Korona Daisaiyaku
When Renee first talked to me about teaching abroad in the summer of 2019, I was under the impression that Japan had a year-round school schedule. That's not entirely true. The school year starts in April. The first term of the year is from April to July, then summer break is from late July to late August, the second term is from September to December, and then they have winter break from late to December to early January, and the third term is from the end of winter break, to late March, Then they have a spring break before the next school year starts. Minamiwa Municipal Elementary School reopened on Tuesday, January 7th. I spent the first couple of days of 2020 getting acclimated to Minamiwa, setting up and starting my podcast, and spending time with Renee and her family. That week, I recorded every blog from Season 1 and started writing the first blog of Season 2, about me landing in Japan and going to the New Year's party.
I was Renee's teaching assistant. On the first day of school, at 8:45, Renee greeted the class. “Good morning, class!”
“Good morning, Mori-sensei,” the class replied.
“So as you can see,” Renee said after asking the class how their break went, “I have a new teaching assistant. This is Mitchell Ulibarri. I taught him piano when I was living in America. He is still pretty new to Japanese, so you might need to ask me questions he doesn't understand. But he is learning along with you. I expect you to treat him with the same respect that you treat me!”
Over the next month or so, I got really good at my job, figured out the train route, got 2/3 of the way done with The Greattastic Adventures: Miracle Child, went to a ton of festivals with Ren and Yuka, and got to know a lot more about them. Ren was the math teacher, and Yuka was an art teacher. Both of them were 24. At some point during this time, I started hearing people talk about something called “Korona Daisaiyaku.” It was only in passing, and I didn’t think to ask what it meant.
On Saturday, March 7th, 2020, I woke up to a phone call from Yuka. “Would you like to run some errands with me,” she asked from the other side of the phone, “and then we could go to the park afterward?”
“Sure,” I replied, not suspecting a single thing. The day was mostly uneventful. It wasn’t until around 6:00 that I started to get suspicious. We had been out from 10 AM until about 3:30 running her errands. We got to the park around 4:15, and while I enjoyed spending time with Yuka, I was ready to leave by 5:30. By 6:00, when we were still hanging out there, I knew something was up.
“What’s going on?” I asked for what felt like 1000 times.
“Nothing!” She insisted.
I was still not convinced, but I let it go because she wasn’t giving me anything. At 6:30, we finally made it to Renee’s house, and when I walked in, sure enough, August, Arden, and Marshall were standing in the middle of the main room!
“Surprise!” all three of them yelled together.
“Oh my gosh, what are you doing here!”
“We missed you,” Arden said, “and we thought this would be a good way for me to celebrate my birthday!”
I was excited to see my friends again, and we decided to go out to a bar to celebrate. The bar that we went to was mostly dead, but I liked it that way. While I've always liked being the center of attention, when I go to dead bars with my friends, it feels like we are the only people in the world. I spent the night translating what my new friends were saying to my old friends, telling stories about my adventures in Japan, and dancing. “So,” Marshall asked, about an hour in, “How do you feel about Covid?”
“What-vid?” I asked.
August and Arden screamed, “You haven't heard about Covid?”
Yuka and Ren looked at me, waiting for me to translate. August, Arden and Marshall, then explain to me what Covid is. Once they explained the term “novel Coronavirus,” I realized I'd heard about it before: “Korona Daisaiyaku,” I mumbled under my breath.
Recognizing the phrase Yuka and Ren joined the conversation, and both groups helped me realize what I had been ignorant of because of the language barrier. “I don’t know,” August said, “It seems kind of apocalyptic.”
“The Coronapocalypse,” I mused.
To Be Continued…
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