Battle Animals

In classes, my second years are studying comparatives (more, better, faster) and superlatives (most, best, strongest).

I decided, what better way to use comparatives and superlatives to have a pokemon battle?

Well, okay, I didn't use pokemon. I used great white sharks, grizzly bears, Lady Gaga, and Jack Sparrow instead. But it was pretty epic.

So, students got to chose which team they wanted to be (Team Clydestale and Team Charizard [Oh! there is a pokemon!]), and then they had three-ish minutes to write as many sentences about their animal as they could. I told them it was certain that the Squirrel was the fastest, sneakiest, smartest, and most dangerous-- because squirrels are ninja! [Hey, nifty ways to model language! And teach them truths of the universe.] Then I told them they had to pick their favorite sentence and memorize it, and then race to write them on the board (relay-fashion, passing the chalk down the line).

There was one student had wanted to get President Obama (he had marked Obama as "the best of all" at the beginning of the class when I asked the students which they thought was the best animal), but his team had chosen horse. So he was writing sentences like "Horse is dirtier than Obama" and "Horse is not as fast as Obama."

I gave one point for each correctly written sentence.

Jack Sparrow and Obama had a pretty intense show-down, but the squirrel kicked all their butts!

Speech Season

With the cool air blowing in after the typhoon a week ago (which featured canceled trains and torrential mists), speech season has begun. I had forgotten how much I love tutoring speech contestants-- students who want to learn about how to properly pronounce a "th" and aren't too embarrassed to try sticking out their tongue. It is very enjoyable working with students who like talking English and are working hard to learn a performance piece. Being able to mention linguistic phonic rules and the students understanding and being grateful for the explanations also pretty excellent.

And, with cooler weather, we are heading into midterm season, so the workload has lifted for me (though it has become rougher for the other teachers). It is a nice relaxing time.

Also higanbana, red spider lilies that sprout up all over Saga during late September and early October, are in bloom. I remember them very fondly from last year, and it's nice to see them again.

Happenings in the Life of Mary

First, Fukuoka was featured in the New York Times, woo-hoo!
http://travel.nytimes.com/2012/08/26/travel/uncovering-the-secrets-of-fukuoka.html?pagewanted=1&smid=fb-share&_r=0

Next on the agenda: Saturday. Er, I mean Saga BBQ!
In Saga there's a tradition of having Big Awesome Barbeques pretty regularly throughout the year. I have heard of these Big Awesome Events, and many of my friends went to the Big Awesome things and talked about how Awesome and Big they were. The first one, I was very sick because I had just arrived to Japan and I had caught all of the sicknesses ever. And the same went for the second. And then the third I wasn't in Saga, oops.
BUT THIS TIME I MADE IT.
And it was Big and Awesome. XD Betcha didn't see that one coming.
About 70 people showed up, and quite a few bands from the ALT and local community (one was a high school band, woo!), and they rocked the place from about 4 p.m. until about 10 p.m.
I really wanted to sing. "Maid on the Shore," anyone? I think it would be better if I got an accompaniest. Or maybe I'll just haul my koto out there and look like a big dork.

Third, today my sister skyped (or, actually, Live-On-ed) with my class, while a newspaper reporter was watching. We had some issues with the microphone looping back the speaker's sound and making really strange alien noises, but other than that, it was a lot of fun! My students were super excited, and super nervous, and Jessie was super giggly and we had a lot of fun, and everybody wants to do it again! I am stoked, and maybe next time it won't make the Woo-woo-WHO-WOOOP-AAAARUGH!!! noises. Heh.

Anyways, that's it for today. Love you all!

Beautiful Sunsets After the Storm

I went on a singing walk run on Tuesday after school and saw the prettiest rainbow sunset combination ever.

Thunder Storms and School

Last night there was the biggest thunder storm EVER.

I swear, it was RIGHT ABOVE my apartment.

…one nifty thing I learned while I couldn’t sleep was that thunder has really awesome echoes when you’re living in a mountain valley. Every boom is very different, and you can hear the rebounding sound waves layering on themselves when it strikes in certain places.

Today I am so tired.

School Update: I only had one class today, but it was really enjoyable.

Two class periods with LL2 talking about what they did over summer vacation, playing a “Did you ____?” summer vacation bingo name (they interviewed other classmates and filled in the boxes when a classmate could answer “yes” to the question, then I had them stand up and call out students names and ask them a question one at a time, using the names to play bingo), and then I made them write 10 sentences about their summer vacation.

Also, my plan to make spider cup cakes with LL2 for Halloween passed (in English, of course!). I AM SO EXCITED!!!

Random Bit of Happiness: Yesterday, at Seiryo, I got applause when I walked into one class. These tiny little bits of Heaven in the classroom can move me to the point of tears.

Life, cooking, and travel

 Ha! And you didn't know this was a food post...

Here's my meal from last night.  The couscous salad and Japanese Eggplant is mine. I had a lot of fun trying out the eggplant. It's grilled in the small broiler in my stove, and then topped with grated ginger, soysauce, and a bit of sesame. I feel there is something missing from my dressing, so if you have ideas, let me know!

The couscous is dressed with lemon (I found them on sale! Also made sugar mint lemon water with the rinds afterwards, and it was delicious), black pepper, carrots, cucumber, and nira (a kind of flat Japanese green onion).

I ate it with two new ALT's in Takeo, and it was an excellent and relaxing evening.

 

Aaaaaand this is dinner tonight!

The zombie couscous salad returns! (and was not conquered)

I made hummus for the first time in over a year! It was amazingly delicious!

Ron added lentils (amazing!) and homemade broccoli ham macaroni. 

Next, our little friend at dinner. Isn't he ADORABLE????

I loved watching him chase the little bugs. He's my hero! Eat those mosquitoes, buddy!

Last, two pictures from my trip that I actually took! Yay! 

I liked taking a picture of a person taking a picture of a person taking a picture of a person taking a picture. Love you guys!

Sister's visit

For the past two weeks my sister and her friend have been out to visit
The first week we did a bunch of stuff around Takeo and Saga. It started out slow-- the girls enjoyed shopping at the YouMe Town, a mall just down the street from me, and seeing all of the Japanese produce everywhere. Then I introduced them to Okamura-san and Tatara-san with a kimono lesson, which Ashley in particular adored and wanted to try again, and perhaps buy a kimono. We also took koto lessons, and Ashley adored them and wanted to try again, and perhaps buy her own koto. (Perhaps I sense a clone in the making?)

Another nifty thing I did was bring Jessie and Ashley along to my ginei (吟詠）performance. It was my first performance! (A month after I started taking my lessons! I'm sensing a trend from my teachers...) I ran out of breath in the middle of the song because my lung capacity is shot after taking 6 years off of clarinet, but it was fun nevertheless. I really enjoyed the lunch afterwards, where we talked with a lot of the other singers and then had a free-singing. Basically, the good singers showed off their awesome songs. I really REALLY adored this old Japanese wedding song that one of the old men sang, and want to hear it again (unfortunately, I haven't been able to find it on youtube yet). Another woman sang this really adorable, more European-sounding song about tulips and other flowers. I recognized the melody, but couldn't put a title to it... it felt like a dance from Mozart's time. Jessie and I sang "Simple Gifts" together, and it was excellent singing with my sister again.

The highlight of their stay was a road trip of southern Kyushu. Since I wasn't taking many pictures and since Daniel put in a lot of time making a post about it, I will link to his description of the trip.
http://dhattem.blogspot.jp/2012_09_01_archive.html
He did an excellent time showing the highlights of the trip.

peace!
Mary