TV会議 / Ash

会議 == Conference.

This is, to say, that I got up early yesterday and went to Kashiwagi Elementary School for their last webcam (making the term "TV" misleading, but whatever) conference with Bennett Elementary School in Virginia. I thought I was gonna be helping with stuff, but I ended up as an audience member.

It was actually fairly interesting to watch. The two schools have been doing a pair project involving investigating the plant and animal life around their schools and reporting their findings to the other school. They took turns, each side doing 5-ish reports at a time.

The Japanese kids stood up in singles, pairs, or triples, had no materials, and recited memorized reports about the trees around the school and Lake Hattori. A Japanese guy in a business suit (who wasn't on camera; none of the adults in the room were, until the end) then read aloud a (sometimes slightly broken) English translation. His pronounciation was pretty good. Then the American students stood up one at a time and read their reports off a piece of paper and showed the Japanese students a picture of their tree via the webcam. A woman off view of the webcam then translated what they said into Japanese. This went back and forth.

I thought it was interesting to note the differences in each side. Memorized vs. not, pictures vs. none. Kashiwagi's webcam was superior to that of Bennett. Kashiwagi's was good enough to stand on a tripod and show all the kids in the room with a nice, clear picture while Bennett's was about the same quality as that of Nacilik -- decently clear if you have it at arms length or so and are showing 1-3 people. It was good enough to get a decent look at the tree pictures they showed us.

At the end, the students of Kashiwagi sang the Japanese version of the Do Re Mi Song from The sound of Music for the students at Bennett. The Bennett students were supposed to join in and sing the English version for the second verse with everyone singing both versions the third time around, but I am thinking they either couldn't hear the keyboard or the time lag was pretty bad, because they weren't in time. I ended up just singing the English with them the third time through. I was sitting behind the keyboard and could clearly see the music, but since I go to this school (every now and then, recently started) to help the kids learn English and learn about American culture, I just sang the version I grew up with.

Speaking of the Japanese version, Do is the "do" in "doughnuts"; Re is the "re" in "remon" [lemon]; Mi is the "mi" in "minna" [everyone]; Fa is the "fa" in "faito" [fight, as in "Yeah, you can do it! FIGHT!" not an actual fight]; So is the "so" in "aoi sora" [blue sky]. (I was gonna type out La and Ti as well, but have forgotten what they were.) One thing that was interesting to me was that Ti was pronounced "Shi". :O That one was a bit surprising. I would have guessed they would use "Chi".

Then the principals and vice-principals and coordinators on both sides said a little bit about how much everyone had loved the project and how they looked forward to doing it again and such. Then the thing was over, the 2nd graders went back to their classroom (more on that later), and the 5th graders got to taking down the webcam equipment and putting the desks and chairs and everything that belonged in the room back in place.

I talked to the guy who had read the kids' reports of in English. His name is Tetsuya, and he looked so familiar to me because I had actually seen him before. He's a friend of Mariko-san, and was at the School Festival Chakai that Sadoubu put on. He got to see me make tea. :D I hope I get to see him around some more; he's interesting to talk to.

After that I had to get home; I had received a piece of paper from the gas company the day before that I couldn't completely read (though I am getting way better at the reading of things; hallelujah! :D), and it had yesterday's date written on it, so I felt that I should go back home for whatever the gas thing was. :P Turned out that it was just the person coming by to tell me what my gas bill is for the month. The lady who comes around with the printer has to look at the meter just inside the door to verify that the bill is correct, apparently -- a fact I appreciate, to tell you the truth.


My Dear Friend Ash

So I was talking to Ash the other night and told him I was updating the blog again. He asked me to put something in the blog about how much I miss him next time I updated. I agreed. I was pondering what to write, exactly, and came up with this poem.

Special note to Ash: Reading this aloud and with drama makes it that much more fun.

Ash

I miss Ash
like I miss my Left Leg.

My Left Leg is still connected,
but back in 'Nam
I often wondered,
"Will we always be so?"

Were my Left Leg ripped from my hip
by a three-legged Ol' Bitty,
a thin tendril of bloody gristle
would retain our connection.

Ash and I are tight,
like me and my Left Leg.
I feel the tug of proverbial gristle --
stretched across the Pacific Ocean
in a gruesome display of friendship --
wishing Ash was by my side.

Realizations of the Period

1) For the record, Ash, I only come up with shit like this when you are involved.
2) OMG! I forgot to redo all the img tags on the early blog posts when I moved all my pictures to my web site. :'( Damn it, Chuck, why didn't you tell me?!