I can't remember the last time I wrote something that actually dealt with the day to day realities of my life, and so I think it's about high time to get into the nitty-gritty. I'm a teacher now. Ha. Let's define "teacher" for a second here. Someone who is old. Check. Someone who knows things. Uh.. check I guess. Someone who stands in front of an assemblage of students on a daily basis. Sure, yeah, I'm still following you, check. Someone with the ability to convey something of worth to said students he or she stands in front of. Ah fuck, nope, I can't do that.
I "teach" four classes a week by myself, but I think on the kid's schedules instead of "Eikaiwa" (English Conversation) some cheeky little bastard at the Shokuinshitu (teacher's room) substituted recess. Or maybe nap-time? The kids certainly converse, but rarely in English, and rarely when I want them to. To be fair, this is due mostly to a combination of my poor abilities as a teacher and Japanese society's hesitance to prescribe Ritalin, but yikes I've had some worthless classes so far, that's for sure. The other day I was trying to teach them about Mt. Rushmore (my first mistake) and a host of other noteworthy American landmarks (including the Alamo, I was really trying to pick the most impossible shit I could, I guess. I don't write out what I'm going to say in class before I go, I just kinda wing it, and so imagine my surprise when I came to the Alamo. I have a difficult enough time trying to convey the names of fruits and vegetables, let alone facts about the Mexican-American war and the conception of rugged individualism as it relates to the old west. Fuck, I was like, "uhh, and then I went to the Alamo (the whole presentation was framed as a massive vacation i went on), which is... an old building? Ok moving on... Disney Land!"). That lesson went well, except for when I looked at my students. I try not to do that anymore. Just pretend they're not there and everything will be fine.
Some good things do come out of my lessons, however. During the first week I got a lot of attention from my female students. I remember back in middle school all the girls had huge crushes on Mr. Bruns, the social studies teacher, (two bits if you remember that dude), and boy was I jealous of him. He was like 26 (?) and all the hot chicks were totally into him, while here I was, appropriately aged (13), and floundering in a sea of never having talked to a girl ever. To be fair, part of me was OK with that, but another part of me wanted to kick Mr. Bruns in the nuts. Oh how times change, because now I have become Mr. Bruns. And you know what, it's not that tight. I feel for the poor guy. But I guess I feel more for myself, because when you get down to it I'm sure the girls who were into Mr. Bruns were a little less forward in their appreciation. I wonder if they ever walked up to him and said "you have beautiful eyes." Or, slightly more unlikely, hollered from the back of the class, "cute boy!" No, I'm quite sure that never happened to him. But it does happen to me, and I guess there's nothing to do about but luxuriously sweep my hair away from my eyes and act sheepish. There's no other appropriate response. There is one girl who asks me her name every time I see her, and after a fifteen second struggle with my recalcitrant memory and I finally find myself able to bring it up, she collapses into a paroxysm of delight that I can only respond to by turning my back and running away at full speed. I'm going to have to do something to let those poor 13 year old boys know that I'm not trying to steal their potential girlfriends. I think I'm going to stop showering and or shaving and or wiping my butt and see how long it takes for a) the infatuation to fade away or b) for me to get fired. Only time will really tell.
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