School Festival

This is my second school. Not my base school...but I go there twice a week (just as much as my base school). So I don't know the teachers or students very well right now, because I've only been there 2 or 3 times. Only once so far as a teaching day...since school started on Sep 1st. I like the school a lot...I just hope that I can handle getting up and taking the train and then walking pretty far to get there, twice a week. Well I guess I shouldn't say "I hope"...I mean I have to.

I heard that they were having a school festival on Saturday, so I invited some friends in nearby cities to come join, and then go hang out in Hofu for the rest of the day. It was the first time that this group saw "The City of Christina and Steffanie".

The following is a quote from Christina's blog, because I think she said it well:

"On Saturday, one of Steff's schools had a bunkasai, a cultural festival. The entire school is decorated and food stands are set up. A couple of us ALTs went and it was a lot of fun. One of my students from my school actually recognized me! Being an ALT kind of makes you a mild celebrity around your city. We stayed to watch the brass band perform, since we were told they were the best in the prefecture. It was incredible - I've never heard a high school band play like that. There was singing and dancing, too!" -Christina (Steff's friend and JET who lives in apt right under her)

Here's all of us on the road between the train station and the school. And when I say road, I mean treacherous journey through rice fields that had to be artificially heated by some alien lifeform harnessing the power of 21 suns.

The festival was pretty cool, I think. There were booths all over the place selling food, shaved ice, and more shaved ice. The problem was that I guess I was suppose to buy my tickets for these items BEFORE the day of the festival. So when we all show up hot, and gross, they said there were no more tickets for shaved ice.

Its so hard to explain how this day went...but basically Kholofelo was so popular among the students there, that they pulled some strings and got us shaved ices. I wonder who didn't get one because of us... :) But really. Both Kholo and Ryan were so popular among the students, that we had to take a million pictures with excited students. Both Kholo and Ryan were literally like rock stars. All the high school girls had crushes on them, and all the high school boys wanted to be them. But us girls had fun too!

I think most, if not all of the rooms in the school had something going on in them. Like each room was a festival station. The teachers have a homeroom, and each homeroom class did their own thing in that room. This room was a "Love the Earth" room, which had a big balloon Earth in the center. Maybe they passed out environmental literature? I don't know. We came at noon, and were a little late for most of the festivities.

The set-up reminded me of a church function during Halloween. Anyone remember Trunk or Treat??? Some rooms had games, some had food, some had music. There was a parade through the halls before we got there. Don't ask me what the festival was for...? Just the yearly school festival?...

(press play on the video above... whenever there is an arrow like that, its a video)

The band was quite amazing. The band director is the guy who sits next to me in the teachers room: Satoshi Sensei. He is very very nice, and its great because even though he's not an English teacher, he speaks English (usually only the English teachers at each school talk to me). He lived in Sri Lanka for 3 years, and learned English there. I wish I could buy a recording of some of the stuff they did...

Honestly, its unbelievable... In the middle of playing something, they all stopped playing, and started singing it instead. A band/choir! And they had things choreographed too, like 3 of the players would put their instruments down, and start dancing like pros! :)

I know Upland High's marching band ruled the world...but its just been so long since I've seen something so crazy good, and from high-schoolers! Yay for them!