I only wrote an entry yesterday (technically) but it seems so long ago..... “Today” has just been a long day, but a great day. I had my first day in a kindergarten. I got up at 5.30 am because the school is quite far away. Although I did discover an alternate route thanks to some of my Junior High students who must live near the kindergarten in question. I saw them ride down a road by the big dried up river bed and so on my way home that day, I decided to follow it and see if it came out where I thought it did. It did. It was baking hot as well, about 31’C, and with the heat bouncing off the concrete on that long ride I was sweltering. I could feel waves of heat only stalled by a bit of a breeze every now and then, but it was a beautiful ride. So very quiet with a great view.

Anyway, I got to the kindergarten in good time. The place was so small. There was only one teacher there when I arrived. She was very nice. She showed me the two classrooms in the school (there are no more than 27 children) and the hall, and then we sat down to have a drink. We talked a bit and then she went outside to do some gardening. It was really nice and relaxed. The two other teachers arrived and we talked, slowly the kids turned up. They were each shy of me at first but after they said “Hello” they changed. They were quite happy to play with me and me with them. I spent the morning playing with different children. First, I was outside in the garden area, then the climbing frames, kicking a ball and then the see saw. I must have been outside for about an hour and then I went to seek some shade. It was far too hot out there. Inside, I went into the main hall and it was chaos. Kids were throwing balls around, climbing on surfaces and riding box carts like dodgems. I just went with it. Later, I joined a group in one of the classrooms. They were making some fake mochi (a bean based snack) out of playdough. When they gave me a piece, I made a cat, but then the children, so happy to see what I had done, they kept asking me to make different animals until I ran out of ideas. One of the kids suggested a koala and then I was done.

Soon after, we had my “lesson”. The kids gathered in the hall and I introduced the UK and showed the flag, then talked about colours. We played an easy game where the kids had to run around the hall looking for things of certain colours. At one point, they all took my by surprise by grabbing hold of me when I said white. They were pointing to my shirt, but it had me laughing because I wasn’t expecting it After my lesson we had dinner. It was a lot nicer than normal dinners,. For one, despite my tiredness and the heat, I was feeling pretty relaxed. Secondly, the children were very talkative even though they knew little English. for the whole day I played this game where every time I used a bit of Japanese they would laugh and say how I understood Japanese, to which I would look confused and tell them I didn’t understand at all - in Japanese. They always laughed at that. There was one girl at the table I sat at that just kept talking all the time and her English was quite good too. I can see her being one of the serious English students when she gets to be in Junior High.

Though, soon after that we had to say goodbye. The children brushed their teeth, got changed and packed up. Then they gathered in the hall again to sing me a goodbye song and then they left. It was lots of fun, and I really do like the kindergarten.

In the evening I was so tired but I went out for dinner to meet some of the other foreign teachers here. We had some kind of all you can eat Korean BBQ. It was nice for a while but I don’t like eating lots of meet (there was practically nothing else) and I got so sleepy. Still we went to a place afterwards where you pay by the hour for all you can eat ice cream and soft drinks and endless games of pool and darts. It was okay. I was too tired though. And it was nice to meet other people, but the other teachers they seem to be the type of people who will happily stand around in parking lots for ages talking about rubbish because none of them feel comfortable saying goodbye. I didn’t really feel there was any actual friendships there. Still, you never know who you will meet that perfect Japanese friend through.