request .... THANK YOU!!!

[Killua]

I can't believe anyone here hasn't mentioned anime yet.

[jcaliff]

The first thing that comes to my mind is the school I taught at in Kochi.

wow! you actually taught in a real japanese school? may i ask, is it much different than schools here an america (well yeah i can imagine its quite different heh, , but what's the main thing that you can see is a big difference here than there?)

Lots of differences, like the school uniforms in jr high/high school, only being allowed to wear special school shoes indoors, cleaning periods, all competitive athletics being afterschool club related, and so on, but I think the biggest difference, especially in upper grades, is the social structure of the school. Instead of traveling from one class to another and having classes with various other students, students are always in the same class as the rest of the their homeroom and take all classes except music/art/science/PE in their homeroom classroom. Teachers who aren't homeroom teachers or who don't require special rooms (like science, art, PE and music) travel from class to class with their books, and all teachers have their desks in a single faculty office instead of in the classroom. It's almost like the students own their class, and the teachers are visitors during the class they teach. This builds strong class unity and competition between classes (which is even more evident during the sports festival).

Things that in my mind, are the things I automatically associate with Japan are Mt. Fuji, koi (carp), sakura (cherry blossoms), kimono, and jinja (shrines). EDIT: Oh yeah, and Samurai and Ninja!!

koi! i forgot about koi! hmmm... gosh that would be so cool if we could have like a mini koi pond... i was thinking of making a sakura tree (since i saw someone made a palm tree last year).... hmmm... but that might be too much. hmmm.

Sakura tree free standing is tough, but if you have a room with a corner you can use brown tissue to build a trunk in the corner and then decorate the ceiling with tissue flowers on brown-wrapped floral wire. You could do something inexpensive with aluminum foil lined with green construction paper to simulate a pond, and draw koi in the water with permanent markers or make them from construction paper and tape/glue to the aluminum foil. Use medium rocks to hold the edges and give a bit of authentic feel. I was in girl scouts for many, many years.

Things they have no where else on earth? 4 seasons! Just kidding. Okonomiyaki. I spend a lot of time daydreaming about eating at okonomiyaki restaurants.

heh! yeah we only have two seasons here where i am... fall (two months) and summer
(hot HOT summer X-p)
what type of restaurants are those?

Okonomiyaki is like a pancake with cabbage and meat covered with sweet or spicy sauce, mayonaise, and other condiments. There are actually two main kinds - Osaka-style, which is like a thick pancake, and Hiroshima-style which is like two thin pancakes with cabbage and other stuff including soba noodles sandwiched between. You usually cook them yourself on a grill in the middle of your table, and it takes practice to be able to flip the okonomiyaki without it breaking. It's fun to show off if you do it right, and a little embarrassing when you don't. If you've ever seen later episodes of Ranma 1/2, Ukyo is an okonomiyaki chef.

One thing that is fun for kids is traditional playthings. I've seen great exhibits in the past featuring kites, kendama, menko, otedama, takeuma, and stuff like that. Especially fun if it's interactive.

yeah, id love any and all ideas!
what are kendama, menko, otedama, takeuma?
oh i hope im not offending with all my questions.
id really like to learn myself!

kendama is a type of ball and cup game, menko are a game like pogs where you try to flip a card by throwing another, otedama is a traditional style of juggling with beanbags (though it's always done circular pattern instead of the typical type of exchange that western jugglers usually use) and takeuma are bamboo stilts. You could also make imitation kokeshi, traditional wooden dolls, out of a styrofoam ball and half a paper towl tube and decorate with paint and felt. They're cute.

If you live in a large enough area, there might be a local Japan Society for Japanese expats. if you contact them, they might be able to recommend local hobby groups (ikebana or dance or tea ceremony or calligraphy or whatever) who are often happy to help with demonstrations for something like this. You could also ask local karate/judo/kendo/aikido dojo if they might be interested.

[jcaliff]

I can't believe anyone here hasn't mentioned anime yet.

Guess I figured that went without saying on an anime forum.

[Belldandy16]

thank you so much for all the info and ideas, Jcaliff!
youve given me even more ideas!!


oh guys, i need one more specific thing,
my teacher talked to me today and said she would like to have the kids write their names in Japanese. i said i really didnt think that was possible because i didnt think that english letters translated into japanese (meaning, letter "A" translates into "such and such" Japanese character... but idunno, maybe it does, i have no idea)...

if it is possible to translate from english (english letters) into japanese could someone direct me to a website that has japanese letters?
(am i making any sense, btw? lol, its been a bad long week and im not quite thinking streight )

thanks so much again!!!!!

[Killua]

Definitely that's possible Belldandy. With some names a little fudging will be in order, but in general you'd want to use katakana.

Here's a list:

A few things to note: "a" is pronounced as "ah". If you want the long a as in hay you need to combine a character that ends in "e" with an "i". For instance, Kei is pronounced like Kay. Also, "i" is pronounced like in Wii. If you want the "i" as in "I" you need to combine a character ending in "a" with an "i". For instance, hai.

This website will do it for you:
http://japanesetranslator.co.uk/your-name-in-japanese/

[Belldandy16]

oh thats awesome! thank you so much killua!

i didnt really think we could, but im so glad i was wrong. ill let her know about that site.

heh, off topic for a sec... what you were saying reminded me of this really funny vid i saw on youtube. it has a segment where it says something about the different sounds of i before e or something... well anyways... its 5 min long but if youre up for a good laugh its worth it.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eCkudNp8 ... annel_page

[Belldandy16]

Well we finally had our multicultural fair and it was a BIG hit!!!

Thank you soooo much everyone for your input and help with the ideas for this!

we were originally going to do a fake koi pond for the displays but we ran out of time unfortunatley (and i really wanted to do one too) . ... oh well maybe next year.

but in the end we ended up doing a few things...

a sakura tree in the corner, we had a parent donate a dress (i dont think its a kimono, someone here had a name for it but i cant remember it sorry. ), someone donated a LARGE ammount of Pocky for the kids and parents to sample (.. *cough ...Syan… cough* )… which was a BIG hit…thanks friend!
the kids did a powerpoint presentation (each child did a slide and it showcased different points of japan), each child did like a research journal on the country (darn i forgot to take a picture of them on their desks, sorry), they did fish kites that hung from the ceiling, and a banner inside and out.

here's some pictures for you...
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2 ... 59c9ed76e6

thanks so much to Syan for donating the Pocky and Rei for sending us Japanese coins for the kids to see!
and thank you to everyone here for helping us think of ideas to include in our presentation!!!
you all are wonderful!!!

[Belldandy16]

oh Killua, the kids did write their names in japanese... which was in the Journals that i forgot to take a picture of. *bangs head*



but they thought it was really cool that they could write in japanese. LOL

thanks for the info, pal!