In the past month...
...I finally got a membership at the video rental place and started to watch Japanese dvds on my new entertainment center--a new tv and questionable dvd player (my laptop won't play the region 2-type dvds found in Japan). Many Japanese video stores are organized into categories like "action," "drama," "new release," "television," "Audrey Hepburn," "Robert DeNiro," etc... any system that you could possibly imagine, but never alphabetic order. One shelf in the "comedy" section reads like this: Kindergarten Cop, Zoolander, Adaptation, Bringing Down the House, Twins and the Austin Powers series. Needless to say, I can never find what I'm looking for.
...my digital camera died. Sad. Plans are in motion to replace it sometime very soon.
...I signed my family and I up for the まゆ玉ころがし大会 (silk cocoon rolling contest) at Kiryu's summer festival on August 5th. We won't actually be rolling a silk cocoon. Instead, I've started to build a giant "cocoon" made from paper mache on a bamboo frame, 2 meters long and 1 meter in diameter. It's huge. Click on the Japanese link to see some pictures and get an idea about what we're getting into... should be interesting. We'll be wearing team tshirts and dazzling all of the people in Kiryu with our spectacular performance as foreigners in a festival event. Since you won't be able to watch us on local tv, I'll be sure to post a ton of pictures after the event.
...I said "see you soon" to one of my schools at the junior high and kindergarten levels (I'm not scheduled very often at the elementary school and my departure is below almost everyone's radar there). The teachers aren't amazing at keeping the students up to date with things like this, so many of my junior high students were caught off guard by my "sayonara speech" before the summer pep rally. I received a stack of unbelievably sweet letters and have gained a few e-mail buddies... it's so hard to leave the kids. Hopefully I'll be able to visit every now and then.
...we received the replies to our pen-pal letters and I learned that New York is famous for the following things: bagels, apples, New York City, beaches, garbage on the side of the road, welfare and taxes, and money. I also saw phrases like "he's a total hottie" for the first time in ten years. Whatever their content, the letters absolutely thrilled my students and they'll be writing back as part of their summer homework.
(some of these students specialize in looking disinterested when I take pictures, but it has nothing to do with their pen-pal letter excitement!)
...I've had to say goodbye to some really wonderful people, especially one headed back to Australia and one to Canada. My stay in Gunma won't really be the same without them around. I'll miss them so much.
To end on a happier note:
...they're just so cute!
...my digital camera died. Sad. Plans are in motion to replace it sometime very soon.
...I signed my family and I up for the まゆ玉ころがし大会 (silk cocoon rolling contest) at Kiryu's summer festival on August 5th. We won't actually be rolling a silk cocoon. Instead, I've started to build a giant "cocoon" made from paper mache on a bamboo frame, 2 meters long and 1 meter in diameter. It's huge. Click on the Japanese link to see some pictures and get an idea about what we're getting into... should be interesting. We'll be wearing team tshirts and dazzling all of the people in Kiryu with our spectacular performance as foreigners in a festival event. Since you won't be able to watch us on local tv, I'll be sure to post a ton of pictures after the event.
...I said "see you soon" to one of my schools at the junior high and kindergarten levels (I'm not scheduled very often at the elementary school and my departure is below almost everyone's radar there). The teachers aren't amazing at keeping the students up to date with things like this, so many of my junior high students were caught off guard by my "sayonara speech" before the summer pep rally. I received a stack of unbelievably sweet letters and have gained a few e-mail buddies... it's so hard to leave the kids. Hopefully I'll be able to visit every now and then.
...we received the replies to our pen-pal letters and I learned that New York is famous for the following things: bagels, apples, New York City, beaches, garbage on the side of the road, welfare and taxes, and money. I also saw phrases like "he's a total hottie" for the first time in ten years. Whatever their content, the letters absolutely thrilled my students and they'll be writing back as part of their summer homework.
(some of these students specialize in looking disinterested when I take pictures, but it has nothing to do with their pen-pal letter excitement!)...I've had to say goodbye to some really wonderful people, especially one headed back to Australia and one to Canada. My stay in Gunma won't really be the same without them around. I'll miss them so much.
To end on a happier note:
...they're just so cute!
posted by Kris at
10:45 PM
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