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Undokai

All of the schools here work for the entire month of September to prepare for Undokai (sports day).  The kids have to wear their PE uniforms every day because every day they are practicing.  The morning of sports day the parents line up (some at 4:30am) to get a good spot for viewing and picnicking.  The gates opened at 7am.  Luckily our friends from New Zealand queued up and let us squat on their real estate.  We rolled in around 7:45 with our picnic and drinks and chairs for the day.

The school is divided into a red team and a white team.  Every kid has these cute reversible red and white hats so it's easy to tell who is on what team.  G was on red and B was on white this year.  This is the entire school sitting down for the opening announcements.  There is a very specific way the kids are required to sit which you can see them doing.

There were all kinds of competitions that were different for every grade level.  In this picture G is pushing a red ball with a partner and it was a relay race.  B ran a 100m race.  G ran a 50m race.  The big thing for the 5th and 6th graders was this gymnastics/human pyramid demonstration.

The field is dirt, which is a little shocking for us Americans.  The kids were rolling around though demonstrating their flexibility and strength.

If you look close in the back, B is the one closest to the school.

The weather ended up being really pleasant.  It was not too hot and there was cloud cover so it wasn't too sunny.  There were so many people there and we were warned it can be hard to find your child.  It was crowded, but Husband is so tall that he always managed to get some good photos.

In the afternoon the kids all came out and ate with their parents.  I packed sandwiches, kiwi, and a cucumber salad.  We saw some very elaborate meals, though.  But also others like ours.  One of my friends told me that she makes katsu (pork) because it also means to win.  If I'd known that before, then I would have made pork as well!

The big show for the 2nd graders was to dance the very popular song, Paprika.  https://youtu.be/T0valuAksuo
Everyone here knows it and knows all of the moves.  If you are one of the little girls in our America neighborhood- I'm sure G will come back and teach it to you.  Or, you can learn it from the video and impress her when she gets back.  haha!


G learned the dance at a one day youth activity shortly after we arrived, and I'm so glad she did, because it really helped her fit in with friends.

It was so neat to see all of the kids and experience something that we definitely don't have in America.  I didn't take pictures of the crowds of people, because it feels rude, but it is really quite extraordinary.  We have so much space in America. 

My friend took this picture of the backpacks and waterbottles on the chairs of the sixth grade class.  It was an interesting sight to see this for so many kids.  One last little interesting thing is that we were required to send in 4 old socks, 4 bags, and 10 rubberbands so that they could protect their chair from the dirt.  The specificness of this request just amused me for some reason.

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