The rest of the week went well. My cold got better after lots of soup, Gatorade and orange juice. Tuesday evening is my regular running night but I thought I'd just walk since I was not feeling 100% yet. When I got to the beach it was very windy, more than I have ever seen in Okinawa. It was foggy, the sand was blowing in the air and there were actually waves in the ocean (a very rare sight). It was beautiful. I started walking and realized I couldn't just walk, I began running. I usually step up on a little two foot, concrete wall to run. The wall separates the sand from the running path along the beach and is only about two feet wide. I like jumping up and down on the wall while I'm running, keeps me from getting bored and gives me more of a workout. I must have underestimated the wind, right when I got one foot up on the wall, my other foot slipped and I fell! The wind literally knocked me down. I saw that my hand was bleeding and could see blood on knee, through my pants. I didn't look back or stop, I just keep running (off the wall). I completed my run and then stopped to cool down and inspect the damage, not bad but there were definitely some cuts that needed to be cleaned. I watched the sunset and headed home. My cuts are now scabbing but a bruise came up around my knee. I just hope for no scars. Maybe now I'll stay off the wall for a while =)
It was a busy rest of the week in class. We celebrated Valentine's day on Friday with fun activities and a party. My students were supposed to have P.E. first thing in the morning but the P.E. teacher was absent. My students got exited when I told them I would lead them in P.E. It was very cold out so we did some exercises and played games inside.
Our school had a "Bento Contest" to celebrate Valentine's day. The principal sent letters home informing parents that one student from each grade would win a prize for having the most creative bento. My students didn't seem excited about this until Friday morning when they brought their bentos in. They were VERY detailed!
Heart shaped sandwiches in a heart box.
The Mickey face and ears are rice balls (called onigiri in Okinawa) which is rice in the shape of a ball, wrapped in seaweed. Sometimes, there is salmon or other fish pieces in the middle of the rice ball. This was the 2nd grade winning bento!
My personal favorite, rice balls with seaweed decorated like a baseball and soccer ball. So cute!
Pink, heart shaped rice. I'm not sure what the little ghost things are made of.
Guess who brought heart shaped pizzas.....my American student! With chocolate covered strawberries and grapes =)
Heart shaped egg and meat with flower shaped carrots.
I'm not exactly sure what this is but it looks cute.
It's a little blurry but if you look closely at the hot dog, there are Hello Kitty stamps on it!
I made heart shaped Jello for my students =)
This student came up to my desk, slipped me a note and ran away.
The note said "Thank you for awas (always) thech (teach) and thank you four awas (always) reed (read) the Bible." It was SO incredibly cute, I had to get a picture of him with it! I now have the letter in my room as a reminder to smile =)
My students did Chapel Friday morning and read a little skit about how God made us unique and for a specific purpose. I really stressed that we each need to use the gifts and talents God has given us to inspire and help others. Funny thing is that in Church on Sunday the homily was about the same thing! God is trying to tell me something =)
After P.E. and Chapel, we played a math game in which each table received a group of candy hearts. Each table then answered groups of questions such as "How many ways can you group these hearts?" and "How many hearts will it take to be the length of one ruler?"
It was a fun game, of course my students favorite part was that they got to eat the hearts after!
Second grade was in charge of sorting and delivering Valentine cards from the school mailbox to different classrooms. After we finished that, we had our own party. Each student brought in not only cards but lots of candy! I gave each student 2 gallon size ziplock bags to keep there candy in and that was still not enough!
Here they are with their bags overflowing with chocolates and candy. We only had 30 minutes left in the school day but I allowed them to each pick out ONE piece of candy and eat it.
I came home with a large paper bag full of gifts. Gourmet Japanese chocolates, donuts, lotions, soaps, cards, etc. I'm not a chocolate fan and I try not to eat sweets so I'm not sure what I'm going to do with all this...I guess one piece every once in a while won't be too bad, right?
This little note from one of my students made me smile, I have it posted up in my room now =)
Saturday, I went to Chatan Stadium to watch a spring training baseball game. The teams were the Dragons and Lions, both are from mainland, Okinawa does not have a team. The game was at 1 pm but I got there at noon, just to make sure I got a seat.
Here is the outside of the stadium.
The only food there was this lunch truck outside the stadium. They sold hot dogs and rice balls, nothing looked appealing.
I wasn't sure which team to root for but the signs around the stadium all promote the Dragons.
Here are the Dragons warming up on a field next to the stadium. There were a good amount of people taking pictures. It was funny to see the players practicing on an open field with no security around.
View of the players warming up from the stadium.
I was surprised to find the stadium fairly empty with only 40 minutes before game time. More people did show up but it was still only about 50% full.
The windmill in the back is along the path where I go running.
The Lions warming up on the field.
The Dragons with their mascot (not sure what it is exactly).
The only non Japanese player came in as a relief pitcher.
I guess it's universal, kids still love watching baseball from the fence (and putting their fingers in it!).
It looked funny to see 122 written on the centerfield wall, 122 feet is nothing....except it's not measured in feet here, it's measured in meters which makes much more sense.
I loved how the umpire would yell "Out!" and "Strike!" in Japanese. Even though it's a different language, you still knew what he was saying!
The biggest difference in the game was that there were no food vendors walking around, yelling and selling items. Also, the crowd was very quiet! They clapped a few times but were not loud at all. Something I thought was really funny, people would move away from foul balls instead of trying to catch them! You just don't see that in America. It was a fun game, I'm planning on going back next Saturday. Apparently it's a more important game because this time you have to buy tickets.
It was a good game.
The Lions were leading 1-0 until the 8th inning. Dragons ended up winning 2-1. I recorded the big play of the game:
Today is Tuesday and I am back at work after a long, 3 day weekend. On Sunday, I went to some Okinawan drag races. I have a few really good videos to post from the races (in another post). It will be a short week because we don't have school on Friday either. It's family fun day so the entire school goes to the park with their parents to play games. Tomorrow is Ash Wednesday, hopefully I get on base for mass. Hope you all enjoyed Valentine's day, I was thinking of you =)
XOXO
Kristen
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