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Sorry about that. That is something that happens a lot here in Japan. I am sitting there blissfully unaware that something is about to happen, and get caught out. Yesterday, I didn't know the furniture in the staff room was scheduled to be moved until someone came along and unplugged the notebook I was writing the last post on. I looked up and saw that everyone was making preparations to move the desks, and one desk was already pulled out into the middle of the room. I had to quickly quit blogging so I could help.

Anyway. It is Spring vacation at the moment. I thought that there would be no kids at school because it is, well, the holidays. But they are all here. They are all members of clubs, and almost all of the clubs are practicing for about three hours every day. I thought I would have space to practice the dance for the yosakoi dance club I am a member of, but at any one time the sports gym and both sides of the field are in use by (in rotation) the soccer team, the baseball team, the volleyball team, the softball team, the judo club and the kendo club. I found a little space in a corner behind the gym to practice in yesterday, but it was embarrassing because the volleyball girls were hanging out the gym windows yelling "Berry Gooodo!" at me, and Yama-chan the Kendo club captain kept passing me as he ran circuits around the school building.

Last week I spent a lot of time reading books. I probably should have spent more time studying, because I had a Japanese test due to be sent to Tokyo today. I have spent all of today up until now (minus an hour when I went to lunch with Hiroko-sensei the Japanese teacher) finishing that test. I ran down to the post box a short while ago. Mission complete!

Last friday we had a party for the three teachers who will be leaving at the end of this week to go to other schools. Two of the teachers I did not really know. One of them was a student teacher who was only at school for three half days a week, so I hardly ever saw him. The other was one of the maths teachers, a reclusive anti-social fellow that no one really knew although he had been working at the school for three years. The other person who will be leaving is the school nurse, and I will be sorry to see her go. Yumi-sensei is a very kind, eternally happy and energetic woman who has helped me out a lot while I have been here. No one wants her to go, and she does not want to go either. She has spent the last week or so crying at the drop of a hat. Poor thing.

Last friday morning I went to see the new school I will be visiting. Because my town merged with two others late last year, from April I will be taking over a school from another ALT. I will be going to the new school once a week. It is called Kamagadai Shochugakkou. It is a combined Elementary/Jr. High School that has 35 pupils all up. There are 9 Jr. High kids, one 1st grader, seven 2nd graders and one 3rd grader. The reason there are so few pupils is that Kamagadai is way up in the mountains attached to the north slope of Mount Chokai. It is not a very hospitable place. I mean, it's spring here now, but up in Kamagadai there was still far more snow than we had down here by the ocean even in the middle of winter. I saw two cars abandoned in the middle of a field, and the snow was up to their windows. Kamagadai will be a good place to visit in summer, but apparently in winter there is three metres of snow. Despite this, I am looking forward to visiting the new school. I will be able to work closer with the students. Also, as I discovered on Friday, the view from the road up the mountain is divine. I was able to look down on Konoura, Nikaho and the ocean and see them rather like they would be seen from a plane because the mountains pretty much go straight up, almost like a huge cliff (that's a wee bit of an exaggeration, by the way).

I did nothing on the weekend but play Playstation. Just thought I would record that.

From next week there will be new students at the Jr. High and the Elementary, but of course to me they are not new students because I taught them all at the Elementary and the Kindergarten respectively. My desk has been moved over to the 1st grader group which, since Hiroko-sensei has become the dean of 1st graders this year, means I will get to work with her like I did in my first year. This is a good thing, because she is the teacher who invites me to do things, such as eat lunch in the classrooms rather than in the staff room, which the teachers I have been working with for the past year never did. (I can't just go and eat in a classroom whenever I want to, because extra food and an extra seat have to be sorted out before hand).

I was also happy to discover that my new desk position has me facing away from the windows, meaning I don't have to be bothered by afternoon sunlight shining right into my eyes anymore.

Today workers are installing an air conditioning system in the staff room, so we are not allowed in there. This has resulted in all the teachers moving their stuff to various parts of the school. Two teachers have apparently moved all their belongings into the computer room. It looks as if they want to stay here for good. I mean, how much stuff do you need to use in one day? They don't need to teach. One of them is reading a newspaper at the moment. Surely he does not need a stack of folders and several boxes of stationery in order to do that? The other computer-room teacher has brought a filled book shelf with him. Other teachers have taken with them just their notebook computers and a folder or two. Togashi-sensei the English teacher does not use a notebook but a desktop computer, so he has hauled his whole computer into the councillor's office (which is currently vacant because our councillor retired last year and was not replaced). All the tea-making supplies are in that room too. There are all sorts of stacks and boxes of teacers' belongs lying about in the strangest places, too. It amazes me. One of the more amusing finds of the day for me was the photocopier in a stairwell and the school principal standing there photocopying all sorts of stuff. In the stairwell? We have empty rooms, plenty of them. I can't fathom it.