Feeling it

Back in June, I thought that saying goodbye to all of my friends and family, leaving America, and moving to Japan was the hardest thing I've ever had to do. I was wrong.

When I decided to come here, I had the support and excitement of my friends, coworkers, and family. I could see their excitement. I could hear them say they were proud and that it would all be okay. The support was visible. I could feel it.

Now, I am leaving Japan in just over a week. This depature, a few weeks earlier than planned, definately takes the not so coveted honor of being the most difficult thing I have ever faced.

While I know that I have the distant support of my friends and family, it is distant, and friendships have inevitably faded during the time I've been away. I don't have the support of my coworker or company. I for company reasons am not able to be totally forthcoming about my reasons for leaving to my students, and thus do not have their support either. Everyone is just sad and angry at me.

To add to this, I'm coordinating an international move in just over a week, am in the midst of a full scale mid-year job search, which because of the time difference, has caused me to wake up at all hours of the night for phone interviews, am sick as a dog (again), and am horribly worried about my mom, who is quite ill. All in all, I'm not doing so hot these days.

I've been being really tough about it and trying to just barrel through it, but yesterday, it all kind of hit me at once. It might have been because I was so tired from the interviews I had during the night before or because I am so sick, but when one of my favorite little girl students started to cry when her mother told her that I am leaving, I just broke down. And it didn't stop. My next class of the night also had a student which cried, and only spurred me on more.

It is hard to come to the realization that my students care so much about me and I care so much about of some of them, yet I am abandoning them for somewhat selfish reasons. It is hard to watch them cry because of a decision I have made. It is hard to go to work and feel the almost palpable judgement from my Japanese coworker and my company. There is just so much guilt. So much sadness. And now even a little regret (and that's a strong statement, as I am a person with few regrets in life)

And there's so much more to do. There's still more students to tell, getting ready to leave and readjust to American culture, more night time phone interviews, an 18 hour flight, and on-campus interviews ahead. I just want things to slow down a little so I can process it all and give this experience the appropriate and meaningful ending and closure that it deserves.

I'm just so tired.

But, there is a positive end to this pretty personal blog. If nothing else, even aside from the positive and negative aspects of my time here, this experience has made me realize that I am very ready to settle in one place for a while. As much as I want my life to be full of adventure, I can't keep uprooting myself like this and establishing and then leaving relationships in the sake of getting it. It's just too draining. And frankly, what is the point of having a life full of adventure if it causes me to have few people to share it with.

And on a final positive note, my job search is going really well and I am very excited about some of the positions that I have been interviewing for. I'll keep you posted, and hopefully should have a job before Christmas.

That's all folks.

Ethics, drinking, and jobs

So, in no particular order, here are some interesting things that have happened recently in my life.

Unlike in America where there are restrictions on where you can drink alcohol, in Japan, it is quite common for people (old people) to pop open a beer while on the train. It happens a lot, and I am pretty used to it. I will even fess up to having done it a few times myself. However, today was a first. ... Several somewhat tough looking guys got on the train a few stops after me and sat down in the booth behind me. Soon after, I noticed a familiar smell, but I couldn't put my finger on what it was. Aha! It was whiskey! As I was getting off the train, I walked by and saw essentially a whole bar full of alcohol set up on their window ledge! There were cups, ice, vodka, whiskey, and some other bottles! They even had shot glasses! It was only 11:30am, and I wasn't sure if I should be shocked, disgusted, indifferent, or just down right jealous.

Switching gears a little from people drinking, to something that makes me want to drink, my job has posed yet another moral/ethical dilemna my way in terms of the timing and way I tell my students that I am leaving, and essentially entails me indirectly misleading my students so that they will spend more money and renew their contracts, costing them thousands of dollars. This whole job from day 1 has been one ethical test after another. I will be so glad when I can put it all behind me.

On a more positive note, I have gotten a few more offers for initial phone interviews for next week from some of my top choice schools. This makes me feel encouraged. I'll keep y'all updated on how they turn out.

A quick update

I just wanted to give everyone a quick update on my situation.

First, I accidentally accepted the position in Nagoya. It was totally an accident. I merely replied to their email asking for more information, but my email was misconstrued as an acceptance, which they then emailed me to thank me for and inform me about orientation details. I am going to call them today to explain the situation and decline. I am 97% sure.

I also woke up yesterday and today, each day finding an email offering me a phone interview for a position back home. Hopefully this is a sign that this is the direction I should be heading and that things will work out well. Since 99% of the jobs I applied for are aiming for an early January start date to correspond with the start of the spring semester, I imagine that most schools will be conducting their first round phone interviews in the next two weeks or so, so that they can have an offer out by the middle of December before the holidays. Hopefully this means that these next 2 weeks will be really busy for me.

I'll keep y'all posted.

BTW...thanks for all the advice and supportive messages that y'all sent. I really appreciate it and I am feeling much better and more positive about the situation now.

What's fair about this?!

So for those of you that keep up with my blog or know my situation, you may recall that I interviewed for a pretty good teaching position in Nagoya last month, but didn't get it.

The combination of not getting that position, and an overwhelming lack of good job prospects and tons of obstacles made me begin to consider going home to the states and going back into student affairs. The more I thought about it, the more it seemed like a good idea, and the more I tried to talk myself out of even wanting to stay here.

So, I began a full fledged job search for positions back home, and am really excited about several of them. I sent out my applications and contacted my references, and now I am just waiting for the first round phone interview emails to start coming, hopefully this week (knock on wood).
Great right?

Well, because life seems to be testing me these days, I received an email just a little while ago from the hiring officer at the job that I didn't get here in Nagoya telling me that they have another vacancy and would like to offer me the position!

I'm not sure how I feel about this. On the one hand, I really do like living here and I was stoked to accept the position a few weeks ago if I was offered it. But on the other hand, I didn't get it, and partly because of that, I've begun planning to go home in late Dec./Jan. and am totally focused on getting a job there.

I feel totally lost. No matter what I do, my current job ends soon and I need to take some job somewhere. If I take this job in Nagoya, I'm opting out of all the great jobs I applied for back home, and am setting myself up to do this big (and tiring) job search all over again in the spring.

If I turn down the job, I may or may not get offered a position back home. And even if I do get offered a position, because it is mid-year and there are not that many positions posted, I may be forced to end up in a place I don't really want.

Grrrr... I seriously am totally lost here. Most people go abroad to find themselves. But all I've ended up doing is making myself really confused. And the worst part is that I have nobody to blame but myself. I'm the one that decided to come here. I chose my awful company. And I chose to quit. It's totally all my doing. I don't regret it, but I do need to own it.

At this point, I just need somebody to tell me what to do. I'm tired.

A perfect day in Japan

Today, I took the train to Gero, an onsen town about 1.5 hours northwest of where I live in Gifu Prefecture. For anyone that doesn't know, an onsen is a Japanese public path, and Gero is full of them. Going to a public bath sounds a little strange if you've never done it before, especially since it is done naked, but once you do it one time, you will be hooked forever. It is very popular in Japan.

I arrived in Gero around 11:30, and after covering my tattoos with big skin colored bandages in the bathroom at the station so that people aren't afraid and think I am Yakuza (Japanese mafia), I headed off with my map to find some onsen goodness. And did I ever! The onsens there are truly amazing. While some are totally indoors, the majority of them also have outdoor baths. Since the air is only about 35-40 degrees now, it feels so good in the warm water with the steam rising off of it. It's kind of like going skinny dipping in winter time in a hot tub in the mountains with a bunch of strangers.

The onsens in Gero are fed from naturally occuring warm springs, that are said to have healing powers. And people have been coming to Gero for centuries.

The scenery was also amazing...nestled in the mountains, I could see the beautiful fall colors on the trees, and even a river and waterfall. All told, I went to 5 different onsens today before heading home. It was a perfect way to spend the day, and I can't wait to go back.

Now that I am home, I am eating dinner and laying under my kotatsu (special Japanese heated table). It has been a good day...definately top 5 since coming to Japan.

Going home?

I've been living in Japan for almost exactly 5 months now, and by the time my last day at my current job rolls around, I will have been here for 7 months. I love living in Japan, learning Japanese and Japanese culture, and if it were up to me, I would stay here for a really long time.

However, searching for jobs here so far has been a miserable failure. Between bad interviews, rejections, tons of competition, and a real lack of quality jobs, my prospects at this point are minimal at best. I even got a rejection letter on Thursday for a job which was essentially teaching little kids English through songs and games, citing that "my qualifications are not adequate for the position." 1) How am I not qualified to do the Hokie Pokie? Is my singing voice not good enough? Do I not "shake it all about" the right way? 2) I have a freakin' master's degree for goodness sake! and 3) I do the same thing now! How am I not qualified to continue doing what I already do?

I'm a little bitter and discouraged about this if you can't tell, but the point is simply that it is difficult and doesn't look good. Making matters worse is that even if I am able to find a new job, moving into an apartment in Japan is incredibly complicated and can cost fees upwards of 4,000 dollars or more, and is non-refundable. With nothing but bad jobs in sight and a cost that high simply to move into a one room apartment, I began to wonder if it is even worth it.

As I sat pondering this and thumbing through job ads, another question popped into my mind: do I even like teaching English? Honestly, I'm not sure. I know I like teaching, but I am not sure that I enjoy teaching a language, and I am 100% sure that I don't find it at all fulfilling or meaningful. I know that I am helping my students to travel, get better jobs, get raises, etc... through their language skills, but the fact that my job makes me feel as if I am selling myself far overshadows that.

So, where does that leave me? What do I do with only 2 months before I find myself homeless and unemployed in Japan?

Well, first, I remembered that I will never find myself homeless and that I don't need to worry and stress because I have friends that I know I can count on to help me, even here, if I really need it. Next, I made a giant spreadsheet (yes, I know I am a dork) with every potential option from living off my savings in Bali for a few months, to sleeping on friends' couches, to asking my boss to un-quit, to doing a job-search and going home. After several hours of carefully examing all of these options, I came to the conclusion that I simply don't know what to do.

I want to stay in Japan, and considering what a journey it was to get here, it seems to be a better value to stay longer. But, I also am not willing to work at a crappy job and pay $4,000 dollars to get an apartment just to be able to stay here for another 6 months. The thought of leaving and going home makes me sad, as I don't feel ready to leave here and end this experience yet. However, there comes a point when it just stops being worth it. I've already paid thousands of dollars in airfare, shipping, and other expenses, have allowed my personal relationships to suffer, and have spent the past 5 months at a job I wanted to quit from week 1.

There's only so many sacrifices I am willing to make for this experience.

So, here's the big decision: I am going to continue to search and apply for quality jobs here in Japan. But, I have also begun a full-scale job search for positions in Res. Life and Int'l. Programs in America, Canada, and Australia. Simply put, I will accept the first quality job offer for a January or February start that I get. And if that means going home, then I will go home. I won't feel like a failure or that I couldn't make it here, because the fact isn't that I can't make it. It's that I can make it, but might chose not to. Besides, living for 7 months in a foreign country isn't anything to scoff at. I'm really proud of myself for having made it out here; this is definately among my biggest accomplishments.

So, wish me luck. I figure that if I am actively applying to jobs on three continents, something's gotta turn up eventually haha.

cute funny short teaching story

Each kids lesson that I teach usually has 5 or 6 new vocabulary words and some new grammar target/sentenc structure. The structure today was:

Would you like some _______?
Yes, I like _______.
No, I don't like ________.

And the vocabulary was different types of snacks, such as crackers.

Well, I have a student that is a little bit challenged in the foreign language learning department, and he often mispronounces or makes up entirely different vocabularly words.

Today, instead of asking me if "I would like some crackers," he spent the entire class asking me if "I would like some CRACK." Literally, this kid asked me at least 20 times if I wanted some drugs in English.

The only thing that I could think of for the entire 50 minutes was Whitney Houstin saying that "crack is whack."

...It's the little things that get me through the day... :)