Good morning, evening, night to everyone.
This week's issue comes with some new drama, suspense, analysis, and food for thought.
No luck on the naval base access pass yet, but the guy should be back from his trip relatively soon. The good thing is that I can gain access anytime as long as I am with someone who has a pass.
The adult classes were great as usual, and the kids were well behaved. Teaching kids is a good gauge of your own character. They are so honest, it's painful sometimes. If they don't like you, they tell you. If they don't understand you, they start drawing, climbing, or rolling around on the floor. If they see you breaking a nervous sweat, they ask why you're sweating so much. However, if they love you, they are into the lesson 400% more than any adult.
My Thursday terrorizers have made a complete turn around. One relationship I have with a student is like the relationship with the girl who is so mean but you refuse to give up because you see something within to make her a good person. The pain, the suffering experienced in order to change this student is mind wrenching, but when they come to class one day look at you with a genuine excitement, it's priceless. Some other students drew pictures of me and wrote little thank you notes in Japanese. As a grown man, I almost cried.
The people at the gym are pretty funny. I made really good friends with one guy and girl who work there; the guy is actually pretty big and is really into powerlifting, and the girl is not big and not into powerlifting. They have been the ones telling others my name and bio because some mid 40s guy with an outrageous half-bleached mullet started talking to me and goaded me to curl the heaviest dumbbells on the rack. Body building is so out of the ordinary here, but people respect anyone as long as they're working hard. As mentioned, cardio is the main attraction and people will finish their hour long aerobics class to run for another hour on the treadmill. The post-workout meal is usually soup and rice, yum.
Thursday night, my American buddy from San Diego invited me to his friends house because they just bought the new Margarita 5000. When I got to the house, it was a typical 2 story American house, with an American stove, kitchen, living room, and American music playing in the background. My buddy, his two friends (they are all high school teachers for Americans on the naval base) and one coworker's son were all drinking margaritas and eating fish burritos. It was a dream land. They were so welcoming, and shared their own experiences as well as offered me all the drinks and food I could handle. Talk about lucky for me to meet these people. A great experience to make me appreciate where I come from. Not many other countries would not only provide its own country's groceries and furnishings, but buy local land and build an American style house just so their citizen will feel comfortable while living in another country.
This weekend I played a lot of soccer. I trained at Nimits park (turf field) and practiced some free kicks under the judgement of a bunch of little kids. The pressure was intense. I'm supposed to be a super human adult from America so there were high expectations on each kick. I felt as if I had to keep a bunch of lions from attacking. After a couple of misses, I tried to keep them entertained with juggling tricks and passing the ball to them. The children responded well to the passing and tricks and I was able to safely escape the children's den.
That night I played futsal (a version of soccer usually played on a gym floor with smaller sized ball and nets). We had 5 v 5 courts and 6 teams total. Each game ran 10 minutes and it was a lot of fun. My night finished pretty successfully with 5 goals netted for my team.
This Sunday I had an open Sunday, which meant I had to work from 12 - 4 and be prepared to teach free lessons to any prospective students. In order to attract some prospectives, I had to hand out fliers in the arcade (mall) twice this week. The closest thing I can describe handing out fliers to is the experience of perhaps speed dating. In this case, I was the suitor, and my potential dates were the lovely people passing in the arcade.
Some dates were love at first sight. Once eye contact was made, all I had to do was show that flier, and they wanted more. With other dates, the chemistry was just not there. I made a nice friendly gesture, showed what my flier was willing to offer, but they didn't feel comfortable committing to such a relationship. Some played hard to get. We would make eye contact, but they would try to use it to their advantage. They knew what I had to offer, but they were telling me to "come get me". So they would show some distance which would force me to take a few steps towards them to hand that flier. I quickly understood that this relationship was going to take more commitment from me and less from them so I had to show I was not going to be pushed around. The flier came at those with force, and if they couldn't handle the power of the flier, they declined. Finally, there were the socially inept daters. Perhaps a friend or family member sent them out hoping they could start living outside the house. Many appeared to lack basic hygiene skills, such as poorly groomed hair, an outfit that was clearly on its fifth use without washing, and of course the musk of no shower for at least 3 days. Some of these unique types, would either quickly distract themselves with a blank phone screen, or pretend to change a song on their ipod. Others, were in fact so dedicated to being inept they would start to run once they saw me offering fliers. They would stop running when they felt they were a safe distance in which I wouldn't notice, but I did notice, I did.
Overall, if you plan to do Flier Dating, be prepared for a large amount of rejection. Some rejections hurt more than others, and some rejections are actually by your own choice. The feeling of acceptance from the beautiful date you just won over can be quickly countered by several simultaneous rejections minutes later. My only advice can be to leave your emotions and attachments at home, and just assure yourself it's not you, it's them.
Next week is another week, and the cherry blossoms are well overdue for blooming. Talk to you soon! Thanks again for reading!
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