A little background info: The new school year started in April, and the high school I work at hired a part-time English teacher to teach about 12 classes a week. I was assigned to teach a couple of classes with her. She had previously only taught elementary school, but her language skills were okay and I was sure she'd have no problems, seeing as the students in our school aren't really that high-level as far as English goes.
Turns out she felt overwhelmed due to the leap from elementary to high school and quit last week. The school scrambled to find a replacement, but it was nigh impossible since the school year's already started and all the competent teachers already got jobs. They ended up having to look outside the prefecture for teachers to hire. The replacement ended up being some guy from a neighboring prefecture.
I got a bad vibe as soon as I heard the details. First, the mere fact that he was unemployed after the school year started didn't speak too well of him. The fact that he's in his mid-forties and hadn't passed the teacher's exam was another negative. The fact that he was willing to do a daily 6-hour round-trip to teach a couple of classes also bespoke of a certain kind of desperation.
All that said, I was not prepared for the utter incompetence I faced when the guy showed up at work today. He cannot speak English. Let me repeat: HE IS AN ENGLISH TEACHER WHO IS INCAPABLE OF COMMUNICATING IN ENGLISH.
I tried talking to him on the way to class.
"Since this is your first lesson, and since the kids will be surprised at having a new teacher come in after the start of the term, do you want to do a short self-introduction?"
"Don't...understand...one more."
"Do you want to introduce yourself to the students?"
"...case by case..."
"I just think it would be a good idea."
"No, thank you."
So, we get to the classroom, and the class starts. Today's topic (the title taken from the textbook itself) is "Asking Permission." It's very, very simple stuff. The guy writes the topic on the board:
"Asking-permmissio"
...which he wasn't supposed to even do in the first place since at the start of the class he and I were supposed to do a short skit/dialogue and the students were supposed to listen carefully and try to figure out for themselves what we were talking about.
Of course, the students were freaked out that the teacher they'd had for a month was gone and here was this new, incredibly creepy-looking guy teaching. A couple of students actually raised their hands and asked him to "jikko-shokai" (forgive my shitty romaji, it just means 'self-introduction'). Even then, the only information he volunteered was his name. What pissed me off the most is that this is a REALLY GOOD class...the students are really active and alert, and I'm pretty sure that attitude will disappear soon enough - students tend to lose motivation when their teachers totally suck, I've noticed.
I taught two classes with him and the ONLY thing he told me in English (of his own volition, not as a reply to what I was asking) was "How long you work here?"
The creepiest thing is how pedo-ish he looks...he looks like a cross between an asian Steve Buscemi and that German dude that turned his daughter into his sex slave.
