Tuesday, September 11, 2007
Wow! An update!
It's about 10pm here and I just got finished teaching my class. It went a little long, but it was fun. I'm really enjoying these night classes. We sit in my dining room, drink coffee and juice, and just kind of shoot the breeze about Okinawa. In the beginning the lessons were more structured, like my college classes: a little grammar, a little vocab., etc. But in the past month, they've devolved, if you will, and to my benefit.
You see, each week now, my students basically spend about an hour answering all of my tiresome questions about Okinawa and Japan. So, while they are practicing they're English, I end up getting lots of free little culture lessons. (And Joe too, since he's usually hanging around somewhere.) Today, for example, I was asking about the ubiquitous Japanese "ooOOooohhh" used in response to almost any mildly interesting comment. To me, this is an expression you make when you are surprised, really interested, or hear something juicy. So, sometimes I'm in class and telling my students, I don't know, let's say I'm talking to them about my weekend, and I'll get a chorus of "oooOOOooohhs", and I'm thinking, "I must pretty good damn storyteller. They're loving this!" Well, no, apparantly, they're pretty much saying "uh huh". "Same sound, different meaning," they told me tonight, to which I replied, "oooOOOoooohhh".
Anyway, for some audio reinforcement of this "lesson", I clicked on "Iron Chef" on Youtube. Of course, I downloaded the only episode in Iron Chef history in which every other comment wasn't punctuated by an ohh here and an ahh there. Oh well. I did get to ask the question nags me every time I see the show though, which is, "Is the Iron Chef Master gay?" (I mean, he always wears that Liberace outfit after all, and the discriminating way he looks at that glass of wine...)
Well, my students actually laughed at me! "Nooo!" they said. "He's a very famous Japanese actor." (Oh, well then!)
"But, what about his clothes?" I asked.
"He's supposed to look like a prince of the Iron Chef Court." Who knew?
Also, it turns out that the Iron Chefs are in fact real chefs with real restaurants (I'd thought maybe they just cook for the show). And one of the judges, the old lady who's on all the time, is Okinawan. Muy interesante.
Well, here's a look in case you want to watch for yourself.
Also, I was looking for some other Japanese show so you could hear the ooohhhs I was talking about. Instead, I found this:
Funny. Why do I watch AFN?
All right, well that's my post class lowdown.
By the way, in case you are wondering, no I haven't learned 10 words a week. Although tonight I learned that "naruhodo" means, "I see!" or "Indeed!"
So there.
You see, each week now, my students basically spend about an hour answering all of my tiresome questions about Okinawa and Japan. So, while they are practicing they're English, I end up getting lots of free little culture lessons. (And Joe too, since he's usually hanging around somewhere.) Today, for example, I was asking about the ubiquitous Japanese "ooOOooohhh" used in response to almost any mildly interesting comment. To me, this is an expression you make when you are surprised, really interested, or hear something juicy. So, sometimes I'm in class and telling my students, I don't know, let's say I'm talking to them about my weekend, and I'll get a chorus of "oooOOOooohhs", and I'm thinking, "I must pretty good damn storyteller. They're loving this!" Well, no, apparantly, they're pretty much saying "uh huh". "Same sound, different meaning," they told me tonight, to which I replied, "oooOOOoooohhh".
Anyway, for some audio reinforcement of this "lesson", I clicked on "Iron Chef" on Youtube. Of course, I downloaded the only episode in Iron Chef history in which every other comment wasn't punctuated by an ohh here and an ahh there. Oh well. I did get to ask the question nags me every time I see the show though, which is, "Is the Iron Chef Master gay?" (I mean, he always wears that Liberace outfit after all, and the discriminating way he looks at that glass of wine...)
Well, my students actually laughed at me! "Nooo!" they said. "He's a very famous Japanese actor." (Oh, well then!)
"But, what about his clothes?" I asked.
"He's supposed to look like a prince of the Iron Chef Court." Who knew?
Also, it turns out that the Iron Chefs are in fact real chefs with real restaurants (I'd thought maybe they just cook for the show). And one of the judges, the old lady who's on all the time, is Okinawan. Muy interesante.
Well, here's a look in case you want to watch for yourself.
Also, I was looking for some other Japanese show so you could hear the ooohhhs I was talking about. Instead, I found this:
Funny. Why do I watch AFN?
All right, well that's my post class lowdown.
By the way, in case you are wondering, no I haven't learned 10 words a week. Although tonight I learned that "naruhodo" means, "I see!" or "Indeed!"
So there.
