Visit to Vaughan's school

Yesterday I unexpectedly got to visit Vaughan's school as he asked me to drop some stuff of for him. I was actually happy with the invitation; I've been very curious to find out what a Japanese high school looks like! On the trainride there I was careful not to miss anything because this was the first time I'd seen any of the further away suburbs. I was naively expecting quaint traditional houses interspersed with rice paddies, but instead witnessed a rather ugly stream of highrises, industrial sites and highways. The rice paddies lived up to my expectations though, their brilliant shades of green offered a welcome relief from all the grey concrete. Anyway, Vaughan would say I'm being too critical, and he's probably right! It's not like Belgium has a great environmental track record, so I've obviously become spoiled by the natural splendors of New Zealand :-).

Chikuzen High itself is considered to be one of the most academic schools in the region, which apparently entails students exhausting themselves with loads of study and extracurricular activities. When asked by Vaughan what their daily routine looks like, a group of 15-year-olds replied this: get up at 6am, go to and sit in school, attend school club meetings (sports or other), study, collapse in bed at 1am. Waw, that makes Vaughan's schedule seem cruisy, because he arrives at school at 8.30am and gets to leave 8 hours later! Stress is certainly not a factor in his professional life at the moment, although dealing with rigid Japanese systems and at times unresponsive students can be a pain. Getting to know 400 Japanese names is also a challenge, especially if each of the 10 classes is only taught by him 1 hour per week! As far as I know he does enjoy it though and certainly doesn't mind hanging around for a few years :-).