My Funny Students

Two more stories about my students.

For the first story, there are two things you need to know about Japan:

First, it is persimmon season. There are two general kinds of persimmons (many sub varieties) one can be eaten fresh and is delicious eaten as it is, skin and all. The other is a slightly different shape and leaves a terrible dry feel in your mouth if you eat it fresh. That one is often dried or prepared in specific ways to change the texture.

Second: People in Japan peel EVERYTHING. Grapes, peaches, apples, pears - you name it. It doesn't matter how thin the skin is or how tasty - it is always peeled off. This is also true of persimmons, whose skin is about the same thickness as a nectarine. Westerners are perfectly happy to bite right into one of these beauties - the sweet variety, anyway - but that just isn't done in Japanese culture. Its really a shame since the Japanese variety of these persimmons has no core, no seeds, nothing that needs to be thrown away except a few leaves and a stem from the very top. Its the perfect fruit for chowing down.

The other day one of our coworkers brought a bag of persimmons to school. It was quite the luxury. There were plenty to go around for two days. Of course, the westerners just dug in right in the office. This got some scandalized stares from students. After explaining that yes, the skin was edible, and yes, it was delicious, we convinced one of the students to try it. You would not believe the process involved in getting her to bite in. She nibbled away but had a very tough time actually biting through. When she finally did break the skin she barely had any fruit to balance it and was pretty sure we were crazy. We finally convinced her to take a real bite and THEN she realized that yes, the skin was indeed edible. This experiment was so intriguing to my boss that she made sure to document all the stages on her camera phone. Not to be outdone, I made sure to take a picture of her taking a picture of the student eating the persimmon.

Win for the foreigners!

My second story is about one of my students from last term. This particular student had gone through a romance during summer break. I am not sure if they broke up and he tried to get back together with her when school started, or if he just confessed his love at the end of the summer. In any case, when he told her he loved her she told him she wasn't interested. He was quite heartbroken and decided to ask one of my coworkers for advice. She talked with him for a while and then decided to pass him over to me. He nervously tried to explain his story and with some help got it all out. He then asked me what I thought. I didn't really know what to say - romantic advice is not my forte - so I told him she must be crazy and he shouldn't worry about it. He thought about that and then the conversation went something like this:

Student: Now I'm lonely
Me: Would you like some chocolate?
Students: Valentines chocolate?
Me: No, Wednesday chocolate.
Student: Okay.

Moral of the story: Don't come to me if you want romantic advice. Do come to me if you want chocolate.