The
term is over, and life here feels like it’s passed another
milestone. It’s funny, though, as the start of summer really isn’t
such a big deal here. It’s not the end of an academic year, after
all; it’s not even half way through one. The end of the first term,
I guess, doesn’t feel all that special. But apparently it is, as
I’m getting all kinds of ‘thank you for a term of hard work’
messages from the teachers here and at primary school. Maybe they’re
aware, in a way that I’m actually not, that it’s been a year
since I first arrived. When the newbies get here at the end of
Summer, that’s when I’ll feel it.
But
don’t start thinking I’m not happy about the holidays being here,
I am! Days come and days go, and sometimes I feel like I’m not
quite pulling my weight as I could be around here, but I tell you,
I’ve earned a break. A long one. These last few days in particular
have been so cripplingly exhausting it’s all I can do to stay awake
at my desk between classes.
It’s
funny. Yesterday I received a questionnaire from Kobe City asking
after my mental health, we all did. And not just ‘we all’ ALTs,
but the teachers here too. It was simple stuff, maybe too simple to
uncover someone’s deep-buried anger issues, and was filled with
questions like ‘How often do you feel tired?’ ‘How often do you
get headaches or a stiff neck?’ As Steph suggested before school
today, it was nice to sound off a little about how exhausting this
line of work is. I’m not expecting some therapist from the KEC to
start demanding to my OTEs that they cut me some slack; as a friend
of mine pointed out yesterday, “Of course we’re going to be
tired, it’s work!” But I sometimes feel like I can’t complain
about life here. My teachers may get offended or, worse, think I’m
being lazy, and by the time I get home to my friends I don’t feel
like it. I feel like being quiet and not being talked to. So I don’t
have much of an opportunity. Having said that, my 3rd Year
OTE, who sits next to me, complains almost as much as I want to. I
have little fear about relaying my complaints to him, so long as
they’re short and don’t get in his way. He can even understand
the ultimately harmless use of ‘I want to die’ after a gruelling
day. Here in Kansai, you see, they’re very proud of the phrase
‘shou ga nai’, ‘It can’t be helped’, so any complaint I
could care to offer, I think, is silently reflected back with a
‘That’s just life’ stamped on it. ‘Oh, you want to die? I
guess that can’t be helped.’ They’d be no good in the
Samaritans, I can tell you.
And
the weather. Ye gods, this weather is appalling. I don’t much care
for numbers, so I dunno what sorta Centigrade we’re looking at, but
it’s too hot for my liking. And humid; I may as well be swimming to
work. Ironically, we get the odd thunderstorm that comes as a soggy,
cold relief, but they’re clearing up now that Summer is well and
truly here. Praise the Lord for cooler climes in Hokkaido, which
Steph and I will be visiting not one week from now. Just call me the
King in the North.
And
to make matters worse, Baskin Robbins’ Challenge the Triple
campaign is over, so I can’t get three scoops of icecream for the
price of two anymore.
Oh,
but I’ll tell you what campaign has started recently, the Steam
Summer Sales. Oh wow, every morning is a magical adventure when you
can’t tell what’ll be on offer! I’ve already got myself the
whole of the Binding of Isaac (creepy as anything I’ve ever played,
but right up my street gameplay-wise) and Crysis (looking forward to
doing more than just scratch the surface of that one this weekend),
and yet I’m still keeping my eyes peeled. I decided not to go for
Arma 2 should it ever get a price cut greater than 20%, as even
though the Day Z mod does look good I don’t much care about the
rest of the game, and that’s what I’m paying for. I think I
waited too long, and my enthusiasm wilted in the heat. No matter, I’m
not grieving. On a similar note, Steph has been outdoing me in the
Steam regard, having picked up Walking Dead, Europa Universalis 3 and
the Half Life 1 collection, all while still hooked on mining in Lord
of the Rings Online. I’m very proud of her.
Okay,
so my last entry got a few complaints from certain people (you know
who you are. The phrase “I wouldn’t have bothered” was used…)
so I’ll put game news on hold for now. I’ll be back though. You
can go watch the football when I next start talking about them, I’ll
make sure not to say anything you’d be interested in after that.
Steph
and I have been working on our rather shameful recent TV knowledge.
Having received BBC’s Sherlock on DVD over Christmas we started
with that. It’s not a bad show, not bad at all in some cases. It’s
funny, entertaining, well-acted (though I see Martin Freeman is
playing himself again) and apparently the writers really did know a
ton about the original books. It’s awfully ridiculous at times,
though, and maybe that’s another reference to the originals. But
Chinese martial-art assassins? Really? I guess I was hoping for
crimes I could have guessed the answer to, and in that sense Sherlock
didn’t really do me any favours. Or maybe I’m just an idiot. But
yeah, I had fun watching it. Except that first episode of the second
series. What in the world was that pile of rubbish…
Now
then, what else. Ah yes. Under Steph’s supervision, I gave Misfits
a second go. I’d been turned off at the first episode on account of
really hating all of the characters bar none. I know, I know, that’s
the intention. I knew full well that the joy was in watching them
grow into decent human beings through their superheroing. But I just
didn’t care enough to load up that second episode. When Steph told
me I’d missed out, though, we ended up trying it again, and boy am
I glad we did. That show is amazing. It’s well-written, well-acted,
well-put together. The characters I once hated I now can’t do
without. With the exception of the first episode of the third series,
I don’t think I’ve not enjoyed myself at all. I’m even quite
fond of Rudy, who is no Nathan but still makes me smile. And that
Nazi Britain episode! Ace!
I
think that’s it. The Hanayama Society for the Study of Modern
Visual Culture is rewatching Katanagatari, which is excellent as
always. Too much talking, but sweet none the less. There’s also
some rubbish about a Lovecraftian space god come to Japan in the
guise of a promiscuous high-school girl with kung-fu, but the less
said about that the better. Alright, that one’s not unbearable
either.
Why
don’t I tell you an embarrassing story, then? That’s what you
want hear, right? My miserable failures? Yeah, of course you do. So
recently we’ve had our class schedules messed up for PTA meetings,
student interviews and the like, so lessons have been 45 minutes long
rather than 50. There’s also been a whole heap of class-less time
after lunch, where I have next to nothing to do. I’ve been watching
the sports clubs practice, but that can only entertain for so many
hours. So imagine my horror one of these days last week when I crawl
out of school in the afternoon after about four hours of no work,
exhausted out of my brain, and say goodbye to my teachers, who say
goodbye back. I ride the bus towards home, take the train the rest of
the way, and start climbing the hill. I happen to pass by the nursery
school on the way, and happen to look inside. The kids, I notice, are
still in school. Strange. Normally I’m home after they leave. And
why didn’t I recognise any of my fellow commuters on the train
home? I take a quick glance at the time on my phone and my blood goes
cold. Would you believe it, I left a whole hour ahead of when I was
supposed to. And the real irony? My teachers didn’t realise! I
called the school as soon as I could to apologise, and the
vice-principal was all ‘Oh! I see!’ like it was the first time
he’d heard I wasn’t a three o’clock leaver. I honestly think
that if I hadn’t said anything, nobody would have noticed. But
that’s not the right thing to do, is it. Instead, I stayed behind
an extra hour yesterday to clean the school and we called it quits.
Got a face fulla dead spider for my trouble. For my honesty. Tch.
So,
what else? I heard that this year the school’s cultural festival is
gonna include a production of Hashire Melos, or whatever the original
Greek name was. One of the kids who’s good at English is gonna be
the starring role, bless his heart, though I do hope they put a bit
more effort into it than last year’s… Maybe I’m just not a very
good judge of Japanese humour, but it seemed a bit flat. It was also
a bizarre idea. I didn’t quite understand.
Okay,
I’ve racked my brain, and I can’t come up with nothing else. It’s
time to…
Oh,
one last thing. On a whim…
TWO
last things…
On
a whim last weekend I happened to pick up the new Linkin Park album
The one that I’m sure has been out in the world now for many years
and Japan has not noticed. You know, like Gotye’s entire career, so
whenever I broach to topic to friends at home I get severely
hipster’d. I thoroughly like it, Linkin Park this is, though I
can’t rate it higher than Thousand Suns, which I really like. It
felt a little like Suns had this story that played out as you
listened, like Meteora before it, but Living Things was just linked
by all the songs sounding kinda the same. Not bad, just all the same.
It’s difficult to tell the first few apart. Pete’s special music
award goes to Powerless, which is stellar.
Okay,
so why was I in a spending mood last weekend? That’ll be because I
bought me some glasses in a Japanese optician. It’s the frames that
needed changing, I’m not one to notice when lenses get a bit weak
for my ever-degrading eyesight. So, we asked around, Steph and I, and
came up with a few shops. Some of Sannomiya’s opticians are just
that, they’re like cramped little clinics with bored-looking
elderly gentlemen behind desks. But then you get the other ones,
which are more like glasses shops. You see what I mean? There’s
less of a medical feel to them, and more a fashion feel. The staff
were all very young, very pretty, and wore those really noticeable
glasses that people who don’t need them wear, the ones that come in
really vibrant colours. Unperturbed by my obvious foreignness, I was
quickly asked if there was anything I liked, and when I found a frame
I did take a liking to I handed it over. Now, here’s the clever
part. You don’t NEED an eyetest to buy glasses! Did you know that?
She stuck my existing glasses in a little machine that scanned the
lenses, then sent the schematics to the computers out back so they
could manufacture a duplicate set. They’d then stick ‘em in the
frames and there you go! For particularly run-of-the-mill eyes, the
whole process can take as short as 25 minutes. You believe that?? Of
course, being blind as a bat I needed something considerably
stronger, and am still waiting on the phone call to tell me they’re
ready. Working in a school with no phone reception doesn’t help.
I’ll be going in on Sunday, when she insisted they’d be ready, so
fingers crossed. If you’re curious, the frames are darker, thicker
and rounder than my currents, though not THAT round. Don’t want to
steal my brother’s thunder, do I? And that’s 5000 yen for frames,
5000 yen for lenses, making a total of abut 75 pounds for the whole
thing. Not too shabby, I think.
Yep,
that’s it. I’mma talk about games again now.
So
the one thing I’m actually pretty excited about is a game that came
out yesterday. It’s a pretty absurbly long name: ‘Shin Ken to
Mahou to Gakuen Mono – Toki no Gakuen’. Which means ‘New Sword,
Magic and Matters of Academia – School of Time’. Which when it
hits the West will be called ‘New Class of Heroes – Chrono
Academy’. Did you get all that? ‘cos I won’t be repeating it.
It’s a ‘build a team of dungeoneers and send them dungeoneering’
game, with the theme being school life. It’s a school for
adventurers, and you enrol a bunch of them and send them off to
potentially die in the caves of a monster-infested world. Now, I’ve
been lulled into false security about games of this ilk before. I
still remember Etrian Odyssey with a sort of cold shiver and the
feeling of skin rubbed from my fingertips from all the grinding. But
this one actually looks pretty exciting. There are a good number of
races to choose from, and a ton of playable classes, with even more
unlocked as earlier classes are mastered by the characters, or
through building friendships with the teaching staff at the school.
And I’m not just talking about your run-of-the-mill dungeoneers.
Your Warriors, your Rangers, your Mages. Shin Totomono, as it is
called on the internet, bases many of its classes on character
archetypes from TV anime or video games. A good example would be the
older brother/sister class, unlocked right from the start. Older
brothers have stronger attacks and healing skills, younger brothers
have faster attacks and buffing abilities. Later on you can get
classes such as magical girls, samurai, tsundere (people who act cold
but are actually highly sentimental), yandere (the reverse, often
psychopaths), and for the really dedicated players your characters
can become maids and butlers. Ain’t that awesome! I’m also
excited that, for the first time in the series, the level of cosmetic
customisation is really enhanced. Character models are 3D, and have
multiple faces, hairstyles, accessories and uniforms to choose from,
as well as voices. I’ll be getting that one on Sunday, I think,
when I pick up my glasses.
And
that’s it. I’m counting 6 pages. Not a bad amount, I think.
Thanks
for reading.
