I’m used to being overfed whenever I’m at a school, but the school I was at today (in fact both the schools in that town) really went above and beyond. A female staff member opened up a box of sweets for me, bought out a plate of mandarins, poured me two cups of coffee (she even came back to check whether my cup was full) and then just left me to study Japanese alone in the meeting room.
Now I don’t really mind this, what I do mind is having a busy female staff member drop everything to make me coffee, while the male staff members stand around outside smoking. I don’t like that three o’clock is tea time in the BOE, unless both of the women who work here are out, because none of the seven Japanese men even consider making tea. Sam does it sometimes, I used to do it until I discovered I make horrible tea (and I still do it sometimes if I need a tea)
At every school I go to, one of the teachers will drop everything to make me coffee, and I love coffee, so I never say no. The thing is, out of seventeen schools and the Board of Education, there’s only one Japanese man who makes coffee; the English teacher at the Junior High School on the cape- our one male JTE. And even he won’t put a pot on, he makes instant coffee if there isn’t a pot ready.
And that’s not even the worst. In any workplace in the west, if you finish a pot of coffee you make a new one- I poured myself a third cup of coffee (like I said, I like my coffee) at the school this morning, the last in the pot, and I went to make a new one. A female teacher ran over from the other side of the staff room to stop me, saying it was alright, and then went back to tell everyone in the office about the crazy ALT who tried to make coffee. She kept saying I’m a guest, which is true, I guess, so I just sat down with my coffee and my Japanese textbook.
And as I sat there, a male staff member walked over, mumbled ‘is there coffee?’, pulled the pot out, looked in it, said だめ, and then put the pot back, returning to his desk.
He did not consider, even for a second, putting a fresh pot on, instead decided on waiting for someone else to do it. That someone, I’m sure, was female. I would’ve drunk that coffee. I would’ve put a pot on, if only I’d been allowed to.
