I'm the first to admit, I'm not a teacher by nature. I'm not really built for it or my mind doesn't work in that way or some other perfectly logic explanation.
Luckily I don't really teach English. Instead I teach one on one English conversation. Now for a guy who likes to chat to people (in general) that's a fairly attractive compromise. My client base is pretty diverse, well as diverse as you really can be in Japan, but it's safe to say I've got a rather colourful collection of clients.
There's the middle aged women who seem to want to just stare at me and listen to me say, well just about anything. Now I'm not going to lie that freaks me out a bit - it's kind of like the chick in high school who you were just never into but always seemed to be around...always. That said there are the occasional entertaining characters who want to learn English so they can watch Desperate Housewives with no subtitles or to go shopping on Fifth Ave with no problems. At first I viewed these as, um, interesting goals but as time goes on you begin to appreciate the level of dedication everyone is putting to get to there personal finishing point.
Then there's the business men and women, university students and professors. They like to talk about things that I can pretend to know about like financial terms and economics (note I said pretend). They are generally quite fun to teach, have very specific needs and tangible goals. Always looking for new ways to express themselves. It's great when you teach someone a phrase or a word and just watch their eyes light up - almost like they're thinking that's exactly what I wanted to say.
Next there's the prospective MBA students. They really make my day. Doing mock interviews with someone, looking over CVs and applications, having debates about serious or hypothetical topics it's all fun. But the real prize is when someone makes it through to the next round and gets one step to achieving their dream. You really feel like you are part of it all, the joy is both theirs and yours - it's something truly special.
I recently taught a client who had muscular dystrophy. It was a shock at first, mainly because I didn't click for about the first minute and just thought he was taking the piss. Then I couldn't really hear what he was saying for a few minutes which made me somewhat nervous because I didn't think I'd be able to correct anything he was saying which is pretty much the point when you're an English conversation instructor. I found myself literally sitting there wishing away the minutes till the end of the lesson, half feeling bad, half feeling helpless. Then it all became clear, I suddenly could hear everything. Every syllable of every word was once suddenly audible. Now if you're reading this and thinking he miraculously got cured, this is not one of those type of stories. It was more of just getting my ear into the groove of his speech patterns (I think). Anyhow I digress. This lesson was particularly amazing because he turned out to be by far the most interesting client I've ever spoken to. Everything from potential improvements in the model of Western aid to the developing world to failures in the transfer of political power in Africa - he had a profound viewpoint on it all. I found myself speechless, again, just taking in all he was saying to me.
Now the moral of the story (figured I'd give you a moral seeing as there were no miracles) is the effect living here has had on the way I perceive people in general. Speaking to people every day and hearing what's on their minds and how they see the world starts to make you look at things differently. Watching people give up large portions of their very limited free time in pursuit of their dream, regardless of how trivial you may think it is, teaches you something about determination.
So many experiences had and lessons learned. Some tangible, some irritating, some awesome, some cubersome - all worth every moment. So to all the Nihon-jin (Japanese people) who pay me to teach them, I owe you so much more.
Domo arigato gozaimasu (どもありがとございます)
