Waiting for a student

7:05 PM JST, December 26, 2005. I hope you all are having a wonderful holiday season. Yesterday, I went to Japanese class for the first time in a while -- just in time to catch the Christmas party. (Yes, I planned that.) We decorated Christmas cakes, chatted with each other in a mix of languages, and had a good time. And the cakes...well, we didn't know much about cake decorating, so...it turned out...interesting. I'll post a picture later.

There was only one other American there, and I'm somewhat ashamed to admit that I don't remember his name. He came here on JET this past August, and he seems to be having a good time -- although he was definitely showing signs of "I haven't spoken English on a regular basis in MONTHS" syndrome. As such, without prompting, he explained many details about how he got on JET (applied, turned down; missed the deadline; applied, accepted), his university experience/major (international business), his Japanese language ability (hasn't taken the 日本語能力試験 yet but is probably between levels 3 and 2), etc., very quickly. (At least, I assumed it was IHSEOARBIM syndrome; you'd think that he'd be friends with the other JET participants in the area...)

Right now, I'm sitting at the computer at work, waiting for one of the adult students to show up. Takashi was supposed to be here at 6 or 6:30. As of this typing, it's about 7:20. We try to be flexible with Takashi's schedule, because his work schedule often changes without a moment's notice. He's going to do a 9-month training course in California starting in January, so he's been coming in for a lot of extra lessons lately. (He's improved a lot.) Anyway, Takashi's got about another week that he can still come in for classes, so we actually scheduled a few on my day off. I don't mind; there wasn't anything else I wanted to do today. But he's not here yet, so I'm doing this now.

Although he's still a little worried, Takashi will probably be fine in California. Meanwhile, as for me, I'm already starting to forget the Japanese I was cramming last month. Too bad (for me) that there aren't Japanese proficiency tests more often.

Rob