One of the fascinating things about having twelve hours of intensive language classes a week with native teachers is that you get to know their weird quirks and also lots of curiosities of the culture that just emerge naturally. On Friday we had to give speeches and all of us were very nervous. One of our teachers told us that a common solution is to imagine that all of our classmates in the audience were vegetables. "There's a carrot, he's a giant radish, behind him is a sweet potato . . " and so on. It was hilarious, especially hearing her try to explain this concept in Japanese.
One thing that hasn't changed, however, is the unwavering focus on the quest for perfection. I can't give the class all of the time I need to in order to excel, but I'm still enjoying it and learning a lot. This flabbergasts my teachers who get miffed when I make careless mistakes and can't understand why I wasn't able to completely memorize a difficult speech. It also explains why we get sad faces on quizzes if we miss a point or two. Frankly, I was elated that I received 14/15, but that's still not quite good enough. Being immersed in the Japanese grading system is an entire experience in and of itself.
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