Job Discussion Forums

[Sweetsee]

I get a monthly salary and 2 bonuses a year. I punch a time-clock but I am free to do as I please when I don't have a lesson, I do errands, play sports, whatever.

The only thing I take home is the stress of spending so much of my time and energy with so many lost souls. I want so much to reach out and to help them, I want to shake them and wake them up, I want to leaf through a National Geographic with them, I want to go outside in the sun with them and run and shout and jump up and down. I want to take them to the beach and to the mountains, to a river and to a lake. I want to introduce them to people who will be excited and interested to meet them. I want them to be.

I really like what Shmooj said about how Japanese students are like a vortex that just sucks the energy out of the room. I thought that was brilliant. After reading that I went to my class of 27 students and I stood there waiting a moment for the last of the toughies to calm down and then I said, "Good morning, everybody." I could almost not breathe. It was as though the energy had convinced the air to go with it, not to mention that the room is sealed up like a drum and the heat blasting. I really meant what I said and so I tried again with the same results.

Ah, its's one thing or another, isn't it? Hard to believe I was homeless, penniless and unemployed in my home country not so long ago. Of course, I was also in love and there were moments there when we were in Hollywood riding double on my bike going to shop at 99 or changing from one flea-bag hotel to another, when I felt completely free. Its true, isn't it? When you have nothing you have nothing to lose!

[dmb]

[maymun]

[Sweetsee]

I heard that.