a day in the noto

driving on the beach

the theme for the day was pretty much where the hell am i?

and then i got more lost

sunday night

special end of the school year bento box for the teachers. so good


1-3 eating lunch, none of them talked at all, they are one of my genkiest classes but i think teachers told them to not talk during lunch for some reason. its a strange feeling to eat lunch in a classroom filled with 40 people and all you hear is the sound of people chewing

sunset from my window

first pics from the new camera

then sun has returned to my life

finally a decent photo of the mountains around kanazawa, they are really big...


really cool continuous shooting mode, look for the return of jumping pictures hopefully soon...
13

mustang in northern california

16

catching up

as the internet and phone have been out at my house, ive been out of the blogging for a little while. here are a couple pics from the last week or so.

couple of pictures from the nagamachi samurai district in downtown KZ


mongolian cooking class meal we made. the place was wild with kids running around all these pots filled with boiling water and super sharp knifes. but nobody died in the making of these curries,


the new camera, havent taken too many pictures with it yet as im still figuring it out, but it is an amazing little machine.

dollar diplomacy

Uchinada chu yearbook, it was so similar to american yearbooks, all of it was in english excpet the names

picture from yearbook of us in teachers room, this was the first month i was in japan, im not even wearing a suit yet...

swarm of parents taking pictures of the classes as they line up for the final time to give thanks to their home room teachers.


this time we did the fox... as you can see, my camera is on the verge of death


a couple pics from our enkais from last night. My grandparents sent me a card with $23 in it for my birthday, i figured since i cant spend it or do anything with it really, id give it away to people. Most japanese im told dont see much foreign currency esp in my area of japan. They were stunned by it, even tho we were all so drunk i could be giving away dead batteries and they'd be happy. I gave the last $1 to a sushi chef tonight who made us an amazing meal, he put it up on the wall of his restuarant i wish i had had my camera to take a pic but i didnt. ill have to go back and get the picture. The 1st pic is of one of my favorite teachers at school, he teaches social studies and will use it in his future lessons is what he said.

Graduation

Program for the 46th Uchinada Chu Graduation
my favorite class of boys, 3-7, with me Inada sensei

a student and one of my english teachers, all the female 3rd grade teachers wore kimono





brass band club and conductor



these are the certificates the students got for graduating, they come rolled up the brown tube you'll see in other pictures

the ceremony itself took about 2 hours and was very formal, comeplete with lots, and lots, and lots, of standing, bowing, sitting down and then doing that all again in unison with over 1000 people. Literally about 25 or so times. yikes. we sang the school song, and heard a bunch of speeches from important people and they read off all the names of the 350 or so 3rd graders. Then we all went outside into the sun and took pictures and talked for a bit and students slowly left. This is a big day for these kids, much more so id say than Jr High grad is in the states. From this point on, all of these kids will go on to different specialty high schools both public and private and what school they go to is a huge determining factor in the rest of their lives. Many will go on to trade schools where they will learn a specific skill like plumbing woodworking, or mechanical skills. The high level students will go on to academic schools and continue with a general education and then compete to get into college.

beachwalk