Chizu JHS Bunkasai 2014

Minus the students missing to the right, this is the entire student body.

On Monday my JHS hosted its bunkasai, or culture festival. I see it as a kind of partner to the sports festival. So its a day dedicated to celebrating artsy and cultural things, like tea ceremony, singing, art, calligraphy, flower arranging, and even English.

I brought Justin and Yana along for the day, and we arrived at work at 8am. We had to wait around for a bit until the opening ceremony began at 8:45am. It was held across from the school in the public gym, since ours is still under construction. 

Like any Japanese event, the day began with speeches. There were so many speeches, I kind of lost track. But it included my two speech contest students giving their speeches. The audience was much larger than at the contest, and the poor girls were noticeably nervous, but they did great! 

There was also a very long and detailed presentation about the life cycle of wasps, including photos taken every day over the course of several months while a wasp built a nest. I'm assuming the student must have won some sort of prize for his research/presentation and thats why he was giving it again, because it was kind of a random addition otherwise. 

Each grade also gave their own presentations. I can't remember what the 1st graders did, but the 2nd graders talked about some kind of social project and the 3rd graders talked about their trip to Okinawa, which also included a very strange and confusing comedic short film they made.

Lastly there was a performance by the brass band. They played 3 songs, including the theme from Lupin III and Sing, Sing, Sing. It was great!

Finally we had a lunch break around 11:45, thank goodness, because it was freezing cold in the gym and Yana was going bonkers from sitting for so long. I had packed a lunch for us (the other teachers bought a lunch box, but it was around $60!!! No, thanks.) so we ate in the staff kitchen.

After lunch we wandered around the school and looked at all the things on display. Yana got a lot of attention during this time; lots of my students came up to squeeze her cheeks or touch her hair. I felt like a security detail for a celebrity or something.

Some of the student artwork decorating the hallways.

After lunch was the second part of the festival, and the main event - the singing. Each class performed two songs, one the same and one different. There was also an accompanying piano player and conductor from each performing class.

Lastly, the entire student body performed the school song and another song all together. Then they announced the winning class - 3-2 - and they gave an encore performance while bawling uncontrollably.

There were a few more speeches to close up the day. During the second half, Yana had made some friends with some girls sitting nearby. At one point they decided to go out into the front hall to play tag and hide-and-seek together. So they were playing out there. During one speech, all of a sudden the spotlights began to move. They swept over the crowd and focused on the back door, which led to the front hall. In the single most mortifying moment of my life, Yana chose that EXACT MOMENT to open the doors and peer through - while the spotlight was directly on her and everyone had turned to look. Then she closed the doors. And opened them and stuck out her head again. And closed them again. And finally the student who was supposed to emerge from the doors came out (he was dressed in the track and field uniform and ran up onto the stage) and I was put out of my embarrassment. Everyone was laughing and of course because she's blonde and foreign everyone knows its my kid. It was pretty hilarious, really, but I still can't believe she chose that exact moment to peek through the doors!

So the whole event ended around 3pm. In all, to be honest, it was kind of boring. Having to sit there through all those speeches that I didn't understand and it being really cold was not fun. I was expecting something more exciting and interactive. However, I was actually being paid to attend, so I was happy to support my students and I did enjoy seeing the art and the flower arrangements! I'm thinking if I'm here next year maybe I can do a little English booth to be more involved! We'll see :)

Some of the flower arrangements.