Anzac Avenue's Median Strip

One aspect of life that is different in Japan and New Zealand is traffic. In Japan, it is considered that cars will look out for pedestrians at all times (heavy penalties if pedestrians are hit, despite the fact that pedestrians may be in the wrong). Therefore, I have noticed that students walk along the median strip, sometimes quite oblivious to the fact that articulated trucks and speeding cars are rushing by them on both sides. Today, Nathan and I will teach some basic traffic conventions for pedestrians.

Television dinners

Television dinners

 

A lot of the students mentioned that it was difficult to have conversations with their homestay families because their families were always watching television. Some of the students even commented that a lot of the time they would have TV dinners, or that the television would be on during dinner time. The students said that they felt awkward if they disturbed their hosts while watching television and so decided not to say anything at all. Television acts as a socially-constructed medium for controlling when conversations should begin and end. Although the homestay families do converse during the commercial breaks, the conversation is usually reduced to short, quick comments rather than lengthy discussions. Again, this is a skill that the students do not have and so they find it difficult to communicate in these commercial breaks. In terms of an interpersonal function, by switching on the television during dinner time (or leaving the television switched on), the homestay parent has indirectly appropriated the mood and modality of any conversation that takes place. Similarly, the conversation of the student and parent watching a drama on television and only speaking during the commercial breaks indicated that the student acted in the same way as the parent in this situation. In both of these circumstances the parent not only controlled who the participants were, i.e., the television and the family members, but also when and how they were to participate. To use Itakura's (2001) term, the host parents construct a "sequential dominance" over the interaction. In other words, the rules of rapport were determined by the parent, who assumed the rules were known by the student. However, as we can see from the conversations that took place when the television was an active participant, the students decided to say very little, or not speak at all. It is also important to notice that none of the students initiated any conversation at these times. As Halliday (1984) notes, the students' communicative options have been severely restricted.

 

 

Showering in the homestay

Showering in the homestay

 

One common issue that was brought up by the students was that they had trouble understanding that their homestay only had a limited amount of water to use in the shower. This meant that most of the students could only shower for about five to ten minutes. In Japan, it is normally the practice for people to wash themselves using a shower and then soak in a very hot bath for up to half an hour. The water temperature in the bath can be controlled easily by a thermostat situated near the taps and is usually set to about forty three degrees Celsius (by most New Zealand people's standards this would be just too hot). Because of this very hot soaking, people would then be able to move around the home in very loose clothing before they get into bed or retire to a warmer part of the house. Because the students couldn't soak in a bath in their New Zealand homestay, they were always complaining of having a cold shower. When the host parents were questioned about this, they said that the water was hot, but that it always went cold because the students were staying in the shower until the water went cold. It was found that the students were in fact using the shower, not just as a means to wash themselves, but as a means to get warm by trying to soak in the shower instead of the bath because this was what they were used to in Japan. This was why the shower was going cold and was the reason why there were many complaints by the homestay parents saying that their student always used up all of the hot water.

It was also found that the students would be constantly turning the water on and off many times during showering. It is the custom in Japan to firstly quickly rinse oneself with warm to hot water using the shower and then turn the water off. Secondly, people soap up a washcloth and then wash themselves while the water is turned off. Thirdly, the shower (or small bucket filled with water) is turned on and is used to wash the soap off. The next step might be to turn the water off again and proceed to wash another part of the body, for example, hair or face. Again, the same procedure is used – the water is constantly turned off and on. The problem here is that in a typical New Zealand house where a hot water tank is used, it takes a bit of time for the water coming out of the taps to warm up. This is why the students often complain that the shower is cold when in fact, they haven't left the hot tap on long enough for it to become warm. (Turning the shower off and on and trying to adjust the temperature is particularly difficult to do if the homestay has one cold and one hot tap.) Similarly, the term "hot" has different connotations for different people. To maintain the temperature for a long period of time in a Dunedin homestay at about forty three degrees Celcius is difficult. The water would quickly be used up.

 

Today's English Class

Well, it was a great class today.

The students did all of their enrollment and other bits and pieces. They went to Unipol and played games for about 40 minutes. I think that they had a good time, but they looked quite tired by the end of it.

In the English class, we learnt to use people's names.

For example: Student(S): Hi, Mike, I'm home.
Host mother(HM): Oh, hi, Yusuke, did you have a good day?

(S): Yes, today, I played at Unipol and it was good fun. Um, I'm just going to change me clothes, but um, yeah, I'll come back soon. See you soon.

The students learnt how to safely (politely) excuse themselves, but say that they would like to continue the conversation soon. We have also taught the students that a simple response to the question "did you have a good day" is not just "good, thanks," but rather an invitation to say what they did during the day.

We also said that it was the students' responsibility to be the first one to greet their homestay parents, and not vice-versa.

It was a packed English class, so I don't know if everything went it. In the end, I said, a simple smile and a look as though you are trying to communicate goes a long way to communicating a lot.

We'll pick up practising the conversations tomorrow.

Best of luck with hosting your student, and if there is anything that you would like to share then please comment here or send me a personal email, so that we can teach the whole class.

My email address is: mpryde@tekotago.ac.nz.

Cheers, Nathan and Mike