Rugby

On May 29th, 30th and 31st I went to Tokushima prefecture to participate in a touch rugby tournament. I almost backed out of the tournament because I was running very low on cash due to my trip to India and the 22,000 yen price tag was a bit high to play a game I had completely no experience playing. It turned out I was already confirmed, which I didn't think I was, so I basically had no choice but to pay the fee and compete. I was more or less looking forward to finally landing on the Japanese island of Shikoku which would complete one of my goals of going to the 4 main large islands of Japan.

The name of our team was the Biwako Basselopes. Biwako is the lake in Shiga, and the largest in Japan. A Basselope is some kind of fictional animal, that I think we created, which is a cross between a bass and a antelope. Utterly ridiculous, and perfectly perfect!


Biwako Basselopes' cheer.

Overall the games were pretty good. And although I was on the B team, considered to be less skilled than our A team, we won more matches! Overall we won 2, lost 2, and tied our last game. Not bad considering many of our players have never played rugby before. I am not a real good competitive team sports player. I guess I just never have my "head in the game." I usually think people care too much about something that means absolutely nothing. I mean there is very little risk in your own life. I guess I just am not one for fame and so the idea of glory in this case means little to me. People pretend they are at war. Thankfully, my team mates seemed to have the idea of fun a couple of notches above demolition.


Everyone wants white lemons.


Forming defense.

In the end, meeting people from all around Japan was what I enjoyed the best. I met some really great people with all kinds of interests, and hopefully made some friends along the way. Even if great distances separate us in the future.


New friend from Seattle, WA.

It's elementary

Back in Japan with no more personal holidays, it's time for a JET rant. I was welcomed back to India with a new internet filter, which makes it impossible to check email, facebook, online banking, student loan websites and even my own blog. Basically anything that would be interesting or personal for me to do in my down time is impossible. Even some work related websites are inaccessible. But I was mainly thinking about how my long days at work with very little to do would be even longer if all I could read was wikipedia. However, since I have been back from India I have been extremely busy.

My schedule has been full with my normal classes and special education classes. I also have been doing many elementary school visits. Usually I like going to elementary schools. I do more "teaching" than I normally do in junior high school where I normally just read and repeat. The days usually go by quicker, but they are much more high energy. However the new fifth graders, who I did not teach last year, are high voltage.

Overall they aren't bad. But the bad ones are extra loud and rude. Of course it only seems to be the boys. They like to shout out English words such as, "sex, penis, dick, etc.," in the middle of class. Or when practicing pronunciation, just shout out incoherent words as loud as they can. But this isn't the icing on the cake. The lack of respect shown towards me by saying things such as, "Oh big, penis big?" Followed by a grab to answer their question is a little over the top.

Somehow this is the characteristics of almost all the 5th year classes I teach. I teach multiple classes in five different elementary schools. Seriously, I wonder where this particular generation picked up their dirty English and bad manners. It isn't like they are good at English because they still don't know how to answer, "How's the weather today?" Needless to say, trying to teach a class with disruptive and rude students that you are unable to kick out, because in Japan it is actually against the law to remove a child from a classroom because they would not receive 'education'" is very draining. Teaching five of these classes at two different schools in one day is almost enough to make me go home and down a bottle of vodka.

I think the idea of keeping disruptive students in the classroom so they have an equal opportunity to learn is bullshit. One, give them an education in manners. If they can't behave they they should be punished, instead of allowed to rule over the classroom and create an environment counteractive to learning. I think allowing a student to continue to disrupt a class is the wrong kind of educating. It lets them know they are safe to misbehave, as long as they are in a classroom. Pretty pointless.

Granted, I wish I could make my lessons more interesting. But I am told just to show up and follow the plan the school has already decided. When I ask, do you have materials such as cards, etc. the answer is "yes," and I go in thinking I will not be supplying anything else besides my presence. Then I find the only materials I have are a chalk board, chalk, and my presence. Great! The teacher doesn't have any idea either. So an hour of relay games, key word games and anything else that only an imagination and a poorly prepared teacher can do. Thankfully this only seems to happen at 2 out of my 5 elementary schools.

I was surprised at one of my tiny mountain elementary school visits though. The principle comes up to me, and speaks to me in fluent English. I find out he has lived in Kenya for the last 3 years. Very interesting! Especially since this is the second Japanese person I have met within the last 4 days who has been to Kenya. Not to mention, this guy looked like maybe he was half Kenyan, or maybe it was just his African English accent. It is also great to speak to Japanese people with some perspective outside of their secluded cultural bubble once and a while. Unfortunately, since his English was actually good, when he decided to sit through one of these terrible English classes I felt like a complete idiot.

In the end, life still keeps moving forward until the end.

India

The following entries about India have been posted backwards, so that they could be read in some sort of chronological order. Since the blog posts the latest entry first, I posted the first entry last. Chronologically my trip to India should be read from "The Path" to "Hindsight."

The Path

India, a vast country situated in South Asia is home to over 1 billion people. Its culture has reached far beyond its borders by influencing the rest of Asia with Buddhism in one way or another. For 10 days I walked upon Indian soil, and saw what very few visitors to India ever experience.


Indian street

The long 12 hour flight via Beijing, China wasn’t enough to get me to where I was going. After arriving in Delhi at around 1AM, it was time for currency and cultural conversion. Sitting on a bus with five armed guards transferring from the international terminal to domestic was my first experience outside of the Delhi International Airport gates. The amount of assault rifle security was stunning, but I guess India has conflicts both domestically and with its bordering countries such as Pakistan.

After waiting for more than 5 hours, and mistakenly and embarrassingly entering the female security checkpoint. We boarded our 2 hour Spice Jet flight to Hyderabad, the capital of Andhra Pradesh, an Indian state in south India. Here we met up with the rest of the volunteers, making us a total of eighteen and also met our Indian contact working with the Association of Relief Volunteers, Ravi Kumar. From Hyderabad it was another 8 hour bus ride to the town of Gudivada where our “hotel” was. The hotel was definitely not luxury; however it did have air conditioning which can make almost any place in India an oasis. After nearly 2 days of airplanes, airports and buses, I was happy to crash on my stained sheets.


Hotel Air Conditioner

The Village

The next morning I was awaken at about 5AM by an Islamic prayer piped through speakers by the mosque next door. Surprisingly India isn’t very Buddhist, especially in the south. Most people are Hindu and after that a small percentage practice Islam and Christianity. I decided I better get a little more sleep before I was required to wake up and head to the village at 7AM. The village, Chevuru, as about 30 minutes by bus from Gudivada.

Upon arrival we were greeted by the villagers dancing and playing drums in clothes reserved for a special occasion. We were then paraded through the street of the village and greeted by many of the children asking us our names. Since we were only the second group of volunteers, and the largest ever, to come to the village, it was a bit event.


Welcome party

After our welcome party, it was time for breakfast. Indian bananas, curry, bread and yogurt that tasted like cottage cheese. The curry in south India is like nothing I have ever tried before. Since most Indian restaurants in foreign countries serve the curries of northern India, it was definitely a new culinary experience. Not to mention, this is the food that many Indians eat every day in rural and poor India. Curry 3 times a day.


Average breakfast, lunch and dinner.

After breakfast it was time for work. We were brought down to the incomplete cement houses and told the basics of what we were to do. Basically skilled labor was left to the masons and our job was to get the materials to them. This meant forming an assembly line and passing large bowls of cement from the ground to the roof. Working in the hot Indian sun side by side with volunteers and villagers and seeing the houses take shape before my eyes was a satisfying experience. It was a welcome change since I am accustomed to sitting at my desk and not really see the fruits of my work.

A few hours later it was time for lunch. Most of us were exhausted, not because of the manual labor but because of the 40 degree (105 Fahrenheit) temperatures. Lunch consisted of breakfast. All the volunteers were surprised that they could drink cups full of Chai since it was a hot drink on a hot day. Actually due to the lack of refrigeration, we never really got a cold drink. After lunch we had a 2 – 3 hour break. This was good, since it was usually the hottest part of the day.


Hanging with the village boys.

The evening consisted of more work and playing with the children. Which was then followed by dinner, which consisted of breakfast and lunch. Most days seemed like repeats of the first.

The Villagers

The most important part of a village are the people that live there. The villagers of Gudivada are known as Dalits. In the Indian caste system, Dalits are the lowest of the low, the poorest of the poor, and dirtier than dirt. It is because of this that many Dalits turn to other religions outside of Hinduism, which embrace equality over caste. For this reason, many villagers practiced Christianity, although the Hindu gods were never far away.

I never thought that I would meet a boy named Daniel in a small village in India. Turns out Daniel and Dan were pretty popular names among Indian Christians. The nephew of Ravi was named Daniel. Since I was the first foreign Daniel that this Daniel has ever met, we instantly became friends. Not to mention it was easier to remember his name than names such as Hariprasad, which I just nicknamed Harry Potter or something else just as ridiculous. All I really knew about Daniel is he liked to count to 100 while throwing a Frisbee, and just ordered a camera from Singapore. Daniel was not a Dalit, but he lived in the village.


Daniel and Daniel

Speaking of cameras, the children loved them. Actually it was hard to pull out the camera and take pictures without being swarmed by children asking for it or saying, “Just one.” I guess in this sense, I took far fewer pictures than hoped since I just didn’t want to deal with it. In some ways I really wish I brought a bunch of disposable cameras and just let the kids take a bunch of pictures. Who knows what interesting things they would have captured. Although most of the pictures they did take when they borrowed my camera were of goats and their friends just standing without a smile.


Framing the shot

Besides the children, the adults appreciated what we were doing. There was one guy though, that seemed a bit too friendly, to the point where many of the villagers sometimes told him to stay away. He wasn’t part of the same village, and decided to show me his village. In a sort of broken English explanation I could tell he wanted me to take pictures and try to find sponsors and volunteers for his village. It was very uncomfortable, because I really did not know his situation or have the ability to really help him in the way he wanted. I guess it is a good example that you can’t help everyone in the world, but you should help those that you are able to.


Under construction

The Other Village

Our fifth day was our day off. We were allowed to sleep for another hour, and after that checked out the town of Gudivada. Even in a place with around 100,000 people, they saw very few foreigners. People would stare at me like crazy. I even had a man slowly ride his bike next to me, just staring for more than ten minutes. Thankfully, rural India doesn’t seem very hostel. A smile and a handshake later and the stares seemed much less threatening.


Eyes of Gudivada.


Stores of Gudivada.

In the afternoon we headed to another village that many volunteers have visited in the past, including our two group leaders Megan and Anna. The name of the village is very long, so it was referred to GP village. GP village was even more rural than Chevuru, but the children were much more…intense. They had no inhibitions and knew what volunteers wanted to see. Even though I would say even fewer knew English than the children from Chevuru, friendship seemed like something made in an instant. The next thing I knew, kids were telling me jokes in the local language, Telugu, and I was just laughing knowing no idea what was being said.


Waiting for auto-rickshaws outside of GP village.


Barren Beauty


The faces of GP village.

Unfortunately that evening my roommate, Joe, got sick and I was soon to follow.