It's all in the wrist...

The morning after the Halloween party we (Gillian, Selena, Anita and I) got up much too early (5:30 after turning in around 3 or 4--I can't remember which) and sat (slept) on a train for two and a half hours back to Shimonoseki; went home for an hour; lost Anita but gained Becky, and were soon back at the train station and on our way to Kita(north)-Kyushu for an Aikido demonstration in which lots of members of our club were involved.

So here it is, my new Japanese hobby. Our sensei tried to convince us to participate but I'm glad we didn't, because the seven-year-olds would have shown us up.



Two junior highschool students who are in our classes.


Two of the more advanced students from our class (who are also students at the local university)



The highlight of the day was this aikido skit, in which the guy in back steals the guy in front's bag while he is fishing and he then chases after him and uses both aikido moves as well as fishing gear to attack him! :)


us watching.. not sure why I have this weird expression on my face.


After the fighting was over, we went for an enkai!

Happy Halloween!

Partying in Yanai with the other JETs.

A taste of Canada in Japan.


Yukari the beer-drinking angel.


Jackie O. Baggins


Mmm sushi!!



It's Harry Potter!




Cheerleaders often get stabbed by swords in battle.







The 7-11 crew: Christine, Justin, and Hannah.

It was decided that a trip to the real 7-11 would be a good idea...Here Justin is trying to convince this poor clerk that he should let him get behind the counter. The clerk's smiling, but I think he was fairly stressed out by this ambush by foreigners in costumes at 1am...there was sweat trickling down his face.


Crystal the French maid displaying a fine 7-11 French wine.


Anpan-girl! Christine (who is from Vancouver and rowed for UVic just a couple years back!) checking the freezer for frozen cocktails.


Irashaimasse!!

Back to my favourite elementary school!

So it seems that I actually do get to go to one of my elelmentary schools more than once this year! I've just had my second and third days of classes there, and four of these classes were even with students I had taught before! So far all the other elementary schools I've visited have only played host to me once.

These pictures are of the san-nensei (grade 3) students who were so hyper! I played with them during the lunch break, and I had about twenty kids circling around grabbing my hands, sweater and hair. I could barely walk there were so many of them. Most of the younger kids don't quite understand that I can't speak or understand Japanese very well, and since elementary school kids don't usually have any regular English classes, they'll just keep talking to me in Japanese, hoping that if they keep repeating themselves I'll undertand. Played a game similar to "duck-duck-goose", then a game similar to "What time is it Mr. Wolf?" at lunchtime with about 40 or 50 of the kids and one of the teachers.




These are the kids in their lunch-getting outfits. They wear these at the junior highs at lunchtime too, where they also eat a school lunch, but I didn't see any at the senior high I visit. They put on their little masks and hats and a group of them go to retrieve the large buckets and bowls of the meal and carry them back to the classroom, where the things are set up on desks at the front of the room and then the lunch group kids serve out the lunch into the bowls of their classmates. The principle of the hats, masks, and coats is good, but the masks often slip off the nose and sometimes the mouth too...


All October I have been trying to do at least a few Halloween activities in each lesson to spread the joy that is the Halloween season :)

Here another class of san-nensei are colouring pumpkins. Some were very creative, one was purple, and another had a mouth full of tiny jagged teeth.






The class with their pumpkin pictures.



Here are some pictures from another elementary school:
The kids outside raking the school garden (only they're all such camera-hogs here that as soon as they see a camera they make a big fuss to pose with their peace-signs).


The entrance-way to one of the buildings, where outside shoes must be swapped for slippers or indoor schoes.



Cleaning-time! Every day students of all levels have cleaning time, in which they are assigned a different part of the school to clean. Needless to say, the schools are typically quite dusty since this is the only cleaning attention they ever get...6th graders are not the most efficient cleaners..

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