Week 2: Alone in the office

Monday: Until 8/17, I only have to go to school between 10 am and 3 pm since it’s currently summer vacation. There are no students except those who show up for soccer, baseball, etc. practice. I spent the day working with my supervisor to book tickets for my first business trip to Kagoshima City. New and returning prefectural ALTs go to the prefectural office once a year for a contract signing ceremony held towards the end of August. New ALTs also attend a Japanese language and culture training camp.

Travel is done through the town’s travel agency, located inside Umi no Eki (seaside station). Also located inside are a few snack stands where you can buy food goodies unique to Setouchi: among the offerings are seaweed, brown sugar candy, mango sauce, and pickled papayas. The station has a small restaurant and stand that sells sashimi, but they were closed today.

Before heading out to the travel agency, the landlord of my apartment came to school to collect my deposit, key money, and rent for the last few days of July. "Key money" is a strange thing that Japan does, where new tenants give a gift of money to the landlord upon moving in.

Today was Nat’s birthday, so we had a birthday party with the Eikaiwa (English conversation) members to celebrate. Some Koniya HS students came and made him a Pokemon cake, and another member made a giant hamburger that was easily 6” in diameter!

Tuesday: After work today (which consisted of me studying Japanese), Nat showed me a ramen place not far from my apartment, where I ate the most delicious chashu ramen I’ve ever had. We went to the convenience store for ice cream and ate it by Umi no Eki, near the only Pokestop and pokemon gym in Koniya. Pokemon GO is quite big in Japan, but less so in Koniya since there are few people and only a small town in which to play.

We then went to a real-life gym to play badminton. Nat knows all of the regulars, and among them are middle school and high school students, and some other Koniya citizens. There was no AC inside, and combined with the 30°C heat and unrelenting humidity, you’re literally dripping with sweat after about 10 minutes of light playing. The sweat towel is your best friend, but as soon as you wipe some away, more appears, so you could call it a futile exercise. I ran out of water after about an hour, so I went home first.

I’ve been taking cold showers ever since I arrived in Koniya, but they never felt as good as the one I took tonight.

Wednesday: Most of the teachers are on summer vacation, so for the better part of the day I was alone in the teachers’ room studying Japanese. At 3 pm, I went up to the music room (across the school and on the fourth floor – getting up there is quite a bit of exercise) to practice cello. Yesterday I obtained permission from H-sensei, the music teacher, to use the room after school so I could prepare my part for Amami Orchestra’s upcoming performance of Beethoven’s 9th Symphony (mvmts 3 and 4) in December. The cello I’ve generously been allowed to use is a well-set-up beginner’s cello, so it’s not nearly as responsive as the instruments I have owned in the past, especially in the upper reaches of the A string, fourth position and above. Even so, it’s decent and will serve me well during my time on Amami.

I went out to the town’s only Pokestop to restock on my virtual pokemon-catching supplies and while I was there I met a few other people playing. They were also young adults who landed a job in town. Together we marveled at the level 20 player controlling the gym (the game’s only been out for 1 week in Japan!) One girl knew a bit of English and could help me out when I didn’t understand a question directed at me, but I managed to get through an extremely simple conversation with the help of gestures and google translate. (Baby steps…!)

Next post(s): Amami summer festival!!