Sports Day

Today was totally sugoi! It was sports day so the students get to compete in different activities for the sports day title. It's like field day in elem. school but more crazy. What's really cool is that it isn't just judged on sports alone. Here are a few categories to give you an idea.
Tug of War, Costumes, Relays(running), Performance (team dance), Battle Horse, Conquerer, Obstacles courses, Storyboarding and some others. So Sports Day isn't just about Sports, it meets a wider group of interests and interestingly a huge amount of team cooperation and cordination. I was very impressed. The genk level was through the roof (I wish Sanjo could somehow pass on some of that genk to my other schools)
OK, so I won't bore you with all the details but I want to give a littler overview of my two favorite games that we are not so familiar with here in the US.

Battle Horse: This game is only for the girls on the teams. Just for the Ladies. Basically, Three girls are holding up one girl about to their shoulders. The three girls are the "horse". The one being held up by the horse is the rider of course and each rider has a bandana. There are about 6-7 horses per team a long with a captain. The horses ride toward the others and the riders try to take the bandanas from the other girl riders. Who ever has the most after a certai amount of time are the winners. However if the Captain's bandana is taken the game imediatley ends. So a blank is shot and all the horses charge across the field and the riders have at it with the other players. Talk about girl fight(cat fight) I mean arms winging and flailing and screaming and squeeling and pushing and shoving and all sorts of chaos it was absolutely fantastic. It made me want to play really badly. (But if I play I want to include mud somewhere in the game, like it's ok the throw it and try to distract other riders) Anyhooo it was sooooo hilarious to watch all the girls go seriously at it with their little white gloves on and all. I totally think we need to adopt this game.
Conquerer: This is a boys only game. It gets a little too violent for the ladies however from the looks of Battle Horse I bet they'd be a pretty fair competition integrated into the male teams. ANYHOOo. It's a boys only game. Which means that for Japanese guys you strip down to your little sport shorts and get fierce. Across maybe one half of a football field are the teams polls. A huge, thick wooden pole is held up by half the members of one team. At the top of this huge, tall pole is a flag. The other team is trying to get this down. So half of the team will try to protect their flag by protecting the pole and keeping it up and the other half will try to get the opposing teams flag. So again the shot is fired and they run at each other and straight into the grounds of the opposing team. But these guys are jumping on each other and literally crawling on each other to climb up the pole to get the flag. Some are so good at keeping the pole up that despite some one climbing the pole and trying to pull it down, the pole stays standing. Holy Cow this game was insane and the amount of injuries that came out of it where too many to count. I mean brutal, it was fascinating to watch the all out brawl and climbing and jumping on eachothers backs to get high enough over the opposing team to get to the pole and thus on to take the flag. Whaoo, it was really cool to watch. We should adopt this as well.
These where my two favorite to watch. There where tons of really cool things all day. The students did an amazing job and worked sooooo hard at putting it all together. Sports Day is completely and independently put together by the students and they did amazing. I had a blast today.

Plus I get to go to another Sports Day on Thursday, whoot. I'll bet Sanjo's the best though, nothing like a hardy game of reality like "Conquerer" and "Battle Horse".

This is some of the cute fabric and ribbon-strip things that I got recently. Today I went with Tanabe and to visit another lady from church and she just so happens to be an ace of a semstress and has an two sewing machines in her studio in Higashi Sanjo. She said I could come by any time and use the machine!!! DUDE!! I'm sooo stoked. But I'll need to look into the stores in Niigata because there is only one here and it's pretty dang small, I may need a few more options. PLUS! I saw on display at the craft store here (Tokai) a cute little change purse basically make from a zipper and ribbon so I really want to try one of those out but heck no on my severe over priced ribbon with the pink elephants and bubbles (that is my ultimate favorite one, next to the houses and nesting dolls) Anyhoo I'm soo dang stoked I want to sew sooo bad!







Plus here's a little peak at my other little "activity" I've picked up with the spray paint. It's not necessarily good or anything just really fun and enjoyable. I don't really know what do to with them yet but I'm making a book out of a couple. It's just really fun.
Also this lady, is the prelim for a comic idea I have. I've got a basic little story planned out but the end is not really clear. I guess it's along the lines of Beatrice Potter if she where Japanese and me. That just got wierd, plus I might just throw some Khalo in there too because who does love Frida to death like me!

Awww....I love Sanjo Highschool sooo much!!! My first years (sophmores) are do dang rad!!! I hate that so many of them will loose all that pazaz and zest by the time they are seniors. Anyhoo Sanjo is awesome. No school will get you genk-ed up for the week like Sanjo. I totally love the classes, they participate, they are active and lively and their whole attitude make it so easy to teach. I can play and joke around with them and be goofy and they are goofy back! It's awesome. Plus they are amazing at English! Mainly because of their attitude and the fact that they try. They made up their own dialogs today with their classmates and they are soo funny. Some of them went kinda like this:

A."What's wrong?"
B."I miss my dog"
A."For how long?"
B."Since forever."
A."That's too bad, you should drink water."

(Now, don't think they don't know what they are saying they know very well because most of them are hams and love to make the rest of the class laugh!)

A."What's wrong?"
B."I'm homesick."
A."For how long?"
B."Since I was born"
A."That's too bad, you should go home."

I also love to go around the room as they work in groups and make up funny dialogs with them. It's the best. These are the kinds of kids that in language class would find out how to say. "The monkey is on fire", or "Bite the greasy rat". This is what makes learning other languages so humorous. I try it a little in Japanese and I always get the best reactions from the students. I wish my other schools where as genki as Sanjo. I love to be the goofy clown in class, but when no one else plays along you just feel like an idiot.

Plus at Sanjo I get the occasional student that yells out: "I love you." (To which of course I always reply by yelling back. "I love you too".)

Satisfied Frog - What a nice weekend

Ok, I'm all set and genki for the week! This past week didn't go so hot so I'm changing attitudes for the new week. I'm moving over to the "chill" track line. I think I'm thinking about things (lesson plans and such) way too much here. I'm just going to put together what I put together and try to make things fun. I'm getting way to stressed out about such small things and it's making me really doubt myself so....this week will be different. In fact, I'm feeling different already.

This weekend was soooo awesome!

I went to the Tokyo Temple. (Forgot my camera -____-) But had an amazing time non-the less and a blast in the 4 hour drive to get there. WOW the senery and Japanese country side is amazing this time of year. It's like nothing I've ever seen before! I wanted to cry because I forgot my camera but I'll get down there again sometime. Maybe in August. I chatted with my little Japanese and slow English to the sisters around me and had a wonderful time getting to know them.

This morning I woke up to find my bike had a huge FLAT tire so I ran to the train station and had alreayd missed it so I called church and let them know that they needed to find someone else to lead the music that morning. I got there waaaayyyy late but I got there. Then I went home with Sister Tanabe. She's my Japanese mom. She calls me a sister misionary I call her my companion (we a visiting teachers) Anyhoo she invited me over to have lunch with her and her daughter and her daughters friend who happens to be a JET. So we had a great time yakin' in up with the ladies. Sister Tanabe made really yummy pizza and the JET brought yummy little variety cakes! It was so fun. Then Sister Tanabe droped me off near the pachinko where I met up with Elder SaSa and Gorton to go to a discussion at a members house. Mari is investigating the church. She comes to E-kaiwa (the english classes given by the Elders) I've met her and have visited on serveral occations. We had a great 1st lesson. Then Sister S. drove me home, she even sang me primary songs which was so dang cute! Anyhooo I had an awesome weekend and I feel a lot better about this comming week. I'm not gonna stress, I'll do my part, be prepared and just let the rest roll and take it's course! Whoo hoooo, I'm all genk-ed up and ready for a new week. I'm also excited too because we finally get paid at the end of this month YAY!!! I'll need to get my tire checked out too, good timing I guess.

kickin' it with the colonel

I had to take pictures! As I rode to church on Sunday I noticed a KFC/PizzaHut so of course I had to come back to check it out and take picutes. Aimee Major mentions the colonels of Japan in her book "Japan Ai", and it's so true his hands really do look like hotdogs!

Seed

Illo.Friday: "Seed"

Yahiko Art Museums

Whoa today was pretty rad! So on my way home from hiking on Saturday I ran into one of the ALT's from my group and it turns out she's just a couple stops apart form where I live. I didn't even realise she( Brigett) was soooo close. So we decided to go to the Art Museums today in Yahiko. They were really rad the first one was ok but when I was there I found out that the next exhibit that's planned to come 7/16 is an Ainu exhibit. I'm SOOOO DANG EXCITED!!!!!!! So we'll have to go back. We where both pretty excited for that. The second one we got lost looking for it but finallly arrived. It was all this really cool Victorian, Art Nauvoo and Art Deco exibition! It was pretty rad. While I was there I got a few postcards with prints on them. I took them home and taped them up on my bare hospital walls. Then we went to the Yahiko shrine and found some yummy food and something for our staff members (as is costomary to do when you visit another city). It was fun and cool to actually have someone to hang out with. It was funny though because I thought I got a lot of stares when I meander around. We got a ton more stares when we are gabbering away in English together. It was kinda funny but it didn't make me feel as bad because I was distracted with someone else being there. We had a good time and even got a good laugh at the Yahiko deer. They are really short and fuzzy and we enjoyed watching people feed them potatos. They are kinda cute! I'm enjoying "golden week". I even got my laundry and ironing done. Then I swept the floor for dust bunnies and beat up my futon to fluff it. My sheets are still sitting out drying though. I don't think they will be ready till tomorrow since it's been raining.

Tomorrow will be the best day ever!!!