Today is the day when a huge number of students get into a deadly fight once a year. So many masculine macho males clash one another, and some injuries are carried on stretchers. This is actually so dangerous. Since I am not totally masculine, I don窶冲 dare to participate in this battle. But I love to watch them fighting, even cheering up. We call this fight Somei match – a traditional annual rugby football game between two college students, Waseda and Meiji. I, as a Waseda student, get so much excited for and have looked forward to every year.

What I am so attracted to this event is the energetic and powerful pace of the game. I strongly believe this atmosphere is only picked up by watching a game at the stadium. If this is TV, no one thinks rugby is interesting, because a TV camera eventually doesn窶冲 let us see what we want to see, but it shows us what the camera crew wants to see or thinks important, and which doesn窶冲 fit our concern in many cases.

What is interesting to see a rugby game is the quick deployment of the player. Rugby is not a sport that a ball is important, but the movements of other players are important. However, TV cameras won窶冲 let us see what is going on around the ground. They just show us what is going on around the ball. This is true that the audience sitting on the seats cannot see the details of the players, but what is important is to observe the movement of the players and think the strategy.

When I was a sophomore, I went to this fight for the first time ever, and I was so impressed by the quick development of the game and the shouts from the audience. I didn窶冲 know the rules at that time (I don窶冲 understand it even now), but I was just surprised at the atmosphere. It was just awesome! It is even awesome to shout something out when got points!

Since then, I went to see a match uncountable times including Japanese college championship when Waseda finally won. That was so impressive and dramatic. There is a song that is sung only when our rugby team reaches the top of the Japanese championship. This is inherited only among our rugby team, so most of the students don窶冲 know including me. Many alumni also don窶冲 know. I was just very fortunate to have had chances to hear it twice.

During my years of Waseda life, our rugby team is disparately strong. It is true that there were some losing game, but the vast majority of my memory is wining game. It was just fortunate though, I still feel so happy to have been a Waseda student for this 5-year.

This match was the last game of the college championship just for the Kanto region. So I automatically expect our team to win the championship for all over the nation which is held in the early January. I would love to see the game, if possible, at the stadium.

Today was actually so cold whether, and in addition, it was rainy. It was so chilly. I thought that I was going to die from cold, seriously. But January would be expected even colder whether. However, I am sure that an enthusiastically heated game will be held for both Waseda and the counterpart. I expect an extremely and overwhelmingly heated game in order not to quake from cold.

投稿者: ふじた 日時: 23:40 | 固定リンク | コメント (0)

I am an official tour guide of Waseda University, and today I conducted a regular tour. The regular tour is held every Friday morning, Saturday morning and afternoon. Some irregular tours are also held if there窶冱 an apply (high school students are one of the most popular applicants of the tour).

Today窶冱 participants are about 15 people, and most of them are the parents of current Waseda students. There are also a couple of high school students.

Purposes which the guest coming to Waseda and joining in a tour vary from one another. However, I can assume purposes to some extent.
Generally, parents want to know how their children live or study at Waseda because they don窶冲 really have chances to talk to children or talk about children窶冱 college lives even they both live together. Needless to say, when the children live by themselves in Tokyo, there will be little chances to exchange information, and that窶冱 my case. So, I have to tell parents the actual, real college life citing my 窶彙ad窶� examples.
On the other hand, high school students generally want to know how the college students are, how the real colleges are since they don窶冲 have much information about it. Talking to the students and walking around the campus help them grasp the image of their coming future. In this case, I will be their role model (I don窶冲 know if it is really better thing). Another thing that is crucial for the high school students is examinational information, especially exam itself and the countermeasures for Waseda exam. Although I hadn窶冲 joined the tour during my high school life, I also wanted to know about it so eagerly. Studying style is also a common question that the high school students have. Answers for these questions will motivate the students a lot.

Adapting this general needs to the today窶冱 guests, what I better to talk is going to be summarized to how my real college life is. This lets parents know how their children are doing at Waseda and enables high school students to get some images for their college life. In addition to that, I also need to mention how the entrance examinations are. These talks are usually optional to the major talk. The major talk is basically to introduce the buildings and the departments. But adding tour guide窶冱 personal experiences or interests or episodes definitely enriches the contents of the tour, makes guests enjoyed, and at this point, the personality of the guides is shown, and this is very interesting.

Tours are different from one another, and exactly the same tour never happens. Everything changes, and every factor affects the tour, even the weather. This is why I am so attracted to this job and have worked for 5 years.

My impression today is basically favorable. There were no any big troubles, no any puzzling questions. Most importantly, the communication with the participants went very very well. Since I am regarded as an eager-for-study student for a sight, participants often get some negative impressions especially having a conversation. But I am not the person who is awkward to talk to. I am actually so nice to talk to (literally) I believe. So, destroying this image is usually my first thing to do to have an amusing tour for both the guests and I, and today, this went so successfully. There was a lot of laughter throughout the tour. I enjoyed today窶冱 tour, and I am sure I was able to have the participants enjoyed. (This is usually expressed to the reflection sheet which I had the participants written after the tour. These are very objective information for my tour, and the extent of satisfaction is measured by their impressions. But since I haven窶冲 got the sheets today yet, I don窶冲 know if the participants really enjoyed. But it will be okay.)

As a tour guide, I am required to be a professional. In this sense, any mistakes are unacceptable. I am proud of this job, and this proud is indispensable. A tour guide is a representative of Waseda for all the guests who come to Waseda. It窶冱 been five years since I started to work, but at any moment, I have never forgotten about it.

I once wrote about tour guide on the campus news paper issued by the college office. Here is the URL for it. (Japanese text, and no English translation.)
http://www.waseda.jp/student/weekly/contents/2002a/962i.html

投稿者: ふじた 日時: 18:38 | 固定リンク | コメント (0)

Earlier last month, when I worked as a manager of a practice examination, I kind of got interested in that job, and today was the third time to work. Today窶冱 examination was a test for English proficiency known as 窶廢iken窶� in Japanese, one of the most famous tests in Japan. Today was the secondary testing day: examinees have already passed the first paper test, but they have to take another interview test. Today窶冱 my job is to facilitate and assist the interviewer.

The examinees for the pre-second grade had the interview during the morning, and in the afternoon, the examinees for the third grade had the test. Even though it窶冱 called pre-second or third grade, and it sounds like very high grade, actually the vast majority of the examinees was the high or junior high school student. I was also the one that took this test when I was a junior high school's student.
Looking at the examinees, I reminded of the day when I had an interview. I guess it was December and was so windy. My examiner was a man, and he and I were supposed to have an easy daily conversation before having the interview. I thought I should talk about the weather first, but since he asked before I talk to him, I wasn窶冲 able to talk about it eventually. The test was held at my junior high school窶冱 class, so he just asked me if I was the student of that school :-(
Another thing that I remember is that there was one word that I didn窶冲 know at that time in the examinational text. The unknown word was, interestingly, 窶彙orrow.窶� I didn窶冲 even know how to read it, but since the word wasn窶冲 related to the questions, I was able to get passed the exam. I wasn窶冲 really nervous somehow, I wasn窶冲 confident though. Maybe it was because most of the students, my classmates, had the same test on the same day at the same place, and it wasn窶冲 difficult.

It was also kind of funny to watch the examinees getting into the testing room. Literally every examinee said 窶廴ay I come in?窶� I thought it is too 窶徇anualized,窶� because many students own a textbook for this interview test, and maybe students were taught to say that phrase. But I think it doesn窶冲 really fit to the situation. Rather, I would say 窶廢xcuse me?窶� or just 窶廩i.窶�
Or maybe it is one of the Japanese 窶彡ultural窶� things to say something to be considered polite. But it is difficult to tell what kinds of phrases are truly used among natives, and what is worse for learners is that the language is changing. There is definitely a trend whatever the language is, and that bothers the learners a lot. Since I was also bothered with the changing and flexible native English, I do understand the difficulty. But I don't think it's a good way to be "manualized."

Another thing that I thought funny is a bag that each examinee wears. The bag is used in order to prevent examinee from using cell phones. The use of cell phone is a huge problem all over the world, and the use during the examination is at stake without any questions. Today, every examinee was supposed to put their cell phone into their special bags and wasn窶冲 allowed to even open it at the test site (the test was held at a private school close to my college). That is very strict, actually. It could be too strict. I don窶冲 know if it was too much, but in order to keep it fare, the cell phone shouldn窶冲 be allowed, so that cannot be helped.

Today窶冱 pay was 8000 yen. I am supposed to have worked from 8 am to 16 pm, so it was 1000 yen per hour. That might be enough and reasonable. It wasn't really very hard job, sometimes I got so sleepy though.

An incentive to earn money is ski. Skiing is the best sport I like and is the only one sport that I am good at. In order to enjoy my winter vacation, I have to work more and more :-)

投稿者: ふじた 日時: 17:28 | 固定リンク | コメント (0)

During this week, I experienced two similar part time jobs. This was the coordinator of the practice examination. The one was for the third grade junior high school students, the other was for the fifth grade elementary school students. Both of them were pretty similar in terms of the contents of the work itself, but the attitude or the response of the students was quite different. It seemed to me that the differences imply the reality and the problem of the contemporary society. In this paper, I will reveal the differences between the two different groups of the students from my observation, and then, analyze some important points. Finally, I will discuss the educational system in Japan comparing my experience with those groups.

Last Sunday, a regular practice examination was held all over the Saitama region. Over 55 thousand third grade junior high school student took the exam. October is the important season for the high school entrance examination, especially deciding the school which they are going to apply (because they won窶冲 have much time to get better score.) Therefore, the students in my class seemed to be comparatively nervous. They reminded me of my this very experience – I was also the one who suffered from the high school entrance examination. The subjects were Japanese, Math, English, Social Studies and Science, and 45 minutes were given for all of them to answer (the exam itself ended within the morning). 45 minutes is a very appropriate and enough time to get all the questions done. But there should definitely have been the gaps between the better-grade students and the not-better-grade students, and it was easily observed during the exam time. The better grade students usually pay careful attention to the answers they have made when they finished first time and make sure if their answers were really correct repeatedly by the end of the exam time or by the time they think enough. On the other hand, not-better-grade students don窶冲 usually check their answers out once they finished the questions. As soon as they get the test done, some try to sleep, some try to play with pencils, some just watch the outside, some even try to watch me! They totally lose their concentration on the exam and hope that the quick ending of the boring day.

The similar situation was seen in the fifth grade elementary school student窶冱 class; high motivated students paid careful attention to their answers, but the low motivated students wanted the early end of the test. This examination for fifth graders was held at a private cram school in Shibuya, Tokyo, and it was just for deciding their promotion or their recession of the class. This cram school is known for a number of the graduates who passed the examinations for the prestigious private schools. The educational quality should be rather higher. Most of the students get into this school from the forth year of their elementary school (some get into in their first year of the elementary school!), and since the fifth graders have one more year to take an entrance examination, they are kind of in between year, so sometimes it is very difficult to keep the concentration on their study, and it was observed very easily even in my class. Of course, even though it is called in between, some are able to keep their concentration on studying. For them, one year passes so early, and the exam will come soon, therefore, there窶冱 no time to waste even though the test was just for the promotion and recession. Otherwise, they will not get into their desired prestigious school. However, since they do have one more year to study, it could be said that they don窶冲 have to study so hard right now. This discussion is quite reasonable. (If really so, they don窶冲 have to go to this cram school right now though.) Some students at this cram school obviously lost their concentration on the test totally in the first 10 or 15 minutes and started to try to play. Interestingly, some started to observe me as I experienced during the test for junior high student. This wasn窶冲 different from their ages.

Watching their answer sheets in both groups, bored students usually gave up very easily, on the other hand, highly motivated students tried to get them done or already finished. The attitudes must have influenced on their scores. I am not going to deny these kinds of practice exams because it does have some good effects to some extent in terms of their proficiency. But there definitely should be some more important experiences that the adults will not have, will not able to have. That is, for example, playing with animals or friends in the park, collecting insects by going into the depth of a forest, or going fishing to the river or the sea. Of course, sometimes interaction with my friends caused a fight between me and my friends. It was a very tiny trouble when I think of it right now though, in those days it was a really big problem, and I learned a lot from these confrontations. I strongly understand how nice and enjoyable they are. I am sure that part of my way of thinking come from these experiences. They are not just my memories.

Compared to that, I don窶冲 think kids in Tokyo also experience this my very situation during their childhood as I did. They go to the cram school instead of going to the park. There should be some other elements that should be learned during their childhood. The interaction with all the living things that surrounds us definitely enriches our thoughts. I think part of the problems that happens among children have its inception in this less interacted society. Even though my fifth grader students have classes everyday t in the same class room, they don窶冲 seem to be friendly, for that matter, maybe they think their classmates of enemy for themselves in order to get into the desired prestigious schools. As for me, there always certain people that I dislike everywhere, but I do know how to live our school life with them even though we had a fight often. We have got the solution learned from the various confrontation experiences. However, children in this contemporary society don窶冲 have much time to play, rather they will study for the test. I think this is just unfortunate. Would it be tough to ask them the cram school is really important?

投稿者: ふじた＠自宅 日時: 22:15 | 固定リンク | コメント (0)