I have been in Japan for just over two months. My journey began with a 10 hour flight and 3 days of orientation at a large hotel in Shinjuku. Overall, the orientation was unremarkable. There were several hundred (perhaps 600?) new assistant language teachers (ALTs) trying to recover from jet-lag, attend a myriad of seminars, and squeeze in some Tokyo sight-seeing.

I arrived at the city I’ll teach in after a long bus-bullet train-bus-car excursion… I went to my new school for maybe an hour or two, and then the vice-principal and another English teacher took me to my apartment in Akashi City. We went by train, then walked to my apartment together so that I could learn the windy route through the small streets.

I’m told my apartment building is about 30 years old, and the first thing I noticed upon entering my apartment was the unfamiliar smell of new tatami. It is a surprisingly spacious apartment. I have a kitchen/dining area, shower room, toilet room, two 3×4 meter tatami mat rooms, and another 3×4 m wooden-floor bedroom. Apparently my apartment building is meant for teachers with families, and so it’s “special” that I can live here alone.

While the shower room is a bit antiquated (I have to turn on a gas water heater to use the shower), the rest of the place was relatively clean and spacious. I also have a small front balcony, and a really large back balcony that overlooks a community vegetable garden and a rice paddy. I can even glimpse the ocean on the horizon.

I won’t lie, my first night in my apartment was really lonely. I had no phone, no internet, no friends, and as I discovered when I tried to take a shower, no shampoo. I felt like crying, but didn’t have the energy to, and instead passed on some used futons I found in one of the closets.

The very next day I had to be at school at 8:20am, and I had to complete a “moving in notification” at Akashi City Hall and get a bank account. Otherwise there wasn’t much to do except meet some of my new co-workers and flip through the text book. That night Haruka drove down from Kyoto to visit me. It was nice to see a familiar face, and to have someone to help me stock up on groceries and other necessities.

About a week after my arrival in Hyogo there was a three day orientation for all new Hyogo ALTs in a rural town in the middle of the prefecture. It was mostly boring, consisting of seminars on life in Japan, learning Japanese, and teaching. But it was nice to see the other new ALTs (assistant language teachers) again, and hear about their first weeks.

At the orientation I met an ALT named Henry (who has been here a few years already) and perhaps a week later we went to dinner with his Japanese lady-friend, Masayo. I enjoyed having good company, especially after more than a week of sitting home alone and cooking by myself. Since then, we’ve had several great evenings out, usually in Kobe ^_^

On this particular evening we had dinner at an Italian restaurant near Sannomiya Station, and then walked down to Kobe Port. Unfortunatly I only had my old iPhone 3S, so the photo quality is lacking.

We walked along the water towards a place called “Mosaic”, where we relaxed and had some beverages.

The weekend after the new ALT orientation, I met up with some of the people I met there and attended a festival in a small city called Ono, where one of the girls lives. I wish I had taken more photos of that night. I’m so pale!

On weekends I often go visit Haruka in Kyoto. Sometimes he visits Akashi, but he thinks it’s too rural, and of course I don’t have the internet or a PS3…

One weekend we went to a swimming pool in Uji, southeast of Kyoto. The pool was located in a park near the top of a hill, and was very scenic.

The students finally returned from their summer holiday in September and I began teaching. I teach at two high schools. My “main” school is a kind of typically higher level Japanese high school. By “higher level”, I mean the students are quite smart. In Japan, students have to test into the various high schools, they way we test into universities in America. Also, high school is only 3 years, the equivalent of 10th, 11th, and 12th grades in America. I teach 1st year students (10 graders) at my main school on Mondays, Tuesdays, and Fridays.

On Wednesdays and Thursdays I teach 2nd year students (11th graders) at a technical high school. The school specializes in subjects such as engineering and architecture. (I think this may be the reason why I was placed here). Many of the students here will join the workforce immediately after graduating. Due to the nature of the school, it is mostly male students. By mostly, I mean there are 683 boys and 8 girls.

During my first few weeks, I was proposed to more times than I can recall. The students are very enthusiastic about speaking to an American girl using any and all English which they may happen to know. Being that this is a technical school, and to these students English isn’t very important, I hear some really interesting English. Some examples:

• A student enthusiastically walks up to me in the hallway, looks me in the eyes, and says “I am so much!”
• A student tells me after class “I love you. I need you. I have 3 mothers!” Just imagine my expression changing from surprised to confused.

A class of 3rd year (12th grade) students was so disappointed that I wouldn’t be teaching them that they asked their teacher to see if I’d come to their classroom for the last 10 minutes of class. Later they wrote a message for me on the board:

じる is “Jill” in Hiragana.

My students at my main school are much more shy. Usually the girls are more brave than the boys, and will come talk to me in the staff room. For homework after the first lesson, I asked students to complete a self-introduction worksheet. Part of the worksheet involved drawing a picture of themselves. Some girls drew manga style pictures, while some boys seemed to draw famous figures from their history textbook. Here is a sample of some of the drawings:

I also attended my main school’s Sports Festival. I’ve never seen anything quite like a Japanese sports festival. First, the students march around the track in army-style formation according to their grade and homeroom class in time to music played by the school band. Most look incredibly bored while doing this.

Afterwards the games begin. Some games are rather silly, and remind me of elementary school. The sports festival is designed so that everyone can participate, even if they’re not very sporty.

Before lunch I actually ran the first leg of the 4×100 meter relay for the teachers team. I can confidently say I didn’t embarrass myself. By the end of my leg, I was in the front-middle of the pack. My team ended up getting 3rd place.

After lunch the students again marched in formation, but only those students that participate on a school sports team. They marched in full uniform, and each team even had its own flag.

Then more games and races.

During the festival many students were interested in talking to me, and were happy to give me high-fives as they ran out onto the field for their event.

Most week nights I just go home, shower, perhaps go for a run, cook dinner, and read a book. I know it’s not very exciting, but I’m usually pretty tired after work and I’m happy to just relax. One Sunday morning someone came and harvested the rice paddy behind my apartment.

And sometimes I take pictures of the sunset from my back balcony.

Well, that’s all for now. It’s taken me 3 days of trying to type this on my lunch breaks. Due to some unforeseen circumstances (a locked crawl space and a missing key), I still don’t have internet at my house. Without internet at home, I can’t say when my next blog will be. But I’m happy to finally write this much, and I hope it was interesting ^_^