It was my first day as an ALT at a new school. I stood in the genkan of the school, eyeing the shoe lockers to see if the school had already set one aside for me. Meanwhile, excited chuugakusei in thier blue uniforms passed me whispering and occasionally calling out the brave "hallo!" or "Goodo Morning!" I found the faculty room and was listening to the morning meeting, which they were doing have in English for me, and I thought how wonderful it would be to be at the same school for an entire year. Instead of coming in for only three months, I would be there from beginning to end, coming back to the same students at the end of every vacation. It was a warm and happy feeling of expectation. I was going to be invovled; I'd help clean the school and everything.
Of course, it was only a dream. But I missed Japan for the rest of my dreams and when I woke up this morning. If I could make it the practical thing to do, I'd be teaching in Japan next year, but most of the schools I've looked at won't take me without at least one more year of experience. And being an ALT feels like taking a step backward from being a full-time English teacher. So it looks like I'll be hear for another year. I guess that's the right decision. My students are just as kawaii as Japanese students after all.
I've been leafing through my books of haiku looking for ones that would appeal to my students as we begin our poetry unit. I'll leave you with one that I found on the front page of Mainichi Shinbun's English website and that reminds me of watching the rain fall from my rooftop in Japan:
potholed road --
the puddles of rain
mixed with stars
--
Gautam Nadkarni (Mumbai, India)
3 comments:
Come on back Eve. There are a few teachers in the international schools we know that we could introduce you to if you need more information (although it sounds like you have already looked into this).
We'd even clean out a room for you if you wanted to live at our place. It would be a good excuse to throw a bunch of stuff away...
Haiku is easy
but sometimes doesn't make sense
refrigerator
That picture you posted blew my mind. I could decide whether I wanted to look at the gravel below or the reflection above; my eyes kept on shifting back and forth.
I hate it when dreams are better than real life. I end up staying in bed a lot longer than usual (and sacrifice the first half of my school classes for the day.)
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