I drove to school wednesday morning thinking only typical wednesday morning thoughts: "Weird, you'd think I'd be more tired. Why do they need so many old men in neon, reflective vests to supervise a single four-way stop? Do I have time to stop for an egg Mcmuffin? Damn, it's recyling day for milk cartons...now I have to wait till next month." So engrossed was I with nothing that I completely forgot what day it was. In my defense, the japanese don't seem to fancy halloween as much other western holidays like say, Christmas, and hence there is nothing to stir my memory. No skeletons hanging from doorsteps, no bats or cobwebs, no obnoxious talking witches, not even sales on candy. (I never thought I'd miss that candy corn stuff but I feel oddly melancholy without it) Excuses aside, when I walked into the teacher's room I was ready for a normal day's work and was just about to start staring blankly at my notebook when I was persuaded into the hallway by a gang of three of my 7th grade students. As soon as I stepped into the hallway-It took a minute because, though I have been here a while know, I still always forget that the japanese hand gesture for "come here" is what we use for "please go away"-I was accosted by three miniature voices chiming out "trick or treat!" One of them, Mizuho, even went so far as to make a jack-o-lantern mask. Needless to say, it was ridiculously cute and I felt like an idiot for not having any candy-especially after my attempt to convince them that we usually give out high-fives failed.
1 comment:
Oh, Matthew... I can just see it now; you as the head of the household on the block that hands out stickers and some kind of dental hygiene, tsk, tsk... Mr. Hate Fun, you need to be more on top of the holidays, especially working with children in another country and being responsible for demonstrating how completely superficial and awesome American holidays are. High-fives were a nice touch, however.
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