Bingo!

In the school year at ISSH there are two days outside of the usual teaching events that the faculty must attend. One of these is family festival which I wrote about in November. The other just happened a couple of weeks ago and it is Bingo. I have never seen bingo quite like it before.

All staff must sign up for a work session, and for the rest of the night (it runs from 5-9pm) we have to be around just in case we are needed (apparently they had a big earthquake once right in the middle and over a thousand people had to climb under the tables). My session was checking the tickets of the winners from 8-9pm, the last shift of the night so people were really desperate to win because that was when all the big prizes went, like a holiday, digital camera and other good stuff donated by parents and their companies. The games before had all used a single line to win, but for the big one they had to get a square shape. We had sooo many calls from people not paying attention, who then got stroppy because they thought they had won. For most of them there hadn't even been enough numbers called for a win to be possible! One woman came up with a line, then came up with a square but had missed one number so we sent her away. She came back a couple of minutes later because she couldn't see the number she had missed, so we explained again but she refused to move and stood in front of us checking loudly while the game carried on. Eventually she went away, only for that one missing number to be called next. When she came back, she had tied with someone else and had to draw cards to see if she won. She didn't win. I know it is mean but I was quite pleased because she had been rude and obnoxious and she was a parent so didn't really need to win, whereas the actual winner was a teachers husband so we were pleased. Bingo just seems to bring out the worst in people here. All night there were shouts of "No Bingo, No Bingo" whenever someone called and cheers if it was rejected. Anyway, it took so long that my hour long shift ended at 9.30pm after being shouted at by parents. I went straight to the pub.

Since then I have still been getting sorted for the junior school musical, Jack and the Beanstalk. It was based on the revolting rhyme version and was so funny, the kids were great. I was supposed to play piano, but because I broke a finger playing basketball I ws going to play the clarinet part one handed on a keyboard. We realised when we went to rehearse though, that it would still need to be transposed to fit the piano and violin parts, so I transposed the whole thing and went in on a weekend to enter it into a program so I could print it. It took a while but it was worth it, we had a mini orchestra and the music teacher was chuffed. Everyone said it sounded great too, so I was pleased. I was given some beautiful flowers for playing, and another set from the parents. Its nice to be appreciated!

In school at the moment we have decided to do a cross-curricular project for the 10 year olds. They are studying Egypt in social studies so we are mummifying a chicken in science. Apart from that I have realised that we have a lot of days off for various things coming up, so much so that I think I only have about 5 full teaching weeks left, and for 2 of those I only have 2 classes as the rest of the school go off timetable for exams. I have to get a move on! Still it feels like we are winding down already which is strange - it's only march!

Japan day is coming up at school. It is a day when everyone learns about the culture and history of Japan, and we all do mini courses in things like Taiko drumming, Kimono wearing, board games, Japanese pottery etc etc. I am looking forward to it, although I have no idea what I am doing yet. The teachers get spread out to supervise so I could be anywhere, although I did get my preference form in early so I hope that helps.

It is my friend Tony's 40th birthday today. We went out to celebrate on a boat in Tokyo harbour with lots of food (nabe and tempura and sashimi) and karaoke it was a freezing night but the boat went all the way out into the bay and under the rainbow bridge. it was so pretty and really worth doing for a special occasion.

Vikki is visiting at the moment - Happy Birthday Vikki!
It was raining and foggy when we picked her up from the airport, not a very nice welcome. We took some flowers for her, but to collect the van I had taken them in my backpack on my scooter in the rain so they were a little bedraggled! Still they looked fine when we got them in a vase. She arrived on my birthday so we just relaxed in the day, wandered around Hiroo and had lunch in the stand up bar, had a nap in the afternoon and then went out to the Icebar Tokyo at night. It was great! The entire place is made of ice, the bar, tables, sofas, sculptures, even the glasses. We all dressed up in silver capes and thick gloves and lasted about 40 minutes and 2 drinks before we got too cold. It was really fun though, I would go again. Although Megan panicked when I started eating my glass - she has a phobia about breaking teeth.

On Monday we went to try sushi (not a hit so we gave the fish market a miss) and walked around Yoyogi park and the Meiji shrine. We went to starbucks above shibuya crossing and then to Roppongi for steak and ribs at Outback. On Tuesday we lay in for a while and then rode scooters out to Shimbashi and got the monorail over to Odaiba. Odaiba is a strange place - an island of reclaimed land with a fake beach facing the city and a shopping centre made to look like an English promenade. There is a mini statue of liberty at one point. It was very grey so we didn't stay too long, but the rainbow bridge was still visible. Today we got the train out to Kawagoe, an old fashioned little town known as Koedo (little Tokyo) full of temples and museums and the remains of Edo castle. It was a beautiful day, really sunny and warm, and we went out with a group of friends and walked and walked and walked. Unfortunately, the Emperor and the Swedish Royal family were there too today. We saw them go past in their cars, and everything we wanted to see was blocked off for them. Even the monthly antiques market was just closing so that the way would be clear. We did manage to see Candy Cane Lane, a tiny street of traditional Japanese sweet shops, and had a nice ice-cream. Kawagoe is famous for its sweet potatoes but we drew the line there and had vanilla (they really did have sweet potato flavour ice-cream). We had Yakisoba in the car park of a shrine and came home. Tonight we are going out for Izakaya food and Karaoke for Vik's birthday.

My camera screen got broken while we were out a couple of weeks ago. I took it to be repaired but I was told it would be around £75. It is not that much more for a new one here, so since it is 2 years old I am going to treat myself with my birthday money. Thank you to everyone who gave me some!