Your Japanese word of the week is...

"bunkasai". It translates into "cultural festival" and this past Saturday was Seiritsu's own bunkasai (hence the late blog entry, since I was waiting for it to finish before I wrote this heh)....



What is a "cultural festival"?? Well, in the case of the school anyway, it's more like a school fair. All the homerooms and almost all of the clubs prepared displays or decorated their rooms or was doing stuff like selling food on the day of the festival. There were dance shows, band shows, a karate demo, a taiko drumming demo, and lots of other great stuff.


I spent most of the day working the English Conversation Club room, mainly because I've started to help run the club. And it's exactly as it sounds, a club where all the students meet once a week and we chat in English, usually over a game of cards or some improv games I teach them.


I didn't, however, take part in the Karate Club's demo, partly because I didn't have any time to prep anything with Richard nor am I really "in" the club, although I do train with them once or twice a week. That would be Richard on the far right in the picture below.


So most of the week was just preparing for that and, now that it's over, I'm on a very very rare 4-day holiday (most schools don't even have this "Fall Break", just Seiritsu). And I'm just relaxing heh...........


But make sure you check the Seiritsu homepage every so often, as more pictures of the event will come up. Til then......

Your Japanese word of the week is...

"manzoku", meaning "satisfaction". And what was satisfying, you might ask?? Well, this past Monday was the 5th Annual Tobu Taikai, which involved quite a few dojos from around the eastern part of Saitama. Although, if I'm honest, some parts were satisfying while others weren't.

Like every other tournament in Japan, I entered kata and kumite. And like (almost) every other tournament in Japan, kata was in the morning and kumite was in the afternoon.

Kata was a bit unsatisfying because there were only three people entered and one of them didn't show up. So it was just a dual between me and Carl..... a sort of International Shiramizu Intern Showdown, if you will...... doubly unsatisfying was that I didn't perform my kata very well. It was mostly fine except for a move or two, but I expect better of myself. However, they still awarded me the win and I got a gold medal for it, despite what I think.......... so, yay!

Kumite was a bit of the same. With only 6 people entered (1 of them being the aforementioned no-show), I was immediately seeded to the semi-final round. There I faced off with Ueno-san, also from Shiramizu. He's also very tall (6'2" or so), which meant his arms were much longer than mine. Despite that, I only lost by one point (2-1) so that wasn't too bad.

And after that was a party with all the Shiramizu people not only to celebrate a good tournament, but various other things. So, all in all, a good weekend out =-)......

And in case you're wondering, this is indeed all of us doing the famous "Kamehameha" from Dragon Ball haha........ yeah, good times heh......

Your Japanese word of the week is...

"yaru". Generally it's means the verb "to do" and can be thought of as a slightly more informal than one of the first verbs anyone ever learns in Japanese, "suru".








In the case of this poster, the last three hiragana say "ya-ro-u", which is a sort of commanding way of saying "yaru", often heard by sports coaches or whenever seniors talk to juniors. And these kinds of posters are endemic to the Japanese rail system. There's lots, especially now, saying stuff like how music that's too loud becomes an nuisance for others. One good one in the smoking areas outside train stations warn of how lit cigarettes are held at the height of a child's head.........



I personally like this one though......

....... largely because of the huge debate that spawned on the site that found it. It says "Please do it on the mountain" (which is does), and people had no idea what "it" is.......... but really, I kinda figured it made sense........ "it" is like camping- hauling lots of gear and, like that seated woman, having your forearm-sized onigiri while on the train and stuff. But I suppose it's more fun to say "Please do it on the mountain" heh....

Anyway, other things I've been doing?? Work....... mostly........ Monday the 15th is the Tobu (East) Tournament, consisting of lots of dojos from the eastern part of Saitama. Check back to see how it goes!

Your Japanese word of the week is...

"hairu" which means "to enter/join". And this can mean to physically enter something like a building, to join a class, or to sign-up/join a group. For example, if I'm late for a karate class, I warm-up on the side and then, during a break in the action, I saw "hairimasu" ("I'm joining") and then find a spot to join the action.

This past week saw three new students join the regular three at the Seiritsu International Department. The three had signed up to a private company that specializes in places foreign students in Japanese schools and Seiritsu had agreed to take them in.

And they really do help the department become more international as we now have a new Canadian, Thai, and Dutch student joining an Australian and two students from New Zealand. You can check them out at the Seiritsu International website.

In other news.................... actually, there is none. I'm working a regular 8-4 job and have weekends off...... almost like I'm a real adult haha.......

But being in the heart of Tokyo, and with really awesome roommates, it means now I have time to really see what the city is like. Armed with my cultural and linguistic learnings from the past year, I'm not at all uncomfortable making my way around the city and meeting people, so it'll be a great chance to add to my experiences here.

The only downside so far?? It's still pretty hot and humid............ but only a few more weeks of that and it'll be over. And then it'll be a short wait until November, when the World Karate Federation will hold its championships here in Tokyo.

The WKF is an all-styles event and draws the best of the best from all over the world, so it goes without saying that the karate on display during those four days will be incredible. But that's not for a few months and I obviously won't be competing in those haha........ so til then, stay tuned for some results of some local tournaments that I will be in =P......