Fly like a bird

Yesterday and today was the Aoba Matsuri.
It's a festival where Japanese people of all ages across the city come out and dance on the streets like sparrows.
Yes, the bird.

When I heard about this festival last year, I was really excited...until I saw it. It was group after group of 20-50 people doing the same moves (in a different order) to the same music!!! I'm not sure how this can come out in a non-offensive fashion, but it was BORING.

This year, I figured that if I actually was a part of the festivities, it would make it more exciting to me.
Nope. Wrong.

Because I couldn't commit to the endless hours of practice for the dance steps (and they are complicated, I admit), I wasn't able to join the dancing. For those who know me also know that I lack rhythm, so drumming was also out of the question.

I was fine with not participating at all...until my friend called me. Her group wanted me to be the flag bearer! Haha...so, for two days, I beared the flag for a group called "Wings," got face makeup like a sparrow and wore a Japanese style festival shirt with "Wings" printed on the back. I paraded down the road and went on stage and waved the flag like I knew what I was doing. Ah, another thing I can write on my resume now. "Sparrow-representative."

Pow-wow before the big trip

Last night, the 11 of us who are heading to the Philippines on Habitat for Humanity gathered to get to know one another. One of the volunteers suggested that we fill out this questionnaire about our thoughts, our stories, our future aspirations and things of the like to help us better understand each other.

As much as I that activity was meant to serve as a "don't judge others so quickly" exercise, I really couldn't help but get frustrated.

We read each section anonymously.

One person said they met relatives they never knew existed when they made a trip to Europe and the this one dude said, "Well, it must be the white people in here." never thinking that people in this world migrate and that Asians, Blacks, whoever CAN live in Europe. It turned out that those relatives belonged to the guy who is the Vietnamese-Canadian.

And then, one of my answers was read out loud. This same guy who had made the earlier assumption about only white people existing Europe raised his voice again to say that the I had "thought too much" about my question.

Honestly, I was insulted and annoyed, and thought this person to be ignorant of many things in LIFE.

So much for an exercise to learn about each other, huh? I learned that I would rather not hear from this guy- at all. Hahah....ok, I will try. Patience. Must breathe.

10 years later

The topic of conversation at the staff room during lunch was bullying. My tea lady asked if bullying was a big problem in the United States. Was she for real?, I thought to myself. I thought Americans were thought to be the biggest bullies in the world.

I told her, yes, it is a big problem. And then, my mind suddenly drifted back to Columbine ten years ago. A part of me was shocked that ten years had already passed. I still remember being a high school student myself, being in a classroom during physics class, discussing this incident.

After that, I also told her that because of recent economic problems, many people are killing with guns. She quickly asked if these people were killing themselves or other people. I told her that they were taking their own lives as well as killing others in shooting sprees . She then said, "I can understand if they are killing themselves, but why are they dragging others into this mess?"

Yikes.

I've been reading about numerous stories on the news about these killings. The violence still astounds me. It's the quickest way to resolve the immediate issue, but it leaves scars that will never quite heal.

One of these stories sort of stuck in my mind. A man had gone into a building with offices/classrooms for immigrants who wanted to pass the US citizenship exam and he killed many people. One of the reasons given for this act was that he had lost his job and that others were making fun of his accent when speaking English.

Neither of the two are uncommon in the US and neither is a justification for hurting others, but you start to realize how something so basic can affect people. Not having a job puts us in a vulnerable situation of not being able to eat, sleep under a roof-- survive. I wonder if things would have been different if one (more) person had extended a helping hand or said a kind word to this man.

Hello, I am your teacher.

I joined the new first grade students in their second day of orientation in the nearby camp grounds. Who knew they would move everyone to a mountain for an orientation and then keep them indoors the whole day?

I thought it was weird when I showed up in my sports gear while the principal and the school counselor came in suits. Man, this whole dress code thing just escapes me.

Anyway, after having lunch, I was helping bus trays and bowls back to the washing area. Being Japan and all, I was wearing indoor slippers because there is a good separation of in and out. As I was headed up the stairs, I totally wiped out. All the bowls (big and small), spoons and trays slipped out of my grasp and I just fell. Hard core.

I just laid there in a moment of shock and then I looked up to see all the kids staring at me in concern. Hahaha....I felt totally bad and slightly embarrassed.

As I collected the things and my own composure, I realized one of the plastic bowls broke into pieces as though it were ceramics. What the heck.

What a great first impression I made on the students. Hahaha...

Philippines here I come...but wait, am I ready?

In two weeks, I will be embarking on a journey of another kind. I will be going to the Philippines for Habitat for Humanity's Global Volunteer program.

I have high hopes of this being a really rewarding experience because many people I know have been ridiculing me for going on a program where I have to pay to volunteer to do hard labor.

In preparation for the trip, I went to get a consultation about the shots and immunizations needed. I usually ignore some of the warnings about going to third world countries because my experience in the past have always been staying around the city areas.

This time around, we are going to be in the island of Palawan and Lonely Planet has done it's job into scaring me into getting the necessary preventative medication/shots.

Today, I got my first HepA shot, a tetanus booster and 6 malaria pills, costing me a whopping 250 dollars!!! Man, this trip is working out to be one of the most expensive ones I've taken. Yikes!

After that, I also went to the eye doctor to get an exam and new contacts. For the last couple of days, I've noticed this black dot in my vision. So, I got my pupils dilated. The optometrist told me my eyes are fine and that it's just a sign of aging. Crap.

I walked out that eye clinic feeling like crap about my age, couldn't see a THING that was close to me, it was too bright and I started feeling queasy...maybe from the Hep A and tetanus booster.

Man, what a day.

Unexpected Superman

I did one of the most embarrassing things today at work.
The thing is, I usually don't do much work at all. I'm not happy about this, but that's pretty much the truth.

My task today consisted of creating phrases commonly used in the English classroom so that we can use it to decorate the English room.

I made small little banners identical to the ones I made last year.

And then...I went to laminate them. Considering they were small banners, I had to cut and attach laminating sheets. One thing led to another and I ended up jamming the machine. Unfortunately, it happened at the same time the school nurse, who was working near by, was complimenting me on my skills at making lovely banners.

When it started to jam, I didn't really know what to do, because there was no way to stop the rollers that fed the paper forward.

I had to turn off the entire thing. I pulled and I yanked, but the banner was wedged in there and wouldn't come out for the life of me.

Thank god no one was really in the staffroom. I struggled along with the school nurse for about 15 minutes. Then, an unexpected hero came to our/my rescue.

The head teacher at the school came up and asked the school nurse what was happening. I think he knew pretty well that I was the one who got the machine jammed...but like most of the time, he doesn't speak directly to me.

For the next 40 to 45 minutes, the man calmly took apart the machine and even summoned a student to pull out the banner while he held on to the parts. He almost burned his hands 3 times.

This happened all the while some other teachers laughed and said to me, "Oh, you're the one who broke it." They chose to taunt me like a helpless kid while this guy helped. After I wasted his precious 45 minutes, I sheepishly smiled and apologized another 50 billion times. He simply smiled and said "It's ok."

I felt like a kid, but ahh...my unexpected superman!

Karate- Wah Zhaaaaa

For the first time since my back injury two years ago, I got back into a martial arts classroom. My friend who wanted to try different forms of martial arts convinced me to try karate out.

It was exhilarating!! My classmates consisted of my friend and three other students who were all probably younger than 11. The teacher spoke only in Japanese and went through everything as though we had been coming to class for the last 2 years.

Ahh...I just realized how much I missed Laney's TKD class.