A post for Shun

I have met Shun once a week since last September. Recently we had our final meeting. He is my only conversation class student and after I moved from Oimachi to Nakameguro we agreed to meet in Shinagawa (where he works) and Meguro (where I work) alternately.

We're nearly the same age so it's interesting to compare my life and his. He has a good job working in patents at Sony. I had to look up 'patents' to understand what kind of job it is. I work with blocks, alphabet cards and sometimes paints. He has a strong old boy network from school and this April, no longer a junior at work, he received a promotion and became a leader for some new graduate recruits. I am in contact with 2 or 3 people from school. I'm returning to England to find my third job in 3 years and one day he will mature into a true Japanese company man.

Sometimes we talked about work. Sometimes we talked about friends. A lot of the time we talked about girls- Shun goes to 'gokon' match-making parties all the time since he and his girlfriend in his home-town Osaka split up. Slowly I discovered Shun has a very busy social life. Every weekend he goes somewhere or does something: ice-fishing in winter, motor-bike tours to Chiba, crab-fishing or firefly watching in summer.

I enjoyed talking with Shun a lot. Giving my thoughts voice, carefully considering what I wanted to say, ordering things in my mind before I uttered them, delving back into all the parts of language that fascinate me- the mutability and multiplicity of English, the range of expression and idiom- and purely keeping a conversation going for an hour with someone over a coffee really gave me a kick.