Monthly Archives: June 2015

All The Bad Suzukis

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The odds against people named Suzuki are not good, at least in the classes I teach. In my experience, at least at the school where I work, the odds of a Suzuki being bad are pretty high.

Now, I’ll grant you that this may be a math problem. Suzuki is the second most common name in Japan therefore the odds of encountering a Suzuki are high and given the normal distribution of good and bad then, well, um, no, that doesn’t explain the past at all.

About a decade ago I taught a class that had four lads named Suzuki in it. They were all bad. (Given the normal distribution of good and bad then at least one should have been good.) What was funny about them was they were all bad in different ways. Suzuki A (not his real name) was lazy and had to be coaxed into doing work. Suzuki B was noisy and had to be stapled to his chair (metaphorically, of course; the school wouldn’t buy me a stapler that large); Suzuki C was distracted by games and work from other classes and, if he had a book, it wasn’t from my class; and Suzuki D was all of the above forms of bad plus a few more.

While I was teaching the Four Bad Suzukis of the Apocalypse, we had an open class where other teachers could observe our classes. A young teacher observed my class.

Unfortunately on that particular day, Suzuki D’s usual partner was absent and he felt this meant he had the day off. He leaned back in his chair, crossed his arms and fell asleep. I woke him up and told him to get a partner. He pointed to the empty chair, mumbled something and went back to sleep.

I woke him up again and he pointed to the empty chair again and once again mumbled something and went back to sleep again.

I woke him a third time and pointed to another lad who had no partner and Suzuki D mumbled something and went back to sleep.

I woke him up fourth time. This time he threw his arms out and shouted “nani?!” (Which usually means “what” but given his tone, was Japanese for “now what the fuck do you want/will you fuck off”) I told him to get out and he left without much more coaxing than that.

The young teacher was both horrified and impressed and, because Suzuki D was well known there were no repercussions. I don’t know what happened to him. I vaguely remember him not passing the year, but that might be my imagination.

Now, when I have students named Suzuki I ask them “are you a good Suzuki or a bad Suzuki”? They usually say good. I’m not sure I believe them. You are Suzuki until proven innocent.

Once More into the Brats

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No, this post is not a repeat of last week’s post on the same subject; rather it’s a post on the similar events as happened last week.

Today we got rain and that means the weather’s about to turn hot and the changing weather and air pressure is messing with lots of people’s heads. I got to school mostly soaked and in a bad mood.

That was the perfect setting for teaching my worst class.

Once again, they started off with the “Jason’s” and this time were more persistent about it. Once again I ignored them and went on with the class.

Things went reasonably well after that until I checked answers by having students stand up. (If you answer you get to sit down and last brat standing starts the next row). At one point, three students decided to play a game by refusing to answer. One guy even turned away. This not being my first rodeo, so to speak, I made three rows stand up which suddenly inspired faster response times.

Towards the end of the activity, a different group of three brats decided to try the same game. This time I just let them stand. I told them I had no problem making them stand until the end of class. (I stand for hours a day as part of my job so half a class is no big deal for me, but it’s torture to them.) One of the brats then tried to lead the class in the “We Will Rock You” beat. I let them do it and started working on my notes for my next class which stopped the music (although they tried it a couple more times).

When they finally realized they couldn’t out-stubborn me or piss me off enough to yell, they answered questions and got to sit down. (Note: the ring-leaders did this to their teacher last year, too.)

Their final gimmick was to refuse to memorize the conversation I told them to memorize. They took great joy in getting help or blatantly reading from the book. In this case the joke was on them, though, as I actually got all but one of them to perform the conversation, which they wouldn’t have done unless they thought they were making a game of it. (See, I know a few tricks.) Everyone who read (which was all but two pairs) earned a zero for the day but at least they spoke English.

One boy in a group of three didn’t perform the conversation as both his partner’s refused to go twice. I told them to come in at lunch (flash forward: they didn’t, but I’ll get them.)

As I left the room, I heard someone say “Fuck you” (Remember, the school where I work is nominally a Christian school). The good news is the homeroom teacher is on my side. I told him to warn them that if I hear another “fuck you” I’ll keep the class after school every night until final exams. It’ll be my own little English club as they write “fuck you” 10,000 times or spell all the numbers from one to ten-thousand.

If they think I’m joking, well, I’ll be the only one laughing. I do this kind of stuff for sport.

Name Stamps Last Longer Than Memories

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I’ve mentioned before how I spent a year or so studying Japanese calligraphy and then stopped. Before I stopped, though, I acquired a few skills along with several brushes, paper, weights, felt pads, ink sticks and grind stones.

Most of that gear has either been thrown away, sold or, in the case of the brushes and the ink sticks, passed on to our girls. The only things I’ve kept are a couple seals.

In Asia, for lots of complicated reasons, the preferred method of sealing contracts and official forms is with a literal seal. The seals, known as “chops” in Chinese speaking countries, are called “Hanko” (判子) in Japan. (That’s “Han” as in “Han shot first” and “ko” as in “coke”.)

Every family, mine included, as an official seal for official documents as do most companies. (Actually, I suspect they all do.) The official seals are made by craftsmen and the hanko is officially recorded. As I understand it, every hanko is different, even those made for people with the same last names. Those are usually round and the coolest kids, depending on your point of view, have hanko made from ivory.

Mine are made from soap stone and are the more artistic versions. They were used to sign my calligraphy works (which are buried somewhere and unavailable for reproduction). Because I was in a “this is awesome” philosophical mood, I opted for kanji and then spent time working out a proper pretentious artist’s name.

The two hanko, my cleaning brushes and the cinnabar paste next to the final results.

The two hanko and paraphernalia next to the results on Tomoe River paper (top) and Japanese washi (bottom).

The larger version reads  旅人道延, or Tabibito Doen (the latter word is two syllables and pronounced very close to Dwayne). The high concept, which made sense at the time, was that since I was travelling, I’d use the kanji for traveler (旅人) and the letters for road/path (道) and stretches (延). Thus, the traveler’s road stretches (with an implied “into the future”.) This hanko was used on larger works (the paper was about a meter long).

The small version is only the letter “do” (pronounced “doe”) and was used on smaller works.

I don’t remember how much they cost, but I also acquired a couple cleaning brushes and a tub of cinnabar/vermilion paste which is a remarkable concoction of castor oil and vermilion powder and other ingredients that has stayed usable for over 18 years.

The cinnabar (or vermillion) paste with the ox bone smoothing spatula.

The cinnabar (or vermillion) paste with the ox bone smoothing spatula. Sharp eyes will notice a third stamp.

I was surprised, after a couple do-overs, that the placement of the seals was as important as the calligraphy itself. A perfect work could be ruined by a badly placed stamp or a smudged one.

I use them now to mark the backs of my notebooks. I could make the small one my official stamp, but that would involve paperwork.

I also acquired, as a gift, a hanko hand made by a student. It has his name Nakashima (Naka) 中 and Shima (しま) with the Naka around the outside as a frame. I mostly keep it because he carved it to look like the man in Munch’s “The Scream”.

My three hanko and how they look on paper.

My three hanko and how they look on paper.

I’m tempted to have it recarved and turned into my official stamp, but it’s the only reason I remember the student’s name. Instead I’ll keep in on my desk as a way to express my mood.

 

(Note: If you’re interested in carving your own hanko, you can buy a kit here.)

(Note 2: hanko are also referred to as “inkan” (印鑑). I’ve not been able to tell if there’s a difference as they seem to be used interchangeably.)

Absence Makes the Heart Go Paranoid

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She Who Must Be Obeyed, being a mother, talks a pretty mean game: she doesn’t care about our oldest; she doesn’t care what our oldest does; she doesn’t care if our oldest eats or not; our oldest absolutely 100% does not need a phone.

Then our oldest goes to Tokyo for a concert and, She Who Must Be Obeyed being a mother, changes attitude.

Yesterday I wrote about how I didn’t know what I was supposed to be doing today. Then, finally, today I learned what I’d be doing today. Our oldest’s friend didn’t cancel which meant my job amounted to going down to the Ex Theater Roppongi at about eight o’clock and escorting the two girls home.

However, this meant the two girls would be going to heart of the largest city in the world by themselves. I was like “That’s cool. As long as I don’t have to actually attend the concert.”

She Who Must Be Obeyed, however, suddenly was concerned about everything and even gave our oldest her phone in case of emergencies. I entered Standard Daddy Crisis Mode which translates roughly to “Don’t worry about it.” However, that was met with things like: “What if there’s an earthquake? There have been three this week.” “What if they get lost?” “What if they join a cult?” (Note: that last one was mentioned sometime today but I’m still not sure of the context.)

It was suggested that I escort them down (I suggested otherwise). It was suggested I follow and spy on them (Once again, I suggested otherwise). SWMBO then noticed the tickets required those under 18 to have adult permission (I suggested that an hour after the girls left was too late to worry about such things. I also suggested she call the theater and check on that).

Eventually I made it down to Roppongi and did some window shopping. (Shopping in Roppongi sucks and what doesn’t suck is expensive. It’s an entertainment district on a shopping district.) It was a pleasant evening and I ended up sitting on a bench and doing some writing and some people watching.

At eight I joined several parents who were also waiting for kids. At first I was concerned as several men about my age walked out but they seemed to have some sort of official status. Then droves of girls walked out and met the group of serious looking parents.

In the end everyone got home safely and, as near as I can tell, no one joined a cult.

Finding Out What You Know is Not What’s Known

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There are unkown knowns, known unknowns, unknown unkowns and the information dad gets. In many cases when you’re a dad the unknowns become known long after you thought you knew what was going on.

In my case, I still don’t know what’s going on. Many of the knowns are unknown and the knowns don’t make any sense.

I thought that tomorrow I would be escorting a pair of teenaged girls to the concert of some animated tv program theme song singer. My job, as I understood it, was to be on guard if the audience turned out to be a bunch of geeky men about my age. I was eventually informed that, no, the man was actually popular with teenage girls and other young women which meant I’d be leading two teenage girls to a concert where I was most likely going to be either barred from entering (Sir, someone your age clearly has no legal reason to be here so we’re walking you out) or arrested for trying to enter (Sir, someone your age clearly has no legal reason to be here so we’re walking you out.)

At best a lot of people would be playing “Daughter or Date?”.

Now, if I understand it correctly, my job is to go down to Roppongi, one of the main party areas of Tokyo and fetch the two teenage girls at the end of the concert ( 8-9 p.m.) and escort them home. This job, for the record, still doesn’t seem to keep me out of legal trouble.

Cop–What are you doing standing here foreign guy?
Me–Waiting for the concert to let out so I can pick up a couple junior high school girls.
Cop–Why don’t you take seat right over there?

That said, I still might be going to the concert. If our oldest’s friend cancels, I’ll be responsible for taking our oldest to the concert and bringing her home safely.

My job, though, is still unknown. The only thing I know is, I’m not a big fan of concerts.

 

Mothers and Fathers and Embarrassing Greetings

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To rephrase a famous line from Dazed and Confused: “That’s what I like about these mothers, man. I get older; they stay the same age.”

Today was parent’s day at the school where I work which means 1) I wore a tie and 2) parents were free to wander in and out of classes at their whim and 3) many students suddenly denied three times that they even knew their parents. (When that happened several years ago, the mother, who spoke excellent English, promised, in so many words, that her son would be punished.)

One of the things I’ve noticed over my years as a teacher (approaching 26 years, in various forms) is that because my students are always the same ages, their parents are usually about the same ages. Seventh grade parents are in their early to mid-30s and 10th grade parents are in their mid-30’s . The problem is, every year they seem to look a bit younger than they are.

It’s the same reaction you have when you see high school kids and junior high kids and 1) realize how young they are and 2) remember how old you used to feel when you were their age. (You, of course, were a lot smarter than these kids. These kids are morons.)

Complicating matters, the mothers tend to dress up and do their hair and make-up perfectly as a part of parent’s day is putting on a show for other parents. This also makes them look younger than they are.

I only had a few visitors, one of whom may have been a homeroom teacher, because the biggest turnout happens on Saturday.

Occasionally fathers show up on a weekday, but that can be a mixed blessing. Today a father committed the ultimate sin. He came into class and after a minute of resistance, walked over and spoke to his son. The other students reacted with uncomfortable laughs and I felt sorry for them both. The father stayed for most of the lesson, even during the part where students wrote conversations. But then, after a while he seemed to get bored and left for a while.

It was during this absence that his son pounced, so to speak. One of my rules is that if you perform your memorized conversation on the day of the assignment you get bonus points. As soon at the coast was clear and the father gone, the son volunteered to do the conversation (his partner wasn’t as happy but did a good job).

I understand why the son did this, but kind of wish his father had been there. It would have made him happy and made him think more positive thoughts about me (the parents are allowed to officially evaluate us). Instead I announced those who already had bonus points to let him know he’d missed something by stepping out.

On the other hand, by embarrassing his son like that, he probably deserved to be punished a little.

Next year I’ll do it all again, but the mothers will be even younger.

 

Out of Habits and Back in Again

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I don’t know if it’s stress or the weather, but lately I’ve been falling out of habits.

I’m not falling back into  bad habits (although I do catch myself chewing my eponychium every now and then) I’m just suddenly not doing old ones. I’m also suddenly unable to start new ones.

For example, for over a year now I’ve been writing 10 ideas a day as part of daily practice to keep myself writing and, on occasion, come up with some good ideas. However, this week, and maybe because it’s June, I suddenly find myself three days behind my entries. What’s odd is this hasn’t been a result of procrastination–Look at notebook; I need to write my 10 ideas; I don’t feel like it right now; don’t write 10 ideas. Instead I haven’t been thinking about them at all. I only think about them when I see the notebook in the morning.

Similarly, this past week my daily log became a diary, which is exactly what I wanted to avoid when I started the project. Rather than make entries during the day I suddenly find myself making all the entries in the evening in one made rush. In fact, I’ll do that after I finish this post. I haven’t been checking the weather during the day and, by not making entries as I go, I find I use the same non-useful language for my entries. (Okay classes; Lazy evening; Etc.)

It’s the mindlessness of it that I find fascinating. Something I’ve done for several months suddenly doesn’t enter my thoughts. This blog remains a habit, although it’s crept back into the personal and focuses less on my hobbies, but I haven’t been able to move my writing time to a more reasonable hour.

It’s almost as if my psyche and my physical system both suddenly decided to reject the new habits by completely ignoring them.

This means tomorrow’s challenge is 30 ideas. If I think of it.

 

The Difference Between Bad and Worst

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Today I taught a class that’s the same level as my worst class. Unlike my worst class, though, they are bad in a better way.

First some history: A few years ago, the school where I work changed the way it divides junior high school English Conversation classes. It added an extra section to the grade to make class sizes smaller, then divided the classes with the “S” class having 20 students and the lower level “R” class having 14. The idea was that 14 students would be easier to control than a larger class. (Note: the classes used to be divided more evenly with about 17-21 in the lower level class and, yes, 14 are a lot easier to control than even 17.)

Because the “R” classes are lower level, and because no one can fail, they are often rowdier than the “S” classes and usually more trouble. The worse they are, the more likely they are to get a nickname: Class 2A (Second grade, A class) becomes “2 Awful”; 2B becomes “2 Bad”, etc. (Note: the others are “2 Crappy,” “2 Damned/Dammit,” “2 Evil” and “2 F@#ked”.)

Today’s class was loud and the students have a typical “I don’t understand, therefore I now have free time” attitude but they actually listened and actually did work (most of them). It was only in the last 10 minutes or so that things began to collapse. Some gave up; some finished and started playing; everyone was talking; no one was working. This is typical of an “R” class. I’ve always maintained that if “R” classes were 40 minutes long they’d be great; unfortunately they are 50 minutes long.

Also unfortunately, my worst class tends to skip the first 40 minutes and starts well after the collapse and goes downhill from there. Those classes tend to get lots of worksheets and they often make me recite the mantra (it’s only 50 minutes, it’s only 50 minutes) and start counting how many more times I will have to see them.

The better bad classes, though, tend to be more fun to work with and they often surprise you. Today a student who got in trouble stayed into lunch to help another student finish his writing assignment.

This class doesn’t have a nickname yet, but it’s still early in the year.

 

Sometimes Ignoring is Bliss

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Today I had to teach my worst group of students. They started the class off by insulting me.

After I entered the classroom, the bad student with the “whatta ya gonna do aboudit?” attitude muttered that he’d been informed by his homeroom teacher that if he didn’t turn in his homework at the beginning of class he’d have to meet me at lunch and do his work. I also tried to remind him but he tried to ignore me.

After got his attention he said “nice joke” and that that prompted the rest of the class to start saying “joke” and to start calling me “Jason,” after Atsugiri Jason, an American in the IT industry who’s become a popular comedian by poking fun at the absurdity of the Japanese alphabets. (For example, the kanji for one, two and three are 一､二､三 and the number of strokes match the numbers in a nice pattern. But four 四 has five strokes. After he points this out he shouts his catch phrase “Why, Japanese people!”)

They called me Jason, I guess, because I’m a white foreigner and we apparently all look alike.

The name Jason stuck most of the rest of the class. They even tried calling me over for help by calling me Jason. I entered a blissful zen state (a very, very rare occurrence) and I ignored them until the used my name. (I also don’t respond to “teacher” or “sensei” so I had a lot of practice at this. I also ignored the three “fuck you’s” that were muttered. I caught one student and told him if he said it again, the entire class would get homework and I’d keep them all after school until they finished. (Note, because this was a junior high class, I can’t send students out of the room for things like that.) (Second note: the “fuck you’s” and most of the “Jasons” stopped after that.)

Somewhere in there, most of the students actually got work done. A few others adopted the usual “I don’t understand therefore it’s free time” attitude and did very little.

I collected all the worksheets and then reminded my bad student about our lunch appointment. I then reminded his homeroom teacher about it. (Long story short: the student showed up, eventually and eventually finished his homework.)

Now I have to back off a bit. I don’t want to keep dragging the homeroom teacher into the battle (and will probably buy him lunch to thank him) and I can’t pull the homework card all the time.

The precedent, however, has been established and that’s often all I need.

 

Babies Make People Insane

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There was a brief fit of madness at the school where I work today. Mostly from the women, but a couple of the men got involved, too.

Luckily, I knew what was about to happen and got to watch the madness unfold, albeit after briefly suffering because of it.

This only happened because I found a discarded or dropped memory stick in one of my classrooms and delivered it to the student office to be added to the surprisingly large pile of lost goods. (The pile is large enough that it reminds me of the large warehouse where the Ark of the Covenant is secretly being stored.)

Unfortunately, I wasn’t able to get immediate service as one of the teachers had just brought his child to school. This teacher is currently taking paternity leave after swapping with his wife. (He wisely waited until after 2:00 a.m. feedings and the toxic Velcro poop phase were finished.) However, clearly being bored, he brought the young one to school. The staff at the student office both looked at me once, determined I was not carrying a child and quickly shifted their attention to the young one and adored him with squeaks and koos that reinforced my notion that babies make people insane.

(Note: the insanity is much different for the casual viewer than the actual parent. More on that later.)

After pretending to play along by making faces at the child, I was treated as a member of the tribe and finally able to deliver the lost goods. I went back to the office an mentioned to a couple people that the room was about to explode. (More specifically, I mentioned that the teacher was visiting and “with child” so to speak.)

Soon the child arrived and there was squeaking and kooing and the crowd gathered and even women who already have children were saying how awesome it would be to have one.

This, is the first form of insanity: mother’s, upon seeing someone else’s baby, immediately remember the cuteness and how adorable the clothes were but forget the 2:00 a.m. feedings, the toxic Velcro poop and, more importantly, the Terrible Twos.

Even She Who Must Obeyed goes through this. When she enters this phase, I play a recording of our youngest letting out a blood-curdling scream that sounds like it belongs in a scene from a horror movie where the baby suddenly stands up in her crib, lets out a blood-curdling scream and then eats her entire family who are so stunned by what’s happening they either freeze or run down into the basement.

If you think I’m joking, here’s the actual recording:

 

The men also found the baby cute and a few played with it.  This is the second form of insanity: playing with a child and thus exposing it’s undeveloped immune system to the germs of dozens of strangers.

In the end order was restored.

 

NOTE: Edited for clarity on June 2, 2015.