Memorizing Japanese Leads to Dreams of Hot Bodz.

(Proven Fact.)

Maybe a week or so ago, my principle mentioned that he would like me to give a speech at the opening ceremony for the school (today). On further pressing, I found out that it should be a couple of minutes long and preferably (aka: no choice) in Japanese.

In a way, this was good - I have a couple of students who are going to be in an English speech contest soon, and they enjoyed playing teacher and correcting my grammar and pronunciation in retaliation for my "attacks" on their speeches. But, in another way, this was bad, in that I had to give a speech in Japanese for two freakin' minutes.

I still had half of the speech to memorize last night. I studied so furiously that I had a dream in which Brad Pitt and Ed Norton came to visit "WashU" (which looked suspiciously like my house in Gainesville) and Brad Pitt started speaking in Japanese.
I wish I were joking.

This morning, I repeated the speech over and over again on the way to school. I repeated it again and again during the ceremony. And, suddenly, I found myself on stage, in front of several hundred students who were looking very, VERY confused.

Here's what I said:

"Good morning! (I had to repeat this, because I didn't get enough of a 'good morning' from the students the first time around. ^_~) [then, in Japanese] My name is Leslie Forrest. Please call me 'Miss Leslie.' I am from Atlanta, Georgia in America.　Georgia is in the south-east of America. Atlanta is famous for Coca-Cola and the 1996 Olympics. 'Georgia Coffee' [a popular drink here] is NOT from Georgia!
My major in college was Philosophy-Neuroscience-Psychology. I like German and Italian.
This is my first time in Japan. I am happy to be teaching at Ikushina Junior High and in Ota. Please talk to me anytime, anywhere. Japanese is still a little hard for me, so I'll keep trying! Thank you very much."

Amazingly enough, I did not have to think about what I was going to say before I said it. Either I was so nervous that I went on auto-pilot, and was thankfully accurate, or I managed to transcend the mental repetition and just go straight to saying it. Either way, it went without a hitch, though I was still thankful to be off of the stage.

Afterwards, several of the teachers told me they were amazed that I memorized such a long speech in Japanese. Apparently, that either wasn't required or wasn't expected. (Thanks for letting me know! -_-;;) But hey, at least it's over.

...until I have to give it again to the elementary school! Ahahhahahahahaha. Ha.