The Summer is Ending, and I have to Change Schools

Well, it is near the end of the summer vacation period here in Japan for the school children. It is somewhat ironic to call it a summer cacation when, in fact, most (if not all) of the kids in the schools have been going to school everyday since school "ended" at the end of July. There are clubs to continue practicing, and homework to work on. This is truly not a vacation.

I too have been needed at my school during this vacation. By the end of the summer, I will have worked 7 days at my junior high school to help some of the students prepare for an English speech contest to be held in September. Interestingly enough, I am helping these students to be the best and win, and I will not evne be at the school when the contest takes place, I am being forced to work at another junior high school in the same city, a rival, if you will.

I say forced, because I did not ask to move. I did not want to move. I was confortable with the school, the students, and the teachers. The only reason I was given for the move was that I was quiet and the school felt that I was not a "match" for the school as they were "passionate" about English. The strange part is that I cannot find a single person at the school who knew that I was going to change schools.

Part of me wants to think that this decision was made by someone in the Board of Education that I have never met and was based on reports from the school, not by observation. The cynic in me tends to think that this decision was made by my dispatch company and is some type of revenge or bullying on their part for me trying to quit earlier in the school year, again based on zero oberservation as no one from my company has ever visited me at my school.

I am destined for another junior high school in the same city, although this one is now a 20-minute (at least) bus ride away from the train station. While I am basically working at the one school, I am further "blessed" to have to work odd days at 3 area elementary schools (yes that is 3 other schools).

Sounds Fun?

Summer Vacation

As the summer comes to a close, and thank god for that with the temperatures we are having, I have not really done much. I have worked the aforementioned days at my junior high school, and worked a few days at my part-time job. The one "trip" that we did was a 5-day stay at my mother-in-law's house in Yokohama. Perhaps there is more to come in the new year.