Gift Giving

Gift giving is a very central part of Japanese culture..this is why anything you buy will be very carefully packaged and wrapped for you. A lot of care goes into the presentation of things. If there's an art to gift-giving, the Japanese have mastered it.

There are 4 English teachers for the first year students, and myself. I sit at a desk with 3 of them, we often do things together. The 4th teacher, Karino sensei, I rarely speak with, mostly because we don’t teach any classes together and he’s very busy. I was surprised when I found that he had left presents on each of our desks before leaving for a couple of days on a business trip. The message said that it was an early Halloween present.

More examples of gift giving:
When I went to see Erica last weekend, she had received presents from the lady at who’s house we had spent the night for the Minamata Perron competition….how beautiful is this..It’s hand made!!

On Sunday, I came home to find a bag of bread and pastries hanging on my doorknob. Since over a year ago, I’ve been getting a bag of bread almost weekly from the Yamaguchi family (my upstairs neighbours). Whenever I travel, I bring them back a small gift, and/or send them a postcard.

I find the pressure to return gifts sometimes a little overwhelming though.

I don’t do nearly enough to thank people for what they do for me here…people are very considerate and thoughtful..I should really learn to be a more thoughtful person.

I spent most of the day correcting term tests. Definitely not as interesting as the journals, but hey it’s gotta get done. Kitano sensei, Fukuda sensei, Shimasaki sensei and I have our desks facing each other. The company makes the work much more enjoyable.

At volleyball practice this evening, we had an exhibition game. For some reason, I didn’t enjoy playing as much as I usually do…I get really frustrated with myself for not being able to communicate…I feel like I should be doing much better than I am by now!!

Maybe I’m just tired.