Thursday...

I've had a really busy week at work this week. Monday was a holiday (pretty much spent at home), but Tuesday and Wednesday were full days with classes in the morning (new lessons in all of them) and Open High School (a day for junior high school students interested in applying to our school to see what it's like) in the afternoons. I did a lesson about sounds with two of my coworkers for the JHS kids (mostly me leading & included making a rap at the end), which went well, and we also held a special English Club meeting yesterday for two girls that wanted to see what it was like. I still haven't been feeling well, but the American meds I'm taking are helping with the congestion, at least.

The Election

Despite all of this going on, however, the real news that was on my mind all day yesterday (and this week) was not about what was going on here, but what was going on in my home country, in the United States of America. Even though I was running around like a chicken with my head cut off, I was literally checking CNN.com any chance I got all day on Wednesday (between classes), updating my coworkers on the election status as the numbers changed.

Then, around 11 in the morning, my computer screen updated itself and suddenly CNN was reporting that Obama had almost 300 electorial votes - he had won!

I was so excited I stood up and announced announced the results to the coworkers sitting around me. A few of them came over to see the poll numbers on my computer for themselves. I had to explain the system a little bit (how the real winner is decided by the College, not by the popular vote), but everyone was pretty excited. In hindsight, looking back at that moment, I might even say I wad potentially in shock. It was definitely a big moment and I was fighting back the tears, while the rapidly incoming news stories confirmed Obama as our new president. I checked my phone and I had already gotten a few text messages from other excited foreigners in Japan (not all of them American) and Facebook was on fire with status updates, mostly happy about the election results, but some very upset, too.

As much as I would have loved to get out and celebrate the news, I still had a few classes ahead of me so I tried to subdue some of the excitement and finish off the day. I actually ended up being at school pretty late with club and correcting notebooks, so when I finally got home around 7, I just made dinner and watched several speeches and newscasts before falling asleep for the night. I will admit that Obama's speech moved me to tears, that I was also curious about Michelle's dress when I saw it (petty, I know,but I found it funny that it was all over the news this morning) and I was moved by the graciousness and nobility of McCain's speech.

Feedback

Now that things have settled down a bit and the news has settled in, I've tried discussing the election with some of my students and my coworkers. A lot of them seem excited, some don't seem to care (about politics?), although - so far - I haven't run into anyone that was upset by the news. It could be a Japanese "not disturbing the wa (peace)" thing, but if they do follow foreign politics, nobody is telling me they thought McCain should have been elected instead.

I did talk to one coworker for a long time on the way to the train station last night and he was telling me that while people are happy about Obama this time, they were actually also glad that Al Gore lost eight years ago. He was apparently introducing some sort of environmental program that would have raised taxes in Japan pretty drasticallyif it had passed, so many people didn't like him (or the associated Democratic party...). He might have said more, but my Japanese wasn't good enough to understand all of it.

Anyways, that negative association with the US Democratic party seems to have passed, at least for now, but I really think people are mainly just curious to see what happens. I'm sure some positive news from the (recently suffering) Japanese Stock exchange (due to expectations from the election results?) probably helps, but - then again - it's also probably somewhat biased to only be talking to teachers and parents in a semi-rural community, who have potentially different opinions from those in, say, the business sector. But, hey, that's what I've got...

Coverage

Well, Obama, Japan (which has selling Obama regalia for a while now and cashing in on the name-coincidence since the primaries) has definitely been getting a lot of coverage as far as Japan's reaction goes, but I think overall, the expat community was mostly excited and a lot of Japanese people didn't follow. One of my coworkers did tell me her 10 -year-old daughter had to do a presentation for her 4th grade class yesterday and decided to discuss the election, however. Some of the kids apparently knew a bit about the election, too, meaning their parents have probably been talking about it...even though they had no idea it was this week. As far as celebrations went in this area, though; I wasn't downtown (in Kobe or Osaka), so I can't tell you what the scene was like there, but I'm guessing it was about the same as any other day.

Most of the headlines today are already changing to more forward-looking pieces about how Obama will cope with key issues (the economy, especially) and how it may affect the current state of our nation, but I don't remember seeing this much international coverage in past elections, however. It's pretty amazing.

I need to get back to work. I'm trying to plough through some notebooks before the mountains build up again (and so I can get home to get some rest instead of working on them... still feeling "blah"), but this is definitely an exciting week.