School Festival: Day One

So, the first day of the school festival was today. It was kinda fun, I guess… The whole day was spent in the hot, hot gym, and the “festival” was essentially just one group performance after another. Some of them were good. One of the 9th grade homerooms put on a Stomp type show that was surprisingly good (the music teacher is their homeroom teacher, so I’m pretty sure she put the whole thing together). The brassband played (though, I didn’t have to join them). They were really good. Especially considering that the kids start playing their instruments in seventh grade. I guess if you practice for two hours a day, you’ll get good pretty fast. I think the first chair alto player is better than me… The music teacher wants me to join the club for at least a couple days a week. Hopefully it won’t be too embarrassing.

Really, only the things that the music teacher had a hand in were good, the rest was utter crap. I was exposed to a unique form of Japanese torture called the “junior high school play”. Wow. Talk about a lack of direction… It was essentially the kids just standing still on the stage, with their arms at their sides, trying to remember their lines. And the plays were totally incomprehensible (even to the people who spoke Japanese). Something about cutting off hands and eyes and then they heal, but it’s a scam (?)… Something about a girl who dies in an accident and is resurrected in people-she-knows’ bodies (what happens to the spirits of the people whose bodies she takes over?)… They went on forever too.

That was pretty much the whole day. The gym was sweltering and I had to wear a shirt and tie (to give a good impression to the Board of Education people – who came for the opening ceremony and then bolted before the plays got started). The teachers saw that I had a nice camera, so I sort of became the official unofficial photographer. They wanted me to take as many pictures as humanly possible, but how many pictures can you have of kids standing expressionless and motionless on a stage? A ton apparently…


[1. a typical example of a moment from a play 2. the brass band 3. boys are bored by brass band 4. "stomp 5. they made this gigantic sign out of flattened milk cartens that you can see from my house]