Hey Mr. DJ

Not one to turn down a party invitation, I met Yuji at the Roppongi station turnstiles. This area of town pulsates at night under neon signs advertising sweaty bars and decadent companion clubs. A haunt of tourists, expats, military and the Japanese who wanna party with them, I avoid Roppongi’s $9 beers and cheesy music at all costs.Yet Yuji’s friend was DJing, and I figured it would be a good chance to hang out outside of his father’s tiny restaurant where we had met. I’m glad I made the exception. Yuji’s limited English could not prepare me for what type of party to expect. To play it safe, I wore a button down shirt stuffed into slacks. I should have remembered that Japan doesn’t have a dress code.

Yuji (right) – in baggy pants, a grey hooded sweatshirt and wool cap – led me in the opposite direction from the bright lights. We made a Family Mart run to grab drinks to finish off en route. The stairwell descending into the basement bar was dizzying. Graffiti lined the walls down to the bottom where a lanky DJ (center) welcomed me like an old friend, and handed out a CD with his R&B remixes.

The bonenkai wasn’t starting for another half hour. This marvelous Japanese concept is known as “year-forgetting parties.” (This being back in December). Momo was already forgetting. He wobbled around the room in a large reindeer headgear. Yuji meanwhile posted flyers with the DJ lineup around the bar.

I was the only foreigner in attendance, which is how I like it. It feels more cultural in that lost in translation way. I get C-list celebrity attention, and don’t get annoyed with other foreigners who think they are god’s gift to Japan for being proficient in the language.

I did, however, feel conspicuously overdressed among the music video wannabes in oversized off-brand tracksuits, dangling chains and sunglasses – sometimes a sign of gang membership here. Then again, it’s hard to consider someone wearing size 28 pants as tough, especially with a Louis Vuitton wallet poking out of the back pocket.

Sometimes they’d catch me staring with arced eyebrows at their outfits, but as a foreigner I can get away with it by falling outside of the Japanese social rubric. A smile and head nod turns embarrassment or confrontation into an icebreaker.

Such was the case with Kobe. I forget his real name, but he was wearing the basketball star’s jersey with matching Lakers cap and a fake gold chain that read “chain gang.” This Yokohama boy was no Bay Star. He looked the least likely of anyone in the room to play a sport or be in a gang. Yet he was eager to make my acquaintance, and summoned his friend Nao to join us.

Long hair poked out of Nao’s trucker’s hat that read “No problem. I love working my butt off for no money.” His sweatshirt was two sizes too big, and he had a goofy grin like he had been sniffing too much glue. He was an older but just as immature version of my students. He even lived in the same neighborhood. Astonishingly, he too, had wandering hands. I’m beginning to think this is a latent cultural phenomenon.

Like most people I met that night, Nao had a curiosity for English. First about translations for private parts, and then about his hat. “Butt” was easy enough, but the expression wasn’t. What did working hard have to do with a butt? he wanted to know. Giving up in frustration, I asked to borrow the hat to wear to the next monthly teachers’ meeting.

I also had trouble translating “Shat,” the artist’s name on the flyer advertising the evening’s party. This being a country where M-Shit is a popular punk rocker (M stands for Mohawk. Shit, for talent).

Easier to explain was a baby blue Columbia varsity jacket, purchased second-hand and turning baby brown from a patchwork of stains. Kousuke was startled to learn that Columbia was a university in New York. I was startled to see it personalized with “Christie.”

Unable to translate songs titles like “Return of the Mack” and “Bug A Boo” or lyrics like “Can I have it like that?…You got it like that,” Nao suggested that we not pay bar prices and instead drink on the sidewalk outside Family Mart. While not illegal, it felt amateur…and freezing, this being winter.

Back inside, Momo (right) was slumped over, naked without his headgear and neglecting the hot plate simmering with pre-cooked hot dogs on sticks for sale. More people had arrived, and Yuji facilitated introductions.

The underground setting bred intimacy. The vibe was friendship, not meat market, which is the selling point of foreigner hangouts in nearby Roppongi. Everyone seemed to know one another like we were in a party in a friend’s basement party.

The dance floor got crowded. Passionate DJs moved their friends with homespun music. In typical Japanese style, no one was going overboard. No bumping ‘n’ grinding, just bopping in place. Fly swatter-like arm extensions towards the DJ signaled approval. Some added their own beat with two drums on hand for audience participation.

In between DJ sets, live acts took the stage. Japanese rappers wearing puffy jackets and unbent MLB lids sang a good first number. Of course, I didn’t understand a word, but the same goes for American rappers.

It was refreshing to be with an unpretentious crowd enjoying one another’s company to amid good soundtrack. No drama, just a girl in a Santa costume passing out free shots of fizzy tequila. It was also DJ’s birthday, and at the end of his set he was presented with a cake, which everyone devoured using a communal spoon.

Santa and reindeer girls made a festively adorable duo, Nao was a one-man comedy show, but DJ was my favorite. He didn’t know much (any?) English, but his smile was contagious. The turntables electrified his blood. I could only feel excited watching him bounce around the DJ booth waving records in the air. He hooked me on “The Drive” by Headnodic & The Procussions and a Chemical Brothers remix of “Galvanzie.” Rock on, DJ.

This being a monthly party, I’ve gone several times since December’s debut, hence pictures in different clothes. The flowers were from Maki for my birthday. Viewers will be pleased to know that I’ve since done away with the long hairdo. I don’t know what I was thinking other than that it was winter and my head was cold.

Mandalay on My Mind

Once in Mandalay, I reunited with Erin & Miles, fellow American traveling buddies I had met in Yangon. They had taken the overnight bus, and after hearing stories of a flat tire, midnight military checkpoints, and sub-zero degree air-con, I concluded that the train was the lesser of two evils.

For sunset, we headed up Mandalay Hill. During our barefoot half-an-hour climb, we encountered a group of “students” ages 13 to 18. We had heard this story before. I thought they were hustlers, but was quickly proved wrong. One boy even bought me a bracelet. Others clutched a printout with questions to ask tourists to practice their English. They seemed thrilled to talk to Americans. Not many native English speakers care to visit a military dictatorship with a history of human rights violations.

These kids, however, made me glad I broke rank. A 360-degree panorama of the plains greeted us at the top. While other tourists took pictures of the sunset, we Americans gathered the children in a circle and began an impromptu lesson with their undivided attention. I introduced the concept of ‘high-five,’ which we practiced many times.




The walk down was dark. Flickering electricity teased our eyes. At the bottom of the hill we met their 22-year-old teacher. He invited us to class the next evening at a nearby monastery.

* * *

After an ambitious day visiting the ancient cities of Paleik, Inwa, and Amarapura via private taxi, we returned to Mandalay. The sun was done, but teaching duties remained.

The darkened road had no signs, but we knew we had the right place. Headlights illuminated joyous expressions of kids waiting at the monastery’s gate. Apparently, we were the only foreigners who had ever taken up the invitation. The teacher was ecstatic, too, and kept apologizing for the blackout. Although they were scheduled to have power that evening, candles had to be lit.

Thirty of us gathered on the floor of a main hall with a huge Buddha statue. I had never envisioned a lesson without a board, much less lights. Suddenly the latter materialized, and Miles took over with charades. It spawned a teaching revolution.

Older students cornered me in the back with questions. When I wrote down words like “amazing,” “gorgeous,” or “guinea pig,” notebooks jostled to copy it down. I couldn’t pay Kanokita kids to do that. Those studying for less than two months had better vocabularies than second-year Japanese students. One surprised me with “nunnery.” I guess vocab lists are different in Buddhist countries (yes, Japan has Buddhists, too, but nothing like Burma).

Learning from the mistakes of the Japanese school system,
I decided to divide the group based on ability. Miles, Erin, and I each took a group. Erin took the newest learners. Miles (right) got Lai Nu, among others. I got the boy with the orange spiky hair (left) and Konnai, the one with the best yellow thanaka design on his cheeks.

I guess I can never go on vacation from teaching, but for this lesson the pleasure was all mine. Their questions exceeded the ability of their Japanese peers. I was asked to pronounce “vocabulary,” spell “photogenic,” and exemplify the meaning of “vague.”

Under the watchful eye of Buddha, I grew attached to these young minds. They had an economic necessity to learn English as a ticket to a tourism job to escape poverty that ensnares most of this country’s 52 million people. Their dreams were intertwined with the language I take for granted.

Suddenly my experiences in Japan felt cheap. It was here that students needed (and wanted) help – not to pass entrance exams, but to make a life better than their parents could give them. I thought about what awaited me back in Japan: a new position in a private school full of uniformed children in a charmless suburb of a concrete capital. Sure Japanese kids are cute, but the exotic setting made teaching young Buddhists more alluring.

It was 10:00 p.m. Dust from the ancient cities still coated my face. Both camera batteries were drained. We hadn’t had eaten since a $3 restaurant lunch (the total for three people), but I could have gone all night. However, out of concern for worried mothers, we ended the lesson with high-fives.

These energetic and appreciative Burmese boys and girls made their Japanese counterparts seem like cookie-cutter clones. The Japanese had no character, no thanaka. No longyis tied around their waists. One was tied around mine (a $5 acquisition in Amarapura), which the kids retied correctly while hugging me tight (but not grabbing what lay beneath like in Japan).

This was an incredible and incredibly local experience. The glow inside me peaked as I climbed into the bed of a pickup truck taxi to our hotel. The kids surrounded the truck, and I handed out hugs and high-fives. I guardedly promised to return after my upcoming contract was complete. A headlight then caught my attention. The orange spiky haired boy was revving up his motorbike while friends piled on. We exchanged one last smirk, for this year at least.
View my top 125 pictures of Myanmar here.

Going Up?

I had three weeks in between jobs. The day after my last at Kanokita, I was on a plane to Myanmar. There was something excitingly controversial about visiting a country where the Lonely Planet cover included parenthesis around the country’s name (Burma).

The contrast between industrialized Japan and a land using World War II-era buses was startling. Traveling by train provided an even bigger contrast. The following is an entry lifted outof my journal:

3/20/06
There was nothing special or express about the “15 Up Special Express” going north (or up) from Yangon to Mandalay. Wide, padded upperclass seats offered ample legroom, but the carriages were vintage Chinese jobs. The seatback reclined 120 degrees, but the bottom cushion slipped forward, creating an abyss for my ass.

I was surprised to be the only foreigner. Ordinary class (wooden upright seats, no electricity) was for locals, some of whom paid extra for the “comforts” I was “enjoying” for $35. Even my air pillow met its match on Myanmar Railways.

While the guidebook didn’t mention anything about air-con, it didn’t mention anything to the contrary. Ceiling fans sat motionless while the sun baked the train in the station. Two men in forest green uniforms began smoking.

Like Japan, departure at 18:00 was on time. Apparently this called for a thunderous send-off with Burmese rock music blaring from the speakers (that worked all too well). The beats outpaced the train’s speed. So did a boy on a bicycle. Is this why the 650 km (400 miles) trip took 14 hours? The rock music was a distraction from the heat, but auditory discomfort lasted until the music switched to more poppy beats to which the rattling train grooved.

Families sat on weedy tracks, some with a teapot and food while train-chaser kids jumped from tie to tie. Yangon’s grimy outskirts gave way to thatched huts and concrete stupas. The country air smelled sweet like a campfire. As the sun set over the flat plains of the Bago Division, the sky turned the color of the pink-robed female monks sitting behind me. Dusty breezes (now cooler) mixed with Vegas brand tobacco fumes across the aisle.

To my pleasant surprise, at 18:30 bare bulbs flickered to life. Locals continued reading The Flower News while I journaled, now in the company of insects who detected that I was the only foreigner on board. At first, many of the bugs that blew my way were small and dead. Further north, they increased in size and vitality.

I bought only one bottle of water so that I could avoid using the restroom. I thought I could handle 14 hours, but the narrow gauge tracks provided stagecoach comfort. A few bounces nearly threw me out of my seat.

Of course, this jostled my bladder, too. With the train rattling, peeing into the open-hole pit was a physical challenge. The door jammed closed, leading to momentary panic of being trapped for the remainder of the rough ride.

At first, I enjoyed the bounce like a cheap amusement park ride. However, the hours dragged on, and I found myself the only one awake after midnight. I guess everyone else got used to it. Some slept on mats under the seats or in between cars, including in front of the restroom. The lights remained on, so to pass the time I began a log:

00:15 We’re stopped. Noises outside, but no lights. Men are near the undercarriage of my car. A kerosene torch reveals their shadowy figures like a Rembrandt painting. They have longs sticks, or were they guns?

01:15 Pyinmana. This is the remote interior city where the dictatorship is moving the capital from Yangon to better consolidate its grip. Darkened faces are waiting in dark places. People are sleeping wherever there’s room – under benches on the platform or in piles of dirt to be used for construction.

“Hey lama, hey gobimon, wabey!” a woman repeats while walking up and down the tracks balancing a basket or water jug on her head.

A barbed wire fence separates me from the kids clustered outside my window. A pig the size of some cars here feeds on garbage by the tracks. The shadows and unfamiliar shapes make my hairs stand on edge.

01:59 Do you really have to smoke that cigarette now?
03:01 Snack time! Caramel and peanut candy and Cowhead Chocobiscuits.
04:07 Landing rights denied to huge beetle thing. Thwà-zàn! (Go away!).
05:05 We have arrived in Thazi (English announcement) 10 minutes early. Hawkers board trying to sell moist face towels. Bags of something are piled high on the platform. My throat hurts – from the air? From the insects? It’s cooler out. Some people in the train are sleeping with blankets.
05:11 Snack time! These Cowheads are addictive.
05:35 Third bathroom break. It’s like peeing off the back of a galloping horse.
06:11 Here comes the sun.
06:34 Here comes the music. Again.
07:56 Arrival in Mandalay, the country’s second largest city, four minutes ahead of schedule, which, come to think of it, beats trains in Japan.

Key statistics:
13.9 hours of travel time
10 Cowhead biscuits consumed
5 big, itchy bug bites
2-3 hours of interrupted sleep
0 more times I’ll take the train over a plane to Mandalay.

Reflections

It seems like a long time since I first stepped into a classroom. A year has come and gone, and in its course yielded unanticipated lessons. I’ve chronicled the day-to-day mischief and chaos I’ve witnessed, but after the final bell, what has this teacher learned?

In a world of poverty and politics, natural disasters and nuclear weapons, I’ve come to value innocent students as an outlet for juvenile jokes and mutual companionship. School immersed me in the simplicity of malleable minds free of adult worries and real-world problems.

Junior high in Japan was a triumphant return to a time in America that I’ve tried to black out; I never even bought a yearbook then. This job gave me an opportunity to make up for one of those three years of misery. More than 10 years later and on another continent, I finally became one of the cool kids, just disguised as a teacher in Pumas.

Friendship was superficial, but I wasn’t expecting to forge life-long connections with kids half my age. We bonded for the moment, and it was the moment that counted. Our lives intersected fleetingly, but these students touched me (spiritually, but certainly also physically) in ways their American peers could not.

They patched a void of camaraderie in a confusing culture where I maintain shallow roots. Japan – with its traditions, etiquette, food, and language – is arguably the most complex country on earth. To even begin to grasp the intricacy of this society is a challenge that takes months of close observation. Businessmen and tourists don’t stay long enough to gain a sense of true Japan.

I came face-to-face with raw culture in a working class ward not in any guidebook: I participated in daily life at public school. In return, students got up close (and often too personal) with a foreigner otherwise inaccessible at their sheltered age. We symbiotically brightened the boredom of the curriculum through high-fives, immature jokes, and recess sports. The universality of shared company overcame the awkward exchange of languages. When crossing cultures, baby steps in communication feel like a big connection.

With wide eyes and curling corners of mouths, they signaled that our company was more than just shared – it was appreciated. Even cherished. I felt like big brother, and wanted to hang out with students after school and pass around bags of dried squid and melon flavored chips while fighting over PlayStation2 controllers.

After growing up, I never thought much about kids, especially not working with them. I became a teacher in Japan because it’s the easiest path to a work permit. I never expected to become attached to those half my age and of a startlingly different ethnicity. They taught me more about life and about myself than I taught them grammar. We grew together, but on different wavelengths.

Through teaching I came to understand the power of a personal touch. Few jobs can influence the direction of someone else’s life. Part educator and part entertainer, I planted seeds of English and Americana in spongy minds. I know that more than a few will mature into interpreters, translators, even English teachers. I never realized this power from my days on the receiving side of the lectern.

A Douyoto School girl chose this to say in a composition about “one important thing:”
Though I’m doing bad and good things…varied things, I’m having a good time at school. I think I can enjoy school life by grace of friends. There are disgusting things in my school life. But my friend gives me spirits a lift when I feel down.

The school which has many friends is pleasant place!! I have a dream. One day, all students will go to school.

To be a part of these young lives for however brief, the memory – on both sides – will persist. None of them (thank god) are reading this, but if they could, I’d want to look them in the eye and with a slight bow of my head say “thank you.” You were my reason for staying in Japan – hundreds of reasons, in fact. Each one similar but slightly individual.

The end is just the beginning. Stay tuned for a whole new season of students.
The New Batch drama premiers this September.

Last Day

Kanokita School is laid out in a horseshoe. Characterless five-story buildings surround a central courtyard with a gated entrance. Every morning, teachers, PTA members, and the principle greet students at the gate as per Japanese custom. They also serve as a checkpoint to inspect hair length, uniform collars and buttons, and to deaccessorize jewelry. Makeup is also forbidden.

Bowing on the run, I utter a hurried “ohayo gozaimasu” to the greeters two minutes before the bell chimes. The courtyard leads to the main building where faces suddenly appear in half-open windows. Hands poke out like little prisoners in the county jail. “Ooh Jeffurey!” they crow while waving to me and smirking to their friends – probably about my commuter tennis shoes or funky tie. This ritual occurred each morning on the way in and afternoon on the way out.

Walking out on my last day surely would be memorable. A scream rang out from the fourth floor window. I recognized a boy with no English skills hanging his mini-mohawk outside.

“Fuck you!” he shouted.

His words rained down on me like bricks. My heart pounded. Pride bubbled inside. What excellent intonation and diction! His English had definitely improved. I congratulated him with a salute of the middle finger, and laughed all the way to the bus stop shedding a tear of joy.

Well, at least that’s how I envisioned my grand exit from one of Tokyo’s most dysfunctional public schools. At Kanokita, however, such insolence only qualified for a regular day. This one was a Wednesday in September.

In reality, while counting down the final hours, Ms. Hattori dropped a stack of papers on my desk. I gave her the look. I didn’t do grades, and it was a little late for lesson planning. I looked down again. Suspicion melted into surprise.

This was the lesson plan! Students had spent a period decorating goodbye letters in rainbow ink. My heart tingled like when someone unexpectedly remembers your birthday. The stack was too thick to review on the spot, so I peeked at a few and savored the rest on the commute home.

I hunted down several students to pass out the remaining pictures I had snapped of them over the course of the year (as a cover for my ulterior motive of posting them online). I couldn’t recognize some because heads sprouting bushy hair in the photo stood before me cleanly shaven and vice versa.

It was now after 5:00. I had never stayed at school this late. A lone flute trilled somewhere down the hall. Dribbling echoed in the gym. The tranquility of after school clubs reigned in the absence of daytime mischief-makers. I joined the basketball team for a few lay-ups and blocked shots. Students gathered to give me a last round of high-fives.

“What’s my name? What’s my name?” a boy in a black Nike t-shirt asked with Destiny’s Child-like insistence. I could only pat him on the head. Kohei was quick to remind me.

“Good luck, Kohei,” I said as our brown eyes connected. “And practice your English, okay, buddy?” Our palms smacked together one last time.

Pushing through the creaking metal gate, I walked out of the courtyard and toward the bus. I reached into my bag for headphones. Just as I was about to juice up my iPod, I thought I heard the wind whisper my name. I turned around. It was Kohei.

“Jeff-uh-ree, Jeff-uh-ree byee-bye!”

The final farewell. For the third time. It was just like the ending of a romantic movie – except that we weren’t in love. We were partners. Partners in a cross-cultural exchange whereby they heard a native English accent without a CD player, and I vicariously experienced Japanese adolescence (going through puberty once firsthand was more than enough).

Kohei, shivering in basketball shorts under darkening March clouds, suddenly represented the hundreds of students I had stood before with an open textbook. The dozens who made me laugh with their “Japanglish” or universal acts and words of immaturity. And the handful who touched my heart with their gentle personalities and genuine interest in English or America.

Beyond textbook scripts and the supervision of other teachers, exchanging a spontaneous sentence or two with these special youngsters made the day’s commute worthwhile. It made the move to Japan worth the effort. Kohei was the last one of them that I’d ever see, ever interact with. He stood there smiling and waving like a happy dog.

I waved back and walked backwards. I couldn’t see the Swoosh on his shirt anymore. My eyes were misty. The setting sun and approaching cold front cast an eerie orange glow. Heaven’s tears showered the bus just as I boarded.

Nuts for Nuts

“Hello, how are you?” plays like a broken record from my lips during school hours. The next most uttered phrase is “Don’t touch me!” Unfortunately, it’s yielding diminishing returns.

Students now mimic me as they swarm in to cop a feel. What would be viewed as perverted or queer in America seems perfectly playful among touchy-feely Japanese school boys. The progression of the school year has only fueled their aggression for my receiving unwanted attention.

The final days of my tenure as a public school assistant language teacher bore an unprecedented number of bold attacks on private parts in public places. After lunch with one of my favorite classes, the boys were feeling frisky. There had been grabbing before, but not like this. Had there been something extra saucy in the fish cake lunch?

I enjoy mingling with students in the unstructured 20 minutes that follow lunch, but as a spectator manage to stay above the fray of pile-ons, insect-catching and games of onigokko (cops & robbers). Not today.

Larger classmates were preying upon “little angel” (my nickname), the smallest and most adorable boy of the class. He was in the fetal position on the floor protecting his vital organs and sacrificing his shoes in the process. I stepped in to repossess his footwear, but was suddenly swept up in what could only be described as a round robin kancho free-for-all.

“Clitoris!” the naughtiest of the mob shouted, catching me off-guard and scoring a direct hit (grab) on my crotch. I cursed him off in English, and side-stepped a second strike. The halls echoed with the frenzy of high-pitched screams and squeaking sneakers as the boys turned on one another.

“This is new sport,” one boy said rushing by with an outstretched hand in pursuit of his friend. I cautiously slid to the nearest stairwell. If kancho were an Olympic sport, I’d award Japan the gold.

* * *

English words were the last thing the boys in the back were penciling into their notebooks. One sketched a picture of a boxer with oversized gloves and long, wavy hair. When I walked over, he labeled it Jeff. He then asked for vital stats to accompany the diagram.

“I’m 185.3 cm. Taiju is 70 kg...what did you say? You little pervert!” I slapped him on the head. Here we go again, I thought, but this time was different. His friends coordinated a two-prong attack. One lunged for the front while the artist reached for the rear.

They took stabs at the American flag erasers I was holding. One snatched it out of my hand and wouldn’t return it, only offering to arm wrestle for it. Intimidated by his spiky hair and shaved eyebrows, I let him keep it.

I looked up to the front of the room to call for backup, only to find that the Japanese English teacher had already left. I looked back down. The artist pulled out a ruler, pressed it against my upper thigh and scribbled a measurement in his notebook.

* * *

I always walk around on high alert when in the presence of Kanokita 7th graders. Although the nickname applies to many, one kid tries so frequently that I’ve dubbed him “The Crotch-Grabber.” This picture caught him in the act. (The green and white sleeve is outstretched to ward off the attack).

Today’s class was handing back midterms full of red ink. The student who scored a 96 was sculpting dried flakes of white out into lines on his desk. Kenta scored a 4. He already drew my sympathy as the class shrimp, always looking lost behind long hair that curled on his neck like the crustacean’s tail.

“Thirty-five?” Crotch-Grabber whined as he crumpled the paper. Devoting more attention to vocab lists instead of my groin would surely increase his rank.

After class, Crotch-Grabber found me in the hall. One wrist was bandaged, which I thought would slow him down. It only increased his ingenuity. He faked his hand down and pinched my nipple. I yelled. The crafty kid offered me a high-five apology, but instead gave me a low grab.

A passing teacher laughed it off as cute, but I didn’t think it was so funny. I wrapped my hands around his neck and pushed him into a corner. Then the tables turned. It happened fast. His friend swooped in for a hit, allowing Crotch-Grabber to break free and renew the assault. I blocked, but our arms tangled. My ankle turned. I didn’t know how to tell him it was still in bad shape after a basketball injury a few weeks before.

To take the pressure off, I leaned on my other ankle, but balance befell me and I took Crotch-Grabber down with me.

“It hurts!” he yelped in Japanese while clutching his bandaged arm that I had just landed on. Nervous and apologetic, I put my hand on his shoulder. Grinning, he slugged his free fist into my crotch.

Editing History

Aside from Prime Minister Koizumi’s yearly pilgrimage to Yasukuni Shrine, there's nothing that embitters Japan’s neighbors more than its Ministry of Education’s approval of textbooks. Every few years when an update is due, a renewed uproar ensues accusing Japan of whitewashing its role in history. Last year was one of those years.

Although I teach in public schools, I’m not proficient in Japanese, and never thought I’d witness the controversy first-hand. That is, until I was modeling dialogue for a lesson about “Language – Life of a People.” It was the last lesson in the 9th grade English textbook, and discussed how after 1870 the Welsh were forced to use English in school, and were punished if they didn’t. The next example hit closer to home by bringing up Japan’s restricting the use of Korean during its occupation of the peninsula.
The teacher stopped me in mid sentence. Was I speaking English wrong? It turned out that the government-approved textbook (used in all of Tokyo’s public English classrooms) had been gussied up (I mean, updated) just after publication. I was reading from the old version. Contrast it with new one below:

“…Korea was a colony of Japan for thirty-five years. Korean school children had to learn Japanese as the ‘national language.’ Later, Korean language classes become optional. It was really painful for them. This system lasted until the end of World War II.”

You be the judge.

Money Hungry

“Money and Card” was the title of the final lesson with Mr. Mochizuki. Preparation was simple: wow the kids with faces of dead presidents on American currency. I brought a dollar’s worth of new pennies to Japan to inspire interest in American culture, and as backup should pencil prizes become exhausted.

The first student to guess the value of the coin I held up received a cash prize. Like ravens, shiny coins distracted 7th graders. I wasn’t so generous with the bills. I weighted down $1, $5, color $10, and $20 notes on the front desk with piles of pennies, and called up rows of students for a viewing. Their eyes turned green, and begging began.

Upon realizing that I was lax about their taking centy souvenirs, they got greedy. They clamored for something I walk away from when dropped. There were a lot of outstretched palms to grease. One kid reacted after smelling a fistful of change. Yup, smells like America all right. Japanese currency is somehow odorless.

I brandished a credit card to regain the educational focus of the lesson. This only stirred the pot. Visa is not everywhere you want to be in this cash-based society, and I transformed from assistant teacher to Daddy Warbucks. The bell rang before I could count my change, but by then it was too late. About 25% of the kids made off with 75% of the coins.

I stuffed the bills, card, and a few remaining dimes into pockets while shaking off demands for more. I continued to laugh until they started poking in places I didn’t wanted to be touched. One pilfered the bag of coins from my rear pocket. I beat him on the head with the textbook until I got a refund.

I consolidated valuables into the front pocket and made for the door. Three kids blocked my path. I sliced through them, but two more held the door shut. I needed backup, preferably an armored car, but even the bumbling Mr. Mochizuki would do. He had already left, and I had to fend off the mob alone.

Driven by hormones and greed, they groped and grabbed – my pockets, buttocks, anything they could get their dirty little fingers into. Outnumbered and outmaneuvered, my bum ankle only hampered my agility.

They were swarming now. Desperation swelled in my gut. I went into survival mode, and backed into a corner. One tried to sneak behind me, so I used my hips to check him into a metal cabinet. He yelped, holding his hand in pain. Others reached in for the “arm”ed robbery.

I knocked two boys out of the way, and broke for the back door again. The kids exited from the front, and confronted me in the hallway. Once there they suddenly became like fish out of water. Although their momentum died, it wouldn’t be the last time they tried to make off with my jewels.

Stay tuned for “Nuts for Nuts”….

Vocabulary Building

As class began, SexPlayer approached me with a new word on his mind. “Service parlor,” he blurted out. I’m not sure exactly what he meant, but my best guess wasn’t too savory.

For students without inklings for English, it’s tough to find something both educational (even marginally so) and that keeps their attention (and mine). Thank goodness for the word association game. It’s my go-to activity whenever I have ten minutes to kill, or have lost patience trying to teach the textbook. Please allow me to introduce it to you.

Hello, class. Do you know the word association game? Okay then, watch me, please. S-c-h-o-o-l [I write it on the board]. School means gakko desu ne? Okay, now what is in a school? Students, teacher, class…or…desk! Okay, d-e-s-k. What is desk? Chair or…wood! Okay, w-o-o-d! Wood is…brown, tree…. Do you understand? Okay, okay, let’s play now.

The rules are simple, and the results interesting. Here are some teacher-vetoed associations students (read: boys) came up with:

• speak…mouth…smoke
  
• needle…HIV
  
• pie…meat pie…cherry pie…cherry boy
  
• toy...adult toys
  
• wedding…baby…six nine [69]…mother…Meg Ryan…children…Mr. Children…Michael Jackson
  

Shrimp…lobster…crab prompted Me Too Pants Dropper to make lewd clawing gestures while pointing to girls. Another boy tried to make an association from that by crying, “Let’s play masturbation!” Me Too Pants Dropper pointed and fired back, “Masturbation boy!” I desperately tried to divert their one-track minds to words I could write on the board. Like “winter.” But Me Too Pants Dropper heard “wiener,” and yelled out “meatball.”

A tamer class started the game with “school” and followed it with “teacher…student….” The final two words before the bell rang were “danger…landmine.” By the law of syllogism, school is a landmine. At Kanokita, teachers already know to tread with caution.

Naughty by Nature

Behavior of perverted, pubescent students at Kanokita has been well documented.

Although I get tired from standing all day, one perk of being a teacher is the freedom of classroom mobility. I call it “The Teacher’s Walk,” and mine sort of looks like a giraffe drinking water. With hands clasped behind my back I methodically pace and pause up and down rows, lowering my neck to inspect desktops.

I walk mostly to keep from falling asleep, but also to joke around with students and to encourage them to at least put books on their desks. This time, Glue Boy in the back corner had another idea. From inside his desk emerged a tissue-covered cup. I braced myself. He yanked off the tissue. A penis sat in a glass of water. It was one of those Grow-A-Penis things that swell when immersed.

I tried to act like the mature professional that I am, and said: “Chisaii chimpo!” He burst out laughing; it was indeed a small pecker.

Later on I was Walking to check the lack of progress in copying sentences from the board. I couldn’t help but ask Glue Boy, “Hey, show me your penis.” We both laughed, and he ducked his hand into his desk to whip it out.

* * *

Eating lunch with students is my favorite time of day. First of all, I’m fed for cheap. Second, anything can happen. And it usually does when taking meals in section 2-4, home of Potato Face, Me Too Pants Dropper, and SexPlayer.

It was a Friday, and these boys were in weekend mode. I opened the door to a scene of culinary chaos. Me Too Pants Dropper was inhaling globs of rice with baby sardines by the fistful while banging his spoon on the lunch cart to demand more from the intimidated girl server. His shirt was untucked and unbuttoned. From the lunch cart he also grabbed the last frankfurter with his teeth and taunted SexPlayer with it. The ever playful SexPlayer bit the other end and tugged.

I ate alone, but as I was finishing the boys closed in. I guessed what perverted question would spill from SexPlayer’s mouth. Usually he lives up to his nickname by asking me if I like to play sex or if I like to play sex everyday.

“Do you like adult video?” he chirped. I almost congratulated him for asking a new question, but replied negatively hoping to end the line of questioning. It didn’t. SexPlayer brought over his book bag for some show-and-tell.

“Porno DVD!” Me Too Pants Dropper exxxclaimed, announcing the obvious. I was floored that they had gotten their hands on another objectionable item (at least this one didn’t shoot pellets), and had brought it to school. They circled me with eyes and ears eagerly awaiting a response. I couldn’t disappoint. “Mimashou!” (Let’s watch!) I shouted to a chorus of cheers.

At other schools class can be as quiet as a library. At Kanokita, however, the only way to get students’ attention would be to press play. Something tells me it wouldn’t be the first time they’ve seen it.

SexPlayer started sucking on Me Too Pants Dropper’s index finger. I rose to rack my tray. SexPlayer followed, and I asked him what other videos he watches. “I have two at my house,” he said. “Toy Story and adult video.”

Far left: Potato Face. Center with Rasta wig: SexPlayer. Far right: Me Too Pants Dropper.

* * *

Hormones run high at Kanokita, but those inside Me Too Pants Dropper are off the charts. He’s grown by inches in months. Now I look up at him, which he never lets me forget by sliding up next to me before class with big brown eyes and a naughty smile.

“Kiss me, please,” he likes to ask before class, pointing to each cheek. I send him back to his seat unfulfilled.

“Would you come here, please?” he asked during the lesson. I should know better than to accept his entreaties, but sat down next to him to see if he’s added anything new to his routine. “I like sex play. Do you like sex play?” Same shtick. I turned away, but he patted me on the shoulder. He smiled devilishly, and began stroking my knee, moving his hands onto my thigh.

“Enough!” I yelled, jumping up and causing a disruption.

“Wait, please!” he begged, sticking out his tongue and winking.

One time he tried a more direct approach: “please tell me about your penis.” His pronunciation hasn’t caught up with his hormones.

“My parents? Oh, well I have one mother and one....”

Slowly, I’m teaching them. We’re starting with the small stuff. Don’t raise your middle finger. “F*%# you” is not pleasant parlance. Erase “COCK” from the blackboard and your textbook cover. And please don’t describe your weenie as an “anaconda.” You’re 14 years old, and Japanese at that.

Crime and Punishment

Just as class finally settled down, Seiko strolled up to the front. She was holding her head. Mr. Hirogashi wrote her a pass, no questions asked. He’s just as happy to get rid of her as she is to get rid of him. Her hand was glued to her forehead, but only figuratively. It’s not a migraine, but rather a bad hair day. She’s been having a lot of those ever since her father lopped off her prized bangs as punishment for misusing a vending machine.

He should have trimmed her tongue instead. While waiting for the pass, Seiko couldn’t help but be a nuisance. She looked up from the floor to crack jokes at my expense. They’ve become so repetitive that I can now understand almost everything she throws my way. I counter with squinted eyes.

Discipline is deteriorating at Kanokita like the paint flaking off the walls. Some behavior qualifies as bad even for public schools in America. Fourteen-year-old girls, Seiko included, were caught red-faced after drinking beer (from a vending machine) in the bathroom in between classes. Not that they attend those classes, but the school nurse solved the mystery of their suddenly flush complexions.

Several boys, meanwhile, uploaded pictures of lighting up on school grounds onto their homepages. Word spread quickly. Enforcement of rules has not. The usual morning staff meeting at other schools is held in the late afternoon at Kanokita, probably to take stock of the day’s carnage and to make sure all teachers are accounted for.

In between classes one day, I returned to the teacher’s room to get more pencil prizes. I didn’t understand an announcement on the PA system, and empty chairs greeted me the next period. Class was cancelled. An emergency assembly was held instead because papers spontaneously combusted in the bathroom for the second time in four days. The fire department knows the route here well. Alarm pulling, or paper burning, has proved effective in postponing class.

Walking out of school one afternoon, I approached a girl shivering in the cold. Her skirt bopped up and down as she sang along to the J-pop playing on her cell phone speaker. She congregated with a group of boys on the steps near the gated entrance.

Their eyes radiated mischief. This group also hangs out on the fire stairs in front of the building. A boy sporting a mini-mohawk smiled suspiciously. As I walked by, he opened his uniform jacket and pulled out a gun. His grin exploded into laughter as he fired blanks at a student peeking out from behind the gate.

The kyoki (murder weapon) fooled me at first. But this is Kanokita where anything is to be expected, and so long as the gun’s not real, it’s not threatening enough to take meaningful administrative action. Try telling that to the special ed students caught in the crosshairs and rushing through the gate to reach the safety of waiting vehicles.

Seeing a policeman with the principal in the corridor doesn’t raise eyebrows. Last year the school made national news when a dozen girls were arrested for fighting. The melee unfolded on an embankment where they were trying to throw (drown?) someone in the river. The only thing that sunk was the school’s reputation.

The headlines never seem to fade for nearby residents. Sometimes I meet people who grew up or now live in the ward. While not an alumna, Carrie at Hollywood Models was well aware of Kanokita’s reputation. She cited breaking windows and casting a teacher’s chair into the pool as less criminal mischief.

What it boils down to is that these kids are just naughty by nature…To be continued.

Vanity

The beauty parlor was in full swing. Mirror, brushes, pads, lipstick – cosmetics crowded the desktop. A dumb-looking girl adjusted her fake eyelashes. She applied blush and eyeliner with the vigor of an actress due on stage. All that was missing were the vanity lights, but the oversized mirror was enough to draw the teacher’s disapproval.

She continued primping despite being instructed otherwise. When the teacher walked over, the girl glanced up with a vacant stare, her fingers still on her lashes. I recognized the stare from when I had asked her what she did on vacation. Maybe she didn’t understand a word of English. Maybe it’s Maybelline.

The Japanese take beauty seriously. While it’s taboo to eat or drink on trains, women routinely apply makeup as if they were in the privacy a dressing room. Men trim and reshape their eyebrows (not on board). Some shave them off completely. The grooming begins in junior high school, and is especially noticeable at Kanokita where students prioritize plucking over cracking a book.

Popular in-class treatments include gelling each other’s hair, filing nails and straightening hair – one strand at a time. Even the boys tote oversized mirrors that they prop open on the desk and spend the period perfectly aligning their spiky hair. The mirror reflects their attention away from the board. Such was the case with one punk with a band-aid patched over his eye and a (fake?) Burberry scarf concealing his neck. When done attending to the hair on his head, he shifted gears to tweezing his eyebrows.

In another class, two kids plucked the body hair off of an early bloomer. One friend dutifully worked on the boy’s arms while his exposed leg rested in the other’s lap. He didn’t flinch much, perhaps numbed from the sound of English.

Personal care isn’t all glamour. Sometimes it’s messy. Like when one student got a trim. Or when the normally well-mannered “Harajuku boy” (as I call him ever since spotting him on the train bound for this trendy area of Tokyo) was playing with shards of glass from the mirror he had sent crashing to the floor.

Perhaps following his lead, a girl with a black kit on her desk threw tweezers, eyebrow clipper and eyelash crimpier to the ground in apparent frustration. The girl sitting behind her remained cool, and continued straightening her frustrated friend’s hair with a turquoise comb.

This teacher is sensitive to some classroom salon treatments. Seiko and Maki bring tears to my eyes when using hair spray on each like they’re in a shaving cream fight.

“This room smells funny,” I remarked to the Japanese English teacher after walking into another class. He sniffed and agreed. This time it’s not hair spray; it’s nail polish. I scanned the room for the culprit. A girl with a pink hair clip was painting her nails at the expense of my nostrils.

To avoid confrontation, the teacher asked her not to stop, but to instead do it later. She pleaded for one minute more, and of course ignored the clock and his empty threat. Class began, and so did rawness eating at my throat. Disrespect had crossed the line into physical discomfort.

I mulled an appropriate response. I, too, didn’t want to cause a stink, and realized that if you can’t beat ’em, join ’em. She didn’t look up when I towered over her desk. I silently stuck out my pinky and received a glittery coating. The Japanese teacher followed suit.

Meanwhile, a misguided boy was working on his own version of nail care. He super glued his thumb and index fingertips together, and raised his hand for me to hail his accomplishment. I gestured back. As long as he wasn’t eating it, everything was relatively OK.

I is for Impunity

Near the bottom of Tokyo’s public educational barrel, Kanokita School appropriately sits in the shadow of the regional garbage incinerator. Toxins must seep into the water table, too.

I share a bus ride from the nearest train station with a disturbing number of mentally disabled adults. They are the only ones naive enough to sit next to a foreigner, although my knees do jut into the adjacent seat, sometimes the last one available.

An otherwise routine trip was once enlivened when one such man boarded with a bottle of brown “English tea.” Drinking on public transportation is frowned upon, but that didn’t dissuade him. He was audibly slobbering on the bottle. How refreshing to have the other passengers furtively eye someone else for a change.

While the bus was in motion, he leaped up and lunged across the aisle to slide open the window, dripping tea on an elderly passenger. He ejected the bottle from the window. Plastic rattled onto the pavement. The engine drowned out stifled reactions.

However small, it was a rare breakdown in order here. Well, rare if you’re a stranger to Kanokita. If D is for Delinquency, then I is for Impunity.

A pack of wild girls runs down the hall feeding off disorder it incites. Like a car with squealing brakes, Seiko’s shrieks can he heard down the block. First, she’s in the hall. Next, the fire escape. Then she’s yelling upstairs to Maki from the flowerbed in the courtyard, her uniform snared by branches. An old custodian lady pleads her not to trample the greenery.

A teacher told me that the outdoor pool is the only one in the ward to freeze in winter because it faces west and receives no direct sunlight. This distinction would qualify for an achievement at Kanokita were it not for the students who nearly fell in after treading on thin ice. Others kept their distance from the safety of fourth floor windows and pelted the ice with Mandarin oranges from school lunches, now a free meal for the crows.

Sometimes their boldness is welcome. Students freely adjust the classroom thermostat, which often works to this sweaty American’s favor. I silently cheer when a student pumps up the a/c. During spring rainy season either I’m getting soaked from above or sweating from underneath.

A tradition dating back to temple schools from the Edo period, students are assigned daily after school cleaning tasks. A rotating wheel of chores keeps track of who is sweeping where that day. Kids arm themselves with hand brooms and washcloths as chirping music sounds over the PA system. The tune mimics what’s heard at a closing department store. Chairs are raised, desks pushed to the side, and dust balls and spilled rice grains swept up. Others rub washcloths along the banister or wipe the linoleum stairs. At Kanokita, however, there’s no music – only the huffing of teachers carrying cleaning supplies.

The only thing that students who don’t want to learn have learned is that they don’t have to learn if they don’t want to. When students wield more power than teachers, threats are hollow and discipline is unenforceable.

Such antics wouldn’t go unpunished in U.S. schools. There are principals to lay down the law and detention for those who flaunt it. In Japan, principals are powerless and detention is a foreign concept. It’s the fundamental right of students to attend class. Kicking kids out would be to deny them this right. Students hold the ace of spades. Except for when after class began I broke up a poker game on the grounds that if I wasn’t dealt in, then nobody was playing.

While sometimes I use outsider status as leverage to encourage good behavior, specialized Japanese “cowboys,” as I called them, are the only hope of containing problems. In the absence of respected authority, cowboys patrol classrooms and hallways to prevent rebellious teens from taking over the ranch.

Chief cowboy Koutoro is a cool 30-something friend to the students and ally to the out-of-touch staff. His hairstyle matches his eclectic taste in fashion. The kids liken his stringy bangs plastered to his forehead to pubic hair. They have a point. He began as a volunteer five years ago, and now is the longest tenured member of staff.

The student-teacher ratio in one class was 3:1. Two English teachers, two cowboys, and one other man were on hand to lead and observe class. The problem was trouble itself. These 8th graders were perfectly behaved.

Although not (yet) as treacherous as their sempai (elders), the youngest students influence classroom life. I suggested dividing into groups to play a game that worked well with elementary schoolers I once subbed for. A 7th grade class at Kanokita has about the same English ability. The Japanese English teacher rebuffed the idea: “This class doesn’t do groups. If we try, one or two groups won’t participate.”

We’re teachers. Time to show ’em who’s boss, right? To the contrary, the mischief only gets worse….

Sushi Place

When it comes to sushi, Japan – not surprisingly – is bar none. My neighborhood is just up the subway line from the world’s greatest fish market, Tsukiji. I wasn’t making it another supermarket mystery meat bento night. I decided to revisit a sushi place private student Aiko showed me one “lesson.” This time would be different. Without a crutch, I was intruding into a salarymen stronghold feeding on the bedrock of Japanese cuisine in old town Tokyo.

Approaching the storefront set gastric juices in motion. But you can’t just walk in and seat yourself. Well, you can, if you’re Japanese. I paced past the entrance to check seat availability along the two bell-shaped counters. It’s always packed. Making a U-turn after entering invites humiliation. Standing and waiting along the perimeter feels too exposed when you’re a foreigner, not to mention the only one under 40.

The glass of the double sliding door is frosted almost to the top, but standing on my toes enables reconnaissance without commitment. I already had peered in twice. Cigarette smoke blurred dark salarymen suits. I pretended to thumb text messages while waiting for someone to walk out, but hunger soon trumped insecurity.

Unlike typical establishments here, don’t expect an audible welcome upon entering, which at least doesn’t draw more attention. Other customers aren’t looking for polite service. The freshest, cheapest sushi on this side of the Sumida River keeps them coming back. I feel their gaze, but hone in on my goal – sliding into an empty stool without knocking it or anyone else over. I cringed stuffing my knees under the counter.

The grey-haired lady poured jugs of sake into customers’ overflowing glasses. I recalled her stern disposition from last time, sort of like the sushi Nazi. Apparently I wasn’t a stranger either. “I never forget a handsome face,” she said through a customer translator. Ack. I let out a breath and looked up to order. Instead, I caught people staring at me from behind beer mugs and raised chopsticks. Can he speak Japanese? Can he eat raw fish? Can he handle chopsticks? Let the games begin.

In such situations, I fall back on a fail-safe recipe: draft beer. I wanted small, but ordered 1 liter. Murmurs of approval. First hurdle cleared. Next I whispered “unagi” (boiled eel) just like I had eaten when with my private student. Its mouth-watering richness makes it taste more like dessert than sushi, although it’s not raw. The sushi Nazi turned to the kitchen and yelled, “Do we have unagi today?” loud enough for everyone to overhear.

I sensed laughter before it became audible. One observer challenged me, in English, as to why I was ordering cooked fish in a place known for its raw delights. My cheeks turned the color of a maguro slice. The lady's answer was no, followed by a sentence I couldn’t catch. The only word I recognized was anago, unagi’s salt-water cousin (conger eel). I didn’t really want it, but quickly accepted.

“Maguro,” I called out, adding the house staple of tuna to my order, which appeased any remaining detractors. I wasn’t in the clear just yet. Furtive stares anticipated how I would eat what I had spent so much effort ordering. I treated chopsticks like a surgical tool and poured less than usual soy sauce.

The conger eel arrived dripping in delicious sweet eel sauce. I steered clear of the accompanying bottle filled with seasoning. Unfamiliar lids with unfamiliar contents only increased chances for embarrassment. Anago in chopstick, I raised it to my lips and stopped. Was that someone speaking to me? When you can’t understand the language, you begin to sense these things. A well-dressed gentleman in his twilight salaryman years had uttered “saisho,” or first. I knew what he meant. I had skipped a step. The eel was still undressed.

I imagined drowning it in green flakes. When nothing came out, I tapped harder and the prophecy fulfilled itself. I causally smeared the sprinkles around my plate like I was seasoned expert. I looked up to find the salaryman nodding. I toasted him with a green slice of eel.

Welcome to Japan! (and other milestones)

That’s what the toothy man wearing a cross hanging from rosary beads said to me as the train pulled into Shinjuku station. The stop couldn’t have come sooner.

He had interrupted viewing Sleeper Cell on my iPod video to say, “Excuse me, from what country are you?” I forced a smile at “Ohhh, Big Apple!” and his hope that we (Japan and America) could be friends.

“You are handsome and clever man!” I looked away, and then tuned out a monologue professing love for Paul McCartney and the “charming” Beatles. “I want to hold your hand,” he said. I hoped he was just quoting. I tried to catch the name of the station we were bypassing. Today the express wasn’t fast enough. When I got up at Shinjuku, he shook my hand and with a big smile welcomed me to Japan. He was almost a year too late.

It’s hard to believe that today marks a full year here. Months have merged into a critical mass. I remember my first day in this then – and still now – unfamiliar setting.

Lying to immigration about being a tourist. Sweating about customs uncovering neckties wrapped around resumes. The bus driver’s struggling to remove my suitcase from the belly of the airport bus. Asking for directions to the landlord’s headquarters. The elation over holding my first set of apartment keys (just like in the Fannie Mae commercial). The shock of ducking into said "apartment". Scraping old ramen out of the kitchen drain. Picking hairs out of the bathtub. Not fitting into the shower after hauling luggage along the Oedo line. Meeting Michelle for a shabu-shabu dinner in Ikebukuro. Buying the wrong train ticket to get there. Being questioned by the police on the way back.

The ride hasn’t gotten easier. The everyday unfamiliarity of Japanese life is something I’ll never acclimate to, or to be honest, enjoy. Being a functional illiterate. Being hungry but not recognizing any food to order, an undertaking in itself. The discomfort created when a foreigner sits next to a local on the train or in the ramen shop. The cigarette smoke. The cramped quarters. The concrete. The crowds. The homogeneity. The dark suits. The school uniforms. The conformity. The oneness of Club Japan. The solitude of the one percent of non-Japanese.

Were it not for mischievous school kids and deliciously cheap sushi, my last blog would have been not long after the first. As it turns out, this 100th post coincides with my one-year anniversary. That’s one blog every 3.65 days, not an insignificant feat since every post is a short story that can stand alone. After finishing the school day, a second shift begins: blogging. A post requires several hours to write and edit, but adds permanence to my ever-evolving experience here. Actually, I enjoy writing more than experiencing events themselves.

Okay, enough nostalgia. I recently signed another one-year contract at a different school, so as soon as the blackblog about Kanokita is posted, I’ll try for another 100 stories.

Changing Tactics

Lately, Ms. Hattori has gotten smarter. Battle weary from the daily onslaught of Kanokita’s 8th graders, she has sacrificed a fellow freshman teacher to the front lines. Instead of leading class from the front, she now stands in the back and watches me sink. Why should she do the heavy lifting when the burden can be shifted?

I waited for her usual shouts to begin class, but they never came. I stared at her, and she stared back. So now I’m expected to take the reins, which were slipping by the second as students picked up on the breakdown in command.

I made the class repeat the greeting because instead of responding, “I’m fine thank you, and you?” they echoed the question, “How are you?” Today’s lesson plan featured an unseasonable dialogue about Thanksgiving Day. I repeated the model reading, but no matter what the month, these students aren’t listening.

From the back Ms. Hattori cried, “One more time,” which became seven more times. A few mouths moved, but were inaudible because the gang of four was concocting trouble.

Birthmark boy is the ringleader, but he gets a little help from a girl with pale skin whose attitude turns mine red. Neither had a book open, unless you counted her journal filled with mini photo machine stickers and magazine cutouts of fashionable J-teen icons.

Before class, birthmark boy invaded her privacy and introduced me to this revealing slice of middle school girl life. Hours (of class time) are spent coloring pages with thick Poca markers and gluing in small photos. It’s an illustrated diary of friends, friends turned enemies (blackened out faces), material desires (cell phones, clothing) and their concept of beauty.

As I thumbed through the book, I got slapped on the head. Its owner had returned was none too pleased. I shifted attention to a boy with a crew cut (usually an indicator of trouble) squeezing swirls of Elmer’s glue. It looked like marshmallows had melted onto the desktop. As I approached, he glanced up to say “petting.” He wasn’t talking about his dog. He flashed a vulgar gesture and repeated himself while pointing at journal girl. Maybe it’s a good thing she can’t understand English.

“Where’s your book, kid?”

“At home,” he said, his lips curving upward. “Heavy petting!” he then exclaimed.

I kept a straight face. Now where did he learn that? In a weak moment months ago, I taught Me Too Pants-Dropper boy the same phrase after he, too, said “petting.” I’m sure it was the end of a long day, and I thought it would be harmless. I mean, these kids use “good morning” as an after lunch greeting.

I tried not wasting much time with the gang of four because several students in the front were actually making an effort; however, the gang distracted everyone. Glue boy tossed a button from his uniform and a battery at birthmark boy. Tired of mild threats to encourage attention, I marched over, confiscated the items and threw them out the third floor window.

I should have tossed out the glue. After joking in Japanese that I wanted to drink it, glue boy uncapped the bottle and began squeezing – above his open mouth. Nothing came out. He squeezed harder.

「ばか! ばか！」 I warned “stupid.” Curious to see how far he went, I didn’t intervene. Even Ms. Hattori was watching after having migrated to the board to write some sentences.

The glue oozed out like a string elongating with gravity. And then it snapped. I was hoping for down the throat, but it missed and pooled on his nose.

“Told you, stupid,” I chimed above his cries for a tissue. Shouldering teaching responsibilities here makes it tough to get a handle on class. Not even if you super glued one on.

Extra, Extra

read all about it. I’m pleased to announce my biggest freelance assignment to date, this week’s cover feature for Metropolis magazine, the most circulated English language magazine in Japan. It took me more than a month to research, write and revise.

Click here to read about Tokyo's less visited museums. I also took the sculptural photograph for the cover and those that accompany with the story.

Loosing That Loving Feeling

It was January, my first week back after New Year’s break. I had missed the childish camaraderie, and was even looking forward to defending the privacy of my parts on a daily basis. The last update on the mischievous nuts at Kanokita Junior High was in October. I’ve been taking careful notes of their behavior since then. By now I’ve finished up at my three other schools, so the focus of the blog will shift to these bundles of trouble doing what they do best – causing it.

“Mr. Mochizuki, how are things here at Kanokita this New Year?” I asked, fishing for gossip.

“Oh, same as usual. Not in particular,” he said showing off his front teeth from behind oversized glasses. That smile always gave me the willies.

Two more days back in session would be enough to erode Mr. Mochizuki’s veneer of winter recess relaxation to the point of disillusionment: “Mr. Jef, I no like this class. Why am I appointed this school?” he suddenly complained before class. “To tell you the truth, I don’t want to come to this place. There are very bad students, maybe the worst in Tokyo.” Although shocked by his candid confessions to a younger and contracted employee, he had a point.

The honeymoon period’s over. I dragged my feet up the stairs to class with Mr. Hirogashi, a young teacher who spent December break in Hawaii on his honeymoon. Regarding the three other schools I rotate among, he asked, “Do you notice a difference between this school and the others?”

I nearly laughed out loud, but realized he was in fact quite serious. He’s fixed at one school, and sounded like he was hoping to gain insight into the outside world populated with better disciplined students.

Perhaps he’s longing for the past. After all, he met his bride while teaching in another ward of Tokyo; however, Japanese school rules stipulate that a husband and wife cannot teach in the same ward, much less the same school. So he designated himself for reassignment, which after half a year at this school must mean he’s filed divorce papers just to get his old job back.

Blood-curling screams echoed into the stairwell from an undisclosed location. It could have been from upstairs or downstairs – maybe from both. Something then crashed to the floor. Usually it’s loud and metallic, but the dull thuds worry me most. Mr. Hirogashi filtered out these background noises.

Students at two of my other three schools were angels compared to Kanokita kids. I didn’t want honesty to burst his already bruised bubble. Morale in the teacher’s room was low enough.

“Well, the 7th graders aren’t so bad,” I said with a positive spin. Actually, Omiyada’s, led by the inept Mr. Nishono, acted worse. Kanokita’s 8th and 9th graders, however, were the bottom of the behavioral barrel.

“I think this school is like a jail,” he said as we climbed passed 8th grade classrooms on the third floor – ground zero for disobedience. His analogy was faulty. Although inmates are also bad apples, and as a matter of law must remain on the premises, a jail enforces order through authoritative guards. Kanokita is more like a game preserve where wild beasts roam free in a loosely patrolled area. There are some rangers, but not enough to be effective guardians.

At the top of the stairwell on the fourth floor, we turned right instead of left. “Oh no, no, no…not this class,” I grumbled to myself. There’s only one room at this end of the hall. It’s the class with the boy with the huge birthmark on his chin whose standard greeting is, “Oh Jefu! Son of a bitch!”

There were eleven students today, but they still outnumbered two teachers. Four girls in the front row were throwing pen cases (one labeled “Bump of Chicken,” a popular band) at one another or using textbooks to inflict head trauma. The boys behind them sketched their own variations of manga characters from an illustrated masterlist.

Efforts to overlay the worksheet on top of their drawings were brushed away. When Mr. Hirogashi then tried removing the drawings, a student yelled and ripped the worksheet in half. Mr. Hirogashi acquiesced.

The girls in the back of the room were hopeless. I knew from past experience that I’d be wasting my energy. One sat on the windowsill staring into space. One foot was planted on her seat while the other leg rested across her desk. At least she looked comfortable. Beside her, a friend craned her neck out the window to report on the boys P.E. soccer game.

Two girls glanced up from writing letters in multi-colored ink. They welcomed talking to me (in Japanese), but one preferred listening. At first I thought she had a new earring, but then spotted an earphone concealed beneath her long black hair. My face lit up, and she begged me to keep quiet. I just smiled and returned to the front of the room to survey the scene from a macro level. Finely fashioned paper airplanes crisscross flight paths in the back of the room.

Except for pretending to arrange to go to a Beyonce concert with a boy who practiced English five hours a day over winter vacation, classes were an exercise in futility. The students don’t care. There’s nothing stopping them from showing it. And there’s nothing I can do except witness the chaos unfold.

Penis Festival

Japanese schoolboys’ asking about my American body parts or inappropriately touching them has been well documented on this blog (with further outrages to come). But now I have proof that the problem isn’t me. It’s them – their repressed culture. Immaturity hit a new low yesterday in Kawasaki at the Kanamara Matsuri, or Festival of the Steel Phallus.

With its origins in the Edo era, this festival is held at a shrine sprouting several smooth mushroom-headed sculptures. The festival coincides with the cherry blossoms when Kawasaki women used to pray to ward off syphilis.

The event attracted more gawking foreigners than Japanese. Penis paraphernalia and themed sweets were available, and photo-ops were aplenty. The highlight was when a mother and her baby (not the one below) slid off the wooden shaft and tumbled to the dirt.

You know what a picture’s worth; I’m not going to waste my breath.