So today was "hump day"!!! Another Wednesday goes down in the books. As I look at the calendar, I can't believe that Thanksgiving is just about 1 week away! Last time I remember, I was still getting ready to come to Japan and embark on my new journey!
This means that I've been in Japan for officially 16 weeks and 3 days as of this past Sunday! Wow, nearly 4 months now?!?! I can't believe it. My time in Japan is flying by! Before I know it, it will already be that time when the new class of JETs come in to start their new journey, and I'll be one of the "Experienced" JETs, haha!
Well, today was another day of school...without class! Yes! I was at the middle school today and they all have exams. So that meant that there were NO classes for me to teach. Nice! They didn't even have their English exam today so I had nothing to grade...that will be tomorrow! So literally, when I walked in to work, I thought that today, I have absolutely NOTHING to do! I thought that there might be an English exam for at least one of the grades, but they're all tomorrow. So I guess I'll be busy correcting tomorrow.
But today was pretty much a free day! Too bad in Japan, they don't like to just let you go home or tell you it's a free day, so I pretty much spent the day doing my own thing. I studied Japanese and kanji....I know, right!? Me, studying Japanese!? I guess it has to be done at some point. I DO want to become a literate Japanese person, haha. And I guess the only way to get there is to start with the basics and study. So I spent a good portion of the morning working through the text that I received from CLAIR for the Japanese language course. I finished the given exam for the 1st month. I guess all I have to do now is fill out the answer sheet with my responses and send it out! (But before filling out the answer sheet I'll have a native speaker check my answers first, of course!) It's not cheating, it's "collaborating"! Haha, Target would appreciate this answer! Working together with other people. Using more minds to make the best decision....yeah..
So anyway, I do feel somewhat accomplished because I also got planning done for next week's English lessons. It sucked to plan because it was pretty chilly today, so all day people were cuddled up in sweaters and trying to keep warm, including myself! Good thing I brought an extra fleece jacket to wear over my clothes, otherwise I would have gotten slight freezer burns on my skin! Haha, not that extreme, but it would not have been as fun. In Japan, it's not as cold as it is in the midwest where I'm from. However, I think I mentioned this in a previous post somewhere, but there is no insulation in houses in Japan. So even though it may be cold outside, it doesn't mean that it's warm inside like in America. There's no central heating and the walls are all paper thin! So that makes for cold mornings when I wake up!
In Japan, besides the kotatsu to stay warm, there is this thing called a "Yutanpo" which supposedly helps. It's basically like a canteen in the U.S., but it's made for hot water...nearly boiling water! It's a canteen-like shaped bottle that is anywhere between 1-3 liters, and you fill it with the hot water. Then before you go to sleep, you wrap a towel around it and place it in your bed. It's supposed to warm up the whole bed so then when you climb in, it's nice and toasty! Then, it should keep you fairly warm all night long. In the morning, the water is said to still be warm and you can use that warm water in the morning to wash your face or to warm up a little after hopping out of bed into the cold air! When I wake up in the morning, it's usually anywhere between 9-12 degrees Celsius...which means about 48.2-53.6 degrees Fahrenheit! yeah....it doesn't make waking up any fun!
So after work today, I stopped at a store to pick up one of these Yutanpos. I guess I'll try it tonight and see how it works! Hopefully it will be nice!!!
No comments:
Post a Comment