cute student/earthquake

Eiko says...

Was it this morning? It doesn't matter. I was woken up, AGAIN, by one of those big earthquakes. The creaking walls, the windows shaking, falling books thudding, and picture frames banging against the walls of my rooms is enough noise to wake anybody out of deep slumber, and I am no exception! No worries. It was time to roll out of bed anyway, so I didn't mind being woken up so much. Never mind the fact that the time I actually got out of bed was 2 hours after that.
This one was a real biggie. A level 4 in Tokyo. Man, do they keep coming or what?

Just the day before at work, an earthquake hit, and despite the fact that it was only a level 3 in Tokyo, train lines were suspended, and two of my colleagues had to do a bit of walking to get back home. Unfortunately for them, it was pouring rain and there was a cold wing blowing--not the weather of choice to make a long night walk in, if you'd ask me. But at least they made it home, right? There's really no complaining when you think about all the people who are still stuck up North in bad-living conditions at the Evacuation centers, separated from loved-ones, homes, and stability.

Now, continuing on the subject of train lines, if there's an earthquake, and there are train line issues, there is no question at all that the Nippori-Toneri Line is out. I really wouldn't care less about this crappy, far-too-expensive-train-line if it wasn't the key to my getting home without having to walk for hours, or wait for an unreliable bus ride. Luckily, this time around, the line was only suspended for a few hours, and I was able to make it back home before midnight.

Why am I blogging about Earthquakes again?

I've got a crazy English student I wanna tell you about!

So, I have this English student that comes for classes every Monday. She's a cute 9 year old that has the memory of a senile grandma!! A.K.A, she doesn't have much for a memory! I'm not just talking about her not remembering what we learned in our previous week's English lesson. I'm talking about...

Me: Okay, sweetie. What did you have for lunch today?
Student:　アレ、何食べたんだっけ。ご飯と納豆だったと思う。
Me: Cool. So, you had rice and natto for lunch.
Student: うん。ライス・アンド・ナットウ
Me: Great. In English, we say, "I had rice and natto for lunch." Can you repeat that?
Student: アイ・ハッド...あれ？何食べたんだっけ？忘れた。
Me: Huh? You forgot what you ate for lunch? You just told me what you had for lunch 30 seconds ago!!
Student: ハッ？先生が言っていること全然わからない。
Me: Sorry. さっきお昼何食べたか先生に言わなかった？
Student:　うん。思い出せない。
Me: Natto and rice by any chance?
Student:　ソーダッタ！
Me: Yeah. Okay. Breakfast. What did you eat for breakfast?
Student: ”Breakfast"　何だったっけ？
Me:　朝ご飯何食べた？
Student:　何だったっけー。何食べたか思い出せない！お姉さんに電話しようかな。
Me： Are you serious? (I raise both eyebrows.)
Student：ハッ？
Me: Never mind. Okay, so...remember I taught you how to say 地震 in English? We just did that a minute ago. 覚えてる？
Student：　ノー。
Me: Why am I not surprised by that answer?
Student: ハッ？

*I hear a chuckle coming from the other side of the partition. A colleague finds my frustration highly amusing.*

Me: Yeah, shut up. You wanna teach her?
Colleague: Aren't you happy she doesn't know what you just said? Heh, heh.
Me: Yes! No! ARGggghhh!

And this is about EVERYTHING! I tell her how to say a phrase, and she forgets after she repeats it to you fine once. She tells me about something that she learned at school and she forgets what that was when you ask her about a minute later. She is seriously a big question mark to me. She also doesn't care for the word 'punctuality'. We're making progress on that one though. One day, she accidentally showed up 10 minutes early. She showed up at 5:20. Apparently, she thought that class was suppose to start from 5:00 instead of 5:30 which means, if class really was from 5:00, she would have been 20min late. It didn't matter! I was so shocked and pleased at her being early for class that we celebrated this with a few rounds of card games. She liked that. She's always been on the dot since! Unfortunately, her memory is hopeless. I gave up many classes ago when she had difficulty remember what her sister looked like. No joke.

The thing that I love about her though, is that she has the most disarming, guilty face! Each time she forgets something--a frequent occurrence--she has this 'guilty' look face that I simply can't hate! I still have disbelief and annoyance written all over my face when this happens but it's just SO DAMN CUTE! Annoying though. I teach her something which she forgets moments after, and she makes me smile with that 'look' of hers. It's a mixture of disbelief and adoration. I'm left with sheer frustration. Her smile wins out each time. I'll make a horrible mother!!