Greetings, from Yamamoto Middle School!

Today was my first day at school, though, my real work starts tomorrow. Since today was the first day back from summer break for the students, they had tests all day (and you think having starting school is bad enough!). That means no classes → I sit in the teacher’s room all day. Sounds boring, but actually, it was pretty fun. I got to meet the two teachers I’ll be working with at this school. They’re both very nice, and really know what they’re doing (which is good, since I have no clue). Tomorrow will be my first day working in the classroom, so I prepared a PowerPoint introduction complete with a game so the students can get to know a little about me. Hopefully they will understand me well enough. I’m a little nervous about that. Oh well.

Also, since it was the first day back, they had a whole school assembly to welcome everyone back, and to introduce me. I had to stand up on stage and give a short speech (in English) in front of all 200 students. Afterwards, a student read a translation of my speech, and then another boy came up and welcomed me with a short speech in English. The school seems pretty fun, and the students seemed excited to see me (their last ALT was a guy from Washington, so I’m a bit of a change).

I was almost late to work today because even though the school is only about 15km away (a little over 2miles), I forgot that the speed limits are so low here! It seemed to take forever! The average speed on the streets around my house is 40km/hr (around 25mph), and on the more main “highway” type roads around 50km/hr (30mph). Though, actually, I’m not complaining too much, because even going that slow it feels like I’m flying on the tiny roads. I have noticed though, the people around here seem to see the speed limit as more of a suggestion. If I drive with traffic on the roads that are 50, I usually end up going around 70km/hr (around 55mph, which would definitely be the speed on similar roads in CA). It’s kind of surprising that everyone speeds, considering speeding tickets can cost around $800… I guess they don’t check very often? My car has one of those radar detector things, though, it’s more annoying than helpful because it always beeps when I drive past the train station (where there is definitely no one checking speeds).

Anyway, what else? Oh, I tried out a karate dojo last night. They do a style called Nihon Karate Kyokai (called Shoto-kan in the US), which is similar to what I do – some of the same forms, but they use different stances. A couple of the people kind of took me under their wing and helped me out, which was nice. The dojo seems to be a good mix of people – kids, older people, people my age, women, etc. – and I was very impressed by their skill level. Even the little kids were REALLY sharp! At the same time, they weren’t too serious (there was joking and smiling going on, even if I didn’t understand it all!), so all in all, it seems like a pretty good place. I’m going to start training there twice a week. ☺

I’m still looking into finding a Yosakoi dance team, but I’m happy starting karate for now. There’s something about it the kind of atmosphere it fosters that translates no matter where I go, so, in a way, it’s sort of a comforting piece of home.

Alright, well I don’t want this to be too long, so farewell for now! Hopefully I will find time to update again soon!


PS. I finished Harry Potter 1! (thumbs up) Now I gotta track down copies of the rest… :)