School

Last Thursday I went to my first day of school at Kwassui. I was first introduced to the teachers and then to the students. Ⅰ made a short speech about three times. One time to the teachers, one time to the students, and another time to my classmates. I am in a class with seventeen girls. The girls are in the english program and so they speak English. I asked them to speak Japanese to me though because I want to learn how to speak Japanese. It is hard but when I do not understand I just smile and nod my head. On Thursday I did not have a full day of school there because I had to go to a Rotary meeting. While I was at school on Thursday I watched the girls practice their dance for sports day and my homeroom teacher gave me a tour of the school. Friday was a long day for me. They had prcatice for sports day agian and this time I practiced the dance with them.  It was very interesting. I had no idea what to do or where to go ever and people were directing me to go here and there. They found it quite amusing and kept laughing. It was very funny. After practicing for sports day the girls in my class had to prepare for the school cultural fair this Saturday. I only covered a box with yellow paper so it wasn't that exciting. On Monday I attended the regular classes. My first period was World history. I could only catch which countries they were talking about but not much else. The next class was English and I was very happy to help out my teacher and my classmates. They were reading a passage on Christmas and my teacher asked me to explain to them what my family usually does on Christmas. After I was finished they explained to me what they do on New Years day which is there big holiday here. We had dance practice twice on Monday. It was really hot outside. After lunch was another English class, the second dance practice, and then home room. In home room we had a meeting, practiced dance, and cleaned the room. Tuesday was the second day of regular classes. The first period I had English and then the second period I had Japanese history. The book was all in Kanji so I looked at the pictures. Third period was oral English. They had to say what they did over their summer vacation. The girls told me they only get a one month summer vacation and they can't do very much because they have tons of homework. They all were very surprised to hear that I usually get about three months and have no homework! Well at least at my school we had no homework. The teacher was from St. Paul Minnesota! She was so nice and told me that I could always come and talk to her. Fifth period they had Japanese literature. They all told me what their names meant. It was very interesting. Some of the names had mountain, or child, or grass in it. After Japanese literature we had dance practice and then we had marching practice. The Japanese literature teacher told me that Japanese students are good marchers. I did not really understand what to do or where to go so I just followed. I also couldn't understand what the person was saying so I never knew when to stop. Today was my day in the computer room. The students were having their achievement tests. I will not be taking all of the classes and next week I will have my permanent schedule for now. I go to school and come home from school using the street car. The days are long because many of the days they get done at 5! I was surprised but I hope I will get used to it soon.