Cool Biz and the Mushi Kamikaze

This morning I walked into work to discover two things: “cool biz” has ended, and there were dead "mushi" in piles on the desks and floors where I sit.

So, you’re probably like “WHAT?!” at this point. Let me explain. “Cool Biz” is a law (?) in Japan that lets businessmen and women wear short sleeves and no jackets in the hot weather, and men don’t have to wear ties. It’s a really nice law, since it gets so hot it would be inhumane to have to wear a suit jacket in 90 degree 90% humidity weather. Now everyone is back in long sleeve shirts, ties, and jackets. Of course, for me this doesn’t change much. For women you don’t have to wear a blouse or a jacket (much like the different business dress styles of genders in America) but can get away with nice slacks or a skirt and a shirt that is not too revealing. (You want your 9th grade male students to be listening to your English pronunciation, not looking down your shirt). Many teachers will change into exercise clothes at different times of the day, so it is not always so formal. In general, our school is very relaxed anyway.


Today when I walked into the teachers room the vice principal was wiping what I thought was dirt off my desk. While he is a nice guy, I was confused why he’d be taking time out of his busy morning to clean my desk. I soon found out that there were dead “mushi” (Japanese for flying ant--my vice principal was nice enough to take out a nature book, show me the proper illustration, and let me look at one under a magnifying glass!) all over the desks and floors of that section. So I took a broom and swept them up. The vice principal pointed to the lights above to explain that’s where they came from. I asked my supervisor why they all fell from the lights. “They committed suicide,” she said. “Why?” I asked, still thinking maybe she was serious. Maybe they all flew into the lights in a feeding frenzy (it seems like bugs think lights = food sometimes) and got fried. My supervisor replied, “Something bad happened and they couldn’t live anymore. So they had to end their lives.” So there was a mass mushi kamikaze. Hopefully there will be no more suicides while I am at my desk!

The speech contest went very well yesterday. I am very proud of my student. She worked very hard and did very well. At one point, she forgot what she was saying and had to backtrack a bit, but many students did this so it was no big deal. The other speeches were very moving as well and it was a really cute group of kids. One of them I found out lives right down the street from me! She seemed really nice and I’ll probably see her again as she lives so close. I told her to come by if she needs help with English homework but I don’t think she will. I will find out soon if my student won anything.

Well, that’s about it for now. My computer should be fixed in a week, and the repairs shouldn’t effect any of my data, unless something else goes wrong. I swear, no one makes anything right anymore. Did they ever?

Bye everyone!
-Lisa