hey all,
The combination of lots of sleep, long hot showers, "grandpa's cough medicine," and actual cold medicine seems to have eradicated my cold germs. I still cough occasionally, and hawk up interestingly colored phlegm from time to time, but the racking coughs and constant streams of mucus have gone the way of the dodo.
I know I've been writing about it for some time, but it seems there are always a few people (probably ones that never read the blog anyway, like Bri) who seem surprised when I disappear for a weekend. So just to throw it out there once more: I'm going rock climbing with Michi on the sea cliffs of Jogasaki this weekend (and Monday), and won't be checking email until Monday evening.
I was really worried about today, because one of my elementary school teachers is getting married, and last week he asked me to create my own lesson plans for my classes today. I spent a good chunk of my free time at the junior high school this week preparing some card files, and typing up the lesson plans. So I showed up today, and was still frantically tweaking them, when one of my teachers' mentioned that I didn't have a job today...I blinked at her in surprise, and she explained that all classes had been canceled because of the flu.
Instead of teaching, I spent all day today reading, and surfing the internet. Why did I do that, instead of heading over to the junior high? Because I had already paid for school lunch today, and I wasn't going to pay for some food I'd never get to eat. Anyway, as I was leaving, the vice principal asked me why I even came in today. Didn't so-and-so tell me that my classes were canceled? Nope. No phone call, no email, no smoke signal. Maybe he hired a runner who got too depressed with his life in Japan (maybe he felt no one was talking to him), and jumped in front of a train...Even that would have been a little better than just not making any attempt to inform me at all.
So that little thing is one more example of the Japanese style of communication, or lack thereof. In similar fashion, I don't really know what the schedule of English classes is at my junior high school. They publish a class schedule, which at the beginning is more or less correct, but then for some reason these unexplained deviations start to show up, and I tend to catch a little flack for not being prepared or not being aware of what is going on. I shouldn't have to ask what is going on everyday, and they shouldn't have to explain it either. If they'd just take 5 minutes, and let me know the weekly schedule has been changed, it would save everyone a lot of hassle and mutual annoyance.
Don't get me wrong: as I've said before, there are tons of things I love about Japan. The food, rock climbing, its history (OK, really just samurai and ninjas, but still), my girlfriend, anime and manga, the friends I've made through work and the outdoor club. But the lack of clear communication and organization in my workplace is really getting on my nerves.
Anyway, that'll be all the ranting for tonight.
Cheers,
