Work Begins
On September 1st, the school resumed after summer vacation, and I started work at Unebi Middle
School.
About a week and a half after school started up, Unechuu (my school) had a culture day, kind
of an all-purpose performance assembly in the gym. The week before, I'd heard there was a choir club
at school, and went to join them. It's a small group of all girls, and they were really friendly and
welcomed me into their club! I sang along with two of the three songs they performed the following
week: "When You Wish Upon a Star" from Pinocchio, in English, and "Yasashisa o Tsutsumaretanara" from
Kiki's Delivery Service. My batteries were dying at the actual event, but I got one shot of the
REALLY impressive brass band, and one of the teachers took a bunch of pictures of the choir for me.
From now on, many photos of students (where faces are close-up enough to be identifiable) will be here as thumbnails only. Sorry!
Another event in September was the prefecture-wide "Clean Up Nara Campaign." People from all
over the prefecture assembled at designated meeting places and received plastic bags, gloves, and tongs,
and we were all bussed to various locations to pick up trash for a day. I went along with a large
group of JETs. Pictured are Anne-line, our prefectural representative, and Oli and Laura T.
The board of education threw me a welcome party a few weeks into school, at a REALLY good
yakiniku restaurant! I saw with Oli, Tamao (our translator), and the superintendent.
At the very end of August, before we started at our schools, there was another orientation
for all Nara JETs. We have SO many orientations, it's insane. But anyway, during lunch break, I
went down to Toudaiji (where I've been probably four times, but it's still fun to hang out in Nara
Kouen) with some other ALTs, including James and Patrick. Then we went up on the roof of the
prefectural office and took pictures of the view.
A couple of my students gave me little notes in the staffroom, so I decided to make a mailbox,
and tell all the kids that they could write to me anytime in English or Japanese, and I would write
back in English. I got a lot of adorable letters! I hope to scan some and put them up at some
point. I made this mailbox out of a cardboard VCR box and colored paper.
The scenery out behind Unechuu is really pretty, so I took a walk out there with my camera.
This is a delightfully grifittied chair in the choir room.
Look! Me, students, and a rainbow!
Once a month or so, Oli and I go to a local elementary school to teach the English club,
consisting of about fourteen girls. In October, we went to teach them about Hallowe'en, and played
some games with them. Afterwards, as we were leaving the school, we were swarmed by a ton of kids
asking for autographs. We signed about fifty rulers, pencil cases, notebooks, and things.
Go back to picture index.
