Lest I Forget.

First thing this morning I taught 3-4, which is Daichi's class. I wouldn't be being fair in this if I didn't note that the class went fine and he tried pretty hard in class, as did the kids around him. His team won the game, and even though he didn't speak up, he was helping his friends. That is good to see. I forgot to mention that the mom the other night kept yelling at me, "I know that you might look at his hair and stuff and think that he is a bad kid, but he isn't! Please understand." Man she misread that one. If I went after kids for looking odd, Evan Mankoff, and countless other campers, would have been bloody corpses years ago. I would have looked in a mirror and beaten the shit out of myself. These last few days have been the 1st years acting nuts. They are almost without flaw when Inoue Sensei and I teach their classes. When it is someone else they go ape-shit. Two of them told me they hated me today. "Glad to hear it!" I said. Later, the big stupid one, Nishiguchi, came to the office to get his foot bandaged up. I got him to speak completely polite Japanese to me and apologize for hating me. Oh, those teenagers! Now that I have said that, do I have to burn all of my Native Nod 7-inches? I also let Nishiguchi punch me in the arm a bunch of times. Maybe that made him happy. I also think it is a little important because he is a big, strong kid, and the more I let him punch me while I calmly explain to him all the reasons that it doesn't hurt, the more reluctant I think he will be to actually punch people in the future. Does that make sense? I just know that it is humbling for me to think that I nailed someone with a good shot and for it to have no result. It makes you hesitant to punch. Anyway. Back to the child mines.