DUFF ARC Giveaway and Fridays suck!

Yes, this is a far out Friday. Yes, it's totally Saturday- and not even just here in Japan where we get Saturdays first. Fridays SUCK! And now that I'm teaching again, it looks like I'm going to have to find a creative way of getting my Friday post to actually go up on Fridays. SIGH!

First things first. The awesome-cool girls over on the Highway are giving away a copy of Kody Keplinger's DUFF. Head on over and check it out.

The school year starts April 1, here in Japan. So last week I had a bunch of a nyuugakushiki and a nyuuenshiki and an enkai. Don't worry explanations to come.

Nyuugakushiki- 入学式- It's like matriculation at university. Excepth that you have one every time you enter school starting from primary/elementary.

My big elementary school invited me to theirs this year. (My big elementary is 194 kids. I know, I know. But it's huge when compared to Tiny Elementary and their 30 kids.) First I was proud to discover that my desk had been relocated so that I now sat with the teachers, as opposed to next to the caretaker. It only took 21 months too. lol!


I decided to try out a new style of 'fro for the day.


The new class marches in. They're only 25 of them, while the sixth grade is 46- demonstrating just how fast the Japanese population is shrinking.

The 2nd and 3rd graders did a recitation and a dance for the newbies. They spelled out Nyuugaku Omedetou (Congratulations on your matriculation) and did an anagram. In Japanese, it's spelled ni-yu-u-ga-ku-o-me-de-to-u. I was most surprised to find that I was the Ku! In Japanese my name is spelled ku-re-a. The sentence was:


Kurea-Sensei ni itsumo genkina eigo no aisatsu wo iite kudasai. (Or something like that.)
Claire-Sensei to always lively English greeting say please. (Don't you love Japanese word order?)



Here's a vid of a part of the dance the 2nd and 3rd grade did. All the dances the kids this age do, look almost exactly the same.


Nyuuenshiki- 入園式- gaku means to study, and is the last syllable in the words for elementary, middle and high school, and also university. Since you're not actually studying much the last syllable is en, and so they have a nyuuENshiki instead.


The teachers are being introduced to the parents and the newbies.


Get out! Now, while you still can! :)

Here's the 8th instalment of Iwate Swan from the late Rodger Swan. Most of the towns here have a summer festival. Hanamaki festival is a lot bigger than the one in my town, since Hanamaki is about the 4th biggest city in the prefecture. If you're wondering what they're chanting as they walk, it's ichi-ni which sounds more like each-knee. It means 1-2.



And in totally unrelated news, the newest flavour of Fanta, which I totally bought for it's name, but ending up being pretty good.