lioness in japan

I’m a little drunk as I’m writing this but I had a pretty weird Halloween party in Shibuya just now. It was also rather painful. I’ll give some background to this little story.

This party was thrown by the company who hooked me up with most of my students and I was more than flattered when the boss lady requested me to be her English teacher. I don’t just teach her new words but I am her ghostwriter. Any collaterals or speeches or emails to do with her business — I wrote ‘em. In fact, I overheard one of the teachers commenting that the instructions to get to the izakaya were “surprisingly clear”.

Perhaps I went to the party with my head just a bit screwed up because I was terribly hung over from last night’s whirlwind bar-hopping. Before today, I was actually quite excited to go as I heard 80 partygoers were going to be there. I have to admit my first instincts (and a good first hand look at the party plans because of my ghost-writing role) were like, “This looks kind of dorky.” It didn’t help that I chanced upon a take-the-piss blog started by a bunch of Nova teachers (Nova is the very troubled English school chain that went bankrupt recently) who made fun of the annual Halloween party at their company. I winced when I read it.

But I had to go. So I slipped my maid costume into my bag and trundled off to the party.

I hoped to meet other English teachers because after Vivienne left I really don’t have other friends who teach (weird, I know, because Tokyo is crawling with us apparently). But my oh my, were the teachers I met bloody weird. And one was even quite creepy. It just brought home the fact that English teachers, especially male, come across as mis-fits.

Yes, we’ve all encountered oddball teachers in school — they always struck me as folk who couldn’t really make it outside the teaching profession and young people or children are a way to hide away from the “real” world. This is so blunt of me but I’m sure this rings a bell with everyone.

Teaching is a respectable job, don’t get me wrong, but it tends to attract a fairly large share of socially inept freaks. I’ve read long debates on forums about this pet topic of teachers who teach English as a foreign language. Honestly, there’s this nagging image that teachers are losers. Why? It’s seen as an easy job but you earn pittance and many of those who do it for years are kind of like perennial backpackers who don’t grow up. That’s definitely a stereotype but people tend to remember the bad eggs than the normal ones.

Take for example the Irish dude I met. He had this way of gazing intensely into my eyes. He asked me why I came to Tokyo and I told him I followed my boyfriend. He went, “So where’s your boyfriend?” “Oh, he’s on a business trip.” And he was like, “I’m sure he misses you very much. I would, if I were your boyfriend.” For some strange reason, he also kept apologizing. He’s one of those people who tell unfunny jokes, and then inform you it was a joke, and then laughed and he would round it all up with, “I’m sorry.”

After his monologue on Ireland being the origin of Halloween, I excused myself to get a drink from this nervous, sweaty Irish who had a pink frog head. He asked me to get a glass of white wine for him but I conveniently got mired in another conversation with a pirate who asked me to clean his boat. Soon after that, he pounced on me with, “You didn’t get my drink.” I apologized, then he said, “I’m just joking. I’m sorry.” Either he has been in Japan too long, or he’s just friggin…. Weird. (The Japanese tend to apologise a lot in their speech by the way).

I had a bit too much to drink, seriously. A Japanese girl came up to me to chat (oh, and we had this “human bingo” game to play so we had to ask other party-goers questions from our quiz sheet) and she was dressed in a frilly denim ensemble. I thought she was some sort of cowgirl but when I asked her, “So who are you dressed as?” She replied, “I’m not wearing a costume.” Oops. I moved back to the buffet table for more food.

Being in a costume somehow made it easier for others to come up to me to say hello. I had a couple of leery comments, “Wow, what a nice view!” (I’m not kidding) and “That’s a sexy maid costume!” I’m not bragging but two male teachers wanted to take a picture with me and they were like, “She’s my maid!” “No, she’s mine!”, plus this other male teacher joked, “I wish you were my teacher.” And from the ladies, I got plenty of “Kawaii!” Indeed, I was very flattered and a costume sure can get a girl a lot of attention. I wish I had my own photos to show you how the party went but my camera battery was dead (see, I’m not good at being organized when I’m hung over).

It wasn’t all bad. I flitted from conversation to conversation until the costume contest results were being announced. A pirate won first place and a monk came in second. I don’t know who was third — by then, I whisked myself off to de-maidify myself. With a pounding headache, I went up to my student and told her I had to head off to a feigned dinner appointment. I feel bad — I wrote her speech and I should’ve stuck around to watch her but I felt so trapped in this bubble of forced small talk and I felt uncomfortably tipsy. I was so glad none of my other students saw me in this getup (and in this red-faced, drunken state) — I’m sure they would lose all respect for me.

I’m recycling my costume for the Halloween hash run this Wednesday but I’m really looking forward to this because these guys put up a real party. In fact, my first hash in Tokyo was last year’s Halloween run. Yay, yet another anniversary to toast to.

Related posts:

1. Hanami party at yoyogi koen
2. My first nabe party
3. Kowai ne

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