I have been teaching English in Japan now for many, many years. In fact I taught my first lesson with Smith’s School of English back in 1996. In those days I was teaching in Higashi Osaka and these days I teach in Smith’s School of English Kyobashi and Fukushima. After all this time some people may want a change but not me, I love this English teaching life. I have plenty of time with my family, I have time for the sports I love. I want to learn more about teaching English everyday and am constantly surprised by what I learn from Japan, my fellow teachers and my students. It’s all right here!
Yesterday my day started with a little local promotion of Smith’s school in Fukushima. I met a few friends and we did a few flyers then walked around the are doing some letterboxes. We were all wearing Smith’s T Shirts and hats and it felt great to be out there telling people about our schools. I always wear my Smith’s wear and it was Wednesday last week when I was standing out there just looking in an antique stores window and a sprightly young lady of about 65 years of age came up to me and asked where our school was. I offered to walk her over to the school and she accepted. She entered the school upon invitation and sat down as I made her we had a cup of coffee. We chatted about the history of Fukushima area and I learned a great deal. As she got up to leave she said, “I am going to tell my daughter about your school”, I really enjoyed the chat and never really expect much to come of her promise. Fukushima has a fascinating history and it was just great to have the chat.
I have been living in Japan a long time now and so can’t be sure but I think this kind of instant friendship is kind of unique to Japanese / Foreign relationships. Maybe not but either way it is always so refreshing to have such a nice chat so easily.
Partly because of the local promotion we do in the community, partly because of Smith’s websites, I have done a few free demo lessons this last week and as such had the pleasure of teaching a new student last night. I asked a little about herself. You know, all the usual stuff, Where do you live? Hobbies? and then I asked about her family. She said “You know my mum, she drank coffee here”
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