invigilator: tokyo

more people; affecting more space

probably the most difficult thing about the event was trying to find an equivalent for “invigilator” in Japanese. We trawled the dictionary but so many watching/guardian type words seem to come with a lot of baggage through association with being told what to do by a person of higher rank. Nothing seemed to have the feeling of benevolence we wanted.

We

In the end we settled for “kizuiteimasu” – I am noticing/aware of things.

Whilst waiting for invigilator #3 at the station we realised we could be using the time as an aquivalent to the 30 mins delay I experienced on my way to work. (incidentally, we did our invigilation in the evening – taking into account the time differences we reckoned we’d be starting out at about the same time as I would bnormally leave home…)

Rather than just hanging around we put up our signs and started invigilating.

Many people swerved to read our signs announcing that we were noting varous things in the area, not many went so far as to make eye contact. When they did we smiled and wished them a good evening.

After meeting our third team member we moved on to Nishi-Shinjuku to find a good starting point. We selected a huge office block building (I think it was an insurance company) where we found a doorway with a stream of office workers leaving (at that time it was probably about 8 pm)

….to be continued next time I go to an internet cafe – time’s up for now…