It was April 1993 when I walked into Nozaki Chu Gakko (Nozaki Junior High School) knowing I only had maybe five months left in Japan before my three year deal was up. On the Japan Exchange & Teaching (JET) Programme, we are allowed to sign one-year contracts to stay up to a total of three years.
Nozaki - or No-Chu - had always been my favourite school (of the seven total junior schools) I visited while in Ohtawara-shi. The school itself was more middle-class affluent, and so were the students. Their demeanour was very much similar to what mine was growing up in white, middle-class Etobicoke (now a city within Metropolitan Toronto in Canada). But this blog isn't about the students.
April was the beginning of a new school year... it also meant new teachers. One of my favourite teachers - Miss Noriko Ishihara had been transferred to Kaneda Minami Chu Gakko (Nan Chu)... and I wondered just who was going to be talking her place here at Nozaki.
I had ridden my bike out to school that day - maybe a 20 minute ride - it was warm but a sunny, non-humid day. I was wearing my teal (blue-green) jacket, black raw silk pants, had my hair in a pony tail and had a nice French-cut beard going on over my face. I looked goo-ood, and I'm pretty sure I knew it.
I walked through the front doors and over to the teacher's office where I bowed to the principal and vice-principal who both seemed genuinely glad to see me, as I was to see them.
I walked over to Mrs. Nagashima, the head English teacher, smiled, bowed deeply and greeted her like the old friend she had become. She always reminded me of my mother (in a good way). She sat down beside me at my desk. I glanced straight ahead and to the left and gasped audibly.
Nagashima-sensei (teacher) must have heard me, and smiled as I asked: "Who the heck is that?"
Ever smiling, showing off her teeth, Nagashima-sensei said (and this is all from a perfect memory, people): "Oh, that is (and I swear she put the emphasis on the word) MISS Kikuchi. She is our new English teacher."
If she said anything else after that, I have no idea. For me, it was love at first sight. Shallow, yes... but, this is me.
Kikuchi Nobuko was the most beautiful woman I had ever met (until I met my wife, Colette years later - I only mention that because she does occasionally read these blogs - especially when I write about other women).
Nagashima-sensei and I walked around the desks to Kikuchi-sensei's desk and made the introduction. It was slow motion. That's the way it felt. As well, I knew that every set of eyes in the office was on me, because it was obvious I wasn't the only one who thought she was attractive.
We bowed to each other, said hello, she told me we would have a class together in Period 2 (we would both have Period 1 off)... I smiled and said "I'm looking forward to working with you", and walked quietly back around to my desk.
I don't know what made me do it, but I did it. At that time, I was on some kind of roll with creative writing. I could touch pen to paper and stuff would evolve. Much like today, when I write, I often have no idea what I'm going to write until it comes out. It's always a nice surprise.
Anyhow, putting pen to paper, I wrote a Japanese poem - a haiku, a three-lined poem where the first and third lines are composed of five syllables and the second line is seven syllables. Here's what came out on a clean, white, ruled paper:
Her beautiful eyes
Seem to hypnotize my soul
Capturing my heart.
Nice, huh? I wrote it in less than 20 seconds. I didn't even need to count the syllables - I just knew it was perfect.
I don't know what made me do this either, but I got up, walked around the desks to Kikuchi-sensei and said (as she looked up at me): "Here... I wrote this for you."
She took the paper, read it, and said: "That's very nice. Here."
"No," I said. "It's for you." I then smiled, turned and walked back around to my desk.
Now you boys and girls might think that I was now 'In Like Flint' (had it made)... but as I sat down, I glanced over at her, and noticed she had put my poem aside and was quickly back at work. There was no blush in her cheeks, there was no sideways glance at me... she was just looking over her teaching report.
Stupid me forgot that this was her first teaching gig (okay, I only JUST realized that 18 years later), and she was probably trying very hard to ensure it wouldn't be her last.
She was going to be a tough nut to crack, I thought to myself.
When second period began, we walked up together to the classroom. I opened doors for her (it's not actually being polite. Men do that to check out a woman's butt), smiled and tried some idiotic small talk. Along the way, almost every single Nozaki student passing by, shouted my name in glee, bowed deeply, smacked my back, pounded my shoulders and grabbed my hand in greeting. I did the same.
Obviously, it was the guys doing the more physical greetings, but the girls were shouting my name out causing other kids to come running. I told you this place was great! Not just respect, but these kids were genuinely glad to see ME.
Because the class was a first-year English class, I was asked to do a self-introduction, as these kids had all just come up from various nearby primary schools. Now because I had been visiting primary schools every March while the Junior High Schools had final exams, the kids knew me already and were quite friendly towards me - as well, they were not afraid to speak their cheerful minds.
During my self-introduction (30 minutes long) that included details of my personal life (birth date, height weight, marital status (single), I showed photos of my family and friends, dog and car (thank goodness I had a Japanese Mazda 323!) that amazed them all. I also stupidly brought out photos of three female friends of mine, and called them my girlfriends.
What the heck was I thinking? I wanted a new girlfriend, and here I am bragging about three women back in Canada that I never even slept with! And why wouldn't they sleep with me?
I glanced over at Kikuchi-sensei and saw her look away - was that disgust on her face?
Thankfully, the self-introduction was over. But the kids had questions for me. Now Kikuchi-sensei, aside from her obvious beauty, also spoke English very well. Of all my teachers, perhaps only Tomoura-sensei at Wakakusa Chu Gakko (Waka Chu) and Shibata-sensei at Ohtawara Chu Gakko (Dai Chu) had better skills. Perhaps.
The first question: "Why don't you have a girlfriend anymore? What happened to Ashley-sensei?"
Geez... these kids had been doing their homework!
I told them that we had broken up a long time before she went home last summer. (By the way, all of the questions were from the girls).
"Do you like Kikuchi-sensei?"
"Well, we've only just met, but yes, I like Kikuchi-sensei."
Not getting the answer they wanted, I was prompted again.
"Do you think Kikuchi-sensei is pretty?"
Giggles from everywhere, but I looked over at Kikuchi-sensei and gave her the once over looking her up then down, turned to the class and said. "Hai. So desu-yo!" Which roughly translates into "Oh, yeah!"
Then for good measure, I added: "I think she is a very pretty woman."
This didn't needed to be translated in Japanese, as one kid obviously was very good at reading my drool-spilling face and translated it for the rest of the class.
Thankfully for Kikuchi-sensei, she was saved by the bell... It was lunch time. I got to stay with this class (and Kikuchi-sensei) as we had our lunch doled out for us... by the way... the students were quite helpful... they purposely sat Kikuchi-sensei and I down beside each other... boys all around us, but girls facing us... in a circle... watching us eat... watching our body language... let me tell you... there was NO body language suggesting anything from her. I actually glanced up at one of the girl students, looked over at her teacher, back to the student and slightly shrugged my shoulders. She nodded back with a concerned look on her face.
Even the kids knew I was hung up on their teacher! They also knew it wasn't happening!
After lunch the girls and boys of that class grabbed me to talk - and we did - with me answering their simple Japanese questions with my crappy Japanese - but it worked. We discussed their teacher. It ended with a simple Ganbatte An-do-ryu-sensei (Good luck Andrew teacher).
I had two afternoon classes with Nagashima-sensei, and I must admit my heart wasn't in it... my heart was elsewhere. Or perhaps my head was... or was it my groin? Probably a bit of everything.
When class was over, Nagashima-sensei grabbed a camera and said she wanted photographs of us English teachers. Sure why not?
Check out the photo above. Look at Kikuchi-sensei's body language... she did NOT want to be near me. And me - bravely had my arm around her shoulder... yikes!
I went home, thought about onani (really, you should read this episode: WHAT?) decided against it, sat in front of the television and tried to figure out what I was going to do to get this woman to like me.
Somewhere realizing this episode IS about the students,
Andrew Joseph
Today's title is by Van Morrison. Listen to it here: 20/20.
PS: This is all 100% true. The students at No Chu really were this nice - and really were interested in helping me in my efforts with Kikuchi-sensei.
PPS: Nobuko, her first name, means "ever-expanding girl"... which I'm pretty sure had nothing to do with this 5'-2", 100 lb woman's size.
