Agony or Fun?! Second Language Learning
I am a native Japanese speaker who used to teach Japanese in a university somewhere on this planet. Currently I don't work but stayed in my house in Northern part of JAPAN. I hope that you could enjoy reading my posts and know what life in Japan is like.
I am a little busy tonight. The campus where I used to be is very far from here. Not only the distance, I feel that being there was a thing of long time ago in my memory.
It seems I had eaten a lot for lunches. Probably I was energetic and working hard at that time, because I was six years younger than what I am now.
I’m a little busy right now. It’s cold outside. I have been doing room makeover today.
The following photos were taken on November 10, 2023.
Tonight, I don’t think of what to write for posting. My (ex)students can tell where the photos were taken.
It’s a little sad to say, but it seems to me they are things happened long time ago.
Tonight, I don’t think of what to write. Instead of writing my bad English, let me upload the pictures which I took in September, 2019. I just want to keep the name of the university secret.
I had spent four years to be a Japanese teacher. When I took these photos in 2019, I thought my dream had come true. But at that time, I didn’t know what was coming after the first semester.
For the new second-year students, it is the time to change their major. Some of students leaves Japanese course for other majors at the beginning of new school year. Since most of them are usually good students, knowing a particular student is leaving Japanese major makes me disappointed in some extent.
But I think I should not complain or criticize those students who changed their major. Because, in most of the cases, their experience of learning Japanese for one year will no longer be useful into the future. And they have to study hard in order catch up other classmates in the new major they have moved to. it must be a tough decision to make, I guess.
I wish them a fruitful learning in the new major and a bright future to come with new knowledge. And if they will, it is possible to learn Japanese by themselves.
I bought a new smartphone last month. Before I went to the mobile phone store, I hadn’t known that a google account was necessary for android. So, I had to make another google account in the shop. If I had known this matter, I would have brought ID and password of existing google account of mine. In addition, I installed “LINE” for my mobile phone, which also increased number of Accounts. Now I have so many accounts for emails and SNS. I am not sure if I can handle all of them.
This morning, I found an email in one of my mail boxes. Actually, I haven’t noticed it for several days. I wrote a reply and sent it. If a message comes, I will write a reply. That is okay. But sometimes I also want to send a message from me to my students. In fact, I am not sure they are happy with my message. Some are happy and write a reply to me soon, but some students perhaps are unhappy, think it troublesome, and are reluctant to reply to me. They may feel it difficult to write a reply to a person who is thirty years older than they are. Basically, doing communication is good, but I have to be careful how I communicate with my students; who to send, how often, what to write, and so on.
Some day, most of my students will forget about me. It is okay for me. They will grow up as an adult, and devote to the day-to-day life in new circumstance. As for my side, too, it is impossible to remember all the students I taught. Time flies and memories will be gone. But for now, I think it is not so bad to send messages to my students, while I remember them well. Now I am thinking about writing one message to one student a day. I hope that my message would not be so troublesome for the student.
Rough calculation gives me the following; I taught students of seven grades (in six years). There were about 50 students in a grade. Therefore, approximately I taught 350 students.
I can’t get things in the past back. Most of the memory is just in my head. Some are still vivid, some have disappeared already. But here are some digital photos which I took in September 2019. I just upload them, because I haven’t been outside today due to rain nor took any photos.
Though I hadn’t lived there for three and a half years because of the Pandemic, the rooms were mine for six years. While I was a Japanese company employee, I had moved so many times from city to city with interval of two to three years. So, six years in one place is a long experience in my life.
I think I was privileged because there was an air-conditioner in my bed room. We had many hot days in June and July. But unfortunately, there is no air-conditioner in the rooms of student’s dormitory. I feel sorry about that.
One month has already passed since I left the campus. I think that students are coming back to the campus this week for the fall semester. I had retired, so I am just spending days without doing any preparations for the classes of coming semester.
Anyway, in the last days for me to be there, I walked around and took many photographs in the campus. On July 19, I found one cat lying on the pedestrian road. As I was taking photos of her (him?), she stood up, looked at me, and laid down again.
It is said that a stray cat lives short because of harsh environment of outside. I hope she can live long.
Agony or Fun?! Second Language Learning 