my team-teachin' buddies.

so i can see why my predecessor stayed for three years, or was at least able to survive those years. i went to a work party tonight. it was with most of the english teachers at my school. so there are eleven total. they were all so great and i was actually able to joke around a little. i hope that i'll be able to pick up enough 日本語 (japanese) to understand some of the stories being told around me. but we went to a fancy/trendy izakaiya (japanese style bar/restaurant). it was nice, lots of mayo. i tried almost everything, and the salmon was definitely the best. i had beer, the only woman who did--although if my supervisor wasn't driving i bet she woulda done it right by the alcohol. i felt kinda bad for the head of the department. he is definitely on the outs of the gang. i need to remember to keep that in mind and still be kind to him. i wish yamagouchi-sensei had joined in the conversation more, but maybe that's his personality. but it was a good night. i think that teaching with these people will be a positive experience, challenging at times because of language barriers, but still good. tsukahiro-sensei reminds me a lot of my high school history teacher, mr. chasko, would just to kick our desks (or us) if we fell asleep during movies. tsukahiro-sensei seems very enthusiastic about team teaching. this week (week after the party) we has me in his classes even though i'm not scheduled until next week. and at the very lest i'll be very busy with correcting speech-papers for the end of year bilingual speech contest. i was handed 5 classes worth of papers to correct today. the bad grammar is giving me a headache, but i think i will be able to make a difference in the student's understanding of english if i am given the chance to communicate with them one-on-one. once i have time with each teacher i'll have a better gage on how that will work. also i met the two part time teachers today. surprise surprise they're both women and speak better english than many of the full time instructors. but both seem great and it seems i'll be able to shoot the breeze with them during my free time (or at least the younger of the two).