October already...

It's raining very hard outside right now. It's pouring. I wonder when the rain will let up. It has been surprisinigly cold these days and it has rained everyday for the past 3 days? (I miss Shirahama Beach, see below.) The Japanese are surprised too. They keep saying how this summer has been especially hot and that it has become very cold really quickly too. We all blame Global Warming. How fitting that the topic of my Free Writing Class this week with the 3rd years is Global Warming. It is a difficult topic even for native speakers to write about their opinion of the environmental crisis we are facing right now. So I am very proud of them for being able to express their opinions in English.

Speaking about being proud, another wonderful thing happened this week! To update you, for the past month, I've been coaching a student from my Nursing Vocational School with her speech as she entered a Speech Contest. She passed the first round and then went to the National competition in Osaka this past Sunday. I met with her about 6 or 7 times in total to go over her speech, to work on natural intonation, stress, hand gestures and facial expressions. I listened to model tapes, watched the winning speeches from last year on video and recorded the speech in my own voice so she could practice listening to a native speaker. So the good news is that she called me on Sunday night, after the competition, and she won 1st prize! Which is a 3-week trip to Hawaii! Isn't that awesome?!! I am so proud of her. Honestly, when I first started coaching her, I didn't know what to expect. I just thought that it will be difficult to win 1st prize because there are a lot of great contestants from what I saw from the video last year. Their speeches sounded very natural and their pronunciation was almost like a native speaker's. When I first met Yuri, I thought the same about her. Her drive really motivated me to do my best to help her. I don't think I actually did too much to help her. She really did work very hard to improve her speech to make it the most natural as she could. Everytime I would tell her to work on some part of her speech like changing the word stress or sentence stress, the next time I met with her, she had it fixed. So I know she worked very hard and just knowing that she listened to my suggestions made it very easy to coach her. I think the most important lesson I learned from this is that I CAN be a good teacher. This experience has been very rewarding and motivating for me to become a even better teacher. I really want to teach my students something that is useful for their lives. Whether it is for travelling abroad or just helping foreign visitors like me. Because I have met very helpful Japanese strangers so I know this is possible. I admire Yuri-chan because she wants to become a nurse who can speak English, so she can help foreigners like me. This is very important b/c when you get sick in Japan, it's very hard to find a doctor who can speak English. I can testify to that. So it is very encouraging to be able to communicate with a nurse who can speak English. Just to know that everything will be okay. Ganbatte Yuri-chan! I know you can do it! (On a side note: Hawaii! That's so great. Secretly, I wish I could go with her... =P Actually, it's not really a secret...LOL)

So there is so much to update on. I have been doing some travelling in Japan, but only within the Kansai region, which is pretty big actually. Two weeks ago, I went to visit my friend in Osaka, like I said I would in the last post. It took about 3.5 hrs to get there by train. And then we didn't even stay there. Funing and his friends wanted to go to Shirahama in Wakayama Prefecture because they heard that the beach was amazingly beautiful and they wanted to try surfing. So we headed out for another 2 hour train ride to Shirahama. So no surfing, but I must agree, the small town of Shirahama is AMAZINGLY BEAUTIFUL. Some of God's most beautiful nature is there. The water was a bit cold because it was the end of summer. Actually that was the weekend of the Autumnal Equinox holiday. I was so glad that Funing convinced me to go to Shirahama. I had an amazing time with them! I wanted to see the kawaii pandas at Adventure World zoo, but we didn't get a chance... Maybe next summer? And I would like to try wind surfing! It looks like a lot of fun! I took a Nenkyu day (paid vacation day) b/c I had no classes on Tuesday so I thought I would stay in Osaka for one more day to explore. So I went to Namba and the famous street called Ebisubashi with all the shopping. Then I realized, hey!, I've been here before! LOL Osaka was one of the stops on the 5-day tour of Japan we took from HK in the summer around June. But I forgot the name. So I knew my way around (sort of). Osaka was just as crowded and lively as before. It's nice for awhile, but the feel of my small city. When I came back that night, I was walking around my city at night and just enjoying the quietness and the nature around. If I want to visit a big city, I could always go to Sakae in Nagoya right? ^__~ Anyways, it's hard to remember some things when you post about past events. I'll try to post more often and shorter.

So next weekend is Thanksgiving in Canada. And I'm starting to miss home when I think about how I'm going to miss Yee Cheung's turkey, Yee Ma's homemade gravy and chinese food, Grandma's spring rolls, Richard's mashed potatoes and of course, Mimi's delicious desserts. This makes me sad, but I know that you guys are still thinking about me and that makes me smile =) I have my own long weekend holiday here in Japan! It is called "Health and Sports Day". I am going to Nara Prefecture for the JCF Fall Retreat! I hope I get to see the famous Shika (tame deer) there! (*wink wink* for Jason ^__^) So I hope everyone enjoys their thanksgiving weekend with their family any way you celebrate it because we ALL have much to be thankful for, right? I will have many stories to tell once I come back! Take care!