@
@
Will's Tour Diary - updated daily!
Will's tour diary - What? Why? When? Where? - Shows - Seminars
==============================
I slept in. I think all the U-turns from the night before had caught up with me (no power steering).
We went to Horigane Primary - the local research school where they 'officially' teach English (as opposed to the towns like mine and Richard's where we just taught English). From the enormous pair of shoes in the genkan we deduced we weren't the only visitors to the school that day. We were ushered into the staffroom and met Dennis, a private ALT who was visiting for the day. He looked like a cross between Capt Jean-Luc Picard and the lead singer from Fine Young Cannibals, and was dressed elegantly in a skivvy and jacket (in comparison Richard and I just looked garish in our red and yellow t-shirts). The English teacher, a very attractive woman just out of university, was a little star-struck when she met Richard - it turned out she had been using GenkiEnglish in her classes.
We were invited to watch some classes. It was lot better than we expected (in similar 'research' classes in Ehime you will find the ALTs playing the game 'fruitbasket' with the students). There were still a few areas that could have been worked on (in our considered opinion), for example not waiting until 4th grade to get the students to speak.
We pitched the show and seminar. The English teacher was keen, but the older teacher was clearly not interested. We went for coffee with Dennis, who gave us some good background on the state of elementary school teaching (and some great analogies). Went to four more schools with various levels of interest.
Today was laundry day. By late evening we had found a laudromat on the outskirts of Matsumoto City. 90 minutes and three loads later we toyed with the idea of ringing up Anna and begging her to let us stay another night, but thought it best to move on. We headed towards Saitama Prefecture, and drove, drove, drove. Around 1am we reached our destination - an onsen just near the Nagano-Gunma-Saitama border. We couldn't find the onsen itself but we found a sign, and a long windy road which was enveloped in mist and not a little eery. Richard , not being particularly helpful, kept talking about axe-murderers as I inched through the fog. We gave up looking for the onsen building and parked near a truck in a clearing not far from the highway.
Will
Previous Entries
Diary Main Page
Opinions expressed in this diary are personal views of Will Jasprizza. They do not necessarily represent those of Genki English, especially where he is slagging people off or making jokes which sounded better at the time!!! Please be understanding!
@
Sign up to get my top tips, games & hints via email! |
 |
|---|
Copyright (C) 1999/2023 by Richard Graham www.GenkiEnglish.com
|
|
@