Homeless

Disaster struck on Boxing Day. I lost my apartment key. I was getting drunk on sake and Asahi beer with a couple of other teachers in an Iida bar. We eventually finished our party at 5am. The two other teachers lived in different locations so we went our separate ways. I walked towards my apartment in the freezing cold whilst the rain came crashing down. My socks were wet, my glasses were smeared from the rain and I was sneezing and coughing like diseased-riddled maniac. I wanted to curl up near my heater in my homely apartment as soon as possible.
When I arrived at my apartment door, drenched, I put my hand in my pocket looking for my door key. I found my car key and Terakoya's door key, but no apartment key. I searched the other pocket but found nothing but old receipts and a tissue. I checked my coat pockets. Empty. I checked my seldom used back pockets. Empty. I even checked inside my shoes through sheer panic. Empty.
The rain was relentless and started to trickle down my back. I thought about what to do. Knocking on Martin’s door, who lived on a different floor in the apartment block, would be a major intrusion considering the late hour. I thought about my other options.
I rummaged through my pockets again and fished out my car-key and Terakoya’s door-key. I could sleep in the cramped car or I could sleep in the empty school. The latter seemed the more appealing so I sprinted over to the school opposite my apartment. I switched on the staff room light and made myself at home. I logged onto the internet, had a quick wash in the sink, turned on the heating and made a cup of tea. I even played some music on the CD player. After 10 minutes I felt relaxed and comfortable and promptly fell asleep on the couch which was located snugly by the heater.
I woke up to the sound of feet walking around the staff room. I opened my eyes and saw some of my high school students walking towards a classroom next door to the staff room.
A bit of morning-drool was dripping from my mouth and my hair was sticking up at a 90 degree angle. I looked like a hobo, which, essentially, I was. My high school students looked at me with concern and confusion through the staffroom window. Any respect I might have garnered from my lessons would now be blown to smithereens. When they come to my next lesson, they might start throwing loose change at me.
I returned a look of confusion to them because the time on the wall was 7.30am, on a Sunday! These guys were intense when it came to study. Couldn't they act like normal teenagers and sleep in late. That way they wouldn't have been exposed to the sight of a bedraggled lump on the couch that has a drooling problem. I attempted a greeting but I was in the early stages of waking up, so the sound that came out of my mouth was: "Burrrrrr murna moooo!"
Not wishing to be distressed further by my wretched sight, they quickly scuttled to the next room.
I shrugged to myself and went back to sleep.
When I woke, I got into my car and drove around the places I visited the night before hoping to find my lost key. I went inside the bar from the last night and the bar-staff tried to find my key but our searching was fruitless. I resigned myself to the fact that I would never find my key, so I phoned Shigeho and asked if there were any key-cutting shops open. She informed me that it was a holiday weekend and that all shops would be closed. I thanked her for this distressing news and hung up. I had to wait two more days before setting foot in my apartment again. I decided to stay at Terakoya for the next two days and nights. On the plus side, I had everything I needed. I had a sofa to sleep on, a music player to listen to, the internet and a heater. I nipped off to a shop and bought essential toiletries such as a towel, toothbrush, toothpaste and a razor. I then went back to Terakoya, my new home. My high school students were going to see a lot more of me over the next few days.
Indeed, the next morning they were up bright and early again, walking through the staff room, and seeing my contorted form snoring loudly on the sofa. I knew I was snoring because when I woke, I saw a couple of my high school students pointing at me from the other room and making guttural snoring sounds. I tried to chuckle but because I was in the early stages of waking up, I once again made the random sound of: "Burrrr murna moo!"
I gathered my toothbrush, towel and razor and went to one of the empty study-rooms which had a sink and started my morning ablutions. As I smeared shaving foam over my face, two members of my high school class walked in. I was naked from the waist up with a razor held in one of my hands. They stood staring at me. I broke the tension with a cordial “Hello”. They said "Hello" and walked out the room. I continued with my shaving undisturbed. I then used the same sink as a make-shift shower, and filled it up with warm water. I rinsed my hair and rubbed shampoo into it. As I was scrubbing, the two students entered the room again, no doubt hoping I would have departed by now. They stared at me whilst I continued to scrub as if this was the normal thing to do in a language school. I greeted them, once again, with a cordial "Hello." They didn’t respond this time and walked out.
I never saw those students again. Perhaps they have quit the school, deciding no longer to be taught by a teacher who clearly isn't potty trained.

Being Santa

My contract said nothing about dressing up as Santa Claus for Terakoya’s Christmas Party. Yet, to my horror, this is what I had to do. Prior to this ghastly occurrence, the Asanos had assured me they already had their Santa. That someone was Russ – the bald headed, drug smuggling nutter. And, quite frankly, he was the worst possible candidate. I say this because Santa is meant to be a wholesome, well-fed, happy fellow who can appeal to the whole family, and Russ sure as hell ain't wholesome. He has the tendency to drop a fart out of the blue and rate it for its potency. Russ will also compare farts with babies and say: “Hate others, cherish your own.”
I was convinced he was the anti-Santa. A realistic Santa Claus is meant to be rotund but Russ is as thin as a beanpole thanks to a 30 a-day smoking habit. I was sure he was going to scare the crap out of the kids at Terakoya instead of making their dreams come true. I asked Shigeho the logic behind the choice of this uncouth Santa. She thought for a while. “He has a beard,” she finally said. This was true. But Santa Claus has a big, white fluffy beard. Russ has a scraggly, dirty, brown beard. Terakoya’s Santa was going to be a gross misrepresentation of the fabled Christmas icon.


On Christmas morning, Russ came ambling into the Terakoya staffroom in ripped jeans and a Peru football shirt. “I’m dying for a dump. Where’s the shitter in this place?” he confessed with a roaming eye.
I am not privy to Santa Claus’ bowel movements but I’m sure he would not use this kind of language. Someone needed to sit Russ down and give him a crash-course in Santa etiquette.
Five minutes later he emerged from the toilet. “That was one of my better craps,” he said, and sat down with an air of accomplishment on his face. He lit a cigarette in the room and started talking about his bad hangover from the night before. He was in the middle of talking about the price of prostitutes in Iida, when Shigeho suddenly came bursting through the door holding a Santa hat. He quickly stubbed out his cigarette on the table and wafted away the smoke.

“I can’t find the rest of Santa’s costume!” Shigeho said irritably. Russ and I couldn’t help her with this predicament so we stared at her.
“What can I do?” she asked. Russ, who had been discreetly picking his nose, stood up with confidence. “Don’t worry Mrs Asano, I’ll go as Santa dressed like this.” She stared at him with loathing.
“But you don’t look like Santa Claus at the moment.”
“Yeah I do,” he said, and took the Santa hat from Shigeho and popped it on his head. “Ta-da!” he said, posing with the hat.
Shigeho gave him another once over.
“No you don’t,” she concluded.
“Look at it this way. Santa wears red and white and my Peru T-shirt is red and white.”
I wasn’t saying anything. I knew this was going to be a disaster from the outset.


About 30 kids came swarming into the school and ran upstairs to the classroom. Shigeho ordered us to entertain them before the Christmas lunch whilst she tried to find the rest of the costume.
Russ and I plodded upstairs and when we entered the classroom containing excitable kids running around like headless chickens. We thought about the best way to entertain them. Russ clicked his fingers and picked up a gym mat from a pile off the floor, and started thumping the nearest little lad next to him with it. The other kids loved this spectacle and quickly snatched a mat each from the pile and started to gang up on Russ and thump him. It was anarchy in the room so I dove under the table. I had recently broken my glasses when I went snowboarding and I wasn’t going to break my new pair because some kid jacked-up on sugar slams me in the face with a mat. Even though I thought the game was quite aggressive, the other kids seemed to love beating each other senseless. When Russ felt this game was getting boring, he ordered silence. The kids responded immediately making it safe for me to crawl out from under my bomb shelter.
Russ put the 30 kids into two teams and got them to play a hockey-style ball game whereby two members of each team had to shoot a ball through a chair using a skittle. The first person who did this won a point for their team. Russ was the director in all of this, so I participated in the game. When it was my turn to play I tried my hardest to be really bad at the game so that the little girl I was playing against would win. But the girl was such a day-dreamer that it was hard to feign ineptness. She was staring out of a nearby window, leaving the goal empty for me to take advantage of. I deliberately passed the ball to her. She looked down at the ball and smiled at it before passing it back to me with her skittle. She then continued to stare out the window. I started to dribble with the ball towards the goal and before I was about to shoot and score, I pretended I had a back spasm and collapsed to the floor, leaving my goal empty for her to score. The adults and kids laughed at my antics, but she continued to stare out the window singing a little “tra-la-la” song as she did so.
I had no choice but to score and let the other members of the team play. I heard some booing from the kids and adults as I shot and scored, but it was necessary to get the game rolling again. As I took my seat, Shigeho entered the room and ran towards me. She took me to one side and said she had found the rest of the Santa costume. I told her this was marvellous news and signalled to Russ to stop the game and get fitted into the suit. Shigeho said that she thought Russ was doing a good job entertaining the kids and that I should be Santa, instead.
“You’re joking!” I laughed incredulously.
“No I’m not,” Shigeho said with such uninhabited malice, that I shirked away from her with fear. She clearly wasn’t joking, and to decline wearing the costume may have led me visiting a vivisectionist.
I agreed to be Santa with speed and went downstairs to get into the suit. Shigeho said that she failed to find the trousers so she was going to tell the kids that my reindeers ate them. It looked as though I was going to be a contemporary Santa Claus with jeans and trainers.
I put on my beard and hat and walked up stairs armed with a basket of sweets.
As I waited at the top of the steps to make my grand entrance, I was adjusting my glasses that seemed to be positioned diagonally across my face. If anyone saw my current state they would question whether Santa had a drink problem.
Whilst adjusting I practised my ho ho ho’s. Russ saw me on the stairs. He then said in an outrageously camp voice, “Ohhhhhh. Look who I've just seen?”
This was my cue to dazzle the kids. I felt it fitting to tug at my lapels. I tugged then bounded into the room with bear-like strides, but before I could say ho ho ho, the kids all shouted: “Hello, Sam,” and pulled off my beard.
To maintain the illusion that I was Santa, despite my beard being maligned, I said, “Sam? Who’s Sam? I’m Santa!”
The kids then yanked off my hat and jacket, completely shattering the illusion. When I was depleted of my costume a fat kid came up to me and winded me in the stomach.

Game Of Life

During the Christmas period I have been talking to my classes about English traditions during this time of year. Namely, eat loads and get pissed.
Once I had finished waffling on about these traditions to my evening class at a business company, they insisted we play a board game which was The Game of Life. I hadn’t played this game for years and my knowledge of the rules had been wiped from my brain. But my students, Sachiko, Sayumi and Shuhey were carefully assembling the board before I could inform them of this problem. I asked what the rules were. No one had a clue. The softly spoken Sachiko confessed that they brought the game hoping I would know how to play it. I confessed that she was wrong.
There was an awkward silence as we sat looking at the freshly set-up board game.
There were a couple of options open to me. I could make up my own rules for the game. But this option was too taxing on the brain. My game would have been something rubbish like, whoever rolls the highest number on the dice wins. Game over. Let’s all go home!
I scrapped that plan. I thought about the second option which was to give a normal lesson. I had brought my photo-copied materials for the students to work through but it was not Christmas related. I could sense they wanted Christmas themes. I toyed with the idea of yelling “Ho! Ho! Ho!” before starting my normal lesson.
Again, this option seemed rubbish.
I suggested to my class that I read the instructions for the game before we played. They nodded enthusiastically. I stressed that this would take a few minutes. They nodded enthusiastically. This looked like the option we were going to take.
I opened the instruction booklet and started to read as my four students sat there in silence. I was trying to concentrate on the words printed on the page, but the combination of the uncomfortable silence and the incomprehensible rules, made me flounder. The instructions were all about stocks and shares, jobs and salaries, and house prices and retirement. It was all a bit too much. At various intervals of my reading, I looked up from the booklet and noticed my students looking eagerly at me. They were desperate to play. As I tried to concentrate harder, the more information I forgot. I started to panic when I was still reading the booklet after 10 minutes. By now my students started eating the Christmas sweets and chocolates they were going to save until later. They ate in silence and trying to retain my focus whilst someone’s sucking on a boiled sweet is bloody difficult.
I gave up and flung the booklet behind me. I clapped my hands, pretending I was confident about how to play the game, and distributed various cards to the players. The fact I didn’t know what these cards meant didn't worry me. I was determined we were all going to have fun.
Amazingly, we all got through it. My students seemed to enjoy the game even though we had no coherent rules. For me, however, thinking of the rules on the spot was an ordeal. When Shuhey held up a card showing a baby on it, he asked what that meant. I had to think quickly and told him he had to buy the baby for 20,000 dollars. And when Sayumi held up a picture of a medicine bottle I told her she had to buy that for 50,000 dollars.
My interpretation on the game wasn’t so much The Game of Life, more The Game of the Black-Market Life.

Christmas Lesson

As Christmas approaches I felt it was fitting to give my lessons a festive theme, especially for my kids' classes. I decided to play Pin the Red Nose on Rudolph. I drew a cartoon reindeer on an A3 sheet of paper and then cut out a circle from a red piece of paper and stuck a magnet on the back of it. This would act as my nose. I then searched the staff room looking for a blind fold but I couldn't find one. I decided to pack a damp towel from the kitchen to use instead. This may have seemed an unsavoury option, but I was sure the kids wouldn't notice.
I then printed off a series of Christmas flashcards which included Santa Claus, a Christmas tree, a snowman and an evil looking elf. When I entered Terakoya for my kids’ lessons, I was confident that my Christmas lesson would be a great success.
I walked into the class and waved to the kids. As usual they all came bounding towards me. I still had my iPod in my hand, and each kid proceeded to put the earphones into their ears. I looked at the track playing. It was an Otis Redding classic. I chose to wait a few minutes before starting the lesson and let them be enlightened by the music of 60s soul. It wasn't to be as they all got bored and started to wrestle with each other.
The lesson began.


The kids knew all the flashcards except for the elf. They looked genuinely frightened of the little chap in the picture. I have to admit, it did look like a murderous elf hell-bent on destruction. But the pièce de résistance happened when I introduced the pin the red-nose on the reindeer game.
I had to draw a reindeer on the board because a yoghurt leaked in my bag and destroyed the A3 copy. Unfortunately, the reindeer on the board looked like a dog and a skunk combined. The kids weren’t sure whether to warmly accept this drawing or run away in horror at its hybrid form.
I then took the damp smelly towel from my bag and watched as they ran away in terror towards the corner of the room.

Luckily I found a blindfold after snooping around in Shigeho’s draw in the staff room. I had no idea why she would have a blind fold in her private draw, and I had no intention to ask, but I was relieved to find it so that I could proceed with playing the game.
The game commenced and it turned out to be a great success.
There was one kid who wasn't the brightest spark, though. For instance, I put the blindfold on him and gave him the nose with the magnet on it. He held up his hand with the magnet clasped tightly in his grip, but he didn't budge. The kids were telling him to move forward but he remained standing, hand aloft. I nudged him in the back with intent, motioning him to move forward. He complied.
He got to the board, lifted up his blindfold, looked at the picture of Rudolph the Reindeer, but had no idea where to put the nose. The other kids heckled him, and in a panic he slammed the red nose on Rudolph's bottom.

Gifts

Japan is a giving country, judging by the amount of gifts I have received from my students. Gifts given to me have included a bag of tangerines, a sushi dinner, a bunch of Disney memorabilia and a random Jack-O-Lantern for Halloween. I even receive sweets from a kid’s class I teach on Friday evenings. Not just small penny sweets, but giant cookies, big cakes and an assortment of other delicious junk food. This is all a culture shock for me. I can't imagine students doing this in England, and I think it is apparent to my students that I am not used to this hospitality. For instance, I entered my seniors’ class on Thursday morning and found on my table a pot of tea and chocolate biscuits bought from their group outing to Kyoto at the weekend. I thanked them enthusiastically and wondered whether I should eat the biscuits right there on the spot. The rest of the seniors were munching away. It might have seemed rude if I didn't join them with the munching. I took the safe option and began the lesson, saving the tea and biscuits for later. Kimiyo, the perennially grinning lady, waved a hand in the air and said, "Please, eat and drink."
I looked at the class, then at the blackboard, then at the tea and biscuits. I raised both my palms in the air and said, "Well, if you insist."
I spent the next half an hour having a good old natter with my elderly class about their weekend excursion to Kyoto whilst sipping refined green tea and eating crunchy chocolate biscuits. At the back of my mind, a small sign was flashing on and off quickly. It simply read: And you’re getting paid for this?!

Cheating

I have never witnessed a more corrupt character than Yuuki, my 9 year old student I teach on Friday afternoons. It is a one to one lesson so I can see his cheating ways up close.
I like to fill his 45 minute lesson with games otherwise he gets grouchy and tends to throw random items around the room. However, games tend to be fruitless because Yuuki doesn't care much for competition. All he cares about is winning and will bend the rules to make this happen. For instance, I will play a ball game with him which helps him to learn about numbers. I write numbers on the board and ask Yuuki to stand ten feet away and throw a small ball towards a certain number and if he hits it, he receives the appropriate points. We both compete against each other.
Yet Yuuki shuns the ten feet rule and stands about one foot away from the board. I tell him this is unacceptable but he more or less tells me to sod off and continues his own unique game. On the rare occasion I hit a high number, Yuuki will add a minus sign next to my score. It is no surprise, therefore, to see the final score read as follows: Yuuki: 1,765 Sam: -100.
When all hope is lost with these games, I'll set up Connect Four. I assumed this game was impervious to cheating. How wrong was I. Yuuki and I would be deep in thought as we planned our attacks and when it looks inevitable I will win, Yuuki shakes his head, tips the Connect Four rack upside down, spilling the coins onto the table and demands a re-match. Sometimes he sets the ludicrous rule whereby he can put in three coins at a time and I only one. I jokingly tell him to put in four in that case. He readily agrees to this, and literally plays with himself.
I'm sure these lessons are influencing him into becoming an unethical crook.

Story Time

Every morning students at Seneiji Junior High school take part in sports activities before their lessons. Martin and I were invited to join in the fun on Wednesday morning. We willingly obliged because the sport played on this occasion was football, a sport we were both crazy about. We arrived at the school gym pumped up and ready for action. We weren't going to take any prisoners.
The sports coach greeted us at the entrance of the gym and put us into our teams. Martin and I were playing alongside three other Japanese teachers- including the sports coach. We were playing against five students, all of whom were wearing glasses. The first kick of the game was a pass from Martin to myself. I then proceeded to charge down the left flank and booted the ball towards the goal as hard as I could in order to test the reactions of their benign looking goalkeeper. The gangly kid in goal, who had an ever present grin on his face, suddenly looked petrified as the ball gunned towards him at a reckless speed. He let out a shriek as the ball plunged into his face making his glasses whirl up in the air. The ball, along with his head, crossed the line making it 1-0.
I was mortified I had disabled a kid after just a few seconds of play but I was slightly baffled by my team-mates reaction after I nearly took this boy's head off. The teachers all huddled around me applauding my goal which they thought was marvellous, whilst the kid in goal was lying on the floor clutching his face. The teachers didn't notice and assumed their positions. I went over to this unfortunate kid and tapped him on the shoulder to check he was still alive. He gave a grunt of recognition and found time amidst his agony to praise my goal. I slapped him jovially on the back and told him to expect more of my bullet shots. I also told him where to find his errant glasses.
The whistle blew for play to commence. I have to say it was a little disturbing watching the teachers play against the kids. I thought I was slightly aggressive in my play, but the teachers were sadistic. A delicate looking girl had her legs swept off the floor by a lunging tackle by the sports coach who victoriously won back possession and dribbled towards the goal without once looking back at the girl writhing on the floor. The sports coach scored and did a taunting, celebratory dance in her face.
This style of play continued throughout the game, and it was no surprise that the score ended: Teachers: 7 Students: 0.
After the football game I taught two elementary lessons. I have been continuing with the 'plasticine lessons', whereby I shout out an animal or food and they make it using the pots of coloured clay I give them. At the end of the lesson I was asked to read a couple of stories to the kids before lunch and had two illustrated hardbacks thrust into my hands. The kids formed a circle around my chair as I began to give a read. It didn't help that the first story was absolute rubbish. It was called The Tempura Ghost, and it was about a ghost who loved Tempura (a Japanese fish). For most of the time I was concentrating on reading the story to the kids in an entertaining style, doing a funny voice for the ghost but I was simultaneously keeping abreast with the story, which didn't make any sense. From what I could fathom it was about a ghost who fell into a pot of Tempura and couldn't get out. He could only get out if he said a magical word which was "Hala-Ba-Ba-Loo" I had no idea why this phrase was used, but I was the unfortunate sap that had to read this sentence without laughing aloud. The story ended with the ghost saying the word and escaping into the night, cackling away. That was it. I closed the book and looked at the students who seemed utterly bored. I don't blame them. Not even my cockney sounding ghost could have injected any entertainment into that woeful story.
The second story was slightly better because it had more characters - not just a sole lunatic ghost. The story was called: The Giant Turnip, which, incidentally, was how I felt reading aloud to these kids.
This tale concerned a disgruntled farmer who could not yank a turnip out of the ground, and needed the help of his wife, daughter, dog, cat, mouse and pig to help him. Trying to think up different voices on the spot for all these characters was exhausting. Doing the voices for the humans was easy because I had the experience of being one. But for the dog, cat, mouse and pig, I had to think fast. I gave the dog a Don Corleone accent; the cat sounded like Michael Caine; the mouse was like Keith Richards and I made the pig a posh git. The kids seemed to enjoy it but I reckon they would have had a better time if the stories were actually good. Maybe I should do a recital of my copy of The Karamazov Brothers next week and show the kids what a good story is.

Snowboarding

Snowboarding was on the agenda over the weekend. I had a few reservations about this trip. Firstly, I had never snowboarded before and had graphic images of me plunging off a cliff-face after a false manoeuvre. Secondly, I wore glasses. This was careless planning on my part because I knew I was going to be falling over more times than a toddler tanked-up on Jack Daniels. I feared the worst and put aside some money in case I had to buy new ones. The snowboarding was to take place in a mountainous town called Hakuba, which is about a two hour drive from Iida. Charlotte, Ben, Eric and Reuben were the other teachers travelling to this popular ski-resort. We left Iida in Eric's car at 6.00am and watched the sun rise over the glowing red mountains. Ben, a keen snowboarder, informed the group that today’s condition was going to be perfect, especially for the beginners in the group which included Reuben and myself.
Ben, Charlotte and Eric, who were all in their late 20s, knew a great deal about snowboarding and when they were rattling off a list of technical information as to why the conditions were perfect, Reuben and I merely sat there gormlessly with our mouths open, trying to absorb all the information.

When we arrived in Hakuba, the air was fresh and the enormous snow capped mountains provided the epic backdrop against a cloudless sky.
We checked into the youth hostel we were going to stay at and greeted the owners, a Japanese woman named Kayoko and a New Zealand man named Lance.
I shook hands with both of them and asked if the conditions were good for snowboarding.
"Yip," Lance said, with half-closed eyes.
Noticing he wasn't expanding on his answer, I dug deeper into my small-talk bag.
"Does this youth hostel get busier during the day?"
"Yip," he said with a grin.
"Where's the beginner's section on the ski resort?"
"Yip."
Seeing as this was going no-where fast I turned to Kayoko and asked if she could lend me some snowboarding clothes as I came grossly unprepared in my t-shirt and jeans.
She was happy to help and dragged out a huge box filled with water-proof clothing ranging from gloves, jackets, hats, goggles and long-johns. She told me to pick whichever ones I fancied. Noticing I picked a particular pair of long-johns, Lance suddenly came alive. "They're my long-johns, mate,” he said, “So don’t leave any piss-stains or skid-marks on it, otherwise I’ll skin you alive."
He stared at me, wide-eyed, expecting an answer. All I could do was emit a nervous chuckle. He also chuckled momentarily but then abruptly resumed a steely glare. I could sense he wasn't joking.

The rest of the group had brought their own snowboarding equipment, so Kayoko drove me down the road to rent my snowboard and boots. I picked an appropriate sized snowboard for my height and was delighted with the name emblazoned on the surface of the board: Spicy Scorpion. At the time, I felt the name made me out to be incredibly cool, a pirate of the mountains, a sultan of the slopes, but in reality it sounded like a crunchy snack from Thailand.
Picking the snowboard was the easy part. It was the boots that were the problem. After selecting a pair that matched my foot size, I attempted to put them on but I was hopeless.
There were numerous holes and loops where the lace needed to be threaded through but I didn't know where to begin. Kayoko and the shop owner stood waiting for me to tie-up my boots. Under their watchful eyes, I gingerly threaded a lace through a particular hole when suddenly Kayoko came charging towards me going, "No No No!" and proceeded to tie my boot up. She asked me to tie up the other boot, which I thought was a bit odd seeing as though I couldn't tie up the first boot. I gingerly threaded a lace through a new hole on the other boot. The shop-keeper came charging towards me going, "No, No No!" and started to tie up the other boot. This was undoubtedly a new level of incompetence for me. At that moment a group of funky young Japanese people came into the shop. They stopped in their tracks and stared at the two adults tying my shoelaces whilst I looked vacantly at them. My presence must have given the impression that the shop was catered only for the ultra-beginner snowboarders because they immediately backed out of the shop. When I was suited and booted I met the others at the ski-resort and we got on a ski-lift which transported us high up into the mountains and deposited us on a ski slope. Charlotte, Ben and Eric tried giving Reuben and I a lesson on the basics of snowboarding.
At first, they asked us to strap our boots onto the board. We tried, but ended up on our backs with our arms and legs flailing about like upturned turtles. I gathered they believed teaching us was hopeless because when Reuben and myself eventually stood up again, they were gone.
It seemed we were going to have teach ourselves.
The first two hours were hazardous. Not for us, but for the other skiers near us. For instance, once we were on our feet, we fell flat on our asses a few seconds later and tumbled down a slope. The portly Reuben turned himself into a human snow-ball as he rolled down a steep hill slamming into all who were in his destructive path. I had a slightly more embarrassing disaster when I crashed into a wonderful skier who happened to be a little girl. I sent her tumbling down the hill, into the arms of her despairing mother. I attempted to leg it, but realized I was on a slippery surface so I fell down with a thud and feigned unconsciousness lest I was to have an angry encounter with the mother.

Reuben and I wanted to take photos that captured us in the perfect action-man-on-a-snowboard pose and we wanted to send this photo to our jealous friends back in England. In theory this would have been great, but in reality we kept on getting hopeless-idiot-falling-head-first-in-the-snow pose. We ruminated on how to solve this problem. Reuben clicked his fingers and said he had a good idea. He positioned himself in the centre of a slope and struck a dramatic snowboarding pose whilst stationary. He changed his mind about the first pose and did another one. I asked him to make up his mind quickly seeing as though he was in the way of the proper skiers hurtling down the slope. He settled on a pose where one hand was on his hip and the other one was pointing towards the horizon. He looked ridiculous. There were clues that Reuben faked this photo. One glaring example was that the passing skiers were looking intently into the distance whilst Reuben's expression looked as though he was thoroughly relaxed without a care in the world. He was even grinning as he looked straight at the camera. Even so, he approved the photo and put his goggles back on his face.
“I’ll meet you at the bottom of the slope,” he said, cool as you like, before slipping over and falling on his ass. At this point in the day, I was marginally better than Reuben and told him I would meet him at the bottom of the slope. I managed to do this without falling over which pleased me immensely. I was good to my word and waited for him...and waited ..and waited. The only problem was that he was all over the place when trying to snowboard down the slope. At one point he was snowboarding backwards. Eventually he came toppling over in a messy heap as he reached the end of the slope. He lay on his back and waved me to go on ahead as he struggled to get up. I complied and skied towards the ski-lifts that would transport me to another area of the ski slope. I strapped myself in, and the lift glided me over the slope. As I passed overhead, I saw Reuben kneeling down in the snow looking forlornly into the distance with his snowboard lying upturned next to him. He was a defeated man. My shadenfreude laugh was cut short when I got off the ski lift, slipped on the snow, fell on my face, and broke my glasses.

A Dilema Solved

Teaching the kids at Terakoya is becoming a struggle. I have now covered all the major topics and used all the resources available to me. I ransacked the staff room hoping to come across anything – a game, a fun subject - that would solve my dilemma. But there was nothing.
It’s said that a long walk is good when you want to ruminate. So I buttoned up my coat, and went on a ruminating walk despite the freezing cold weather. I passed various shops looking for inspiration. Gawping at the local-fire station, post-office and a startled old man returned no ideas so I continued my solemn walk. I was about to turn back, defeated, when I came across a One Hundred Yen Shop - which is the equivalent of a pound shop in England.
I scouted the shop on its two floors looking for anything I could use to shake-up my stale lessons, and I found it on the bottom floor, tucked away in the corner. It was small buckets filled with coloured plasticine. I calculated that I taught at least 30 kids at Terakoya each week, and filled my basket with 30 small buckets. I walked over to the counter and reassured the young shop-keeper that I was a teacher and was buying these items for my young students, and not some lunatic who liked sitting around in his underpants, giggling with his tongue lolloping out as he made silly shapes.
I went back to Terakoya armed with my buckets and planned my lessons. I decided to go through the names of animals and then give each student a bucket. I would then say, "Make me a rabbit" and they would all mould cute little bunnies. This plan could not fail, and it didn't. My afternoon kids’ class loved it. I have to admit some of the shapes they made were dubious. One kid called Risa would always make the same worm-like shape for all the animals I said, and a boy called Naoki ate his plasticine and spat it out, declaring that the saliva-covered blob on the table was the finished product. However, there was one precocious boy, named Kordei, who was absolutely brilliant at making animal shapes. He always finished before everyone else, got bored, and started to make a new animal. I noticed he was making a superb simian-type creature. I walked over to where he sat and said, "Wow, is that a gorilla?"
"No, it's you," he said.
"How thoughtful," I said and 'accidentally' cuffed him round the head as I walked by.
The lesson went so well that I am seriously considering teaching with plasticine in my adult classes.