A lightheaded Tuesday

Today was an interesting day. The weather seemed to have everyone at its mercy. I mean it’s not half as bad as it will be this summer when temperatures will reach up to 45 degrees Celsius, which is probably around 105 degrees Fahrenheit. The humidity alone will kill me and then mix that in with the heat and it won’t be pleasant. But anyways, back to today. This morning seemed like a regular day because I woke up earlier than my alarm again. But I didn’t mind, since I was able to get ready and leave the house earlier than usual. But as luck would have it, I just missed the express train to get to work, which means I had to take the long ass Local train to get to work. I ended up arriving 10 minutes before class started. It still isn’t bad, but I just hate to stand in a packed train for a very long time. I ran into another teacher while I was on the train. I haven’t talked to her since she’s a new teacher and she’s a part-time teacher so we are in different offices. I really don’t even know what she teaches, but it was nice to talk to her a little bit. She was speaking to me in English, which was pretty impressive. It wasn’t perfect, but much better than I would have thought it would be.

I only had 4 classes today, which wasn’t so bad and since I felt pretty good at the beginning of the day, I didn’t think too much about it. I didn’t really have to prepare too much for class either since I don’t know what I’m teaching until the class before it. All I’m doing is basically copying CP, but adding my own little flare with it. She’s in charge for the grade level so I just have to do what she says. We were teaching two 8th grade classes, one 7th grade class and one 11th grade class.

The first class that we had with the 8th graders wasn’t too bad. They were a bit antsy, more than usual and they couldn’t focus that well. I was surprised since they usually aren’t that way. I was beginning to feel a bit weird in this class too like I wasn’t getting enough oxygen or something. But it wasn’t that bad and I didn’t notice it too much. We kinda just coasted through the class, even though we were really trying to get them to catch up with the other classes. We were supposed to be in Chapter 3, but we were only on Chapter 2.

The second 8th grade class today, was further behind. They just don’t understand English, so it was a bit of a challenge to get them to catch up 2 chapters since they didn’t understand anything in the first place. But I think that something happened today and they were able to understand and catch up. We didn’t end where we wanted to, but still we were able to catch up. They understood the material better than I thought they would have too.

The 7th grade class was when I was really starting to feel the affect of the weather. I was becoming very tired and sleepy. Even though I felt like I had enough sleep. I hadn’t eaten anything today, so I was thinking that might be the problem. We just went over the passages for the recitation contest that is coming up next month. I was bored out of my mind since I didn’t have much of anything to do and I wasn’t leading the class so the weather was really bad here.

During lunch I was talking with some teachers in the kitchen area of the office. It’s not really a kitchen, but it’s where teachers go to nuke their lunches and get their tea. It’s the water cooler area. But they were talking to me about gogetsubyou, which is a disease people often get in the month of May. It is basically as what we know as senioritis, but it affects new workers since they have just been hired in April and in May they get a bit tired of the surroundings and things become a bit too much for them. But when I was talking about it with one of the teachers, she mentioned it kinda loud when other teachers walked in and they assumed that I had it. I was denying it and blamed the other teacher for framing me like that. It was all in the timing of when she said it though, it was funny.

The 11th grade class today was really loud. I was practically screaming and still couldn’t hear myself. It was just one of those days. They decided that today, they wouldn’t listen, and the usual threats didn’t work either. So I just went along with the lesson, which at this time, I learned to present much better, but didn’t get the results I was expecting. I think for the most part, they understood the underlining message, there’s a test coming up. But they don’t know what to say or what to do to prepare to do well on it. That will come later and I’ve really get to get them going on doing well since my major test will come in September when I have to teach them to give an advanced level debate in front of my bosses on another school trip. That’s going to really be the test of what I can do, as well as the other English teachers. That’s going to be one hell of a test too!

After school, we did a little English club today. Since the Language Laboratory was being occupied by a bunch of 7th graders practicing for their recitation contest. So I had helped with that to get the ball rolling and to help out the other English teachers since there was long line. We finished in about 20 minutes with about 6 English teachers doing it. The club basically consisted of 4 girls and we listened to the Carpenters because there was supposed to be another song that was on the tape, but somehow it wasn’t there. Shortly after that I left school. I was planning to attend a rehearsal for an English performance, but my Department Chair told me to go home before I get dragged into doing more work. So I took her advice and left, it was really early too. There was still sunlight as I was leaving school. That hasn’t happened since, I don’t even remember.

It was nice since I got to my train station earlier the restaurant I wanted to eat at was still open. I had tanmen, whatever that is, but it’s delicious. It’s at a small little restaurant at Hongodai station. I’ve eaten there for a few times and really like the food there. Whenever I get a chance, or when I’m craving ramen I go there to eat it. The chefs are pretty good and the people are nice and friendly. I came home early and just chilled and checked up the usual, e-mail, news, and xanga. I still will sleep around the same time though, even though I have to get up early tomorrow for work.