I arrived at my island school this morning to find no students. Apparently the weather (strong winds and rain) was too dangerous, and they all had the day off. But one of the quirks of the Japanese school system is that weather too dangerous for students is not too dangerous for staff, even though the students come by bus from other parts of the (very small) island, and all the staff come by car from up to an hour away, crossing the long, exposed-to-wind-and-rain bridge from the mainland en route. So the staffroom is full but the rest of the school is empty.

Anyway, this means I have the day off, more or less. I still have to sit in the staffroom this morning, and at my desk in the main office this afternoon, but I’m left to my own devices. I’ve been using the time to catch up on my Japanese studies, since the JLPT is coming up in a couple of months and I want to pass level 2 this time.

I was plodding along quite happily, writing out corrections and going through listening scripts from an example exam paper, when I found this lovely dialogue. It’s a conversation between a new employee at a company (a woman) and a slightly more senior employee (a man), which takes place during the lunch hour.
Here it is in its, with my translations in italics:

Continue reading ‘Soaking in it’