button-down shirt which (I think) is meant to be worn untucked. Somedays I am scruffier than others (most readers know how loathe I am to bring blade to face) and my hair is often clearly wind-blown from the walk up. I keep expecting someone to tell me I look like shit and I need to clean myself up, but everyone treats me with unceasing politeness and mention of my appearence has yet to be made.
As for the students, the person in Fort Collins who told me Kaisei College students wear uniforms was mistaken. The students wear whatever they want. Older students often wear businesswoman suits (they often have job interviews after class), and younger students wear casual clothes, with jungle camouflage being a prominent fabric pattern for some reason. A handful students regularly dress in what I call hooker-outfits (~4 inch high heels, thigh-high stockings, daring miniskirts, miniature halter-tops), which can often be distracting to any non-neutered male teacher. One student even wore a shirt that sported an image of Disney's Bambi--a frame from the scene where the young deer was trying to stay balanced on an icy surface. Above the image was printed "Face-Down, Ass-Up, That's the way I like to fuck!"
Sheesh! And there's nuns walking around outside...
The biggest challenge in this job is getting students to participate in class discussion. Japanese girls seem to be the polar opposite of Arab boys, who like to shout comments to the teacher and answer questions, and are rarely afraid to look like an idiot. At Kaisei, the students usually look at me, pay attention, take notes, nod in understanding, but never raise their hand or say a word when I ask the class a general question. Even if it's the easiest question in the world, a question I know everyone knows the answer to, they just stare at me and watch me squirm. I've been told many times that this is standard classroom behavior in Japan, but it's quite difficult to get used to.
So, a casual classroom in which students freely dialogue with the teacher and answer questions and ask their own seems to be a fond memory and an impossible dream. What I have found, however, is that putting students in groups actually works, and wonderfully so. Take three or four normally catatonic students, put them in a group, give them a task, and watch them go! I never thought I'd be a cheerleader for any form of groupwork, but in this culture it's great.
After class, the students like to come up and ask me all the questions they didn't ask in class when they were supposed to. Sometimes, they also just want to talk to me, try out their English, be friendly, and make me feel very welcome. Students are usually just being kind and friendly, but it's in these situations where most of the terrifying flirtatious attempts and bold innuendo occasionally occurs (from them, not me of course). The less mentioned about that the better, but suffice it to say I am a heterosexual male, and a solitary one at that, so, on a chemical level, it's extremely difficult to maintain a disinterested poker-face and politely shut them down. But this is something I'm getting better at--a skill I never thought I'd need to learn.
Perhaps I should shift here and describe my pay in vague terms. Kaisei College pays for my apartment and train fees. They also pay me overtime because I'm in the classroom more than my contract-mandated 16 hours a week (I'm at 20 this semester). Additionally, I can expect a hefty bonus twice a year. The kicker is that, for my first two years, this is all tax-free. My yearly salary might be average and silly-to-boast about, but I am currently making at least four times as much money as I've ever earned in a single year. For comparision, just a few months ago, I was at King Soopers grocery store in Ft. Collins, cashing in my accumulation of pennies in order to buy four rolls of cheap toilet paper.
As for drawbacks to this job, about the only one I can think of is that Kaisei College isn't a demanding or impressive institution in an academic sense. The Kobe Kaisei compound in which I work has multiple buildings, and students from kindergarten to college are taught there. In terms of prestige, Kobe Kaisei Junior High is, I'm told, the Harvard of private junior high schools in Japan. Kobe Kaisei College, on the other hand, is regarded as highly as Front Range (a very pricey Front Range). It's exceedinly rare to fail a student, and the administration discourages this. This policy, of course, doesn't mark Kaisei College as an elite institution. So once all this is said and done, I'm not expecting future employers to be awed at my tenure here.
But it does qualify as "overseas teaching experience," a critical aspect for anyone seeking to make a career in this field. Plus it pays great, has wonderful perks, wonderful students, and I'm really having a wonderful (albeit lonesome) time here.
Here's a picture of the cubicle-hell destiny I always feared I'd wind up in--a destiny it would appear that I've avoided (for now, anyway). It's a great 2D CG picture with some spiffy Cthulu imagery (again). Check the label on the printer... it and all the other minute details make this a superb and brilliant "everyday dystopia" satirical masterpiece.
Whew ... so that's pretty much my job. I hope I didn't sound too bragadocious, but I love it. Any questions? Now what do you people want to know about? I'm open for suggestions.
Friday, April 28, 2006
Finally, the long awaited description of Kobe Kaisei College!
Dear readers:
Before I write anything, allow me to immediate state that I'm very sorry for the ridiculous delay in this substantial post. I've been busy, but not so busy that I couldn't write here. I feel I owe better to the three or four people who read this blog and comment here (even the guy from Malaysia or wherever), so please, accept my humble apologies.
In my mind's eye, I often see dear friends checking this blog and frowning at (yet again) the appearance of the dusty old post featuring the guy on the bicycle. It makes me feel bad to know that my friends might be encountering such daily frustration due to my sloth, and I promise that, with the exception of circumstances involving my death or grevious injury, posting here will be for more regular in the future.
As I stated last week, part of the reason that I haven't written this post is because I've been waiting until I had an accurate and balanced perspective of my current work situation. To be honest, my job seemed too good to be true, and I've been waiting to better understand it so I could give a full and accurate portrayal here instead of one distorted through the lense of nauseating enthusiasm and exuberance. Finally, after three weeks, I am convinced that this new job in Japan truly represents the pinnacle of happiness in my oft-rocky near-27 year existence.
So, at long last, without further ado, with my humblest gratitude and fondest wishes and even sincere apologies, please enjoy a detailed description of my new job:
Actually, it's gonna be a huge post, and before I write all that, I think I'm gonna take the train into Sannomiya and eat a nice curry dinner. Then, when I come back, if there's nothing on TV and I don't feel like reading or doing laundry or clipping my toenails, then I'll write it.
Before I write anything, allow me to immediate state that I'm very sorry for the ridiculous delay in this substantial post. I've been busy, but not so busy that I couldn't write here. I feel I owe better to the three or four people who read this blog and comment here (even the guy from Malaysia or wherever), so please, accept my humble apologies.
In my mind's eye, I often see dear friends checking this blog and frowning at (yet again) the appearance of the dusty old post featuring the guy on the bicycle. It makes me feel bad to know that my friends might be encountering such daily frustration due to my sloth, and I promise that, with the exception of circumstances involving my death or grevious injury, posting here will be for more regular in the future.
As I stated last week, part of the reason that I haven't written this post is because I've been waiting until I had an accurate and balanced perspective of my current work situation. To be honest, my job seemed too good to be true, and I've been waiting to better understand it so I could give a full and accurate portrayal here instead of one distorted through the lense of nauseating enthusiasm and exuberance. Finally, after three weeks, I am convinced that this new job in Japan truly represents the pinnacle of happiness in my oft-rocky near-27 year existence.
So, at long last, without further ado, with my humblest gratitude and fondest wishes and even sincere apologies, please enjoy a detailed description of my new job:
Actually, it's gonna be a huge post, and before I write all that, I think I'm gonna take the train into Sannomiya and eat a nice curry dinner. Then, when I come back, if there's nothing on TV and I don't feel like reading or doing laundry or clipping my toenails, then I'll write it.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
