Okay, bear with me, it`s been a long couple weeks, and my brain is very scrambled right now, I need to just blather for a minute.

I have been thinking a bit about the nature of the JET program. It`s a huge safety net, with an immense support network, and a lot of the lessons and whatnot are sort of given to us. It`s not very hard work, and there`s a lot of sitting around to be done. I, of course, try to make my lessons as complicated and grand as possible, and in so doing, make way more work for myself than most other JETs.

I think one of the reasons for this is that I am coming at the JET program from a different angle than most people. About 70% of the JETs are fresh out of college, and most of the rest have not been doing a whole lot since college. That`s fine, but it`s a different place than where I`m coming from. Invariably, one of the first questions I get after my self-introduction in my classes is `Why did you come to Japan?` (usually the second is, `How much did you make doing special effects?`)

Basically, I don`t think I was doing super-well with the whole special effects thing. It`s a great industry to be in, but it can be very demanding, and my personal life was not stable enough to support it. I came to Japan to clear my head and get my shit in order. It`s not running away or postponing life so much as getting a life to postpone. At least, that`s how I look at it.

Japan is both good and bad for this. Because everyone is so polite, and there`s such a vast safety net, you can get away with pretty much anything. It doesn`t feel real, a lot of the time. It feels like a game. I find this really unsettling — this isn`t the reason I came here. I try to take things seriously, and not be sucked into this fantasy wonderland that a lot of the other JETs (especially the fresh-out-of-college JETs) fall into, but it`s hard. When in Rome, you know?

Anyways, that`s just what`s been on my mind. Back to organizing festivals.