Spring break

Everywhere is rammed at the moment as the schools are closed. Next week, Omiya will hopefully return to normal levels of over-crowdedness. For most teachers, it means a holiday but for Shaners it`s extra work in the form of Spring School. I did a shift at Koga this week, which was gutting as it`s a long way on the train, so I had to get up even earlier than usual - and I had to skip my Japanese lesson. When I heard I had seven kids to contend with, I was dreading it, but I knew most of them already (including big, bad Seiya, who left my class last week and I miss more than I realised) and they were good fun and fairly smart, so it was easy. We played games, drew aliens, made masks and, of course, played dodgeball.

Seiya managed to steal my heart actually. He`s always been teacher`s pet, but has been more and more boisterous of late and I had began to wonder if his Japanese whispers were attempts to undermine my very fragile authority (if they don`t want to comply, you are basically fucked) due to his dislike of the big, bossy gaijin. Simple paranoia apparently. Now I`m not his teacher, I allowed myself to experiment with some Japanese on him and asked him how his new teacher was - tanoshikunakatta, apparently - not fun. Darrell needs to kick off his shoes and play some dodgeball with the kids, Seiya will love him forever (it clearly worked for me!). As well as sucking up in a very nonchalant and fairly convincing way, he also helped me out with the little kids. He finished his bookwork easily, so went around the table explaining to the little ones what to do and was the perfect assistant. In spite of his frenzied competetiveness in all games, he took it down a notch when I asked him so some of the younger kids could win (he is double the size of the other children). It made me feel quite guilty for using him to demonstrate `scary` and `fat`.

Last night, Raju answered my complaints about having no one to pull with and invited me along to one of his student`s leaving dos. I took my new friend Yukako along and found her friend Kiyomi was in Raj`s class. The world of English conversation is a small one. We got incredibly drunk and talked absolute rubbish. Raj bashed me in the ribs as I was about to shout how awful I found Kate Moss and Yuka, the student who was leaving, lifted her skirt and revealed a bottle green tattoo of the ex-junkie on her thigh. It didn`t even look like her, but I had to then spend a few minutes berating Pete Doherty and praising Kate Moss`s face to win Yuka back. Then Raj and I jointly offended her by trying to explain the Gaijin Effect, which she is clearly a victim of. We ended up doing a bit of a double-act for a while. Unfortunately, when in the company of gaijin, the Japanese sit back and expect you to entertain them. It`s quite hard work at times and last night, as I was tired and couldn`t think of any stories to regale them with, Raj had to lead the way. I joined in, but it did feel a bit Morecombe and Wise (well, Morecombe and Morecombe, I don`t think either of us want to be Little Ern). It makes you say some utter rubbish just to fill the gaps. Raj prattled on about how he`s going to die with just his tattoos for a long time, before trying to set me up with the waiter.

I might go back to follow it up. I am not convinced he was amazing-looking, but he wasn`t awful and as Japanese women consider being paid for and going no further than holding hands, I am more than happy to let him be my meal ticket.