Wednesday, April 23, 2008

The New School

I'm sorry Saitama. I wrote a blog about how Saitama sucks, probably because I started working again and am stressed. Well, not stressed, but broke. Saitama has a kick ass organic cafe, the John Lennon museum, and a Bonsai city. Hooray!

ごめなさい 埼玉。 私の 埼玉の ブラグを 書きました。 だから 今 私は 仕事を して、自棄が あります。 あの。。。 自棄が ありません。 でも、 お金が ありません。 埼玉は すごい オルガニクの 喫茶店 あって、ジョンレンオンの 美術館 あって、盆栽の 町 あります。 やった!



I've mentioned that I started a couple new jobs. The word started doesn't follow the normal denotation though. Here, the connotation is that by starting a job, I have spent about a hundred bucks and about 5 days of time spread out over the weeks to attend unpaid trainings, interviews, and general job related fun. But I haven't actually worked.



My Junior High School job, which I assumed would start on the 1st of April, since that's when school starts, actually starts on April 21st. "But that's in the past". Let me rephrase. I thought, since the company told me I would start on the 21st, that I would start working on the 21st. It's now the 23rd, and they are still "working out the contracts." But all is not lost! I get to attend another unpaid training for this company next week. Celebrate!



My other job, the big evil ekaiwa (conversation school for people with lots of money) in Tokyo has finally started. I actually taught a lesson yesterday. One lesson. Today I'm going in again, but I don't have any lessons scheduled. "Sweet! Just chill and get paid!" Not exactly. The way it works is you fill in your schedule and show up at those times. If you don't have a student, you don't get paid. If you do have a student, you get garbage money.



15 bucks for each 40 minute lesson. So if you go in for 5 hours but only teach 1 lesson, 15 bucks. The idea is that if you are there a little while, your schedule will fill up with regulars and the big bucks will roll in.



By big bucks I mean pocket change. After train fare and a massive bowl of Ogikubo ramen, I was in the red yesterday. And I had to wear a suit.



But let's look on the bright side! When there isn't a class scheduled, you can chill on the internet and study. The school is way relaxed, and each private cubicle has good chairs and a laptop. What the hell? Is that really the bright side? I can chill in the park, or at home in the nude. Like I am now.



Give it another month. I'll be waking up early, going to my Junior High a few days a week, teaching at the ekaiwa Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday nights, and taking long weekends to go on grand adventures into the unknown. Or I'll be copying and pasting this paragraph into a new blog. Welcome to Tokyo.



FYI, this corn was damn tasty!

2 comments:

thegypsie said...

I love the random shots in between your tribulations about work. What was the corn seasoned with?

Ramen Adventures said...

No idea! This was many, many years ago. Though I still go to that same restaurant now and then.