I am one of the luckiest boys in the whole world!

This morning, the news was abuzz with a story about a man’s trial. I couldn’t understand a word but one: “MDMA”. Along with the video of him being escorted from a building in handcuffs, they had water-color paintings and computer generated images of simple human figures showing the events inside the courtroom. They also showed a still photo of a woman’s face. This leads me to believe he murdered her and Ecstasy has something to do with it. An odd thing I noticed: when they showed the video of him being escorted to and from different places, they mosaiced he his hands and wrists, to keep from showing the handcuffs. Why would they do this? It must be a big taboo to show an image of someone being actually in custody but it’s okay to allude strongly to it? They never showed him in the courtroom, just recreations. They never showed him in handcuffs, just walking near policemen, with his hands in front of him. They did show him in the backseat of a car that had a divider between the front seat and the back, a divider that had a little window cut out with wire mesh covering it, but they never showed the top of the car, so he was probably just riding in a new kind of taxi. A taxi driven by police officer looking cabbies. Cabbies that ride tandem.

Yeah, that’s it, cabbies that ride in tandem.


When I arrived at work I was pleasantly surprised to find a huge box of rice and a bag with a rice-cooker in it. Oh boy! These guys are too kind.

Presents? For me?

I taught my first class today in Junior High school. At JHS, I do something called team-teaching. The Japanese Teacher of English conducts the class and I stand-by to help with pronunciation and to act as the “other party” when we read scripts as demonstration. I had a lot of fun!
 

As the day went on, I gave my self introduction PowerPoint presentation a few more times and had a good time meeting the students. I met girl who actually knows a band that I like. Usually when I mention Japanese bands the students have no idea who I'm talking about. She was introducing herself to me and she mentioned liking "Ripslyme", a punk band from Japan that I like. I was overjoyed and told her I shared that interest. Then it was her turn to be surprised, as most Japanese children assume the things from Japan are unique to Japan and the rest of the world is unaware of their existence.

"This guy in the middle, he is me"

"Who likes natto?"

"My name is ~"

"Thank you, nice to meet you!"

At the end of the day I went with Kouchou-sensei, Kyoto-sensei, and Shimada-sensei to a city office to collect a gift of two desks. Kyoto-sensei told me two desks would cost the school $2000, so it was very nice of the city to give the school two desks for free! The new desks are going in Kouchou-sensei's office because his desk is 50 years old! The desks were heavy but not too heavy. When we returned to school and unloaded the truck is went into the teacher's room and began to pack up my things as my day was over. One of the teachers came over and told me she would teach me how to use my new rice cooker. She showed me how to measure and wash the rice, measure the water and which buttons to press. Then she surprised me with a bunch of gifts!

SO much kindness!

Epic box of rice.

 

My new rice cooker!

She gave me a bowl to wash the rice, a cup to measure the rice, a tub to wash dishes in, a package of sponges, a bottle of dish soap, and two Tupperware containers of leftovers from lunch today. She told me to eat the food and bring back the Tupperware everyday and the lunch lady would gave me more food to take home. Everyday! Wow! I feel so warm inside! I don't know why they are being so nice but I like it! She was talking to me about the food when another teacher overheard and then told me she would also bring me food everyday! The teachers know I like to cook, so they told me, once I got paid, I had to make them some food and bring it in. No problem at all, me thinks!

What should I make for them...?