Yesterday two of my teachers were discussing how they could get moved from this school. In Japan, you have no choice as to which school you work in; the prefecture (in the case of High School) decides it for you. One of them suggested that another teacher was prematurely moved out of a bad school because he got into a fight with an "important person" at the school. Both of them then proceeded to muse about who they could fight for maximum possibility of transfer.
It brings to mind a few things:
- The level of my school really has dropped that dramatically in only a single year.
- The prefectural educational system may be in need of some changes...
- A fight...! You don't see those much in Japan, especially amongst teachers. Just the idea of that certain teacher (a smurfy kind of guy) in a fight is giggle-worthy.
We had a small "League Retreat" over the past weekend. It was a great time; great weather, great fun, etc. Of course we can't really call it camping at all, because though we were at a camp ground, the typical Japanese "campers" usually end up in a cottage with full electricity, included futons, and often air conditioning and heating. Hardly roughing it.
Anyway, below is the thumbnail to the gallery. You know the drill. The pictures of the stream you see are pictures of the coldest water on Earth. I know because we went swimming in it. We coulda given the Polar Bear Club a run for their money I think. I wonder if the PBC members squeal like girls as much as we did...
Please also bear in mind that I have a pretty strict filesize limitation set on my pictures, so they can sometimes have some pretty nasty compression artifacts. Sorry about that.
Finally, credit for many of the pictures goes to Will, who is far more energetic about taking pictures than I am. You can find his own version of the gallery here.
My favorite movie of all time is being produced as a brand new cartoon series. This could be absolutely fantastic or absolute offal. *Praying...*
Last night the collective schoolteachers of Japan breathed a sigh of resignation upon learning that "Abe chan," an even-more-conservative politician than his predecessor, will replace Junichiro Koizumi as Prime Minister. I know very very little about politics in Japan, but the impression I get at least from my own co-workers is that "Abe is not a friend of teachers."
Apparently he isn't a friend of peace either, with one of his major pledges being to revise the pacifist Japanese constitution to include the ability to maintain an army apart from the purposes of self-defense. Awesome! Now Japan wants to wage preemptive war too! I fail to see how he can have any platform whatsoever for "improving diplomatic ties with China and Korea" when basically he wants to throw them a huge "fuck you."
I said above and will say again, I know pretty much nothing about Japanese politics and won't ever pretend to. It does make me wonder about the state of the world when boobs like Abe and GW Bush can lead nations.
One thing it does, however, is make for interesting staffroom conversation (and Japanese practice!).
...my Japanese still sucks.
I tried to make a reservation for a rental car today, and it was a disaster. I think I made the reservation, but I understood the guy so shakily that I actually am not sure.
Sigh.
Quite a few people in Japan have 趣味(shumi: hobbies). Often, these people are fanatically dedicated to their hobbies, and are quite skillful. We've taken up a hobby: golf! We don't have the dedication or the skill, but it sure is satisfying to smash four-hundred-something little white balls into green oblivion.
The most interesting part is where we golf. As Japan has little space to dedicate to such a space-hungry pastime, most people go to driving ranges, which are weird netted-in affairs. Inside, it looks like a normal driving range, except for the fact that the balls come to you.
Allow me to demonstrate (click on the thumbnail for a short video clip).
Coincidentally, this entry also marks the 500-post anniversary of shock-e.com! What that means is that I've been blathering on about things that bear little relevance to the outside world for not a small bit of time. Maybe more than 3 years?!
Sure, there are much more prolific "bloggers" out there, but I prefer to think that people who can write more than that are probably blathering about even less relevant things than myself. Amen.
...of rampant self-indulgence.
It'll give you the chance to:
a) Deride me publicly
b) See for yourself just what Japan has done to my sense of style
c) Gasp at my age
d) Laugh
Remember when you were in school, you always used to snicker about how the teacher couldn't figure out the simplest of technology, like the VCR or the projector?
I'm no stranger to technology as you know, but in the past two days I found myself on the receiving end of a big dose of irony. I spent five minutes at the beginning of each class struggling manfully with the DVD player. The sudden realization that I had just dated myself made it all the worse.