Today was my second go at a kindergarten school... a different one too. I was really excited about it in the morning... but, the excitement became stress within an hour. I'm still a bit stressed by how today played out.
Last week, a teacher was trying to help me by showing me where Muramatsu Kindergarten (the school I was going to go to today) was with a map. He showed me where the school was (which turned out to actually be Muramatsu Nursery) and how to get there from Muramatsu Elementary (my school).
Yup... that was a mouthful... Muramatsu Kindergarten, Muramatsu Elementary, and Muramatsu Nursery... let that be a sign of the confusion to come.
I don't blame the teacher, however, and take full responsibility. He was trying to help me and the language barrier was present as I didn't know there was a difference between how to say Kindergarten and Nursery.
So, yesterday and this morning, I made sure to check a map online to make sure I wouldn't get lost and knew exactly where I was going. The only kanji I really knew was for Muramatsu, and I found it in the area the teacher had showed me. However, I didn't know the kanji for Kindergarten... and assumed the Muramatsu Nursery was Muramatsu Kindergarten.
When I arrived at the Nursery, I asked if that was the school I had to go to. A teacher pointed me to the next building saying an English class would occur there. However, the school was another ALT's kindergarten.
He saw me and asked why I was there... and I told him I was confused. He talked to a teacher as I called the company to tell them I was going to be late. The teacher then said she'd take me to Muramatsu Kindergarten since I wouldn't make it by bicycle. So, they told me it was okay to leave my bike there and drove me to Muramatsu Kindergarten.
When I got to the kindergarten, I apologized for being late (遅くて来てごめんなさいでした.) and thanked the teacher for driving me to the kindergarten (私にてつだってくれてありがとうございました.). After teaching at the kindergarten, I apologized once again to everyone for being late and they told me to not worry.
They then offered to take me to pick up my bike, but I told them that I had an English class in Muramatsu Elementary and that I'll be able to pick up my bike either during the lunch break for afterschool.
A teacher then took me to Muramatsu Elementary and I thanked them again for helping me and apologized once more. The teacher also explained the situation to my Kocho and Kyoto Sensei and how my bike was still at the other kindergarten. I told them I could pick it up either during lunch break if it was okay with them... or afterschool, but, they volunteered to drive me to pick up my bike during 5th period since I didn't have an English Class.
So, during that time, the Kyoto Sensei drove me to pick up my bike and I apologized and thanked everyone for all the trouble and for all the help once again, and bicycled back to Muramatsu Elementary in time for my next class.
::sigh::... what a day...
1 comment:
It didn't sound like an epic failure to me. I'd be confused too if there were 3 places with the same name. At least you got there and now you know where the place is at.
幼稚園= Preschool (yea, the kanji on that one is hard to remember) N E way, the furigana is 。。。。。ようちえん
There is this awesome book that they sell to help you memorize kanji characters. They tell you how many strokes they are (which means nothing to me) , how they originated, and suggest ways to remember them.
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