When I headed off to teach in Japan, I hadn’t had much training. As we were teaching assistants, it never really fell to use to manage a classroom for long periods of time. As long as we were effective and tried hard, we tended to get pretty good results and the classrooms in general were pretty well behaved.

Now obviously, I don’t know the stresses of running a homeroom class. Not only teaching those kids, but dealing with things like bullying, applying to university, their parents and so on. That must be quite a tiring job if you’re looking after 40 of the little monsters. But even if they got really out of hand, you probably wouldn’t end up doing something like this;

A schoolboy and his parents have filed a lawsuit seeking 10 million yen in damages for emotional distress after a teacher announced him as the most disliked person in his class, based on a survey, it was learned Saturday.

The boy attends a junior high school in Chiba. In April 2005, when he was in his fourth year of elementary school, the teacher in charge of his class at the time made the students list up the names of classmates they liked and disliked.

Now stop me if I’m wrong, but I don’t think that’s very effective teaching. Generally most teachers run surveys like “What do you like about the cafeteria?” or something, but “Which kid should we all dislike?” probably won’t promote classroom harmony. According to the article the kid went on to get bullied and ended up changing school. I hope he gets the money, and I hope the teacher loses their job. Maybe I’ll start my own questionnaire and send it to that homeroom class. “Who thought that was a dumb idea?” Perhaps.

I looked all over the net but sadly I couldn’t seem to come across a copy of the questionnaire itself, which is a shame. So instead here’s my interpretation of how it may have read.

Dear Students;

Hello there! It’s your teacher Dr. Bizarro here. As I’m sure you’re aware, surveys are very important here in school. I’d like to thank you all for your responses to ‘Should we put laxatives in 1 in every 20 school meals?’ and ‘Who likes low hanging unprotected electric wires?’.

So many great changes have happened because of our surveys; as you know the second floor cafeteria now has hundreds of bees’ nests in it, and everyone over on the 5th floor tell me they really like how we covered the walls in extra strong adhesive glue! So to further improve your school life, we’re running a new survey. Please fill it in and hand it to me by 3pm!

Your Name:
Your Class:

1. Who, in your homeroom class, do you dislike the most? _______________

2. If the student voted least popular in question number one left the school and tried to sue us, do you think they would win the lawsuit? [YES / NO]

3. We’re thinking of welcoming new students into the school by savagely beating them on their first day. Do you think this would help them fit into their new school? [YES / NO]

4. Who likes searing heat on a daily basis? I know I do! Please select if you would like us to channel hot lava around the basement floor of the school. [YES / NO]

5. Our school uniform is very well liked by students and we seek to make it better. You know what would be better? Clogs. Do you want clogs? [YES / NO]

6. The school anthem is a little dull, isn’t it? So instead of singing songs, how would you like to have to rip out chunks of your hair whilst screaming at your parents? [YES / NO]

7. The cafeteria food is being changed from next month. Please select the type of food you would most like eating. [SEWAGE / SPIDERS / THE OLD SCHOOL UNIFORMS, BOILED]

Thanks for filling in the questionnaire! I’ll be sure to tally up the results as soon as possible, and let you know by writing the results on a student’s forehead! Don’t forget to bully them!

Thanks,

Dr. Bizarro

Those poor kids.

Good old Japan Probe did an article recently about Japanese Salaries, and how much various professions make. Now whilst I’m all for enjoying your job over getting money, I thought it had quite a few interesting entries I wasn’t expecting. Note that the way the team behind it got the data was pretty rubbish - they asked one person from each profession. But poor data has never stopped me before! I’ve only kept the interesting ones, the rest are available on Japan Probe’s article. All pay is in USD so everyone sort of knows how much it is.

New TV “talent” $9,000
Surprisingly low, really. I suppose by talent they might mean people who appear on game show programs and have to try eating horse ears or something.

Stuntman $20,000
Again, another surprise. This is possibly the most dangerous job on the list and yet it’s not very well paid. To be honest, I think I’d rather do the next job on the list for double the pay…

Ice cream salesperson $40,000
It’s not enough! Ice Cream is on of the most important products in the world! It’s part of a balanced healthy diet! (Carbohydrate, Protein, Sugars, Starch and Choc Chip).

Portrait artist $50,000
Probably not the ones who sit along beach piers and boast of their hilarious ability to make you look weird.

Creator of food samples $70,000
What an awesome job. It’s not clear, but I assume it’s the people who produce the plastic food that sit outside restaurants and so forth. I think they deserve the money, those little plastic bowls of Ramen look delicious

Takoyaki shop owner $100,000
They deserve triple what they make simply because Takoyaki is the best food ever. Much better than Ramen. Wait, hang on…

Ramen store owner $300,000
Boo! Although if you can get Takoyaki at the store then that changes everything. Someone should invent TakoRamen. Maybe I should.

Manga creator $500,000
Good grief, I was expecting them to make a 10th of this. I assume this guy probably makes the Pokemon manga or something, because if everyone who draws those things make this much I’m going to drop out now and start writing Japan Is Doomed: Cute Animals And Fighting Ninjas 5000.

So then, if you make Manga you will earn twenty five times as much as a stuntman. That’s just not right, and for that reason, where is “Junten Volunteer”? Probably not in the top 40,000. Oh well, one day…

Swallowtail Butterfly is the third Japanese film I’ve watched for my East Asian Cinema module. (The first being Rashomon, the second being Tampopo). I think of all the films I’ve seen now (around 10), this one was my favourite one so far, so I thought I’d review it here.

I am going to be writing an essay about the role of foreigners in this film. If you’re reading this and you are a student at Sheffield doing the same essay, don’t you even think of stealing these ideas! I’ll know!

The film was made in 1996 and was directed by Shunji Iwai, who also made All About Lily Chou-Chou and Love Letter (US: When I Close My Eyes) amongst other classics. He’s a pretty famous director in Japan, and his films usually do very well in Japan, both with critics and financially. Swallowtail Butterfly grossed 2 billion yen, which is a pretty significant amount.

The film starts off with a short narrative which I think sums the whole film up quite nicely, so I’ve posted it here;

“Once upon a time, when the yen was the most powerful force in the world, the city overflowed with immigrants, like a gold rush boom town. They came in search of yen, snatching up yen. And the immigrants called the city Yentown. But the Japanese hated that name. So they referred to those yen thieves as Yentowns. It’s a bit puzzling, but “Yentown” meant both the city and the outcasts. If they worked hard, earned a pocketful of yen, and returned home, they were rich men. It sounds like a fairy tale, but it was a paradise of yen, “Yentown”. And this is the story of Yentowns in Yentown.”

It should be noted this isn’t true but it does allow Iwai to create this amazing “Yentown” sub-culture, made up of immigrants who have come to Japan. This gives Iwai free reign to shape his creation in any way he wants, whilst still making clear and relevant links to the real state of Japan. He’s pretty ruthless, too. The majority of the Japanese in the film are either clumsy and dim-witted, or incredibly ruthless and effective businessmen who can’t wait to shank you for a quick Yen.

The film’s heroine, Ageha, is an orphaned girl of Chinese descent, who’s upbringing leaves her speaking only Japanese and English. She becomes part of a ragtag bunch of outcasts, all working together to make a living. Glico, another part of the team, becomes a famous singer and as a result has to “become as Japanese as you (her bosses) want!” Everyone here has no official identity - they are outcasts pushed aside by society, yet their deeply developed characters make them a lot more realistic and like-able than their Japanese counterparts.

This film is quite slow paced, but not boring, I promise. There’s plenty of action and some pretty brutal violence, some of which is intentionally over the top to give certain characters a more surprising or unrealistic edge, all the whilst being framed in the gritty realistic Yentown setting.

This film, then, is awesome. It really is. There’s not really a weak character to let the team down, the directing is excellent and the plot, with it’s underlying themes of homogeneity and the need to diversify, are well developed. If I had to make one small gripe, it would be that this film was created entirely on hand cams, and as a result the image quality is sometimes irritatingly poor. But I think in a way that adds to the ‘dirty’ Yentown image. You certantly find yourself siding with the underdogs, and whilst this isn’t a family film it does carry a heartwarming message.

Go see this film, and stick with it. It starts off pretty good, and believe me, it just gets better and better.

This entire post is based on things I’ve heard from current 2nd years, been told by various lecturers or read on my university email. I wanted to talk about it as it will give you guys an idea of what we can specialise in, and what I’m going to be waffling on about for the next year!

There are three mandatory modules I take next year. Two of them are core language modules, Japanese Language III (Autumn) and Japanese Language IV (Spring). The other one is similar to last semester’s Understanding Japan module. It’s called Contempary Japanese Society (Spring) and apparently prepares us for our year abroad. Exciting stuff.

What I’m more excited about are the optional modules I’ve chosen. The first, Postwar Japanese Politics, I chose partially because I enjoy writing about politics on this blog, and mainly because although I’ve never had an interest in politics, I think it might be beneficial to have one for the future. Plus, this way I can write even more stupid updates about building underwater trains or whatever.

The second is Japan’s Minorities, an interesting course considering until not long ago the Japanese government issued statements that there are no minorities in Japan. We do in-depth study on Koreans, Ainu and Burakumin amongst others. I really can’t express how excited I am about this module! Who knows, I may even be able to find a little humour somewhere and do an update someday.

I’ve saved the most interesting module for last - Understanding Japan Through Contemporary Texts. The idea is by translating novels, newspapers, journals and blogs, we can learn more about contemporary opinions and so forth. Rumour has it I may even have to swallow my pride and get my nerd hat on, as we will be translating a manga, too.

So there you go. A short and pretty boring update about my course. Why did I post this? Well, if anyone has any interest in how UK university works, or Japanese courses, or if anyone is thinking of coming to Sheffield, they can read this and all their deepest, darkest desires will be fulfilled

If on the other hand you found this boring, normal service resumes soon. See you then.