Lots of Children, English, and a Super Potato!

Kyou no Nihongo no Kotoba (今日の日本語の言葉): shougakkou (小学校) - elementary school

This was brought to you by today's highlight, which was visiting a local elementary school

Today has been awesome. It has actually been one of the best days I've had thus far on my journey in Japan, and this is mainly because of the children. I got to go to a local elementary school today both to observe classes and to teach English. I wasn't like, the most excited about this, but then I showed up, saw all the smiling faces, and was so damn happy that I didn't quite understand it.

So the background to this is that today, we went to visit Daiyon Hino elementary school, near the Fudoumae stop of the Tokyo subway system. They have school on the first and third Saturdays of every month. It wasn't that big of a school, and each of the six of us got assigned a class/grade to observe and teach. I got fourth grade, which was perfect, because they knew enough English to make teaching fun for me too, but not so much that I had to think up a harder game than I wanted to do. But more on this later.

They have rails in some trains for no more "passenger injuries"

I got to the school and had a small breakfast at the station while waiting for others to arrive. We were supposed to get there at 7:45, and I swear I stepped foot into the meeting point the moment the clock struck 7:45. I usually don't like things to be this close, but I didn't want to leave the house any earlier than 7:00, because I needed my sleep in order to have energy for little children.

When we got to the school, we switched into indoor slippers (just like you have house slippers in a Japanese home, you have school slippers to be worn only inside the school). As I said before, there were six of us, and you already know Julien and Ian and, of course, me. There was Rokk, who goes to school in New York and majors in business (and politics, I think). There's Michelle, who goes to school in Texas and double majors in Japanese and music. Then there's Gabby, who goes to none other than Harvard (go crimson!) and is majoring in East Asian Studies. They're a really fun bunch, and I convinced Rokk and Gabby to go to the Odaiba onsen with us later in the year (so that I'm not the only girl, because that would be sad). 

Anyways, back to Daiyon Hino. We put on our shoes, and were led to the welcoming ceremony, where they sang for us, clapped for us, spoke tons of introductory words to us, and in general gave us a very warm welcome. They had actually assigned certain members of each class to be escorts, and they took their jobs so seriously. My escorts would go nowhere without me, always kept me in sight, and often held my hand as they led me places. Once, Julien's escorts lost sight of him, and they dashed to me breathless asking me where "Julien-san" was. When I pointed and told them, they sprinted off. I definitely wasn't used to being treated this way. o.o

I had a shoe locker! With my name on it! 

My class!

First period of the day was music, and I got to say, these kids are good. There are a few videos below you can play and see for yourself, but compared to American public schools, even the better ones, this is still much better, in my opinion. Japan spreads out their funding evenly between all schools in the nation, so if one school district wants to increase their funding, they must be willing to personally pay enough taxes as people in the community to support an increase in funding for all public schools in Japan.

Nevertheless, it was cool to see these fourth and fifth graders (Julien's class) perform together. They played the recorder, drums, timpani, xylophone, glockenspiel, tuba, and accordion. Those are pretty "out there" instruments for fourth and fifth grade, if you were to think about America, ne?

After music, we returned back to the classroom for their math period. They were going over PEMDAS, and I got to help out students, which gave me an opportunity to work on my Japanese number skills, so I tried to correct them and help them all in Japanese (and I did it!). 

This is the straightest, most beautiful writing I have ever seen on a blackboard. Woah.

After math class was recess, which was a very interesting experience. They rotate between classes what they do at recess, and they take that very seriously. They also wanted to play with us, which made me feel so honored. There were some girls who were learning how to ride unicycles (which is a pretty common activity in Japanese preschools, so I've been told), which I thought was awesome. You definitely don't see that in America often. It's just all... football. Bleh.

Anyways, my class was learning how to flip backwards and forwards over a bar. Forwards is easy, but backwards is tough as heck. I tried it with them, of course, since they wanted to see if I could do it (somehow being American brings with it the expectation that you can do what others can't), and when I couldn't do it (come on, let's be honest. Me?), they all visibly relaxed. It was such a weird sight.

After recess came the English learning period, which was very, very fun. The Japanese, above all else, value education in being fun, which I find to be a wonderful notion. And when they say fun, they actually mean fun, not like, concept maps and stuff, which is what American education boards deem as... fun. Have they ever tried concept mapping themselves? Or like, brainstorm sheets? -_-"

Anyways, the first thing we did was sing the alphabet song. Then we took away the letters of one color and sang it again, except now for every missing letter, we had to sit down and stand back up again (we were singing while standing to begin with). And then we took out another color, and repeated. It got to be quite a workout by the end of it all, sitting and standing and sitting and standing. Phew!

After that, the teacher timed us as we put the alphabet letters on a sheet (we shuffled our letter cards first, so of course it wouldn't be as easy as putting it down in order). I was the first to finish, but there were like, three kids who came in a second after me. These kids are really really smart. And they love English, which is wonderful to see (though painful as well, since I know how hard English can be as a language).

After this game came the game I had to prepare to play with them. I sort of made it up on the fly, because I had to know how much English they knew before I made a decision, and of course, I couldn't really know until I saw what they did in their English class and spoke to the kids a little in English to see if they understood.

The game that I played with them was simple. I asked them for the first letter of the alphabet, then asked them for a word that started with that letter. It might sound boring and easy, and it would be, if they weren't at the English level at which they thought "elephant" started with "L." Thus, we had quite a bit of fun, and I found it quite hilarious that they mostly knew words like "Wii," "DS," "DVD," etc. or movie names, like "E.T." Heck, they even knew James Cameron, and yet couldn't tell me the word "watch" for the longest time.

These kids were so wonderful. They got together and let me take a picture of them, and then they had me sign their stuff, which I didn't expect. I signed erasers, notebooks, backpacks, pencil cases, etc. It was sort of nice, I'm not gonna lie, but more so because I felt that they actually had fun with me there observing and teaching. I really think they enjoyed it, and for that, I am very glad, because I was very nervous coming in.

These paintings are all over the school, and they're so cool!
They're made out of string lines~ 

As we finished for the day, we all got to walk under the arch of children's hands, and since I was the shortest of all the people, they tended to use my height to their advantage and put their arms down around me and entrap me (which they couldn't do for others when they were squatting down because their head to rear length was too long). It was very fun, full of laughter and good music.

Bye, class 4-1!  

After those wonderful children, we went to have lunch, and I had a beef rice bowl with a side of salmon. It was delicious, though the salmon from Mori no Ike (my Japanese summer camp two years ago) is still the best Japanese style salmon I've tasted.

Such a pretty bowl! 

Thank you cookies from the school~ 

After lunch, we split up and a few of us decided to go to Akihabara. Michelle and I went to Book-Off, which is a great secondhand bookstore, while Julien and Rokk went off to the Gundam Cafe (I took a picture of it before in an earlier post) to wait for Adrien (goes to UMass Dartmouth), Tatiana (goes to school in... Washington?), and Nathan (I have no idea) to come.

Book-Off is a wonderful seven-story place. When I say secondhand, I mean Japanese style secondhand, which is to say basically first hand. The japanese take care of their books as religiously as I take care of mine, which means like, no bending, no dog ears, careful wrapping, etc. Not even slightly bent or over-rubbed corners. Thus, these books were in great condition and were very cheap because they were second hand. I got three volumes of Tsubasa RESERVoir CHRoNiCLE and three volumes of Kyou Kara Maoh! from Book-Off, each volume for only 105 yen, which is equivalent to about $1.20. Manga volumes in America are around $7-$8.

People also are so lax about standing there reading books. At Borders, I always felt bad when I stood right at the section of a book series and was blatantly reading the whole thing right then and there (and I'm sure other people felt that way too), but at Book-Off (and other bookstores I've been in), people are totally chill about that. They just stand there in packs of people and read, no cares in the world. It makes it a bit difficult to get down an isle, though.

Tsubasa CHRoNiCLE!

Fruits Basket~ 

HANA KIMI! God, if they had volume 1, I would have totally
bought it. 

Ranma 1/2 

Look at all these people! 

Full Metal Alchemist is so much cooler looking in Japanese. o.o

Book-Off also sold old/new CDs, games, game consoles, and movies. What does this place not have? I found my beloved Arashi section, but not my favorite album, and thus didn't buy anything. I found it hilarious that The Eagles, Eminem, and Elton John all ended up in the 250 yen and under section, which basically is the no-one-listens-to-this-stuff section. Ah, my favorite artists; how far you fall in the eyes of the Japanese.

At the Gundam Cafe, Michelle and I found the rest of the people, who had gotten themselves little Gundam figurines. I've never seen Gundam though, but to them it was like if I had walked into a Kyou Kara Maoh! themed cafe (which I actually sort of have before, at Anime Boston, and boy did I fall in love). The figurines were cute, but needless to say, I totally didn't understand the inside jokes.

We went to Super Potato together, which is a three story retro game store. It's more like a museum to be honest, considering all the stuff that it has. It really was quite awesome, and it was interesting to see games evolve as you went through each floor.

I lost to him, and he lost to the NPC

All this stuff is old stuff that's new. Where do they even
get it from, huh?

Mario pocketwatch! =D 

The next floor up (floor 2 of Super Potato) had a whole isle full of PS games. I've never seen that many PS1 games in my life, let alone held together in one collective place. And they had tons of PS2 games too, though all in Japanese. I'm fine with that, but Aaron isn't. :\

Playing cards! Too cute! 

The top floor had the world's most awesome chair, made out of old game cartridges. I definitely had to sit in it, but I couldn't stay long, because lots of people were sitting and smoking on this floor, and inhaling smoke gives me a headache quickly (not to mention it's terrible for your health).

After the experience at Super Potato, Julien and I decided to go to Harajuku to visit the Daiso there, which is the 100 yen store. It's on the complete opposite side of the Yamanote line though, which means thirteen stops (about twenty-nine minutes). In other news, I've managed to memorize all stops from Takadanobaba to Nishi-Nippori, which, as you can see here, is quite a feat, I believe. It was tough though, but I think the knowledge is pretty useful. I can make sudden decisions and stuff about changing lines and new destinations without consulting a map and wasting time.

On the way to the Daiso, Julien and I saw this lady dressed in a full sailor moon outfit driving a car. It was actually a pretty good looking cosplay, but I was totally caught off guard that I couldn't snatch a picture until the car was too far away and you couldn't see her well.

Cool high tech vending machines~ 

Such a pretty color. 

The Daiso had five floors, I think, and it was full of everything from stationery to cookware to snacks to Halloween decor. It was a great fun to walk around and see everything, and I got some nice snacks for myself, which I have to try out. I definitely want to go back there if I find that I need anything else.

ALL Disney

After that, I came home to have dinner, which might be one of the scariest things I've eaten thus far. It might not sound like much, but it took me a lot of courage to eat it. Not that it wasn't delicious, it just scared the crap out of me at first. We had avocado, rice, cucumber, clam miso soup, etc. The usual. And then we had these little white fish that took me so much guts to eat because to me, they just looked like worms. They were boiled, and I forgot the name of the dish, but goddamn they just reminded me of insects. And their eyes. Ugh. Eyes.

But I ate one anyways, and it tasted vaguely salty, and had the consistency of noodles. If you blindfolded me so that I couldn't know what it was, I totally would have had more. But my mind works in strange ways, and once I know it's a whole fish in a bite, eyes, bones and all, I couldn't do it. It was pretty good tasting, but I still couldn't do it. It's like the eating-liver-without-acknowledging-it's-liver thing.

I also had avocado dipped in a sauce of mayonnaise and soy sauce, which was the way that Ryosuke ate it, so I tried. It was actually quite good! (This isn't the way most Japanese do it, I think. That might be too weird, even for Japan. Plus, I'm sure that the only thing that is respectfully allowed to mix with soy sauce would be chili of some sort, or wasabi).

Ja, with that, I'm off to bed. It's 1:15 in the morning, and I'm tired, because last night, I didn't get that much sleep. But I stayed up to write this for you guys, because I'm glad that you all take the time to follow this blog!

Have a nice day/night!
Maggie