Yesterday I went to my first undoukai at Anamizu Junior High School. An undoukai is a sports day, similar to American field day. Compared to field day however the event is a bit more formal. Several weeks of preparation go into the event, which is why I have no taught at that school yet. They were using all their time to get ready for the undoukai!
I was walking to the middle school (about 20 minutes from my apartment) when a car pulled over. It was the principle from Anamizu elementary school. He gave me a ride to the middle school as he was also going to the undoukai. I was surprised he was going because it was not his school, but when we arrived there were even more important people there such as the police chief, superintendent, my boss from the BOE, and other important looking men in suits. Apparently these sports days are a big deal!
There was a tent set up with chairs under it where all these important people were sitting and I got to sit under there with them. The students were seated under three tents on the opposite side of the field. They were divided into three teams, red, white, and blue. Each team contained a mixture of students from all three grades (7th, 8th, and 9th).
The event started with speeches from various students as well as the principle. There was a lot of bowing, it seemed very formal. Then thing got more fun with the first activity which was the team cheers. Each team created and choreographed their own cheers, and these kids really go all out! The cheers were accompanied by taiko drums and pom poms, they were very entertaining!
Then the first event began. This was a crazy relay race. Two contestants from each team went at a time. One had to catapult a ball into the air and the other had to catch it in a bucket. After completing this they ran around a cone at the other end of the field and then one of the teammates got into a card board contraption. The best way to describe it is to think a tire on a bulldozer or something. It was a long piece of cardboard taped into a loop. The teammate in the cardboard then had to crawl back to the finish line while being guided by their other team mate. Some of the more competitive kids actually somersaulted in the cardboard instead of crawling in order to get back faster! It was very amusing to watch.
The day continued with various events such as rolling and carrying a giant ball, a scavenger hunt race, baton passing relay, etc. The guys had an event where they had to climb a pole and retrieve a flag from the top. The girls had a tug of war event that got brutal. About half the girls were sporting gauze and tape on their knees and elbows for the rest of the day after being dragged across the ground.
One girl tripped and fell during the baton pass race and got hurt pretty badly. She scraped her knees and elbows and was bleeding a lot. She was crying for a good half an hour, I gave her some chocolate to try and cheer her up. (I made sure to ask her in English "Do you like chocolate?" first. Go go English sensei secretly sneaking in English practice even when you are injured, hee hee).
The event got done around 330. It was really fun and it seemed like the kids had a good time despite some of the injuries. I think the white team ended up being the winners.
Later that evening I went to my first enaki with the middle school teachers. Enkai are big parties that are usually held at restaurants and are all you can eat / all you can drink. The place we went was a korean bbq style restaurant where you cook on a grill on your table in front of you. It was really fun, and my coworkers were very accommodating of me being a vegetarian. I got a big salad, grilled eggplant and mushrooms, rice, miso soup, figs, and cheesecake! Also got to try three kinds of Noto wine (pink, red, and white, all delicious!). It was a good opportunity to relax and talk with some of the other teachers. It is still a little frustrating trying to communicate through the language barrier. I can have basic conversations but it is hard to talk about anything too in depth. A lot of our conversations revolved around places Id been, my favorite places, etc. There is another ALT at my school who is actually from Detroit so I chatted with him in English for quite a bit too.
After the enkai there was a nijikai, which is basically a second party, but with less people. Only six of us went but it was still very fun. We went to a "snack bar" and had some more drinks and did karaoke. I managed to impress my coworkers with my awesome rap skills, though I then had to try to explain to them what "can't touch this" means in Japanese, lol. None of them knew any English songs but I did get everyone to join in with me and do the arm motions for the "YMCA"! And I sang "the sukiyaki song" with one of my coworkers.
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