Partying with the Sensei

The sensei, teachers, must celebrate the end of the trimester with a drunken party. They simply must. While not everyone gets drunk, there is certainly more alcohol than food consumed in the course of the night as a whole. The food usually consists of a set meal of many courses, not unlike what you would get at a Japanese inn, and preferably an all-you-can drink menu of some sort.

I was kindly invited to one of my elementary school’s start of summer parties, and had a wild time followed by karaoke. On Tuesday, I was invited to both of my junior high school parties and managed to make them both thanks to one starting earlier than the other. I started out with Minami-chu, where I got to see many of the teachers in jeans and a little sloshed for the first time. Then I went to Kita-chu’s party nearby and drank with them for about an hour before going off to karaoke with the younger crowd among the teachers. We sang for about two hours and had a rockin’ time.






The school parties have been a huge boost to my self-esteem, though not all compliments are entirely deserved. In addition to praise for my farewell speech, I’ve gotten tons of compliments on my Japanese ability, English ability, teaching ability, and understanding of Japanese culture. Japanese people being kind and complimentary in general, I’ve heard this before and responded with the usual denial and self-deprecation which is both expected and oddly liberating.

However, several male teachers, in varying states of drunkenness, have also told me, “I love you!” during the past week, and I haven’t known quite how to react to that statement! Of course, none of these are confessions of secret emotions; it’s either that the teacher wants to exaggerate with a taste of American effusiveness, or just that he doesn’t know any other way to compliment me in English. Nonetheless, it’s cute, and my response of smiling, laughing, or putting my hand to my mouth as if surprised or embarrassed has seemed to be appropriate.

Teachers in Japan work incredibly hard and have a ton of responsibilities in addition to teaching, and though I find some of these burdens and expectations unfair, I’ve come to have profound respect for these teachers and what they do. As hard as they work, however, they can play just about as hard, and still come into work the next morning!