I have time, so I'm posting.

Is it "visit an English language school and ask for an interview" week or what?

Usually, Isesaki GEOS averages 1 interview a week - that is, we usually only have 1 person stop by and inquire about our classes and maybe signing a contract. The interview process is really long and quite involved, taking about 2 hours to complete. My role is short and simple, in that (if the prospective student is of a high enough level) I come in and do a level check to see which class would fit them best. It takes about 10 minutes to do. I get a little extra money if they decide to sign up for a class, but William told me it that I may get 2-3 interviews a month.

In the previous two weeks, Isesaki GEOS has perfomed exactly 1 interview. This week, we've already done 6. Yowza. That's four walk-ins and two appointments, of which I've only done one level-check. Actually, I should have done a second one, but the lady can only come to Monday classes, and because that's my day off, she would have to attend one of Benni-sensei's classes.

This sudden influx of potential students has kept us on our toes, especially Hitomi-san. Because of personal issues, she goes home between 5-7pm. The past two days, she hasn't left until long past 8pm.

Despite this, I still took the train this morning to Maebashi so Benni-sensei and I could do important things, like shop for books and eat lunch. We are swapping language lessons: I will teach her English (which she already knows pretty well), and she will teach me Japanese (which we all know I don't know all that well). There's a big bookstore at a mall in Maebashi, so she took me there to pick out lesson books. Ended up with "Japanese for Busy People," which looks fairly uncomplicated and something I can handle. My main concern is learning how to read and figuring out how to distinguish between katakana and hiragana. This confuses me endlessly.

After going to the mall, Benni-sensei took me to a little out-of-the-way Korean barbecue restaurant, which was awesome. They gave us so much food, it kept coming and coming. We started with marinated bean sprouts (yummy), followed by soup, salad, and a huge bowl of rice in quick succession. The meat course was beef, lean and fatty cuts, which we cooked on a grill right on the table. Man, that was delicious, though I found it hard to do like Benni-sensei and eat it straight off the grill. My tongue is still a little burnt. We were also served Japanese cucumbers with grated carrot and curry, which I did not enjoy so much. Finally, for dessert, we had fresh figs, which were very good. (funny sidenote: before coming to Japan, I'd never eaten a fig, now I have eaten three.)

Then we drove back to Isesaki, where we went to a furniture store for me to buy something to put in the bathroom to have room for all my crap (I don't have magnetic walls! although, the ceiling is magnetic, but that wasn't very helpful). We also went to look at cell phones, because I really need to have one. The store we went to was in the last day of a campaign for October, offering a specific phone free with a two-year contract. Normally, I don't like getting into a contract with cell phone companies, but it's a decent deal, I liked the phone (uncomplicated and with an English option), and I'd like to stay in Japan for two years anyway. The saleslady was very nice and allowed me to fill out a contract and reserve a phone even though I won't get my gaijin card until next week. Yay for awesomely nice Japanese people!

It is a really nice phone, white with green features, and it has a camera and that's about it for extras (Benni-sensei says, "Camera, but no tv, are you sure that's okay?" and I assured her it was - I don't think she understands that my last phone came from a drugstore of all places). I get 62 minutes a month (with the option to upgrade at any time), and the whole package runs me about $30/month. Which is not too bad, I think. I don't plan to use my phone overly much, but even if I decide to upgrade, it'll never cost me more than $50/month. Roughly equivalent to my phone bill back in the States, but with a camera and email, so I'm not complaining.

And then we came back to GEOS and actually did some work! Thursdays are awesome because my first class isn't until 6pm, and I only have 2 private students. One is adorable little Rio, who is a little genius, I think. She's way too advanced for the Rocky book, so she's got other play and activity books to go through. She still acts really shy with me, but her mother said that last week, she talked about me all evening, so I guess that's a good sign.

There, so that was my day! Next Thursday, I go to pick up my gaijin card (which is really an alien registration card), get my hanko (a signature stamp) and open a bank account, and get my cell phone. Yay!