koneko-desu

A few weeks ago we had a small comic convention here in my city.  It was very small, only an afternoon with about 200 people in attendance.  Unlike the anime cons I know in N. America there wasn't a dealers' room or shows or anything like that, just artists selling fanart goods, maybe some original character goods, etc., so it's not as intense as running around trying to find panels, workshops, catching shows, getting autographs, etc.  It's a nice way to spend an afternoon hanging out with friends that have similar interests and grabbing some cosplay photos.

I saw a few of my students there too  Some of them even rented a table and were selling their own goods.  I felt so proud of them!!  I'm thinking maybe later this year I"ll sell some things too (they have this convention like, 2 or 3 times a year).  My plan is to start with some stickers, postcards and "rakugaki" books, like doodle books of a few anime.  I can make all these at home so I don't have to go find print shops or anything, and I'm not hoping to make money, but just for fun.  But I'll have to make sure I actually MAKE things instead of being lazy in my free time.  

So now I'm in the midst of drawing some things for that, but also to apply for a table they ask us to give us the name of the artist/circle, so I'm trying to come up with a pen name of sorts.  I'm leaning towards Maple Panda, lol, I mean I like pandas, and I'm from Canada where maple syrup is famous, so I figured I'll add the two together.  Plus the image of a Panda pawing at a maple tree for syrup is pretty entertaining.

Anyone have other ideas??

So today was the Opening Ceremony at my school.  I was a little nervous since I didn't know which teachers would be changed and which ones would stay (apparently in Japan letting teachers know they're getting transferred in the new school year a few days before school actually starts is normal). Last year we had 5 Japanese English teachers and me as the only ALT at my school.  This year it went down to 4 Japanese English teachers, and still just me as the ALT.  2 of the teachers from last year stayed, and we got 2 new ones

Last year I started working at this school in September, smack in the middle of the year because the ALT before me quit after one semester.  So by the time I came in all the other teachers knew each other.  This time there are a bunch of new teachers, so I feel a lot better, and many of them are talking to me, taking the time to chitchat with me since it's just the beginning of the year and the work hasn't piled up yet.

I found out one of the social studies teachers actually volunteered in Ethiopia for a few years, so his English is actually pretty good even though he's not teaching English.  And I got a new teacher sitting next to me in the teachers' room who seems much more talkative than the one last year (the one last year was nice too, but she was sometimes a little difficult to start a conversation with.)  The teacher sitting across from me was really interested in my tablet that doubled as a computer since it has a docking station with a DVD drive, plus a keyboard and mouse, so we chattered a bit about that, lol.

Tomorrow I have some 3rd year classes, so students I already know from last year.  Also a special needs class, which I didn't teach last year, but there're only five students in there and I know some of them so it should be fine.

After school is the welcoming party for teachers, which I'm totally looking forward to.  I always have a lot of fun at these teachers parties and this time I'll get to mingle with the new teachers

This year's looking to be pretty good so far!

It's almost been exactly a year since my last journal entry @__@  Unbelievable...well actually quite believable given how lazy I get.

So anyway, last August my work with the eikawa (English conversation school) AEON finished and I moved out of Nagasaki to Saga.  They're like, right next to each other.  Now I'm at a junior high school as an assistant English teacher.  I like this job a LOT more than the previous one, even though it pays less, and I found that surprisingly I can get along quite well with junior high kids.  My anime/manga obsession might have something to do with it, lol.

Actually, it's thanks to those students I've started drawing again.  They like to request drawings of certain characters, and I try to draw as many as I can.  From last November to now (March) I've got over 120 drawings under my belt from those requests, a LOT of practice seeing as I used to draw only two or three times a year OTL  It can be a little overwhelming, I mean there're over 500 kids at the school so I'm just praying they don't all start requesting, but at the same time it feels good to get more practice in.

Also re-started my fanfic over on fanfiction.net (www.fanfiction.net/~konekodesu).  And now with spring coming around and the weather getting warmer everything feels pretty good

Oh, last Xmas/New Year vacation I took a trip to Beijing to see my dad and other relatives again.  I enjoyed this trip a lot more than the one I took in summer 2010, it was so blistering hot in Beijing I was in a crabby mood the whole time x__X  This time it was cold, but nothing like Canadian winter cold, so I did OK.  Also met up with two university friends whom I haven't seen since graduating, so it was nice to catch up.  One of them's working at the Canadian Embassy in Beijing, how awesome's that.  One day that's where I want to be too *-*

Alright, well, back to drawing, haha, maybe I'll update more than once a year this time