| Current mood: | a little itchy |
| Current music: | Ultimate Secrets-Toshiro Masuda-Naruto Orginal Soundtrack III |
...and her name was Alma.
Alma. Yeah, I've been chewing on the name all week, and I think it fits. I wanted my little car to have a name that described her, since she's got spirit. And she's a Honda Life. So "Alma" kinda stuck in my head.
She seems to approve--meaning that I don't think she's rejected the new name or me, the new driver.
Mmm...I've had a couple of very nice culture festivals since I last posted. The Toyohama JHS Bunkasai was Saturday, October 26 and Yutaka's culture festival was earlier today, Sunday. I played taiko with two teachers and four students at Toyohama's bunkasai, and hit the bongos and chimes for a Simon and Garfunkle medley. Didn't do anything musically at Yutaka's culture festival except sing a couple songs with the teachers. I liked how both the festivals were different. I think it kind of reflected what the students and teachers were like at both schools.
Yesterday, I also suffered through a common form of Japanese torture, also referred to as the Kure City Junior High School English Recitation Contest. I was a judge with two other Kure JETs, Rob and Vicki (I'm sure you all remember Vicki...Or not. ^_^; Well, anyway, she was one of my esteemed visitors to the island.) and our not-so-esteemed supervisor, Mr. Sakata. Judging was haphazard and based on each person's own opinion. There was no scale that we were supposed to use to assign points for each student's prowess in the broad areas of "Voice, Memorization, Manner, Pronunciation, and Intonation/Stress." We listened to nearly sixty speeches from seventh, eighth, and ninth grade students. They way I learned how to judge each student was very similar to the way I learned to "teach" on the JET Program: the first students we heard were graded on a learning curve. I think I got better at judging as I went along, but i would have been waaaaaay easier (and way more fair) if stupid Mr. Sakaa had done like he was supposed to and held a "judges' meeting." I mean, the guy does this each freaking year. I'm pretty sure he could have given us tips on what to look for in shining students. That would have helped even out the haphazard way we were judging the poor students. I admit that I often cheated off Rob's paper in the first ten--okay, the first twenty--or so contestants.
In the end, the winning students weren't exactly the best speakers. They had a combination of good prounciation, intonation, and some form of stage presence--uh, manner. There were dozens of kids peeling the lines off the ceiling as they recited, and there were others who looked everywhere but at the judges/audience while they were on stage. Ultimately, I'm sure the judges began awarding points to anyone who made an effort to make gestures (though they're supposed to be "frowned upon") and liven up their otherwise dull textbook recitations. But if the poor students had been informed on what they would be graded on before the contest instead of after, I'm pretty sure there would have been more kdis trying. So shame on Mr. Sakata for that in addition to many other things.
I was also forcibly asked (the Japanese Way, at least for Mr. Sakata) the morning of the contest Saturday to make a speech during the closing ceremony at the end of the day. It would have been one of the three of us JET judges anyway, and apparently I had the least scary face when I heard the not-surprising-but-still-fairly-annoying news. Vicki phrased it very diplomatically when she said, "It's very difficult to ask us to give a speech the day of the competition. You knew a long time ago that someone would have to do it." Or something like that.
It just makes you wonder what the hell is going through Mr. Sakata's mind most of the time. Even if he hadn't told us this weeks ago, say, around the time that he was soliciting judges for the contest, just a day's notice would have been enough for most people to think up some short words of praise to say without feeling too much pressure. Not having the decency to let us know about this Added Judge Bonus! just shows what little respect he has for the JETs. I'm sure he wouldn't have gotten away with doing some sh--doing something like that with his J-pals from the office. Gosh, he's such a turd.
Anyway, I gave the speech, working on it off-and-on in the thirty-five minutes total of break that we had throughout the day, not counting lunch. Of course, around lunch time, Mr. Sakata kindly informed me that nope, there wouldn't be a translator like there had been last year for the other young man who gave his (most likely impromptu) speech at the end. I managed to get a mix of sarcastic English for the ALTs and the Japanese teachers who recognized sarcasm and mock-reverent Japanese for everyone who didn't. It appeared to work out all right. I came off as "cuuuute" according to one of my girls who came to cheer our other students on. I was happy to see bright, happy faces from the kids at the end of the competition when I invaded strangers' personal bubbles and congratulated them on a job well done. I really like making people happy. It's such an awesome high.
Oops. I let this entry sit too long. I've lost the will to write more. Off it goes into blurty cyberspace!
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