Wednesday, December 13, 2006
Mmm... food...
I am basking in repletion as I sit a my computer, because I just got back from an absolutely delicious dinner. One of the girls upstairs, Kathryn, is moving back home at the end of the month, so she's passing on her private students to me. They are two absolutely lovely women who just want someone to speak English with once a week, and they're willing to pay me a good salary, and buy me a very nice dinner to boot. They own a cram school, so I'll also be teaching one class a month at the school. I have to prepare a lesson, but for a two-hour class they'll pay me about $70, so I'm certainly not complaining!
Technically Nova teachers aren't supposed to moonlight, but I think those rules are just on the books to keep teachers from stealing students away from Nova schools. Everyone I know that's been here more than four months has a private student or two, and they all openly talk about them at work. I was very startled the first time my boss said, "Well, I have to run out in a hurry now. My private students are waiting." I'm told as long as a student doesn't tell Nova they're quitting for private lessons with me, I'll be fine.
Apparently that's quite the thing to do: work part-time for Nova and part-time as a freelance tutor. It's hard to find enough students to freelance full-time, but the private students pay MUCH more than Nova does, so everyone tries to set it up so they do half-and-half. That's the nice thing about Nova: they don't pay much, relative to other schools, but the work load isn't heavy at all, so I have plenty of time to take up outside work.
I love Japan: the land where I can get paid in excess of $70 just to sit and chat with people for a couple of hours. I am going to be the QUEEN of chitchat by the time I come home.
As I said, Kathryn's leaving. Darren, who lives down the hall, left today. My two roommates haven't really settled into the community here, and they're already talking about leaving in February or March and moving to England together. One thing that kinda sucks about working for Nova is that you cycle through an entirely new set of friends about three times a year. The minute you get to know someone here, they move back home. Which is why it's important to get involved in the Japanese community, I guess, or else you get stuck perpetuating the vicious cycle: you end up moving home yourself because you're sick of not having any good friends, which makes others want to move home too, etc...
Things are starting to get a little strained between me and my roommates. I don't think Sara likes me very much. She has parties all the time, and doesn't invite me. I didn't even know until after the fact that she'd had a birthday party a few weeks ago. I guess we don't really have anything in common, because she's a bit of a party girl and the highlight of my week is Bible study.
But I am getting a little sick of her friends always hanging out at our house. I mean, it's one thing to have a couple of friends over for dinner, and quite another entirely to stay up drinking and shouting until 3 or 4 in the morning. Sometimes they'll do that twice a week! Last week they had a bunch of people over and were banging around in the kitchen at 3:30, and I had to work at 10 the next morning. I've asked Leslie twice to kick people out at a decent time, but to no avail. I'm not really sure what I should do in this situation, because it's not like in college where I can ask the RA to speak to them. There are no rules on the lease against having parties, and all the rooms around us are either full of Nova teachers or empty, so unfortunately none of the neighbors will call the police and make them quiet down.
I guess the only option is to try asking them again to not to have people over. If that doesn't work, all I can do is ask Nova to reassign me, or move out into a private apartment. That's only a last resort, though. I really like this apartment--it's MUCH nicer than some of the other Nova accomodations--and it's wonderful only being one train stop away from work. When I'm alone with either Sara or Leslie, they're perfectly nice girls. I just like being able to get to sleep at a decent hour, especially if I have to work the next day.
Miyoko lent me a book last week that attempts to prove that the ancient Chinese were familiar with the story of Genesis. It's really an interesting theory, although I think sometimes the author stretches the parallels past the point of credulity. The theory goes something like this: the religions we think of as 'Chinese' -- Buddhism, Taoism, Confucianism, etc. -- are actually fairly recent innovations, at least in Chinese terms. 2500 years ago the Chinese were actually monotheists, and they believed a religion that was startlingly similar to Judaism. Most of what we know about the religion we know by studying Chinese characters, which pre-date Buddhism and other Eastern religions, and thus provide clues about what the Chinese originally believed.
So the author takes apart the Chinese characters and breaks them down into their constituent parts, or 'radicals.' All the radicals, combined together, tell a story that add up to a single word or character. The character for 'tempt,' for example, is made up of the radicals for 'devil,' 'cover,' and two 'trees.' Thus
tempt = devil under two trees
Likewise, the character for 'create' is made up of the radicals 'living,' 'breathing,' 'walking,' 'dust,' and 'man.' Thus
create = man is living, breathing, walking dust
The character for 'boat' is made of the radicals for 'vessel,' 'eight,' and 'people.'
boat = a vessel with eight people on it
And there were eight people on Noah's arc. And so on. He analyzes several dozen characters, attempting to prove that the ancient Chinese believed something very similar to the book of Genesis. Like I said, I think he has a strong case with some of the characters, especially 'tempt' and 'create,' but other arguments are a little weak. And even if he establishes that the Chinese knew the story of Genesis and based some of their characters off of it, that only proves that they had contact with the ancient Hebrews through trade on the Silk Road, not that there is a clean line of descent from the diaspora at the Tower of Babel all the way to ancient Chinese monotheism. But I think it can definitely be argued that at least some of the ancient Chinese knew and made reference to stories from Genesis in their daily lives.
What do you think?
|
Technically Nova teachers aren't supposed to moonlight, but I think those rules are just on the books to keep teachers from stealing students away from Nova schools. Everyone I know that's been here more than four months has a private student or two, and they all openly talk about them at work. I was very startled the first time my boss said, "Well, I have to run out in a hurry now. My private students are waiting." I'm told as long as a student doesn't tell Nova they're quitting for private lessons with me, I'll be fine.
Apparently that's quite the thing to do: work part-time for Nova and part-time as a freelance tutor. It's hard to find enough students to freelance full-time, but the private students pay MUCH more than Nova does, so everyone tries to set it up so they do half-and-half. That's the nice thing about Nova: they don't pay much, relative to other schools, but the work load isn't heavy at all, so I have plenty of time to take up outside work.
I love Japan: the land where I can get paid in excess of $70 just to sit and chat with people for a couple of hours. I am going to be the QUEEN of chitchat by the time I come home.
As I said, Kathryn's leaving. Darren, who lives down the hall, left today. My two roommates haven't really settled into the community here, and they're already talking about leaving in February or March and moving to England together. One thing that kinda sucks about working for Nova is that you cycle through an entirely new set of friends about three times a year. The minute you get to know someone here, they move back home. Which is why it's important to get involved in the Japanese community, I guess, or else you get stuck perpetuating the vicious cycle: you end up moving home yourself because you're sick of not having any good friends, which makes others want to move home too, etc...
Things are starting to get a little strained between me and my roommates. I don't think Sara likes me very much. She has parties all the time, and doesn't invite me. I didn't even know until after the fact that she'd had a birthday party a few weeks ago. I guess we don't really have anything in common, because she's a bit of a party girl and the highlight of my week is Bible study.
But I am getting a little sick of her friends always hanging out at our house. I mean, it's one thing to have a couple of friends over for dinner, and quite another entirely to stay up drinking and shouting until 3 or 4 in the morning. Sometimes they'll do that twice a week! Last week they had a bunch of people over and were banging around in the kitchen at 3:30, and I had to work at 10 the next morning. I've asked Leslie twice to kick people out at a decent time, but to no avail. I'm not really sure what I should do in this situation, because it's not like in college where I can ask the RA to speak to them. There are no rules on the lease against having parties, and all the rooms around us are either full of Nova teachers or empty, so unfortunately none of the neighbors will call the police and make them quiet down.
I guess the only option is to try asking them again to not to have people over. If that doesn't work, all I can do is ask Nova to reassign me, or move out into a private apartment. That's only a last resort, though. I really like this apartment--it's MUCH nicer than some of the other Nova accomodations--and it's wonderful only being one train stop away from work. When I'm alone with either Sara or Leslie, they're perfectly nice girls. I just like being able to get to sleep at a decent hour, especially if I have to work the next day.
Miyoko lent me a book last week that attempts to prove that the ancient Chinese were familiar with the story of Genesis. It's really an interesting theory, although I think sometimes the author stretches the parallels past the point of credulity. The theory goes something like this: the religions we think of as 'Chinese' -- Buddhism, Taoism, Confucianism, etc. -- are actually fairly recent innovations, at least in Chinese terms. 2500 years ago the Chinese were actually monotheists, and they believed a religion that was startlingly similar to Judaism. Most of what we know about the religion we know by studying Chinese characters, which pre-date Buddhism and other Eastern religions, and thus provide clues about what the Chinese originally believed.
So the author takes apart the Chinese characters and breaks them down into their constituent parts, or 'radicals.' All the radicals, combined together, tell a story that add up to a single word or character. The character for 'tempt,' for example, is made up of the radicals for 'devil,' 'cover,' and two 'trees.' Thus
tempt = devil under two trees
Likewise, the character for 'create' is made up of the radicals 'living,' 'breathing,' 'walking,' 'dust,' and 'man.' Thus
create = man is living, breathing, walking dust
The character for 'boat' is made of the radicals for 'vessel,' 'eight,' and 'people.'
boat = a vessel with eight people on it
And there were eight people on Noah's arc. And so on. He analyzes several dozen characters, attempting to prove that the ancient Chinese believed something very similar to the book of Genesis. Like I said, I think he has a strong case with some of the characters, especially 'tempt' and 'create,' but other arguments are a little weak. And even if he establishes that the Chinese knew the story of Genesis and based some of their characters off of it, that only proves that they had contact with the ancient Hebrews through trade on the Silk Road, not that there is a clean line of descent from the diaspora at the Tower of Babel all the way to ancient Chinese monotheism. But I think it can definitely be argued that at least some of the ancient Chinese knew and made reference to stories from Genesis in their daily lives.
What do you think?
|
