living on the edge (including attending a sumo tournament, going on a japanese bus tour, and teaching elementary school)

teaching elementary...
i've been quite busy lately, both socially and teacherly. and if teacherly wasn't a word before it is now. i'm in the middle of my two weeks at elementary school. i love the kids, they are amazingly energetic and entertaining. their one downfall is spreading germs and getting their eigo no sen-sei(me) sick, but their love is endless--not to mention a little annoying at times. everytime i go into a classroom to eat lunch with a different class i am bombarded with "ashuri, ashuri, koko(here)!" usually i make them janken(rock, paper, scissors) for me. that way it's fair and square. the best part is that even if i try a new lesson and it fails miserably they are still by my side hopeful and wide-eyed for a "hello, how are you?" from the big blonde lady. love it.

i especially enjoyed teaching directions to the 3rd and 4th graders this week. we danced to this song "left, right, forward, back" and then i had them split up into teams to test their skills. one of them had a blindfold and the rest of the team members had to direct them to a little stuffed owl i hid in different places around the room. it rocked!

i also renewed my love for dodgeball. it's a bit more complicated than i remembered (maybe because the students were explaining it in japanese), but so much fun. i was initially scared about hurting one of the students, but it turns out that they throw it just as fast as me. are kids getting stronger or am i just weaker?




watching live sumo...
there are six important sumo tournaments throughout the year. i had the pleasure of attending one of these "big" (pun intended) events. although i had seen sumo a few times on tv here, i was unaware of how intense the matches could be live. two gi-normous wrestlers crash into each other several times, grunting and straining to gain a better hold for pushing down or pushing out the opponent. of course there are more specific terms for each of the manuevers, but i feel i can enjoy it just as much without knowing that the winner out-manuevered his man by using the "nishi-bo-bishi". i just made that up too. it was really exciting when i recognized some of the faces that i have seen on tv and in advertisements. they are big celebrities over here and i was as star-struck as i would be if i saw dolly parton walking down the street. hey, she is pretty cool.

being on a japanese bus tour...
as i've said before my landlord and his wife are very neat people. they speak good english and are "cool" grandparents. so when she asked me to go with her on a bus to disney sea i was all for it. we started our day bright and early at 6:30am leaving from takasaki and busing to chiba (which is east of tokyo). i impressed her with my ipod and she impressed me with the number of snacks she brought.



we tried every ride at least once. at the last minute she ditched out of the roller-coaster, but i don't blame her, she is 64. we took a romantic gondola ride with some of the other people from our bus, ate mexican food, and people-watched. it made for a lovely day. actually two of my chugakko students were on the same bus. they were very surprised to see me on their bus as were other people seeing me get off and on at the stops. i would definitely do it again.


life in general...
i must learn more japanese. i feel bad when i don't understand the kids. it's getting warmer and warmer out, but cloudier and cloudier. i need some sunshine (literally) in my life. i am teaching one private lesson a week to a bengladeshi lady. the tennis players are playing some sort of game right now and yelling a lot. i don't mind though. and "the davinci code"(the movie) was disappointingly bad. i won some free 'make-up sheets' at the seven-eleven the other day. and i am craving an everything bagel with veggie cream cheese.