 |
| Did you lose your eraser? |
It's amazing really. I've been watching my students--and from school to school, it's always the same. They enjoy colouring - probably more than they do learning English. To be honest, so do I.
The colouring... they never seem to run any of the 300 coloured pens they have outside of the lines. Japanese-Bad-Girl-Hair-Dye, Ocha-Green-Tea, Sky Brown, Sea-If We-Had-Clean-Water-Blue, Car-White, Victorian-Sailor-Suit-Grey. It's a list of colours that would make Crayola (TM) cry. The flair these student exhibit for neatness looks to border on anal retentiveness. That's why I feel more than qualified to comment on this topic.
On a particularly cloudy day in Ohtawara, I thought I'd try something new and pay attention to what my students at Ohtawara Junior High School were doing in class. Well, those who were awake alternated between pointing to their nose when called upon, and looking for just the right shade of pen to underline a word they began writing 10 minutes ago and just finished now.
Part of my duties--besides harassing them--is to walk around the classroom and look like I own the place. I also check spelling. I dread that part of the job, especially when I see the look of humiliation on the faces as I point out that they forgot to 'dot the i'.
Apparently, to simply add a dot would destroy the harmony of the word they have just created. That wouldn't be zen. Nope. Nothing short of the total elimination of the dotless abomination would do. Carefully, the pencil case is opened. Delicately, the eraser is steadied in the hand as it meticulously searches for the best and most logical place for the destruction to begin.
As always, it is determined that the best course of action is not always the total erasure of the afflicted word, but rather the termination of the entire sentence. And before you can say, "Chotto matte, kudasai" (Just a second, please), they have erased the unclean words from the paper - twice. Twice because the pencil lines are still visible in a spectrum seen only by heavy drinkers and junior high school students.
Then, after carefully and correctly copying the word again (with uncountable repeats of the previously described procedure), the students begin to clean the eraser of all of the befouling black rubber gook that has now attached itself to a once-perfect instrument. Students frequently use a second eraser to remove the damning imperfections from the 'family' eraser that has been carefully maintained and handed-down through the generations. Okay, maybe I'm exaggerating a bit with the 'generations' quip.
Sometimes, to cause total and utter panic, I steal their eraser when they turn around to catch a glimpse at how their classmates are erasing. Other times, when I feel more mischievous, I put tiny little pencil marks all over their notebooks and then watch them scramble for their now-missing erasers. Hey, I'm a gaijin (foreigner).
Somewhere cleaning my dirty mind,
Andrew Joseph
PS: Today's song is by Toronto, Canada's own Barenaked Ladies, EH
PPS: Though this episode may seem completely made up - it's not. This happened several times a week at each one of the seven schools I visited in Ohtawara. There's nothing wrong with it - i just thought you'd like to see how the kids can oft times be anal retentive.
PPPS: In the photo above, I had indeed stolen that boy's eraser and was having a bit of fun with him... but he quickly became agitated as he had been without his eraser for longer than a minute.
PPPS: In the photo above, I had indeed stolen that boy's eraser and was having a bit of fun with him... but he quickly became agitated as he had been without his eraser for longer than a minute.
