nuggetofjoy29

Nugget of Joy

    Fujiwara Sensei is quite possibly my favorite colleague. He`s a seasoned* (*old) PE teacher whose specialty is judo. Occasionally, and recently rather often in fact, he makes appearances in the teachers` room in his judo outfit, a single bead of sweat running down his broad chest which cannot be contained by course white fabric and a black belt alone. It is but one example of his carefree, I`m-gonna-retire-in-three-years-so-mess-with-me-if-you-dare attitude and goofiness. All his communication is achieved (?) through grunts, which vary in tone, length and intensity to allegedly convey meaning. Most Japanese teachers can`t understand what he says, and find it remarkably funny when he singles me out for some oneway talking, which lately has been daily as our desks are in the same section.

     For reasons that cannot be ascertained, he`s taken a particular shine to me. I`ve learned that he`s been to Acapulco and Chicago, where he`s seen the ocean and eaten steak respectively (beyond that the garbling was impenetrable). He also has a three-year-old granddaughter (that one was easy as he had a photo handy). Apparently he also harbours me in his subconscious. After the morning meeting yesterday, Fujiwara Sensei motioned me to follow him out to the hallway. I reluctantly followed, wondering where this foray into internationalization would take me. He then motioned me outside, thinking we were going for a little tour, perhaps to his machine in the shed which decodes Fujiwara-speak. What happened instead was Fujiwara Sensei telling me that he`d had a dream about my father.

     I think what I like best is that his sense of decorum deemed such information too delicate for the teachers` room, and yet suitable enough to tell me anyway. Dad, I guess you were speaking English - fluently - but he couldn`t understand you in his own dream and got flummoxed. To be fair, I`d probably go batshit if I had a dream about a foreign colleague`s father, benign as it may be.

     So the moral of the story is - I look like my dad.

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