Wednesday, March 22, 2006

Wicked Things My Students Have Said

Disclaimer: My students will, of course, remain nameless. I also won't mention the identity of my employer, for reasons of employment maintenance, common sense, and plain old decency. My lawyers have also instructed me to inform you that there is a 5% chance that these stories may be entirely fictional, so if you ever meet one of my students you won't be tempted to ask them if they said these things... If you happen to be one of my students, then you can also rest assured that these people probably don't exist. But.. then, if you are one of my students, then you are probably having a really SHITTY day, now that you found out what a disaster your formerly respected Sensei turned out to be - but hey, this blog is a hell of a lesson in colloqual/online/terrible grammar, right?)

ok. yeah. that disclaimer might have been the...uh... funniest thing... I've... written.

(cough.) Try the ... (cough)... veal...

Yeah.

um... I am therefore happy to present you, dear reader, with the very best in unintentional hilarity.

Background is really only needed on one student ... We'll call him "Deadpan" or "DP" for short, because he rarely breaks his monotone or smiles... Also, if I had to guess, I would say that he has about as much experience with women as I have with the machinations of the court of the Ottoman Empire circa 1532. This, of course, makes any material on "romance" difficult and painful at best.

Btw... the textbook unit for the past month has been entitled "More Than Friends: Talking About Relationships!"

Anyway... so here are some gems from DP and some of my other language charges...

Most Common Unintentional Error:
Sensei, I was very boring on the weekend.
(in Japanese, the aren't two adjectives for describing things ("boring") and feelings ("bored"), so students tend to mix them up alot.)


Third most painful silence:
Me (to student 1): Why do you like jokes?
Student 1 (smiling): Because I like to laugh. Jokes make me happy. Why do you like Jokes, DP?
DP (seriously): I like Jokes because there are very many sad things in my life.


Biggest Mix up of the "Encouraging" / "Discouraging" lesson material:
Sensei: Ok, class, I'm going to jump out the window!!!
JGangster#1: um... That's a ....great idea??


Best Classmate/Text/Cultural Ethos Combination:
3 businessmen + 1 Antiglobalization Activist + a unit on "Genetically Engineered Foods" + the powerful Japanese belief in consensus-seeking.


Second most painful silence/"I'll prescribe Sex and the City AFTER you get through The Wonder Years" award:
Sensei: Ok, what are some things you can do to "keep the spark going" in a relationship?
DP: You should remember her birthday.
Sensei: Anything else?
DP: ....
Sensei: Hmmm... what things could you do to show someone you like them.
DP: .... I don't know. Please teach me.


Best opening to an anecdote about pets:
Happy Happy Student (female): Ok... I have a story. When I was young, I was verrry fat...


Most Painful Silence/Scariest Corporate Mind Control:
Sensei: Ok, guys... take a moment and think about your work day, and think about what makes you happy.
Student 1: Well, I like to do a good job, and I enjoy lunch, and I really enjoy coffee.... and...my salary of course. (laughs)
DP: My boss tells me that work is like wash the face. You don't think about wash the face. You just do it, and then you are happy. You are happy when you don't think about it.
Student 1: ...
Sensei:....
Studnet 1:...
Sensei: ... So... um... if you don't ask any questions... you don't get any bad answers....hmm... Student 1, what do you think about that...?
Student 1:... (thinks...)... um... (more thinking).... (nods)... Okay, sounds good.


Best inapropriate two-part verb question:

Housewife#1: Sensei, you go in, and you go out... but do you go down?



/ The voices in my head had a field day with that last one, but I managed to squeak out "doors" and "stairs" as examples of things you could go in, out and down....

Saturday, March 18, 2006

Look Ma! Two Hands!

So, I have a some news to contradict the last post. Apparently, this week, I did drink too much.

But don't worry, I have some madness (not the good kind) to put it all into the proper perspective.

Ok - lets get the awful imagery out of the way!

CHEERS!

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While I didn't actually drink all of these specific beer glasses (just 3), I did actually empty more than this number the other night during some sort of weekday festivities (I dunno... I think it was called "huzzah! its wednesday!) but man did this pic turn out well.


Last weekend I also managed to hit up some downtown all-night-drinking-party-ness. I ended up following two of my dear chums... (for the purposes of this blog, lets call them "party sensei" and "hungry sensei".) Unfortunately, I can't really nail down specifics, as I think that a few people that live here in Japan actually read this blog now. (Yes, I'm talking to you, Captain Oldhump, among others)... so... I can't say which is which without being johnny gossip.... but its too funny to resist!)

Between them, over the course of one night in Shibuya, I managed to tail Party Sensei and Hungry Sensei, as we/they managed to chase after a number of awesome goals. I'd like to point out that I was actually reprising my role as "drunkscort" from first year, and basically trying to make sure that these cats didn't do anything toooo rash (well, unless it would make a funny story for me...) ANYWAY, Party Sensei and Hungry Sensei managed to accomplish the following with me in tow:

1) gross consumption of booze
2) unsuccessfull wandering of the streets for two hours looking for a ma-sa-geee.
3) bar visitation, disco ball theft and forced removal. This forced removal happened no matter how many sober-esque "tomodachi o sumi mass-en" (friend excuse) "tomodatchi ga drunk desu!" (friend drunk is) and my favourite "tomodachi beeru wa sugoy daiski...a gomenna sai" (friend beer super likes, sorry... so sorry) I managed to throw at the still (very) polite bar staff.
4) rolling down the stairs into a mystery puddle and still managing to be possessed of said disco ball.
5) finding RAMEN!
6) sleeping for 2.56 hours in said ramen shop. Sorry ramen shop people... as three rather boozed (ok... two boozed and one amused) gaijin folk are surely not so good for business.

here are some money shots, including a beautiful kicker of a drink from my past that some of you may or may not recognize as... DIRTY GOODNESS!!!



1) They had the only kind of karoke that doesn't get your butt kicked outside of J-Pan! Freestyle Spoken Word (or, as its known to the masses... shit. what was it.. Wrap or something)

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2) The Ressurection of the Dirty Goodness, and the Passion of the Former Unbeliever

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3) The Aftermath

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Sadly, the disco ball was lost in a fit of pique.

Drunk Sensei: stupid disco ball. and there's pee on me, I think. I don't want this any more [tosses disco ball into a pile of garbage bags]
Brent: Nooooo oooooo My Sideburns and sense of history!!!!


Ah. what a shame....


And just so you manage to put this into perspective... I'd like to point out that we are at least three evolutionary steps above a certain level of drunkeness that is unique to Japan...

Drunken guys in suits

endangering their lives!!!

With an audience!!!


1) The Audience:

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2) The Dumbass (being helped by security in the middle of the pic)

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3) The Dumbass in Action

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now, I have to say.... I was super impressed with the JR (Japan Rail) Staff. They are either super highly trained and heavily drilled in reacting to this sort of flagrant darwin-baiting, or this level of drunken idiocy is more common than I would hope.

I actually watched the whole thing unfold... I saw the guy stumble/slip off the platform, and within seconds there were shouting guards who had sounded an alarm system that bellowed a claxon and lit up a string of red flashing lights all along the station and up the tracks in either direction. Any train coming would have had plenty of notice and stopped well before the station. They were down on the tracks and had him up in about ten seconds.

So, good on them. Every now and again, the uniquely Japanese idea that EVERYONE should take the utmost care and pride in every area of their job/service to the greater population pops up in an amazingly helpful way. Further, I really doubt that this guy is going to see the emotional trauma of the incident as an excuse to sue the train company for building platforms that drunk people could fall off--thereby incuring public shame, humilation and scuffed hands... not to mentiont he fact that he surely swallowed a chicken beak and a finger during his tumble.

Tuesday, March 14, 2006

The Awful Truth About Japan

So, apparently my dear mother has taken some time in the last un-updated month to take a peek at the blog....

This is, unfortunately, a time where I have foolishly left a half-assed post about some friend of mine who is ensuring that the average virtue level of the middle aged ladies of Japan retains its "tarnished" character.

oops. my bad.

Anyway, there has been some me-related drama over the last month, but thats still no reason for me to neglect this highly important documentation of personal history. Right? Right.

Soo... lets start with clearing up some misconceptions that this blog may or may not be attempting to highlight.

Now, those of you who have met my mother know that she is an entirely wonderful woman, who has bouts of wackyness that I firmly believe are genetically responsible for at least 60% of the fun that I am able to bring to any given party. Of course, she is also my mother, which means that between bouts of wackyness** (Wackyness Anecdotes follow the end of this post) she is also given to bouts of crazy things like "worrying about me", "trying to support me from the other side of the world" or "caring that I exist." sheesh! what the heck!

Anyway... here is part of the email...



Hi Hon!

...

I find your blogs sometimes difficult to read in the sense that I worry
about your lack of sleep, your apparent heavy drinking, and the fact that
you loosely share sex comments... Would you please
just send over regular emails with some attached pictures once in awhile.
Then Gramma and I can read them. Call me old-fashioned, but I worry about
issues of privacy and about your liver and about your aging process due to
lack of sleep.

...

Love,

Mom!

So... as I see it there are a few key problems...

1) I am unhealthy

2) I drink too much

3) There are too many humping jokes on this website.

4) I won't be able to run for political office with any sort of moral fibre

5) #1-4 will probably upset my grandmother.


In light of this, I would like to share with you....

The Awful Truth About Japan

There are these entire strings of pesky times where I don't drink, party, get lost, fall alsleep on stairs, fall down stairs, fall alseep on trains, or even get felated by santa claus! (see December 2005).

These times are called "Weekdays". which is why I only update about once a mon...cough...cough...WEEK.

ish.

Anyway, to help sweet mums feel better (and becuase I am enjoying this post as well) I would like to detail a REGULAR day.

Come back!


I'll try to make this funny. Seriously. and I won't make it a habit.

To add to the incredible excitement that nearly matches the glee on all of your faces when you realized that I was (indeed) not dead, but being a posting slacker! The first part of this was written by CELL PHONE, with no predictive text)


well, im a bit sad that you only think im talking dirty and drinking, but this just happens to be the stuff i find most amusing.... and since i only write one post each week, you are definitely getting a skewed view...
actually, most of my days sound like this....


1025 get up
1045 turn off snooze and get up for real
1055 ok. seriously, youll miss the train if you dont get up!!
1057 get up, shower, eat toast, walk to train station.
1133 see train crossing gate descend, sprint the last 300 metres, including two flights of stairs.
1135-1139 pant heavily while being stared at by disgusted japanese people.
1150, change and prep/review first lesson.
1200-2100 teach


(ok... I'm typing with a real keyboard again. that might not look like much to you - but that was TWENTY FIVE MINUTES of my life that I'll never get back! I could have been bored, or staring out the window, but instead I spent my precious train-transit time concocting that wonderful bit of awesomeness for YOU dear reader.)

Anyway...

teaching:

40% actual instruction of students.
10% prep of props, highkighting lesson plans,etc.
10% walking to get food, getting food, reheating food, eating food.
10% - wasting time/ reading the newspaper, magazines and goofing off.
5% paperwork
5% doing company stuff, emailing my schedule, answering email, aggregate of attending meetings, etc.
2% being a wiseass to students standing in the lobby waiting for lessons.
8% explaining said wiseassness and comments like "turn down the suck!"
mean, as well as answering straightforward questions like "I have a two part verb question, sensei... you go in, and go out, but do you go down?" while not cracking a smile. (I seriously almost lost it, and if that came from anyone other than a 50+ year old housewife, I would have answered "whenever possible")
10% pooping. (not really, but I realized that the rest only added up to 90%, and this seemed like as good a time as any for a poo joke.)

/ Aw crap. We can officially declare that I have failed in my attempt to disprove #3 above. Shiat.

Anyway: 900 - 915: finish paperwork, get changed, leave work.

fun night: meet a friend for dinner. two of my best friends here are not heavy drinkers, actually - one doesn't drink at all and the other drinks the odd glass of wine now and again, so usally we don't drink, but do enjoy healthy chat and fun times.

I do drink sometimes on weekends, about as much as I did in Canada, but now it leads to wakcy adventures, instead of just going to sleep, etc. Generally if I drink, its about 1 night a week of sizable drinking, and maybe a beer or a glass of wine or two on another night with dinner. Actually, health wise, I am doing a lot better - my weight is down a lot (about two inches off my waist) and my hair is growing back from lack of stress. The sleep still needs tweaking, I guess, but I am generally getting no less than six hours, and most often about seven. Weekends, I get 9-10 hours, actually, as I stay in bed until the afternoon.

This weekend, for example, I did stay out all night on sunday, and that is/was a VERY funny drinking story, but I feel that presenting it now would undermine the main point of this post. You can look forward to it soon though.

ANYWAY.

On most nights, I actually just come home, snag a bit of action on teh intre-web and/or watch a movie or something. Contrary to popular believe and the evidence presented regularly in the Weekly World News, my life really isn't that exciting. But I have bouts of funnyness, and these are the ones that I would like to contribute to posterity.

So, dear reader (I'd add an "s", but I'm suspicious about the fact that I may need to do some active work to earn that s back after the latest hiatus)... let us make a pact.

I will continue to have shenanigan-filled adventures and I will share them on this site. They will of course, be interspersed with bits and pieces of other-ness that we can call "weekdays"...but I'll try not to mention them on this site if I can help it.

I will also attempt to send at least pg-13 rated emails to the rest of my folks. They don't want to hear that I got plowed (in any sense of the word... )

You... well.. shit. promise whatever you want. I'm still making a pact with you and you can't stop me.


OK! lets do an update on those 5 points!!!


1) I am unhealthy
Ok... I didn't address this one at all, but my pants are not wear-able without a belt, and I can see a noticable lack of additional chin-ness on me. I'm not that much lighter, but I'm certainly thinner. I am also de-balding after removing the stress-madness that was my old career. Sleeping more is a work in progress, but I am doing my part by sleeping in uber-much.


2) I drink too much
Well, lets call this one 23% de-bunked. I drink too much on some weekend days, but mostly I am a good boy. Unfortunately, I suspect neglecting to mention these nights in glorious "worstpossibleinterpretation-o-vision" would make for a blog about as exciting as a Reality TV show populated with honest, upstanding individuals with a healthy amount of self respect. (or perhaps "as thrilling as Jerry Springer with all the chairs nailed down...")

Anyway... I do drink a decent amount, but I don't ever find myself NEEDING to drink. I'm happy to go out w/o the booze too. ...

Where is "rationalizing" on the 12 steps again? Somewhere after "admitting it", right?


3) There are too many humping references on this website.

This point is entirely without any sort of penis.



4) I won't be able to run for political office with any sort of moral fibre.

With all of the "baby" jokes that D and I make, I have bigger problems than this blog.



5) #1-4 will probably upset my grandmother.

I am currently in negotiations with Fox News to report this blog as the result of the "liberal bias" of the internet, and that since the Internet was invented by activist judges, it is actually reinterpreting the wholesome conservatism that I think.




So, to conclude, out of a possible 5/5, I scored...

1.23/5

So... I really didn't accomplish anything. nice.


GIMMIE A P
GIMMIE A R
GIMMIE AN IORITIES!!!!

Thats right!

I hope you found this all at least 123/500 as amusing as I did.


Welll... thats it. sleepy time!!! More soon!




** As promised. the post script!!!

My Current Top 5 Merry-fam Wackyness Incidents

1) any Merry-fam Christmas dinner when the uncles start making naughty jokes and our dear Gram does the "Sweetest, nicest lady-chef + matriarch in the world/Rush Limbaugh Cheerleader" Jeckyl/Hyde thing.

2) That time we all split about eight bottles of wine (including the best and most misspelled gwertstrameiner bottle ever) and went out for indian food.

3) Family Ski trips. 'nuff said.

4) That time we replaced my sister with my brother's (ex) girlfriend for Christmas Tree decorating. I mean... we called! but she was on the phone... and it was just one decoration to start... and she'd be down soon... oh... lets just take a few pictures... oh! hi! don't worry... we saved you some tinsel....

5) Summer friday nights, when I arrived last to find the whole fam half in the can and all the way in the pool. JEALOUS. gah.


Feel free to offer your own suggestions if you have witnessed any.

Runner up: oldie but a goodie - that time in high school when the rest of the fam showed up after letting me host the prom after party HAVING ALREADY ACQUIRED A NEW CARPET ON THE ASSUMPTION THAT ONE WOULD HAVE BEEN RUINED DURING THE FESTIVITIES.

Somebody slap me for daring to use caps lock. seriously.