There and Back Again The continuing travels of me

I am in the middle of the exam period, yesterday was exceptionally boring as I had no classes. For about half an hour I got to go into the students homeroom and read out part of the exam. They do a listening test, but it was only around 10 minutes per class. The rest of the day I literally had no work to do. It’s one of the frustrations that often gets brought up by ALTs, the underutilization of them as staff. At least today I have an elementary school visit in the afternoon. I realized that tomorrow I have no classes at all, no elementary visit and not even a few lines to recite for the students. So I organized to swap my ALT day visit that was planned for next Friday (when I have 3 regular classes) to tomorrow. So at least in the morning I will have something productive to do. It’s just under 4 weeks till I get back to Melbourne now, I’m looking forward to it. I keep thinking about what I need to buy to bring back with me (vegemite, toothpaste and other toiletries, maybe some new clothes that fit). Tomorrow is the release date for Wall-e, so I’m planning to see that with another ALT. Marcus has already seen it a few times in the US, but he’s keen to go again. I really need to see more movies. Lately I’ve begun downloading radio podcasts from the BBC, mostly interviews and documentaries. It’s a slow Internet connection at work, but in a full day I can get around 10 or 12 programs (depending on the size) which is about 4 hours of programming. But I imagine I’ll run out of content from the archive soon and be reduced to whatever they release each week, it keeps me informed and mentally active though. The ABC website is good for news too, but it’s less useful for downloads. I was trying to download TV programs, but you can only do that in Australia, at least all the ones I wanted to see. I am planning to shoot some video in the new year, a couple of the other ALTs want to do some support material for the English text book. Apparently there is a DVD but it’s supposed to be awful, they thought it would be fun to do our own. I’m keen if they are. Speaking of DVDs, I was in Akhihabara (elecric town – or nerd central) the other day and I saw a DVD of Starship Troopers 3 playing in a shop window, so I went in to buy it, but there’s no way I’m paying $40 for that DVD. I’ll rent it when I get back to Australia. But while I was there I found a doner-kebab stand run by some Turkish guys, pretty good stuff. I’m clearly bored, that’s the only time I really think this much about food, I should be studying Japanese. I sent my test card off for the first of the correspondence courses, I have no idea how I did. Some of the questions really confused me, if I don’t get at least 70% I won’t be eligible for completion, it could go any direction. I have to be at elementary in about half an hour, the morning has really dragged, but now it will go quickly since there are a few things I want to do before I go, like post this to my blog, that’s when time really speeds up.