Being Tourists

Even though we feel a certain amount of mild distain towards the over tourism situation and thus tourists in general, we sometimes intentionally fall into that category. In between school, work and life, it happens sometimes. Last week, we intentionally booked a very touristy thing in Asakusa - a ninja experience and guided tour at the Samurai and Ninja Museum. It was actually nice to tell the girls that we were intentionally going to be tourists, and Asakusa is only one 20min train ride away, so just the closeness of the destination made it relaxed and fun. 

The experience itself did feel a bit slap dash, "for the tourists", but the guided tour was full of interesting information and cool things to look at. We did get to dress up as samurai and ninja, which the girls loved, and also practice our "ninja skills". 

Throwing the shuriken (throwing stars) was fun - Steve was the most successful of us, but the real highlight was trying the blowing darts. We even tried lying down and shooting. So cool! I was pretty excited to get a bullseye on my first shot, even if I didn't maintain my accuracy going on. 

At the start of May, we also went to a local festival thing at a sports centre near us. This felt much less touristy, way more local, but still lots of fun. There were sumo athletes there, traditional music performance, mochi (rice cakes) making and a stack of other stuff. 

It was cool to see the quintessential Japanese things being embraced by just every day people, not just put on for the tourists. Rachel and I had a go at pounding the rice into mochi, just like the sumo in the picture did. So much fun! 

Organised School Painting: Ninja Skills

Organised as I am, I finished this school year by preparing for an activity that's happening in March 2025. Since I've taken over as Japanese teacher, I've run a full day of "Cultural Festival" activities, otherwise known as the 文化祭 (bunkasai). It's a pretty huge day, with all students from years one to six participating in 12 round robin activities. When I ran it earlier in 2024, we had a group of Japanese students visiting, so there was a mix of Australian and Japanese culture. Next year is all Japanese activities. 

I was inspired by another Japanese teacher to have a ninja-skills station and needed some resources to make it work. Luckily I had a bit of budget left this year and the school groundsman was willing to help me get what I needed from Bunnings. Largish pieces of MDF, a bunch of extra pine beams, some hinges and screws were the main part and then of course - some paint! 

Even more amazing than being this organised was that when the kids finished school and the staff week rolled around, I was ahead on my paperwork and had the time to spend getting this done at school in office hours. One of the groundsmen also helped me out by cutting these big circular holes in MDF. 

These ones are for the kids to throw bean bags through the holes. They will have support beams on the back to hold them up on the oval. I was pretty stoked with my ninja - especially the green one who looks very invisible from the right angle. (Notice that pink goes good with green? If you know, you know.)

My other two boards have yet to be finished - I need to add dowels to the balloons in the Pikachu one for the kids to throw quoits at. Poor Pikachu is a little fat in the face, but I think he does an alright job of being iconic and recognisable. 

I knew I'd be going for an "up in the air" theme with the Pokemon boards, so I quizzed a bunch of grade five kids in the last week of school to get ideas for who else I could put in the air with Pikachu. "Dragonite", "Charizard!", "Areodactyel".... The replies were enthusiastic but also way too tricky for me to paint. 

So I went with Butterfree, who is chasing away a Charizard through the clouds. I'll add dowels to the clouds on this board. Not too bad for ten hours of work if I do say so myself. And I got to listen to podcasts and loud music while I did it. Now to keep going with my tedama production and another activity so I'm ready when March rolls around. Teacher life!