Week 4

April 19: Day 21
There’s nothing worse than making a bowl of ramen and not being able to eat it because it’s too hot and you already burned your mouth on it so you have to just watch the steam rise from the noodles as you drool with impatience. Anyways, today was another half-day of school/half-day of parent conferences. Here are some highlights from the day: a bloody nose, a giant splinter in a tiny thumb, a bonked head in need of an ice pack, and another thumb in need of a bandaid; all in the span of 2 minutes! I was told things like this will most likely happen every day because kindergarteners are a bit accident-prone. Other than that, it was a good day in the classroom and routines are starting to settle in place. I haven’t had a single good hair day since arriving in Japan. I’m thinking about ordering a small disco ball for my apartment to catch the morning sun rays and guarantee a good day. Thoughts?

April 20: Day 22
Pay day! I can finally use my Japanese bank card to pull some yen from the nearby ATM. After work, I was introduced to a nearby import store called Yamaya and nearly spent my entire paycheck on peanut butter. Joking, but that stuff is not cheap here, and hard to find. My bag also included some vanilla black tea bags, CHEETOS, matcha kitkats, spicy cheese sticks, and other random groceries/snacks. If you know me, you know my love for Cheetos; however, I was told the Cheetos here in Japan are disappointing… We’ll see about that. Today I also got my first card in the mail! I’ve been patiently waiting for a package from home for about 3 weeks and I’m starting to worry it was lost somewhere in the Pacific Ocean. Anyways, today was a fun day with the kindergarteners, but I’m feeling tired after just a half day and I’m worried about the full days of school that start tomorrow! Wish me luck…

April 21: Day 23
Today was the first full day of school! Whew. I ate a good breakfast this morning (oatmeal and protein yogurt) which powered me through the day. We used paint dot pens for a craft, played outside, made origami, ate lunch together (for the first time!), sang songs together, and practiced English of course. I found my jaw on the floor as I watched the students take out their lunches. They all brought a lunch kit which included a place mat, a utensil container, a damp cloth for their hands and a cup for gargling water after they finished eating. After carefully laying out all of their items, we folded our hands and sang a prayer before saying, “Let’s eat!” Each bento box was meticulously put together with heart-shaped carrot cut-outs, characters pressed into sandwiches, sculpted cucumbers and apples, soybeans threaded on colorful toothpicks, etc. I’m going to take pictures of the bento boxes tomorrow to prove it. I was amazed.

April 22: Day 24
It’s Friday! Today, we began a Mother’s Day craft, celebrated all the April kindergarten birthdays with a birthday party (we’ll do this every month), sang songs about red and monkeys, practiced the stroke order of the letters in our names, and played outside. Now that we’ve been in school for about a week, the students are starting to call me by my name and hearing “Melia sensei” or “Miss Melia” is so CUTE! The students are still adjusting to a whole day at school and are EXHAUSTED by the end of the day. Some of them can barely keep their eyes open during story-time before dismissal. The most challenging part of this job is trying to communicate with 4-year olds who don’t speak English. When a student comes up to me to ask/tell me something in Japanese, I don’t know how to help them and it’s quite disappointing for both of us. This will get better as their English vocabulary bank grows bigger and bigger, but for now, it’s a lot of hand gestures and pointing. I’ve already noticed their sponge-like brains in action when I say something like “Oopsie!” during playtime and a chorus of little “oopsie”s follow me around for the rest of the day. As promised, I took a photo of a student’s lunch bento which you can see below. Look at the intricate Thomas the Train seaweed cutout! I am in awe.

Additionally
After work, I headed to a charity concert for Ukraine’s children with a coworker! It was in the Miyagino Ward Cultural Center which was a beautiful venue. I wasn’t sure what to expect, but there were over two-hundred people in attendance and we were lucky enough to get a seat close to the stage! It was first-come-first-serve because they didn’t sell tickets. There were three main musicians, a violinist, a cellist, and a pianist. The violinist grew up behind the Iron Curtain in what is now Slovakia and organized this event to help out Ukraine, especially the children, so that they wouldn’t have to grow up in that environment. I could not understand any of the speeches, introductions, or explanations, but I’m fluent in classical music which is all that really mattered. I had goosebumps the entire time and left with an extremely full heart. Experiencing such unity in a room of many diverse backgrounds is something that cannot be described. The concert lasted about 2 hours and I returned home around 10:00pm, feeling grateful and fulfilled. There’s something about classical music that feels like home, and it was really special to experience that feeling in Japan today.

April 23rd, Day 25: The Perfect Day
Today was so eventful that I actually made a separate post called Ah, Matsushima. In short, I got to explore the place near the top of my “Japan Bucket List” today and it was amazing. My coworker, Nancy, loves to show people new places, and I love to explore new places, so it was perfect! She drove me to Matsushima bay where we walked across bridges, gandered through gardens, ate a delicious lunch of fresh fishes and noodles, peeked into souvenir shops, stopped for matcha and desserts in a tea house overlooking the bay, learned about Japanese history (relayed through Nancy, of course), tasted Sakura mochi on a stick, and walked around a bit more. On the way home, we stopped at AEON mall which is a large shopping mall with an arcade, food court, and grocery store inside. Oh, and an ‘animal cafe’ with owls, a sloth, parrots, rabbits, baby chicks, and other animals for children to hang out with. We had dinner here, which is where I tried cow tongue for the first time! I was sliced very thinly on top of tofu with a soy sauce marinade. I also had vegetable tempura, barley rice, white miso soup, wabari mochi, and some pickled vegetables. This restaurant was known for having the best-quality rice in the region! My stomach was feeling quite content today. See my Matsushima post to see more photos.

April 24, Day 26:
After such an eventful day yesterday, I have decided to rest, relax, and spend Sunday at home. I also have much to prepare for the upcoming week. I went to the ‘Japanese dollar store’ today with intentions of buying one pack of whiteboard markers and MAYBE a cup to hold my pens. However, I walked out with a small trash can, a pourable measuring cup, a new ceramic bowl, a wooden coaster, a pack of bunny stickers, a pack of cherry blossom stickers, sumo wrestler stationery, a mesh pencil pouch, push pins, a reusable water bottle, a bag of recommended Jagabee snacks, AND a pack of whiteboard markers. Oops. But hey, each item was only 100 yen…

April 25, Day 27:
I don’t know if I mentioned this, but I haven’t been teaching alone these past couple weeks. I’ve been team-teaching with an experienced teacher and she has helped me more than she even knows. Anyways, today she left during lunch (to go teach her regular class) and I was taught the afternoon portion by myself! It went surprisingly well, and I think I owe it to my days of substitute teaching in the fall/winter. Lucky for me, I already know how to be a teacher; it’s just the new environment, new age-level, and new routine that I have to get used to. There are some teachers here who did not arrive with a degree in elementary education and I can’t even imagine what it would be like to start here from square 1! I have a couple more days of team-teaching before I’m on my own and I’m both thrilled and queasy. My team-teaching partner has lived in Japan for a long time and can understand English, so when the students ask her something, she actually knows how to help them! She answers in English of course (we are never allowed to speak any Japanese in front of the students), but it’s been so nice having someone who can understand what they are saying. When she leaves, I don’t know how I’ll be able to get them what they need, but I’m sure it’ll be okay. And there’s a friendly translator next door that I can always call. All will be well…