Thursday, April 29th:Okay, So Again

"Golden Week," a string of four holidays clumped conveniently together, started off today, so despite my earlier claims, the drunken escapades continue.

First up was an enkai with the people from my board of education to bid farewell to the staff members who were transferred. In case you're wondering, 'enkai' just means a get-together, except since it's Japan, "stupid amounts of alcohol and foolishness" is an understood and essential part of that definition as well. I've mentioned before that my tolerance has gotten better since coming to this country, perhaps progressing from the One-Beer Queer to the uh...Three-Beer, Was Kind of Curious in College. Still, that's only when I pace myself. I mean, if I'm at a bar and my friends try to make me chug, I tell them to fuck off and it is understood and accepted that I am a big gaping pussy. Thus, all is right with the world. Going at my own snail-on-Nyquil pace, I can get some nice little happiness going without getting completely ridiculous. At enkais though, pacing is not really an option. You refuse a drink at an enkai, and you're not just being rude. You are besmirching someone's HONOR.

See, when you drink with Japanese folk you're never supposed to pour your own beer, so you've got people constantly running around insisting they pour you drinks, even if your glass is already entirely full. There's a whole system of ritual involved in the pouring, involving something about (I am not making this up) the way the bottle's label is facing indicating the relative social status of the pour-ee to the pourer. Yeah, I don't really get it either, but whenever someone offers me a drink I fucking take it, for fear of someone challenging me to an impromptu sword fight on the grounds of shaming them and their ancestors.

Anyway, as you might guess I tend to get rather ripped at these things. The one I had on Tuesday though, was absolutely ridiculous. We started at 6 PM and by around 9:30, I could barely even stand. Eventually I even had to call a taxi so I could go home early, which has never really happened before. The best part was when the taxi driver came into the bar to announce his arrival, and I saw that he had this absolutely wild handlebar moustache. Which, as you may have guessed, is not really a popular style even in the States, since at least the late 1800's, let alone in modern-day Japan. What was even stranger was how cheerful this guy was, like he'd driven to pick me up via the Yellow Brick Road. He kinda talked in the style of a 1960s sitcom milkman, sort of that dapper, slightly corny, "Good day, sir! And how you doin' sir?" kinda vibe. This is especially odd since usually taxi drivers in Japan are gruff sons of bitches who, you can tell, are exercising enormous amounts of willpower at all times just to not continually scratch themselves in public. Anyway, when I got home, I could barely recognize my apartment. Everything looked too large to me. Despite being not even 10, I decided pretty quickly it'd be a good idea to just go to sleep, and hope everything made sense when I woke up.

Surreal side note -- the following night, I was in a small Japanese-style bar with some friends, when someone in the restaurant (no one I knew) called for a taxi. A couple minutes later, the door opens, and who should the driver be but, that's right, Handlebar Moustache. What, this town only got one taxi driver or something? Okay, so I guess it helps that my town only has about five people total in it.

That brings us to last night, when an innocent trip to my friend Chris' house to watch a movie (28 Days Later -- the first British movie I've seen that wasn't entirely centered around drug usage) somehow transformed into all-night karoke session that didn't end till about 5 AM. Quite frankly I'm a bit surprised I haven't written about karaoke until now, but for the six or so of you unfamiliar with it, basically it encompasses the twin Japanese principales of innovation over invention and every fucking social activity really just being a thin excuse to drink. I used to hate karaoke (I don't exactly have a melodious singing voice), but lately I've gotten rather into it. People say there's nothing like good music to bring people together, but in my experience I've found that bad music is much more conducive to bonding. I mean, music is such a personal thing that it's pretty likely that no two given people will like the same kind, and that's okay. Given all the various genres of music out there, we should take care to respect each other's tastes even if we personally think said tastes are absolute shit. However, there are, of course, limits to this; a subset of songs that, if actually, genuinely liked -- and not just so-awful-they're-good like, but songs you would listen to yourself in your own free time like -- gives you the legal right to rain blows down upon this person until their horrible horrible tastes exist only on the sub-atomic level. These are the songs that are perfect for karaoke. Some of last night's selections, as well as general examples:

• Somebody to Love -- Jefferson Airplane
• Sweet Caroline -- Neil Diamond
• Bring Me to Life, AKA "that awful Daredevil song" -- Evanescnesnancneance
• Any fucking song whatsoever written by Creed
• Crap rock in general; i.e., your Nickelbacks, your Stainds, your Puddle of Mudds

Again, songs that are so dreadful they're fun to fuck around with on karaoke or with friends in the car, but if someone actually likes them, well, that's when you know you will never get along with this person. In fact, in some states like Texas I think it's still legal to shoot people for liking these songs.

At any rate, some good times last night, although I should mention that walking home when the sun is coming up from knowing you're coming from a fucking karaoke session is one of the worst possible feelings in the world. I don't really remember much of the walk home, but when I woke up way too early this morning, I found the following laying mysteriously on my floor:

I believe I spotted that in someone else's garbage when walking home, and, apparently, just had to have it. Still...see, most guys wake up the morning after some heavy drinking to find a strange girl in their apartment. Me, I wake up after a night of heavy drinking to find strange cardboard cutouts of girls in my apartment. And isn't that just fucking typical.

Sunday, April 25th: Never Again

Ugh. You know those days where you wake up promising yourself that you'll never drink again? Yeah, well, today is one of those. Isn't it funny how I've had more hangovers over these past two years than I did throughout my entire college career? Let's see, in college I had maybe...two, perhaps three, hangovers at the very most. Not really a surprise I guess, since I never really drank so much in school. Ever since I came to Japan though, weekends where I wake up feeling like a horde of microscopic dwarves have bored into the side of my skull, I'd say, number about 57,006 times that. I dunno; I couldn't say for sure. Math has never been my strong point, and I haven't even been able to keep track of just how many trips I've made to the toilet today. I like how the only real personal growth I've made since signing up with JET can only be measured by the increase in my now slightly-less-pathetic alcohol tolerance. Japanese people may not be strong drinkers, but brother, they sure can drink.

Not that Japanese people have much to do with my condition today. No, that fault would fall with the party friends Kevin and Paolo organized in a local bar last night. Sometimes, admittedly, big JET get-togethers can kind of get on my nerves since a lot of the time they degenerate too much into the predictable WOOOOO I'M A FOREIGNER AND IN JAPAN AND THEREFORE MUST ACT OBNOXIOUS WHEN DRINKING WOOOOO *CHUGCHUGCHUG* but damn if last night wasn't a nice, relaxed little shindig. Not one of those parties people sometimes throw when they're just staggeringly desperate to have a good time, and not one of those parties that people attend just because they have nothing else to do and want to kill some stress. I think why I enjoyed last night's party so much is that it didn't feel like it had anything to prove; it was just a bunch of people (okay, a lot of people) I like hanging out in my favorite local bar enjoying each other's company and listening to some good music. Gosh, that sounded way too sappy and sensitive. So here I shall mention that, on another note, I masturbate furiously to bear porn.

Okay, writing this is definitely taking too much effort so let's just end this by posting a couple pictures. Here's one that will probably (okay, hopefully) make it look like I had a good time last night for reasons other than the ones I just stated above:

I haven't seen this much white since that Albino bukkake session

Interesting note; only one person in the above photo really has the right to wear virginal white (hint: he has a penis). Oh, and just in case, heaven forfend, some of you have started to get the crazy idea in your heads that I am not a latent homosexual:

Phew, that was close. Quick trivia question to gauge how well you know the author of this site: of the four non-Galvin people pictured in the photos above, which do you think ended up sleeping at my place last night?

Friday, April 23rd: Duhhh, My Name is Principal Skinner

Today I got second period off so I could go to the gym to attend a "Welcome Assembly" for this year's batch of first graders. Personally, the entire concept of this ceremony struck me as a good example of the Japanese tendency to over-ceremonialize pretty much everything; but hey, I only had to teach four classes today instead of five so what the hell.

Anyway, for the assembly, each of the classes had prepared a short skit to perform, I guess both to make the first graders feel welcome, and to trick them into thinking school might actually be fun sometimes. Some of the classes sang a song, some of them executed the best jump-roping tricks the schoolyard has to offer, and some of them just made stale speeches full of the usual sterile, fake-emotion I'm-only-doing-this-because-the-teacher's-forcing-me fluff you might expect (not surprisingly, this was the 6th graders' contribution). Also, some of them used a powerful biological agent to transform themselves into magical hypercolor gnomes that shat rainbows of golden coins and candy. At least, I think so; to be honest I couldn't really tell you since I was too busy being sprawled out on the floor wondering if my life would really be very much worse if instead of signing up for JET I had my entire torso devoured by velociraptors. I mean, I'm sure whatever the children were doing was very cute, but I'm hardly going to waste respite like that by paying attention to children when I don't contractually have to.

The only time I did sit up, actually, was during the (I think) 4th graders' skit. Come to think of it, theirs was the only class that put on an actual skit, as opposed to some random performance of whatever task they happened to suck the least at. See, the 4th graders decided to put on their own mock-lesson, as I skillfully deducted when one of the students came out wearing a big cardboard nameplate reading "Sensei". For this challenging role the student affected a stilted, artificially deep voice to convey the fact his character was indeed over 20 years old and therefore boring. This was, of course, hysterical to the children, and truthfully reasonably funny to me as well, inasmuch as the person they were making fun of was not me. No, see, that task fell to the next person to come out, a 4th-grade girl wearing some big fucking glasses and a cardboard nameplate reading, you guessed it, "CHOW." The parody here, of course, was based on the fact that I wear glasses, speak English, and am overall different from you and your friends. Yes. Very amusing, children. I bet I could kill you all and still make it look like an accident

See, I suppose on one hand, I should be flattered. And I am. But on the other, pronounced, infected-with-gigantism more important hand, however, I hate everyone and one day I will bludgeon them to death with an endless barrage of canned fruit.

Anyway, much to my horror, the mock-Chow proceeded to mince about the gym, asking questions in Pidjin English like "What's your name?" and "What do you like?", which are of course my standard first-ten-minutes-of-class time wasters used to camouflage the fact that I'm still thinking of what the hell to teach them that day. Shockingly, other than the expected Engrishy pronunciation, the girl had my mannerisms down to an almost frightening extent: from my overexaggerated pointing, to my referring to every student as "You"; even my tendency of repeatedly rubbing my crotch against the shoulders of only my prettiest and most trusting young students. She even mimicked my habit of using multiple greetings of Hello Good Morning!/Goodbye See you!" whenever entering/leaving a classroom (which are again, done to waste precious seconds of class time). So I must admit, it was a pretty accurate impression. Judging by the students' (and teachers') howling laughter, I'm guessing they thought so too. Personally, though, I found it to be a very shallow, one-dimensional performance lacking any real defining moments of characterization, to say nothing of the cheap B-movie costume and makeup effects. Okay, fine, so I'm just bitter because I believe that their having my part played by a girl was intentional and incisive commentary in and of itself.

Seriously though, although you're probably expecting this to be the point in our program where I act all offended seeing as the whole skit was akin to when my college celebrated Black History month by serving corn bread and screening How Stella Got Her Groove Back , you're forgetting one very important character trait of mine: narcissism as burning and persistent as all but the very worst of sexual diseases. If imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, then this little skit of theirs was flattery enough for me not to have to bash in their little faces. I should be pleased that these kids thought enough of me to include a parody of me in their performance, even though I've only seen them like once every two months.

That doesn't mean, however, that I still wouldn't like to, like Krusty the Clown, throw on giant false front teeth and a rubber dickie and go around shouting "OHH, ME SO SOWWY" and see how THEY like it. Racist little shits.

Wednesday, April 21st: God of Lame

Do you ever think about how weird it is that, every morning when you wake up, you can turn on your computer to log onto a message board where a reasonably large number of people are busy discussing the details of your daily existence? No? Oh wait, I guess that's just me. See, kindofcrap is, surprisingly, getting increasingly popular; much more so than I ever thought it would. I mean, I used to crow about getting 25 hits a day, now I get twenty times that many visitors. Sure, that may not sound like much when you consider just how many masturbating nerds there are on the internet (as well as, I generously estimate, around five or six 'normals'). But like I always like to say, I bet MY webpage is more popular than YOURS.

Which is not to say that specific numbers are anywhere near the point. No, the point is that the more popular this website grows the more it adds to the already generally weird flavor of my life. At worst, I see myself stabbed to death in an alley somewhere by someone who saved up his life-size-resin-anime-statue money to come find me and make me pay for my bad-mouthing the latest episode of Nanodimensional Schoolgirl Rape Adventure: Train Edition. At best, it merely gives me a highly distorted sense of self-importance. See, I like that I have a message board, an online community culling together some six dozen people whose only real common interest is ME. I like that pretty much the only e-mails in my inbox these days that aren't trying to convince me my penis is too short come from total strangers who tell me OMFG YOUR SIGHT IS SO FUNNY ENGRISH HAHA FINGERS IN BUTT LOL. I love that certain people sit around and make Photoshop manipulations of my image for fun. I am an abject, hopeless narcissist, so of course I love it. And you, in return, shall love me, Fuckbots, LOVE ME! For, in the land of the lame, he who has at least once came kinda close to almost touching a girl sorta is king.

I am your GOD.

That said, however, there is something else that must be stated. Though I love each and every one of you if not in the manner of a man touching another similarly-oriented man then at least how a tobacco company executive drools at an eleven year-old eyeing an unattended package of cigarettes, the fact remains that the great majority of you...well, the great majority of you are not normal. You've got problems. Great, huge, looming, emotional problems. I am a man who runs a website called kindofcrap, someone whose entire sense of humor is based around the repeated themes of child abuse and the hilarity of unsolicited groinal interactions. Yet, a few of you write in telling me that I have inspired you, that my writing has lifted you from the depths of depression; that, God help you, you're even thinking of doing JET (and that last one alone should tell you how twisted your emotional state must be).

And then there's my message board. It's full of people who can answer questions directed at me, FOR me, or start sentences with "I think Galvin would say that..." and actually be right. Hell, there's even a thread on there right now about how some of them have dreams about me. One of you out there even TELEPHONED me once to wish me a Merry Christmas. Now, really, I appreciate the goodwill, which I am now probably tanking, I do. But step back for a moment, and tell me -- don't you think this is all a little bit odd? If not for you, then for ME? Go do something! Anything! Just get away from me and come back only occasionally and under the strict supervision of heavily-armed guards! Jesus Christ -- READ A BOOK or something! Anything! I don't care anymore!

...okay, so I'm probably coming off as an ungrateful, pompous jerk. Which shouldn't be surprising since as usual I'm elaborating and I don't get nearly as many weird e-mails as I probably made it sound. I mean, I'm sure most of you are actually quite decent people, with normal, healthy lives of your own (though God help me, that doesn't mean I'm still not absolutely certain that most of you smell like month-old cheese). I mean, I won't argue that you all don't help make my life just a little more surreal, but I suppose what's really getting to me is that, here I am, with this very limited yet proportionately-large-given-the-context amount of fame, and it has to come from something as dorky as a frickin' online journal. I mean, there are many people out there who devote large chunks of their time to stupid activities that they've convinced themselves will someday be accepted as normal if not cool, if only they keep a positive outlook and not let themselves be bogged down by other people's uninformed, stereotyped views of their activities. And these people are, of course, idiots and wrong.

I don't care what anyone says: Band nerds, you will always be band nerds no matter how much positive energy you put into your music. Synchronized swimming, rhythmic gymnastics and competitive trampoline will always be the absolute stupidest sports no matter how many gold medals people may be awarded for them. And you can make as many blockbuster comic-book movies you like, but comic books themselves will never be regarded as anything other than fodder for children and the intellectual devoid by the public at large. And that goes double for manga, except replace 'children' with 'perverted sociopaths.' You know this to be true.

Thus, online journals, no matter how popular they may get, can never really be anything more to me than hopeless overindulgence of ego and yet one more instance of technology being used for little else than allowing us to masturbate our egos a little more efficiently. See, no matter how many of my personal friends who I actually like start them up, to me blogs by definition are something disillusioned Goth kids root aimlessly through at 3 in the morning looking for someone who 'understands them'. I mean, I don't care how good anyone's writing actually is. I don't care if Ernest Fucking Hemingway comes back to life and starts one up detailing his afterlife in drunken hell. You write something in a blog, it's automatically much lamer than it would be if it were in print; no exceptions. Therefore, the more popular this site gets, the more intense my feelings of self-loathing for even having it become.

Plus, when you get right down to it, it's not as if internet fame will ever be the same as say, book fame, or magazine fame, or even local television commercial fame. It's not exactly something I can use to hit on chicks. In fact, I've even been at parties where I'm maybe talking to a not totally unattractive girl, when one of my friends will chime in with something like "Yeah, Galvin has a really awesome webpage; you should read it, it's totally hilarious!" This is, of course an honest, good-intentioned bid to help me out; but even the mere mention of the word webpage in front of someone I don't know too well makes me feel like the only Asian contestant at an otherwise all-black-man dick-measuring contest. Trying to impress a chick by telling her you have a truly excellent webpage is like mentioning that yeah, you have gonorrhea, but you keep the medicine for it in the COOLEST Pez dispenser. I mean, "Hey baby, have you ever typed 'www.kindofcrap.com' into your internet web browser by some great chance?" doesn't exactly have the same ring as "Hey, ever hear of Rolling Stone?", now do it?

...aww, fuck this pretentious bullshit. As I've always said, I am not only a hopeless narcissist, I'm one equipped with horribly low standards. I mean, let's face it, that combination is often the only thing that keeps me going. Like a cocaine junkie willfully snorting a mix that is 9/10ths scraped off of individual Frosted Flakes, I am willing to take my highs where I can get them. And if I don't hold myself up to exactly FDA-approved standards, why should I do it to you? Ah, hell, with it. C'mere, you great, big, socially inept freaks. All is forgiven. Let's just go back to the way things were, shall we?

...

...you, there, Fuckbot. Love me.

Tuesday, April 20th: A Site About Nothing

I walked into my junior high school today to find no one in the teacher's room except for my friend Mark, who's their regular AET. I just assumed all the real teachers were off having a meeting somewhere else, and would be back shortly to give me whatever my assignments were for the day, but no...turns out, all the teachers went off to Kyoto with the 3rd graders for a school trip, and wouldn't be back for three days. Mark had a few classes to teach, one of which I went along for since it was for the retard class and you all know I love me some retards. Other than that, though, I alternated my time between dicking around the internet and reading the copy of Time magazine (Cover story: Why Did Jesus Have to Die?) that I bought a week ago in the airport. Had we not eaten lunch with some of the other teachers, it's doubtful anyone would have even noticed we were there. So essentially, all I did to earn my 100 bucks a day pay today was sit around the teachers' room with Mark raiding the snack cabinet and making up elaborate yet unambitious plans for even earlier escape (school ended today at 1 PM). It was kind of like being in a minimum-security prison, in that way: sure, it's nice that it's a picnic when it could really be so much worse, but at the same time, you can't help but wonder what's the point ofyour even being there.

Situations like this make it very tempting to bash Japan. In fact, I did, saying that only Japan would require us to even come in on a day where we very clearly would have nothing to do. If we were doing nothing anyway, why couldn't we just leave and go do it in the comforts of our own homes? Mark, however, made a very good counter-argument that set me straight: "Any other country would probably make us do work." This is, of course, a very good point. Hooray for Japan!

See, now me, I love doing nothing. In fact, I'd say doing nothing is probably my very favorite thing to do, even better when getting paid to (not) do it. Therefore, for the most part, I couldn't have been happier with today. Especially since I had an exceedingly crappy day at elementary school the day before, the highlight of which was when a sweet little girl, by way of saying hello, reared back with her tiny little fingernails and gave me a giant red slash running along the length of my entire forearm. After a day like that especially, earning today's paycheck by doing very little else but sitting on my ass became an even more attractive proposition. The #1 complaint JETs have about their jobs is boredom. I, on the other hand, scoff at this complaint. I mean, my whole life has arguably been one long stretch of boredom. I've trained for it; I'm conditioned to it. Besides, given the daily tortures my job usually involves, by this point, I feel like I'd pay good money just for the privilege of merely being 'bored'.

That said, I must bring up the #2 complaint JETs have about their jobs, which is that we are not treated with the same respect and seriousness that a native Japanese person would be in the same situation. This contention is of course, like most sweeping, stereotypical generalizations, entirely true, and luckily being an Asian man with glasses I can mathematically prove it to you on my big nerdy honkin' calculator. I mean again, it's not as if I mind making money for scratching my ass all day, but still: my school visit schedule is determined way in advance, I've only been alloted ten junior high visits this semester, and yet, this school requests my presence on a day that all the freakin' other teachers are halfway across the country. Way to plan, fellas. It's not as if this trip to Kyoto was some last minute thing either. No, it's an annual thing; so not only have they known for months, it could be argued that they've known for YEARS. Yet, despite all that, they still schedule me to come in on a day where none of the other teachers or even students are there, leaving me with little else to do but play with my dick all day. Which, again, is not exactly my most un-favorite thing to do, and again even better when I'm getting paid for it, but still. Dealing with little slights of disrespect like this on a consistent basis, is it any wonder most JETs do not take their jobs anywhere near seriously?

Thursday, April 15th: Big Bad Harv

One of the things I perhaps complain about most on this page (other than uninvited groinal assaults, of course) is the fact that being both in a foreign country and being an elementary school teacher is one of the most dehumanizing combinations ever conceived since the first German to see a pornographic film thought to himself, 'Hey, I bet my people could make some of these'. Being a foreigner in Japan means weathering gawks and stares like a supermodel in a comic book store, and being an elementary school teacher means spending 95% of your work day with students who may honestly believe that you emerge from shrink-wrapping every morning before coming into school. Think of how you probably didn't even really perceive your parents as real, actual people, with a purpose to life other than serving you, until at least your high school graduation, and multiply that by about 100, since I'm betting that you were around your parents at least enough to occasionally see some flicker of emotion from them (apologies to the orphans in the audience). Teachers, though, are normally limited to a very small set of emotions in front of their students: serious educatin' mode, or varying degrees of rage depending how dicky the students are being; plus maybe levity in the form of a few relevant jokes told throughout the lesson. That, though, is pretty much it. Teachers to students are tools, appliances. Theorizing that teachers might have other things going on in their lives outside of the classroom is like jamming a piece of bread in the DVD player and expecting it to come out as toast. If you are a teacher you are utterly subhuman to your students, simply because they are unable to conceive of your even having a life outside the classroom.

Again, this is for just being a teacher. If you're one in a foreign country, particularly Japan, multiply that by 100.

Case in point: I've really been stressing about teaching ever since getting back from the States, if not because I'm getting antsy due to the finish line being only four months away, then because I've finally run totally out of lessons and by all that is good and holy I simply have forgotten how to do anything even resembling work at home. My students, of course, have no conception of this. They have no idea that I derive most of my enjoyment from being at home in my apartment from the mere fact that being there means I am distinctly not at work. They don't know that they only time I devote to planning lessons is relegated to either the ten minutes before class or sometimes the ten minutes after class has already started. They are unaware that my whole professional life has become one big game of 'Procrastination Jenga'; with each succesful block stacked on top only building up a bigger and bigger inevitable fall. To them, I'm just some guy that comes in now and then who magically has some wacky foreign-flavored game ready to entertain them. To them, my lessons were never made, they always just were. Sometimes I'm amazed when they ask me how old I am, because that means they have some dim perception that I have a birthday; meaning that I, too, at some point, popped out of a vagina like the rest of them.

Yeah, the students have no idea that their beloved Chow-sensei, ever since he got back from the States again, has been so on edge that when he comes home from work every day, the thought that primarily dominates his mind is Oh my God, I can't believe I have to go to work in only 17 hours. They don't know that, despite jet lag forcing him to wake up at 4 o'clock every morning, the 8 o'clock train seems to come around awfully fucking fast.

Anyway, this is pretty much what I've had to deal with over the past 20 months, but only today did I discover the flip side of it. I suppose I've experienced it before, but only today did it occur to me: when my personal affairs aren't going as well as I'd like them to, this whole not-a-real-human-being perception is an absolute godsend. Suddenly, students not having even the slightest conception that I have a personal life means that, for the duration I am at work, I myself do not have to deal with it. Coming into work means all my petty insecurities and worries can be checked at the door along with my shoes; it means I can throw myself full-on into my horrible shitty job and find solace in being the Jovial Education Automaton. Today, despite being at one of my absolute shittiest schools I found myself actually enjoying teaching because when I'm in front of a classful of kids I don't have to be Galvin, I can just be Chow-Sensei. In this way it's become almost fantasy fulfillment, catharsis for me; I liken it to geeky Peter Parker or Clark Kent throwing on a brightly-colored costume and blowing off some steam by punching a bank robber in the colon. Ha. If only Lois could see me now.

Yeah, see, it's Galvin who has to deal with the actual stress of coming up with fun lessons, but it's Chow-Sensei who gets to bask in all the glory and adulation they bring. Galvin gets to sit at home and worry about how much the following day will suck, but Chow-Sensei always pulls through in the clutch and gets to spend all of his time surrounded by children who quite honestly love the shit out of him at heart. I mean, look at it this way: if I were to go up to some random 10 year-old in the street, and kick him in the balls, that means me in jail. However, I do it in a classroom, and suddenly it's discipline, that is approved if not lauded. Looking at it that way, I don't see why I'd ever want to be dopey ol' Galvin, when I could be the awesome, and worshipped, Chow-Sensei.

And, if reading this entry hasn't already convinced you that I've gone off the deep end, you should know that today I actually gave up my coffee break to go play with students. This marks the first time I have voluntarily done that in literally 19 months. Other than my brief bout with self-cutting early in my JET career, that probably counts as the most masochistic thing I've ever done.

Wednesday, April 14th: We Know

Before we begin, a brilliantly Photoshopped image of my brother's wedding photo courtesy of some Fuckbot (Hi, Endymion!) from the message boards:

Awesome, yes? Anyway, today's fascinating topic, in which I yet again take some simplistic thought that crossed my mind for maybe 3/10ths of a second at some point that revolves around information most of you already know and then patronizingly and shamelessly self-indulgently drone on about it for way longer than any sane man has a right to, is as follows:

"If I were to rank the different types of schools I could teach at in descending order of personal preference -- and I will -- it would probably look something like this":

#5 High School
#4 Elementary School
#3 Junior High School
#4 The Retarded School for Retarded Retards Special School
#1 Galvin's School of Erotic Groin Massage

I suppose I should elaborate. I shall. In the selfsame order.

#5: High School -- While it might be nice to deal with students that are at least somewhat close to my approximate intellectual level, who could theoretically speak the most English of any student I could possibly teach to boot, high schools have two glaring negatives against them that just completely tank it for me. The first is that, unlike my elementary kids, high school kids could likely hit me back -- rather effectively, I might add -- when I decide to beat them for nonsensical reasons like not being able to juggle enough pineapples or the recent dearth of unicorns in the schoolyard. Also, considering what most Japanese girls' high school uniforms look like, I imagine being a successful high school JET involves slamming locker doors shut on your genitals daily just to prevent the urges that could get you charged with multiple counts of statutory rape before the day is even out.

#4 Elementary School -- Jesus fuck, do I even need to explain or do you not even read this fucking site?

#3 Junior High School -- To me, this is, appropriately enough, the ideal middle ground of the three mainstream schools. Unlike elementary school, I'm not put there on my own to die on my feet in front of 20-some screamy grabby monsters trying them to keep them entertained in my non-native language for five or six periods. No, in JHS, the kids have at least started to form a brain, and another teacher basically does all the work as I am (quite happily) reduced to the role of glorified Human Tape Recorder. Plus, as an added bonus I get to watch the fresh-from-elementary 7th graders get their carefree zoo-animal spirits slowly but decisively crushed by the droning, oppressive monotone of the Japanese education system. Seriously, I wish I could take a Polaroid of the 7th graders every day they're there from their first day till about four or five months in, then staple all the pictures together into one sadistic fucking flip-book and watch as they magically animate from gleeful l'il tots to emotionless fucking Angst Zombies in seemingly no time flat. I bet if I squinted, and watched reeeal close, I could actually see their souls leaving their increasingly debilitated bodies as the pages flipped. Yeah, okay, so I probably need professional help. So does anyone in this line of work, I guarantee it.

In related news, I actually ended up back at a junior high this semester, one that is also staffed by my friend Mark over at Teacher of English no less. Which I'm sure is something I will no doubt go on endlessly about in future journal entries. For now, though:

#2 Special School -- I've went on about this place enough in the past as well, so instead I'll ask you to stare into the eyes of Shuzo here and see if you can glean a summary telepathically:

Okay, so that probably didn't work -- although I bet if you stared at it long enough, you'd start to hear some sort of voices in your head -- but I'm man enough to admit that really I was just looking for an excuse to post that horrible picture. Moving on:

#1 Galvin's School of Erotic Groin Massage -- This is just a little alternative-education concept of my own I've been cooking up that hopefully, for the sake the young and nubile, will see the light of day someday. However, until then, all you need to know is that I would serve as both chief instructor and practicing dummy. Also, no men/fat chicks will be accepted as students.

And that brings us to the end of our informative little list. Of course, you should keep in mind that ranking the best possible JET scenarios like this is somewhat akin to finding out your next life will be spent as a toilet brush and then making a list as to what color you'd like to come back as. Pink, blue, or green, it all still just comes down to putting up with way too much shit.

Tuesday, April 13th: Dragon Beat

Still jet-lagged out of my skull, so here, look upon a picture from my brother Garrick's wedding, because I know you're all dying to see me in a tux:

In case you're wondering, from the left the brothers' names are Greg, Garrick, and Geoff. Yes, all our names start with "G". And yes, our middle names are all "Bong-something", meaning that means we all have the same initials. My mom said she did it to save money in case she ever got anything dedicated in the names of her sons. Oh, those efficient Asians! Also, I should mention here just how close I came to being named George Chow.

Anyway, before seeing this picture it never occured to me how the similar-but-varying personalities of me and my brothers, when reduced to soundbite form, make us come across as some sort of non-threatening Asian boy-band with each member designed to appeal to the tastes of a different set of 13 year-old girl. There really should be neon bubble-letters floating above each of our heads listing our personality roles: "The Slacker!! The Rock-Star!! The Reponsible One!! The Geeky (and Huge-Wanged) One!!" Okay, well, boy band or Asian mail-order catalogue. Quick, you there, Photoshop that.

Sunday, April 11th: First is Worst

Hello there. It's 2 in the morning and I've just now woken up. See, I just got back to Japan yesterday, so I'm a wee bit jet-lagged. I settle down to take a nap around 6 PM to take the edge off, setting my alarm clock for 8 PM, only to wake up at 2 AM to discover that my alarm clock had just run out of batteries. Fuck. Oh well, better now than tomorrow when I start work, I guess. I can't remember; two in the morning is when most normal people start their days, right?

Anyway, it's good to be back. Home was nice, but I am relieved to say it wasn't too nice. Don't get me wrong, three weeks of laying on the couch getting up only to go pick up some more Arby's/Chik-Fil-A/Dunkin' Donuts/Taco Bell was enjoyable in that wallowing-in-your-own-filth kinda way, but at the back of my mind I was pretty anxious to get back to Japan, where, y'know, I actually have something of a life. When I went home last summer, it honestly worried me how much I enjoyed it, how great it felt to live life like a 16 year-old again and have zero responsibilities (and gain 10 pounds). The morning I had to get back on that airplane, I honestly wanted to cry. I didn't want to go back to Japan and pretend to be an adult again, leaving behind everything that made me comfortable. For at least two months after I got back, I was pretty down; it took me a long time to readjust. This time though, I feel much more ready to jump back into it. It's strange, when I was back in the States this time, I felt oddly uneasy sometimes. Once, when I went to pick up a bucket of Bojangles fried chicken, I bowed and said "domo" when the clerk handed it to me, forgetting completely where I was. I guess in a lot of ways I feel much more comfortable when I'm in Japan, like my personality is better suited to it. Maybe I was meant to be here, maybe I was merely forced to adjust a bit too much. Or maybe this is just one big fucking case of Stockholm Syndrome. Whatever. It's good to be back.

Which is not to say that all his flowers and boobies in the world of kindofcrap. Okay, see, while this would normally be the portion of our program where I mince words and tell you that while on one hand it is awesome to be back in Japan and on the other it is complete bullshit, I'm just going to come out and say right now for the record that I hate my fucking job and I want it to end now; no, not in four months as it's set to, no, right fucking NOW. I gotta tell you, now that the end is in sight, I see no reason to continue to shit motivational mantras down my own throat, and feel secure in the knowledge that the finish line is now close enough for me to cross it by taking one last running leap and coasting over it on a trail of my own bitter, cranky slime. To set the record straight -- Japan = great. Children are even at least remotely fucking tolerable when not my exclusive responsibility (yeah, kind of a shocking statement from me, huh? But hey, we have similar underwear sizes). Teaching though, is absolute death, at least for me. I want a job where I can go in and shut the fuck up if that's what I feel like. I want a job where no one expects me to know nothing and no one gives a shit about what I think. In short, I don't want anyone to expect anything from me, and want to be somewhere where people will just leave me the crap alone. Which is why, I think, that after JET, I shall be moving to Delaware.

...yeah, you heard me. Delaware.

Now, now, wait a second, hear me out: the Delaware thing is not merely the throwaway cheap joke you probably think it is, I'm actually somewhat serious here. Over break I was talking with the Sakura Shogun about what we shall do with the next phase of our respective post-JET and post-college lives, and he mentioned that he might go live in Delaware with his ladyfriend. He sold it on the strength of the state's wildly hedonistic lack of motorcycle helmet laws and absence of sales tax. Naturally I laughed in his face and questioned why on earth anyone would ever voluntarily or at least purposely move to Delaware. Delaware is just one of those unassuming states that people just end up in, not someplace someone specifically chooses to go to. Delaware is sweat pants, TV dinners, and memberships with multiple dating services, rolled all up in one. It's like the nice but boring chick someone would go to the prom with 'as friends' simply because they both wanted to go but were too geeky to find actual dates. I mean, it's just kinda THERE. Which is why it was so surprising that, sometime during the 10-minute laughing fit that followed my friend's initial announcement of his decidedly Delaware-heavy future, it suddenly dawned on me that my living in Delaware would make a disturbing amount of sense. After all, what better place to live for a guy who wants no one to expect anything from him? I just love the notion of someone actually purposely, consciously coming out and saying, "Yeah, I'd really like to live in Delaware." It strikes me as the very height of absurdist humor. I just honestly find it so hilariously ludicrous that I feel I just have to do it.

See, over the past few months, I've been giving a lot of thought to where I want to live when I move back to the States after JET ends. I figure, if I move to somewhere like New York, or practically anywhere on the West Coast, I'd feel obligated to be doing something exciting with my life, something appropriate for my surroundings. I move to one of those places and I can already hear the potential nagging in my future -- "Here you are, in the middle of this big, exciting city, and all you wanna do is sit on your ass eating Cheetos and watching cartoons?!! Why don't you do something with your life blah blah blah..." No, see, I don't wanna do shit. I do just wanna sit around on my ass all day without anyone pointing out all the exciting things around me that I could, theoretically, be doing instead.

Which is why, of course, Delaware started to make a whole lot of sense: I go there, I be boring, and no one blames me for it, because come on, it's fucking Delaware! You live in Delaware and suddenly you are treated in the same patronizing fashion as a horribly retarded child managing to tie his own shoes. That's so good for someone who lives in Delaware!! I mean, if someone were able to construct helicopters out of giant, lame-detecting compasses, they could take them to Delaware and they'd be able to twirl through the skies all day long without ever needing one single drop of fuel. That's probably the most complicated and scientifically unsound metaphor I've ever made, and that's saying a lot, but that's just how lame of a state it is is! But hey, no talking shit about my future home. Lame though it may be, that is exactly why I think I could learn to love it.

In all seriousness though, I am looking for someplace to relax after JET, and besides, in terms of things to write about, I think it's a gold mine, as I always feel I'm at my best when making mountains out of molehills. What do you all think, faithful fuckbots? Would you be willing to follow me from Japan to Delaware? Could be interesting. Then again, Galvin's Delaware Journal: 99 Cents Means 99 Cents doesn't carry much of a ring, now does it?

Yes sir, despite the shittiness of my job, it's good to be back where I feel I belong. Now it's just my life after JET that I think I need to start worrying about.