Tuesday is a Different Kind of Day

Most days go by with relatively little to write about...today was not that day. i don't know what the stars were aligning to do, but today had about 3 or 4 blog-worthy things happen (blog-worthy being a loose term). To start, I was in my small elementary school. After my first class, I saw that all the students were unnecessarily orderly out on the playground. After investigating, I was told that they were playing dodgeball! Dodgeball is evidently one of those things that has transcended national boundaries. There were some twists to make it convenient for playing on a field, but it was dodgeball alright. 

3rd and 4th graders competing ferociously for the glory of being the All Akita Elementary School champions.

The 1st and 2nd graders played a little different variant. I didn't catch the good stuff, but here is the end. They played in a circle. Circle of Death. Maru (Japanese for circle) Muerte (Spanish for death). Tri-lingual name game here. 

I taught a Christmas lesson to the 4th graders today. Upon reviewing the list of Christmas words, I realized how difficult it is to explain Christmas-y things. Think about stockings...socks...that you hang on the fire until candy comes. I didn't do a good job of clarifying it for them, but what can you do? I ate lunch with the 4th graders, and they asked me if I knew about chapurin. They meant Charlie Chaplin, I discerned this from the mustache, hat and cane imitation. As lunch was winding down, I was folding up my milk carton when a funny thing happened. I left the straw in, and as the air exited the carton, I launched a stream of leftover milk into the air about 7 feet. I immediately laughed and looked around to see if anyone else saw. There was one little girl with wide eyes that was laughing along with me, the other 12 students had no idea. 

In my 5th grade class, we played a game of charades. I let the kids choose their own names in English. These were the best that they could come up with. Team Fairy and Team Angels. The class is 60% boys. 

 You can see that I awarded Team Angels 10,000 points. I don't really remember what it was for. 

 I went to a discount grocery store while I was waiting to meet some people. The store is called Trial...perhaps because it is like a super-packed dollar store. In other words, it's like every Asian market in Chinatown across the world. In any case, they had Natural Hardwood Smoked Bacon. Nice right? I figured it was worth a shot. It actually tasted like regular bacon if you cooked it and left it on the country until it got cold. Not too shabby for Japan! 

 Another seeming by-product of America. I don't think I have ever seen corn this giant. 

 In the beer aisle, I found this. Now I am no expert, but this seems a little small for a beer...am I right? 

This picture pretty much sums up everything you need to know about Trial Bargain Store.