March 15

I had one of those rare days in my teaching career as I got slapped on the wrist for unprofessional conduct. Strangely enough, the slap came from four high school students whom we're currently grooming for life in American universities. These guys are very keen though a bit on the hyper side. Still, they're very good nonetheless. They came to me after class tonight to good-naturedly chastise me for being too generous on them during their speech class. And you know, they were absolutely right; I have been much too easy on them. They were nice about it, but I'm taking it quite seriously so I'm not exactly too thrilled with myself right now.

Well, the past week has been light though those high school classes have still managed to tap my energy reserves. I'm looking forward to the weekend. On Sunday, I'll be heading out with two other teachers and three students to the tip of Chiba Prefecture for a little walk through the woods, a nice little excursion for a person who hardly ventures outside of the megalopolis. However, I'll have to shuck out a good 15000 to 20000 yen for the round trip tickets on the Romance Car. The Romance Car is just a moniker for an observation train car with enlarged windows and movable seats. Lucky I got paid today. Still, this will pretty much deplete the entertainment budget for the month.

Very happy that there's been a resurgence in the return of American TV programs here in Japan on regular and satellite TV. The last time we've had such an influx was back in the 50s when there wasn't enough original domestic programming to fill the airwaves in Japan's virgin industry. Now, it's just the case I've become disinterested in the tons of trendy dramas and variety shows. The West Wing is firmly esconced here along with all of the Star Trek series, plus we're getting CSI in April. However, the great experiment with Buffy didn't take, and Ally is coming to a series end this Sunday. Heck, I even caught an old episode of Gunsmoke this morning. Now, if only we could get either Alias or 24, we'll really be making progress.

March 12

We're definitely in a light week. First, my non-teaching Monday, followed by a shortened Tuesday session and now a 9-hour break between a morning and evening class. Not that I'm complaining too much about it. However, from my classes, I've been getting a largely negative reaction to this upcoming war in Iraq. People from my oil company class to my group of travel-loving middle-aged ladies are frankly a little concerned. Mind you, the UN actually did show a bit of gumption and managed to stave off D-Day to the 20th, at least.

March 10

One of those non-teaching teaching days. My first couple of classes were just chat fests as they usually are. And then, my final class had two of my students coming in over an hour late so that I just did an iota of instruction. Still managed to feel tired

The hay fever is still beating down on me. My nose was stuffed up so I had to apply some Tiger Balm-like medicine to my upper lip to clear my sinuses. My eyes are still looking pretty bloodshot.

I caught the trailer for the next Charlie's Angels movie. The suspension of disbelief required is probably even higher than the "lift n' separate" of the stars' bras.

March 10

A bit of a bittersweet weekend. Found out from my ex-(?) that she'll moving out of prefecture next weekend. It's not too bad; she says that she can still reach downtown Tokyo in less than an hour but our meetings will become even more infrequent. Also, found out last night how much out of synch a person can be with other people. My good friend's friends are good people but they just don't mesh with my personality, and I think that was vice versa.

Caught the latest Bond flick yesterday. I was rather surprised that the hoary series still managed to draw the folks over in Tokyo in. It was a very serviceable movie with the usual sex-and-violence. However, I hope the next movie will have a much better theme song. Where's Shirley Bassey or Carly Simon?

Hay fever is still running rampant with my sinuses, and my eyes are as "road-mapped" as a major urban centre. One can only hope that someone decides to deforest much of Chiba Prefecture.

March 5

It's been an up-and-down week. Luckily, the down side is coming from tomorrow. Tuesday was pretty heavy but the last couple of days will be fairly stress-free. My school is now hosting 40 high school kids heading for the States to study in university. So far, the kids I've had are pretty good and keen; I'm very grateful....I've had some real dumpees over the past few years, so it's good when one gets kids who are very eager for the trip abroad.

It's also been up and down in terms of the weather. We've had some pretty stiff gales to rival those in Chicago this week. Plus, the temps have been doing some major yo-yos. For the next little while, we'll be fairly cold but perhaps next week, we may be getting those first few licks of spring.

February 27

Finally got that 4-day Intensive out of the way. No more of those 2-hour commutes crosstown. That little adventure got tiring pretty quickly. However, the training centre was nice, supplied good lunches and bottomless cups of coffee. Glad it's all over now, and I can start my weekend a day ahead of schedule...a little reward for the work.

Strangely enough, the big news here is about a Bullet Train driver who was asleep at the wheel for about 8 minutes and ended up having the computer stop the train 90 metres away from the station. With both NHK and Japan Railways calling a major red alert on this incident, despite the fact that no one died or was hurt, that driver must feel a whole lot like Charlie Brown after he screwed up in that spelling bee.

February 25

Well, the winter of yesterday has been replaced by the near-spring of today. Unfortunately, that means the hay fever is back. My mask was on!

Day 2 of the Intensive was better although I'm still left rather drained by the experience. It also doesn't help that I go through a 2-hour commute back and forth each way. However, on the plus side, I still appreciate having nights off.

Looks like North Korea is coming into the backyard and fooling around without asking. It decided to give the new incoming South Korean president a warm welcome with a Silkworm missile.

February 24

The winter this year in Tokyo has been long and hard. It's been bitterly cold today and we even got snowed upon, although it was of the very wet, non-accumulating variety. One wonders if Spring will come here on time.

Today I had the first day of a 4-day Intensive based on Listening. Got the job done but it's never easy when one has somewhat uninspired students who've been forced to attend by their minders. The material is tough enough as it is without people who really don't want to be there. That, combined with the lousy weather, gave me a rather tough Monday.

But I am happy to say that I could get home and make a nice hearty meal of soup and kimchi chicken. Nothing like good ol' comfort food.

February 22

Well, I had the graduation party today for our students on a chilly cloudy day. We had it in our current venue of choid, C-AMBER, a somewhat incongruous restaurant of slickness and style surrounded by the usual Starbucks clones and down-and-dirty izakayas in the Ichigaya district.

Pretty much everyone showed up who was to graduate, and we had a larger-than-usual turnout of teachers to see them off. A couple of our grads came in full kimono, a common form of dress for women graduating from college or university in Japan. I had the MC duties as I've been having for the past 5 years, and we dutifully handed out the diplomas. Then came speeches from all the grads. One particularly had everyone, including this author, on the edge of their seats as the speaker, with a brilliant combination of pregnant pauses, expressions and giggling, described her very first lesson with little ol' me. Whew! Bullet averted. Then we had our musical performances from a student and teacher before we all broke up.

Of course, this being Japan, that didn't end the day's events. Of course, we had to follow up on the nijikai, or second party. So we went down the block to the neighbourhood karaoke box for a couple of hours of singing, and then there was the final stage at the izakaya. The past year's students were a good crew and there were a few misty pairs of eyes when it was finally time to say good-bye but at least some enterprising new alumni decided to keep the good times rolling by suggesting a day trip out to a local mountain next month.

February 22

The aftermath of the resignation invovled having the managers approaching me to see if I would change my mind. I would say that I could come back in a "cameo" appearance. They weren't too happy but then again, I haven't been too happy with them for the past few years. However, now that the news is slowly leaking out about my long goodbye (I had to the school 3 months' notice), some offers are starting to come in. Nice to be needed.

It wasn't an especially busy week hours-wise but Friday was pretty intense with a round of term-end level checks and then having the penultimate class with the City Hall people; half of them were giving presentations in English which were keeping them up nights in preparations. Happily, everything went well and we celebrated long into the night at a local izakaya and then a karaoke box. Parties to celebrate or to commemorate the end of something don't often stop with just one party, especially if things come off on a successful note.

I'll be repeating the same thing today as I head off to my school's graduation party; and I think it's very possible that I may find myself in three parties. Again, nice to be needed. However, the balance to all this is a 4-day Intensive at a training centre for one of the government ministries. The theme: listening. I should be quite out of my head by Thursday night.

February 17

After a weekend of relative comfort because of the rain, the hay fever came back today. The mask did help but I did need to do a bit of nose wiping from time to time.

Well, let's see....I officially resigned from my company of 5 years last Friday although I'll have to continue working until mid-May there. Not too bad since it'll give me time to get my future plans together. Hopefully, I won't have to face too much more of those late-night and early-morning classes. I gave the admin staff a rather bad shock, though.

February 13

More bad news...hay fever is in full swing in Japan. And true to my luck, I reside in the prefecture with one of the largest counts of cedar forests whose pollen is responsible for most of the Japanese version. I've been going through most of my tissue with the speed of a Bullet Train, and ingesting medicine and Halls. I've even gone native and bought myself the mask that most people over here wear when they've caught a cold. It looks just like a surgical mask, and I've seen quite a lot of pseudo-doctors and nurses on the trains and in the streets. The problem is that it doesn't really matter; the subways and trains with their usual 200% of capacity during rush hours are living germ farms!

Also, Tokyo may be facing the same rolling blackouts that California did a couple of years ago. It seems as if TEPCO, the Tokyo version of ConEd, has to shut down some of its nuclear reactors because of a scandal involving false inspection checks. If that happens, a lot of Tokyo goes dark this summer. Already the ads have been popping out pleading with us to conserve energy. I think most people would like to conserve energy just so that they can give these TEPCO morons some whup-ass.

On the good side of things, the media has been buzzing about the Hayao Miyazaki anime flick, "Spirited Away" getting an Oscar nod this year. Plus, Japan's latest export, Godzilla Matsui, has been on every TV for the past several weeks.

February 10

I gather that the Force is indeed not with me these past few days. My computer is starting to die a slow death, my vacuum cleaner sucks up a neglected Phantom Menace Pepsi bottlecap which permanently plugs up the hose, my TV's audio fades in and out, and my wash gets an unnecessary rinse after an unforecast squall makes a surprise appearance. Well, at least, I've got Constitution Day tomorrow; Japan basically celebrates a birtthday which means all of us can sleep in.

February 9

Well, the weekend was certainly an expensive one...even by Tokyo standards. Last night, we had a farewell party for a couple of students who had decided to drop out of our school. We went over to a large entertainment complex in Shinjuku. Our first stop was dinner at an izakaya (Japanese pub). Now, the characteristics of a typical izakaya is that the food is edible, the beer is flowing, and most importantly, the prices are cheap.. However, this place only fulfilled the first two; some of us were rather shocked to find ourselves pulling 5000 yen ($47 US) from our wallets.



Next stop, as is usually the case with our student-teacher outings, was karaoke at the local Big Echo box just one flight below. Now, Saturdays often entail a higher hourly rate for use of their singing chambers. And to be honest, we did imbibe quite a few beers, and gin & tonics. I had to pull out of there about 45 minutes before everyone else did so that I could get my train home (at 11 p.m.!...for the largest city on the planet, Tokyo transit closes up obscenely early). A friend from last night's binge met me and a couple of others today for lunch; he was kind enough to cover me so I got quite the financial jolt when he told me that the cost for singing and drinking was another 5000 yen. Urk!



Anyways, things were a bit more reasonable today as the four of us went out for a buffet lunch at the Farm Grill. However, the usual convivial atmosphere at the Grill was rather lost this time as the very harried and tense staff had to handle multiple bus tours of Chinese tourists. It wasn't just the crowds but also the culture clash between the locals and the tourists; knowing the hustle and bustle, take-no-prisoners attitude of Hong Kong from friends, and my own experiences in Chinatown back home, I was accustomed to the tourists butting into line and checking if the waffles were ready by opening up the iron. However, the staff and the surrounding locals were absolutely scandalized by the manners. Again, just one of those example of culture clash. Live and learn.



Afterwards, the four of us went down to Shibuya to see Luc Besson's latest (as a producer, not as a director), The Transporter with Mr. Madonna's favorite, Jason Statham. The story was not very deep and the ending was limp, but all in all, a good popcorn movie. The gimmick of a transporter was interesting to note, especially in the first half, and Statham gave a pretty good performance as the stoic Frank.

Well, back to the salt mines from tomorrow.

February 7

If there were a day that perfectly befits the life of a indefatiguable English teacher in Japan, today would be it. Woke up in the wee hours of this morning to get some prep work done on a class at a nearby city hall, before heading out to the base school and opening it up. I made copies there and did some crossword puzzles before hitting my first class at a nearby printing plant.

Afterwards, I headed back to the base school at noon just to touch base for an evening Pancake Party (being Canadian, I decided to regale the kids about the wonders of maple syrup one month ahead of the Sugaring Off), before heading out on the train for an hour to the City Hall class.

I pulled off the City Hall class well enough. I came back to the base school and started the pancakes with the kids. Managed even to make some maple fondue. It's safe to say that we managed to increase everyone's cholesterol levels by a significant amount tonight.

Finally made it home. It's Miller Time!

February 2

I've just caught live coverage on CNN of the breakup of the space shuttle Columbia. Of course, harkening back to the 1986 Challenger disaster is natural, but I also remember Columbia's launch as the first mission of any shuttle in history back in 1981. ABC's Frank Reynolds covered the nationwide coverage. Even a guy as unflappable as he was couldn't help whooping it up when it went up that day. Now, the oldest shuttle is gone.

February 1

Finished a pretty busy week. I had to take care of some final student reports and then do some micromanaging of that mixed level class. I think out of all the classes that I do, that one drains me the most. Luckily, the students are nice and down-to-earth. I even got invited to their party later this month.

Tokyo is being double-whammied by 2 colds: the virus kind and the weather kind. So far, some of the teachers have been reporting a lot of their junior highs are calling off classes due to a 50% absence rate, and I see a lot of snifflers packed into the subways and trains. Can you say "virus breeding farm"? Also, it's been pretty chilly of late, and we've got a snow forecast for Sunday.

January 30

Pretty tiring afternoon for me after handling that mixed-level class. It's one of those classic scenes of where one tries to please everyone and ends up pleasing noone. But perhaps I speak too harshly; some of them are getting something out of it. It doesn't help that there is a cold bug out there and it's just plain cold, period. I'm just glad that I got to come earlier than usual.

January 27

As an addendum to the last paragraph of my last entry, one of my landmines managed not to explode today. The class went pretty well, but it was still one of those half-hearted ones with some spurts of learning and activity. Sure enough, today was cold and rainy. Now I can see how the Carpenters got their "Rainy Days and Mondays."
Well, at least, I did get to go to my favorite eatery today in the Ginza, the Farm Grill. The food isn't spectacular though it's a California-style (why California?) buffet, but you can't beat the price: 970 yen (about $8 US). In this city, that's a true bargain. Plus, it's all you can eat. Double plus, the weekdays are far less crowded than on the crazy weekends so I can actually prep for my classes on the table. And definitely, I can avoid the "hungrys" in the evening.

January 26

Had dinner with an old friend who just recently moved to my hometown as a landed immigrant. His first few months there haven't too great in his estimation. He hasn't made any friends, he failed his GMAT and he hasn't scored a job. I did feel rather sorry for him; it can be rather rough sailing being in that situation, especially when there are -35 degree wind chill factors and tons of snow all around you. I hope he can get some better luck when he returns there.

His talk made me reflect on my time here, which is now 8 years and counting. I think I've been inordinately lucky in that I had a group of friends waiting for me here in Tokyo and there was even an apartment waiting for me. It certainly hasn't been easy but neither has it been an ordeal.

Having said that, I think it may be time to move on. It's getting to the point that I'm starting to find the weekends speeding by a bit too fast and the weekdays filled with a few landmines of company classes to teach. For me, when one starts to wish for the weekend even before the current one is over, it's time to whip out the old resume again or think about new things.