Sutorenjaa In Japan

This is it... again!

So last entry I was living it up on the streets of Fukui…
After the crazy night (not really), the next day was filled with… wait for it… MEETINGS and LECTURES! Yes, joy of joys, we got to sit through all the formalities such as being introduced to the school board (stand up, bow, sit down, stand up, bow, sit down, etc.), listening to a cop talk about the traffic rules in Japan (as well as what is needed to start driving, speed limits, rules for bicycling, etc, etc), and stuff about our contracts, vacation time and taxes… BO-RING! I suppose this stuff must be said and must be heard, maybe as a disclaimer. Too bad I know I will be asking others about it all in a week’s time. I am still just really anxious to meet and go to my school. As I have mentioned before, I appreciate all this information but I am really ready to just get to school already!
Tonight we had a BBQ at the international club. Yes, there is a small group of people in Japan who form this group and they like to meet the new/ old JETs as well as other foreign language individuals in the area. If I haven’t mentioned this before, there are lots of other private companies that hire English language teachers in Japan. There are a bunch in Fukui (Nova and Aeon are the most numerous but there are also UFO? something like that). Good people too… pretty much doing the same thing as JETs are but privately and from what I hear the set up is not quite as good as JETs. Not sure… if any readers have heard otherwise, I apologize for the mistake! Anyway, I also found out there is a pretty decent size Brazilian population living in Fukui prefecture. Crazyness… I hope there are some good restaurants! I hear they work at some of the factories in the area. Apparently there were Germans before the Brazilians. Go International Fukui. So the BBQ was interesting. A bunch of people crowding up this tiny little street corner in the heat of the night (it was INSANELY hot and humid… the BBQ grills weren’t helping). Talked to a few people but I think I was still feeling a bit homesick (I miss you all already!) so I wasn’t really social. Perhaps I am just still a bit tired. Again, it seems that a lot of people are sort of still in the process of checking each other out (esp. us newbies) and scoping the scene for the coming year. I’m not really into it. But, there was a good turnout and plenty of yaki soba for all! That is, fried noodles with veggies & meat… yum! I was almost forced a plate of mushrooms but you’ll all be happy to know that in staying true to my dislikes, I took a tiny bite (to be polite) and then sloughed it off on someone else. It was a nice get together but I was quite glad just to get back to the hotel (I’m starting to dig my shoebox of a hotel room).
The next morning was more talks (guy/ girl stuff, so many of the chicks here are concerned with waxing… weird… & team teaching info) and then… hooray! We get to go to our new homes! I was pretty excited. A room full of JTE (Japanese teachers of English) supervisors and one of them was mine!!! FINALLY!
When I found my JTE and I wasn’t quite sure what to do… some people sat down and started talking with their sups but mine was ready to get going. Her name is Sugimoto-sensei (Soo-ghi- moto). At first she seemed a little cold shouldered (great, first day and she doesn’t like me!!!), but then I had heard that sometimes the teachers/ people can seem that way when really they are just busy. So, I will just say that she seemed ‘busy’. Anyway, we took off in her little pink kei car (it’s PINK!!!!! HOW CUTE IS THAT?!) and went off somewheres I have no idea where… my town I guess… its so confusing being in a new town. I am literally in a land where the streets have no names. Seriously. My apartment complex has a name but the street I live on has none. Apparently only the REALLY REALLY main streets and highways have names. Otherwise it’s, “first right and left after the first rice patty, before the metal shop). OH!!! And let me just say that for some strange reason, their driving on the left is not freaking me out! It doesn’t seem absurd or as radically different as I thought it would feel. But I do still try to get in the car (instinctively I guess) on the left side. (-__-#)
My new best ‘busy’ friend and I made our first stop at the bank where I opened up an account with a single yen! Haha! I have 1 yen to my name! I had to fill out a bunch of forms which I didn’t understand… because they were all in Japanese! So, my sup had to fill out some things, and I just signed where she told me to. And by sign, they do NOT mean signature. They mean “print it out in ‘romanji’ so that we can read, stupid”. I realized this after the ‘aaaaah?!?!’s and baffled looks I got when I ‘signed’ my name on the bank form. They asked “Waaaa! Is this English?! What is this?! Could you write it like this? [points to the passport]” Besides a signature, I also have a hanko or inka which is a stamp (like a Chinese chop) with my last name in katakana. It’s pretty convenient. Alls I have to do is put it in some red ink and stamp it, and its official! Woo hoo! Additionally, we set it up so all my bills would be auto-withdrawn from my account each month. Easy peasy. After that it was off to pay the land lord a BUNCH of money! I forget now how much exactly (its too painful to remember… I blacked out… I handed over a WAD of cash and I don’t remember much after that) but I didn’t have it all so, I have to come back on Monday with the rest… OR ELSE THEY WOULD DEPORT ME!!!…. j/k. It was all good.
Finally, I got my first glimpse of school. It’s up on a hill!!! It was a pretty quick tour (just got shown my office and the school office) but it looked like kids were still hanging around? WHY?!?! The poor tykes… but then I was informed that they are there to practice their club activities…. WHY?!?! Eh, I guess its my lazy side reminiscing about how far away from school I wanted to be during the summer and thinking these kids are nuts! I got to meet the principal too. Seems like a nice guy. We actually sat down and had some tea, with my sup interpreting for me. So, I figure if the principal thinks I’m OK, then the rest will be fine… I hope!!!
So after all that excitement it was about 4:30pm and my sup was ready to hit the road. She dropped me off at my place, made sure I knew how the essentials worked and then said she’d see me later (when? how do I contact you? please don’t leeeeeeeve meeeee!), and don’t forget to pay the landlord.

posted by KidBach @ 4:34 PM