September 19, 2000

Hello everybody.  It�fs Tuesday morning here, but you wouldn�ft know it by all that is going on.  It is safe to say that I am experiencing the second Monday of the week here in Japan.  First, I have been cleaning my house to prepare for my mom to come visit.  It�fs not that the place is dirty so much as it is just cluttered, and so small that there is nothing that I can do except shuffle the piles around and hope for a better configuration.  As I shuffle the piles, I clean underneath so that it�fs easier to move them around the next day, when I have decided that the current configuration isn�ft working.  When I clean, I do so with this bleachy stuff, and if I sniff it for too long it makes my eyes water a little.  Today, my eyes will not stop watering, and many of the teachers have come to me to ask if I am feeling okay since it appears that I am sitting here blubbering or something.  They don�ft just accept �gyes.�h  No, they have to know all the details here, and so I have had to explain, using various gestures AND a dictionary, why my eyes are watering.  Then we have a discussion about allergies.  I should have taken time in the morning meeting to explain it to everyone, though.  Ha ha ha!  What I mean is that I have had the same conversation about twenty times today.

Having the same conversation is time-consuming, and this is a day when I just do not have the time for that kind of nonsense.  Nope, I had to teach a first period class of very genki (energetic) first-year students.  My team-teacher forgot that it was Tuesday, and went to the class without me, and so I was late because I was tracking her down.  When she saw me, she was so apologetic.  I explained that if she didn�ft need me today, that it was fine because all I had was a fluff lesson anyway, and she said to come on in and teach it anyway.  I wonder what she would have done had I just not shown up�coh well�csigh�c  So I commence telling them about the new reward system in the English classes, talking with them for the appointed first twenty minutes I had allowed for this exercise, and then I plugged in the tape player for the listening section.  It was at this time that I discovered that I had the wrong tape.  So I gave them a translation problem quickly, left them with the teacher to explain the problem in Japanese, and RAN AT TOP SPEED to the staff room, where I discovered that the tape I needed was actually in my car, and so I RAN AT TOP SPEED to my car to retrieve it, and then back to the classroom, completely exhausted by the effort, but just in time to get there as they were finishing up the exercise.  So I popped in the tape and turned on the player, to listen in horror as the machine ate the tape right there in front of the class.  Okay, so there I am, with a lesson in front of me that required the tape player (unless I felt like breaking into song right there and trying to sing the song myself, which was NOT going to happen that early in the morning and besides, it wouldn�ft have been so interesting to them in my voice�c) and I just didn�ft know what to do, so I looked out at them and said, �gOkay.  Look at this sentence.�h  On the board I wrote the words �gWe can not listen to music today because the tape is broken.�h  Beneath that I wrote, �gLynley-sensei is changing the lesson because the music lesson will not work.�h  I talked about the word BECAUSE, and used several ways to use it.  I have found that in learning foreign language, one of the most difficult (and ultimately one of the most essential) points to master is using WHY and BECAUSE so that you can have a conversation ABOUT something.  So we wrote about WHY and BECAUSE and they practiced their English and they built some vocabulary to boot.  It all turned out okay, except that now I am covered in chalk dust (which has to be washed out here because their chalk is finer than ours is in America) and we have VIPs from Australia coming to watch me teach my 6th period class.  This is the third point on the �gIts another Monday�c�h list:  The team-teacher announced this morning that she will not be here, so I have the class by myself, which is always a little tougher because as soon as we get stuck on a point and I have to bring out the dictionary, I lose the kids for a minute and they chat away.  I didn�ft want to do this in front of the VIPs, so I am going to restructure the lesson again.  I spent hours planning, preparing and copying to be ready for today, and now I have to redo all of it.  Ick.  Thank you for letting me vent about all that.  I will get on to the funny stuff, I promise.

Recently, we were in a store called Tokyu Hands and they have a rather large collection of western-lifestyle-type paraphernalia.  The second level has lots of holiday decorations and games and the like, and they have a whole collections of Halloween costumes.  At the other end is a section where I can pick up some goodies and foods, etc., though we keep it light since we have to cart it all home on the train usually.  I left Jessica looking at the costumes and I wandered away to look at food, naturally.  She browsed, looking for ideas for this year`s costume.  We will have a party at the Akibadai English Club for all the members and their family, and it will be a costume party.  We will have lots of fun!  She chatted away, as she usually does, while we walked through the arcades later that afternoon.  She kept saying that she had seen the most beautiful costume ever, and I was only partially-listening as we were shopping, knowing that she would continue to change the topic of conversation at a rapid pace until she got to one of her stories, and then she would chat on about the storyline and I would tune in fully for that.  Well.  At one point when she was talking about the most beautiful costume ever, I asked her:
Me: �gSo Jessica, tell me what the costume looked like.�h
Jessica: �gOh, Mom�cit was beautiful.  It was a black dress.�h
Me: �gOh yeah?�h (looking at home furnishings�c)
Jessica: �gYeah, and it had matching short pants with it.�h
Me: �gReally?�h  (still looking at the candles�c)
Jessica: �gYeah, at it had an apron on the front of it.�h
Me: �gwow�c�h  (I have a candle in each hand now, comparing them�c)
Jessica: �gYeah, and the apron had lacy stuff on it at the bottom and it comes with a hat.�h
Me: �ghmmmmmm�c (I can`t believe the price of the candles)
Jessica: �gIt`s called French Maid.�h
Me: (fully tuned in now and knocking over candles)  �gWHAT??!�h
Jessica: �gFrench Maid.  That`s the name of the costume.  I want to be a French Maid for Halloween.�h
Me: (mouth hanging open) �g�c�c.�h
Jessica: �gAre you okay, Mom?�h
Me: �gI don�ft think so.�h
Jessica: �gWhat`s wrong?  Are you sick?�h
Me: �gNo, I mean I don�ft think you can be a French Maid.�h
Jessica: �gWhy not?�h
Me: �gBecause�c�cbecause�c..�h (mind starts listing things�cbecause you are ten years old�cbecause they might arrest me for letting you�cbecause you don�ft speak French�cbecause I said so�cno, go from the practical angle, Lynley�cbecause there are more fun costumes�cbecause lace is expensive�cbecause it is cold in October and the French Maid costume will show too much skin and you might catch a cold�coh boy�c�h
Jessica: �gBecause why, Mom?�h
Me: (I give up and decide to go with honesty on it.) �gI agree that the costume is pretty, but that is a costume that is made for an adult.  A lot of grown-up men have fantasies about doing sexy things with women dressed like that, so it is not appropriate for you to dress like that because you are still pretty young.�h
Jessica: (screwing her face into the picture of pure concentration�c) �gSo what you`re saying is that if I dress like that, then men might want me to do their chores or something?�h
Me: �gWeeeeeellllllll�c�h (mind starts listing again but I won`t go there this time�c)
Jessica: �gWell WHAT, Mom?�h
Me: �gNot exactly.  It`s different than chores.  It`s meant to be a sexy costume.�h
Jessica: �gLike doing sex?�h
Me: �gThat sort of stuff, yeah, so you see why it would be for an adult woman.�h
Jessica: �gEEEEEEWWWWWWWW!!  I think that doing sex would be pretty icky.�h
Me: �gHmmmmmmm�h�cdeciding perhaps it is time to change the subject�c.�hWe could try to put together another costume, maybe of one of the Pokemon characters or something�cwhat do you think?
Jessica: �gHey Mom!  I know!  YOU could be the French Maid!�h
Me: �gNo, Jessica, I don�ft think so.  How about Pikachu?�h
Jessica: �gReally, Mom, I think you would look beautiful in that costume.  And you are an adult woman.�h
Me: �gNo, Jessica, I don�ft think so.�h
Jessica: �gWhy not?�h
Me: (abandoning reason, I just go for what first came to mind�c) �gBecause men would see me and not think about sex at all.  They would think that I was a real maid and they would bring me all their dirty laundry and then I would try to explain to them that I am not a maid, but they would not understand me because I don�ft know all the right words in Japanese and hey, you KNOW how bad I hate doing laundry�cit might ruin Halloween for me.  THAT`S why.�h
Jessica: �gOh.�h  (as if what I had said made perfect sense�c)  �gCan I be Sailor Moon maybe?�h
Me: �gWe`ll see.�h (meaning it�cI start to pick up the fallen candles�c)
Jessica: �gWhat if I translated for you and then they wouldn�ft give you their clothes?�h
Me: �gHey�chelp me with these candles.  Look�chere is a vanilla one.  I can tell because it says BAH NEE RAH on the side here in katakana.  Read the rest of the flavors for me, why dontcha?�h

Luckily, I was able to get her to reading katakana so that I could finally escape the horrors of the French Maid discussion.  She is such a great kid.  She has some weird taste though.  That`s just part of it, though.  I remember a pair of pink shoes that my sister wore when she was playing grownup, and she flup-flup-flupped through the house with this pair of hideous pink shoes on her feet.  She thought that they were beautiful, and she was like Cinderella in them.  I always liked to watch her put them on and play around because sometimes she would smile brightly at herself and say sophisticated things to the person in the mirror, and she would preen and flounce and pull her bag on her shoulder like a little adult.  It was so entertaining.  Not just was it funny to see it, and really cute, like a lot of things that kids do, I was always so affected by the way we build our self-images.  I was not much older than my daughter is right now when Tracy was flupping around in those shoes.  I watched her building her confidence, practicing that smile.  We learn to walk really early in life, but learning to walk in high heels is a whole different ball game, and an important lesson for some of us girls.  It was fun to be able to watch my sister play adult.  (I know Tracy is bright red, reading this�csorry, Kid!)  At least I didn�ft tell them that your ensemble regularly included the yellow plastic glasses that belonged originally to Mr. Potato Head.
Oops.

You know, poking fun at my kid sister is pretty safe while I am here in Japan, but you know what?  I soon will be in grave danger, for she and my mother are coming to Japan, and will be here in about 52 hours.  OH MY GOSH I still have so much to do!  On that note, I will close this letter, but let me hear from you!

Love, etc.,
Lynley