It’s the end of another academic year, but the closing of one door heralds the coming of a rare event, the school’s AGM.
This is a chance for us ALT wunderkind to witness the sports teachers dressing like Premier League football managers (in that they wear tracksuits every day, so when they wear suits it's as though they're on trial for match-fixing) and to give a context for the important work that we do.
I say chance. It’s worth pointing out that we are not invited to attend this meeting, and that we are faintly discouraged from doing so. But as anyone can attest, I am very contrary, and 150 teachers playing hard to get makes me salivate even more than just the 15 I work with directly doing it.
We arrive. There are no chairs left. Not just for us: a couple of other teachers are also standing forlornly at the back, waiting for someone to tell them how to deal with this horror. I put some chairs out, loudly. No-one turns to look. Damn.
So, who’s here? Well, it’s clear that the part-time teachers are conspicuously absent. If we are, in fact, in the same category as them, then they should give us 3 days off a week too! Ha ha! However, there is some rare wildlife. The orchestra leader has been roused from his usual nap-spot behind the timpani, and the small hairy teacher in the Aran Island knit sweaters (I have NO idea what he does) is cutting his nails at the back. All present and correct, let’s begin.
08:50
I’m offered a white form. “It’s ok” I say, graciously (I hope) “読めません” This is either “I can’t read it” as I intend, or perhaps “Piss off, I’m not going to read that”. “そうかな？” says the puzzled Jimushou lady, so I’m still none the wiser as to which answer I gave her.
The general gist of the various speeches that make up the meeting is to go through your list of achievements in as hurried a way as possible, illustrated by dry graphs printed onto brown recycled paper, the visual equivalent of an oat biscuit. Staff meetings in my life have been few and far between, mainly because of my past six jobs, three have been in theatres. At my last, we used to sit in comfy chairs in the bar whenever the mood took us, trying to out-humour each other and eating many many shortbread fingers.
09.15
Maybe we should be less critical of the way kids murmur and fuss during assemblies in both Japan and the UK, and I’m sure in the rest of the world (except perhaps China, eek.) There is not a single physical sign of life amongst these teachers. This is, sure, in part, politeness, but also, tiredness. We should be jealous that the kids still have the energy to fidget.
It’s at this point that I realise that the only teachers sitting in the chairs at the back are ‘outsiders’. Myself, my esteemed Canadian colleague, the much-fancied and highly-revered soccer coach, who is Korean (and plays on his i-pad for the duration, mainly you-tube videos of his own saxophone concerts, with the volume on...) and one of the 事務賞, who is very lovely but essentially a secretary who wants to go back to her cosy office with the sofas and the Nespresso machine, and who does just that 30 minutes in. There is also a senior member of staff- the school’s head of marketing and PR, who is always too busy to stay in one place for long and needs to be near the door in case one of his smarphones rings.
09.32
Hold the phones! I just understood several sentences in sequence! There is a 2,800円 retainer that all the kids are meant to pay, but only 30% do. “I know it’s stressful,” this teacher says, his perfect bald head gleaming, “but of course do your best to collect it.” Are they kidding? It’s a private school! The fees are astronomical, if they added it on, no-one would even notice.
09.41
Now the hot, young, ball-breaker teacher is talking. She mispronounces some word or misremembers some fact and is corrected. Male teachers at the back, where they are safely out of view, smirk. They definitely fancy her; she even gets a little clap at the end of her speech about figures.
09.45
Time is whizzing by! The gruff baseball coach is speaking. I’m starting to get chilly, and am glad that I ate breakfast, but still keep fantasising about a dish that I ate at an enkai on Friday. Crunchy fish eggs. Not cod, maybe dried salmon roe, sliced in lumps, dyed bright green, and flavoured with wasabi. Mmmmm. I ate the whole thing thinking it was just tasty cucumber, but that’s neither here nor there.
In this room there is not a single mixed-gender desk. Wait! 間違った, there are two. One, with two nondescript male teachers and the school nurse (but let’s face it, she’s seen it all before) and, nearby, two female teachers sitting with an effeminate male teacher, who the other teachers won’t play with because he’s a fan of hugging. Constant hugging. Never bloody hugs me though! I should get in there, definitely not enough hugs in my Japanese life.
10:25
League table time. A sore point. It transpires that we are now behind Hofu, Fuzoku, and Iwate.
Hang on, IwatA. IwatE was one of the places hit by the tsunami.
They’ve turned the heating on! It’s having more effect that an chemical cosh! I wonder if this is how MPs feel during the budget? They’re on more comfortable seats though, squishy leather benches, though I don’t envy whoever has to be squeezed next to Ed Balls and his massive bum.
10:30
Unlike the rest of world, my school is shutting the stable door BEFORE the horse has bolted and saying that Chuggakou students shouldn’t be on Facebook during I.T. lessons, so they’re going to block it. Only 15 kids in the whole school even know what Facebook is! Although I'm sure that that number is going to rise exponentially very soon. They’re still introducing the teachers to the concept. The school has a page, and even the Head’s on now… jeez, I’d better check I’m not friends with him.
10:35
Yeah, definitely must check that.
10:37
At this point, I slipped into oblivion and started drawing cockatoos on my jotter. My godmother used to have one. So sleepy…
The meeting ended at 11.30. Here endeth the reading.
