Ah, Bureaucracy
I wrote that I made the cut and was approved for another year of service as an ALT in Ehime Prefecture on March 26th. I received the updated prefectural AET terms of agreement packet 3 days ago, and I received and signed my contract on the day before yesterday. Yes, the day before yesterday, September 11th. That’s a mere….5 MONTHS, 2 WEEKS, AND 1 DAY after the fact. Awesome. Gotta love the sense of timing around here. I’m supposed to be ready to go in 5 minutes should a teacher pounce on me lacking any semblance of a lesson plan, but I get to wait 5 months for the paperwork that means I’m still employed. Ha ha ha. Ah, bureaucracy, if you didn’t make me laugh so much, you’d make me cry. (It happens.) 
So, I bet I’m not the only one out here with this kind of story. Anybody want to share?
Aside: Speak of the devil! I actually just got dealt another crap lesson plan, 2 minutes ago. The lesson plan? Word games for 30 minutes (actually, according to the teacher, the same game for 30 minutes, but I’m not that evil) and a speech on…drum roll please…”the differences between America and Japan” - for the remaining 20 minute of class. This is going to be the worst class all week, easily. The kids are going to hate me. But I’ll let them know that it wasn’t my idea. Sheesh. Poor kids. They deserve better. Gotta go prep.