Note to Self: Do Not Throw Garbage in the Garbage

Every year, the Tobu-Kamikita board of education (which encompasses Momoishi, Shimoda and Rokunohe) engages in an exchange program with our sister-city, Kittery, Maine (Maine is the northeastern-most continental United State, for those of you who don't know). During the spring, we send a group of about 15 middle-schoolers to America to eat pizza hut, drink pepsi and bathe in the warm glow of freedom that emanates from every television set in the land. Then, in the late summer, about 15 American students come over here to complain a lot and marvel at how boring the Japanese countryside is (although I imagine that Kittery, Maine is not much more exciting).

Well, this year, three girls from Momoishi Junior High School have been selected to participate in the exchange. They have been asked to prepare English aisatsu (self-introductions) and yesterday they were set to recite them for the principal. Well, I sat next to the three girls at lunch and eventually coaxed all three of them into letting me hear their introductions, which were quite good, especially considering their usual performance in class. However, when I asked them if they actually understood what they just said, they replied with a hesitant "Not really...".

Anyhow, actually conversing with my students during lunch reduced the already minimal amount of time I had to finish an entire tray of food to about two minutes. While this would be no problem for the average Japanese person (anyone who has eaten a meal with Japanese people before will know why they so easily dominate eating competitions the world over). Although I was able to finish most of the food on my tray, I still had a roll of "graham bread" left. I hastily took two bites out of it and then got up to dispose of my leftovers and return my tray and bowls. In Japanese schools, each classroom deposits all of their leftover food and liquid into a large metal pot-I'm told that the contents are then shipped off to farms to feed pigs with. Well, by the time I got up there, they had already carted-off the pot, which left me in a bit of a bind. After putting away my trays and bowls, I discreetly buried my half-eaten bread in the garbage can underneath some papers. I was a little unsure if this was the correct course of action but I figured that in all likelihood, no one would be the wiser.

Well, after teaching a few more classes, I returned to the teacher's office to kick back with a copy of Hard Boiled Wonderland and the End of the World when two of the girls I was talking to at lunch came into the office. They stood nervously in front of me for a few seconds before the more outgoing girl produced an old friend from behind her back: the half-eaten bread. "Sensei, did you...bread...into...dust box?" I replied that yes, I was the culprit. "Don't...bread...into...dust box," she replied. She then thrust it forward towards me and exclaimed "Present!" Um, thanks.

As comical as that may be, even funnier was the explanation that I received afterward from Takahashi Sensei, their "English" "teacher". "If we didn't enough bread," she said as she outlined the shape of a pot with her hands. She then took the bread from me and placed it on her desk. I have no idea what she intended to do with it.