1. The archaic Japanese for 'Panda' - apparently from the Chinese - is 熊猫. (Bear-cat) Cute!
2. A minor but ultra-right-wing political party in Japan -one of the black van parties that was broadcasting messages involving the words 'Russia' and 'explosion'- is 愛国党. (Love-country-party) And the Chinese word for America is 愛国 - (love-country)

Although the second one is probably for a similar reason than the reason that the Japanese for America is 米国 - (rice-country)

Now that I've got my most horribly terrifying classes behind me I'm looking forward to actually teaching more. Until two weeks when I have those horrible classes again, as part of the Busiest Day Ever.

I might go home and nap in my delicious new bed after work, despite the gorgeous weather
 

tuk tuk
the ripping off tourists system is really sophisticated
sudoku and word searches on a rooftop bad
no time! argh! poverty
more later

gin_ger_bread , I hope you weren't really waiting in London for me, as serious as my desire to go to the Jarvis Cocker concert was. Considering it would take me at least five hours to get to the nearest international airport. I do hope you stay in London (/Europe) long enough for me to visit you there.

Another reason I should give up the internet. I have phone webs which has far fewer distractions, so I can just update twitter and check facebook and nothing else. Which is what I'll do on my holiday. For anyone wanting to follow my every movement through the vast unknown land that is Australia, my twitter is twitter.com/lou1sb

less than a month now. Much less, I think. three weeks?? Yes, that's right.

1. I don't know if I've mentioned this before, but I remember eating lunch a while ago at one of my junior high schools. A boy dropped something and quickly picked it up, saying 三秒ルール. I laughed and said in Australia it's five seconds, or sometimes ten, and then commented that since cleaning time occurs AFTER lunch, it probably isn't safe to eat food you pick up off the floor, even if three seconds have not passed. Then later I heard an American refer to it as the 'thirty second rule' which was just gross
2. Last week strolling around another junior high school I saw third grade goth girl Saki cutting her own hair with a small pair of pink-handled scissors. I asked her what she was doing. She said 前髪カート (because the little English is meant to help) and then said エイシメー. I thought about it for a second, and then just to clear it up she said エイシメトリ. (my katakana is really bad, sorry) It made me wonder how many words these kids know of English that they don't even know are English. I mean, the average fifteen year old in Australia would have no idea what 'asymmetry' is. This should make speaking Japanese really easy, but for some reason if I get the katakana pronunciation even slightly wrong, all I get is strange looks. Frickin annoying.
3. More happenings at the same school. Two girls had written their names, blood types, hobbies and love interests on their desks, like a mixi profile page, and they were testing my reading to see if I could understand them. I forgot the word for blood type (which is silly, but I always forget my own blood type so oh well) but that's not the point. One girl listed her hobby as 'rubik's cube' I told her I thought it was cool and she turned to her friend and said (in Japanese) "see, Louis-Sensei thinks it's cool" This made me happy
4. More happenings at the same school. Today my favourite smart-arsed 13 year old told me I look like a "cool old man" with my mustache, and then said I look like Natsume Soseki. The two best compliments I've received this month, and both in one sentence. I've also been told I look like the guy on the new ￥1000 notes.
5. edit: elementary school now, I was teaching the names of subjects to one of my most painful classes (at this school first and second grade are always good, fifth and sixth grade are always great, and third and fourth is like beating my head against a wall) and when I said Art one kid yelled "Art Attack!" Apparently Art Attack or another show with the same name is on Japanese TV.

This is another long day at the office, made worse by tiredness which makes it difficult to study Japanese. So I've been keeping up to date with the news of the world. Here's my opinion on everything;

The US electoral system is deeply flawed. No independent electoral commission? Voting on a Tuesday? Even though I'm certain the candidate I prefer will win, this system does need a bit of an overhaul

The world economy is going down the toilet, but Japan is kind of hovering on the brink. Other than relying heavily on imports, Japan seems to have put itself in a good position to weather this crisis with a strong financial sector that lends more than it borrows (or something like that). This, coupled with the fact that Japan weathered a major financial crisis which deeply affected real estate prices about ten years ago mean the world has a lot to learn from Japan, not just about building a strong economy but also a green economy.

That said, Japan has a lot to learn from the rest of the world about not creating (and then burning) so much garbage. That's not really related to anything I've read today though.

It would be a shame if solar, etc. were to lose out on the current market as lending tightens and people have much much less spare money lying around for solar panels and hybrid cars. A government program of supporting these to prop up the economy and allow the clean energy etc. sector to be strong when things get better will work. It's not going to go bust just because there has been a strong boom recently, for the simple reason that this recent boom was justified

And right now my opinion is that it's lunchtime

edit, more opinions:
the American taxpayer would have a lot smaller financial burden if every new president didn't change the drapes. Alternatively, the new president could save a lot of time if they were given the measurements beforehand. These could then be taken to IKEA as the president's first order of business. I go enjoy the prevalence of the 'measuring the drapes' metaphor though.

And I don't care about the following sports
baseball, american football, golf, australian football that doesn't include the dockers, international rules football, ice hockey. There are probably more.

Apparently Americans say 'I'll get you back' to mean 'I'll pay you back' which is just rediculous. It makes it sound like you're seeking revenge against someone who lends you money. Unfortunately, I was too late to change it and one of the first year speech contest groups will use it. And Sam won't even be there to defend his choice