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Published: October 10th 2005
Recovery after the Flour-Face Dunk Obstacle Course
These are 5 of my third-year students who have just engaged in a strenous obstacle course, in which the last obstacle was to retrieve something from a plateful of flour. Poor Kana, on the far right, was just covered!Believe it or not, although you may not be able to tell by my blog entries thus far, I am actually teaching English in Japan! I am teaching at Akifuchu Senior Highschool, which is located about 20 minutes outside of Hiroshima City. The school which has about 700 students, is the only school to have an international course in the prefecture.
In autumn, all schools in Japan have an annual "andokai" or "sports day", in which students and even sometimes parents (!) and teachers (!) engage in strenous competition throughout the day! Akifuchu's Sports Day was held on October 1st. The student body was divided up into two teams, the Reds versus the Whites. Some of the events included the classic tug of war, the traditional relay race (in which I don't think I've ever seen kids run so fast in all of my life!), and the ever popular, yet highly unusual obstacle courses which forced students to dunk their faces into plates of flour, or grab with their teeth for donuts in plastic bags, just to name a few...
Dob, the other Assistant Language Teacher at my school, and I were involved in two events throughout the day.
Don-ut look delicious?
Regrettably, I was not asked to partake in this competition. Another obstacle course, in which the final challenge involved retrieving a donut with your teeth from a string We were volunteered to participate in a bean bag tossing-like event with the PTA, principal and vice-principal, in which we went tete a tete with the winning team of a previous competition. The objective was to toss as many bean bags into a net as possible, and our side (with no help from me!) prevailed! The BIG competition came in the afternoon as Dob and I entered a relay race with the English Speaking Society. We placed a healthy 4th out of 6 teams, beating the volleyball team, who had to bump the volleyball all away around the track (...they didn't stand a chance😉
The day also featured each year performing a dance as a group. The first years did a graceful dance routine, the second years an acrobatics expose, and the third years a riveting folk dance performance.
At the end of the day, the Reds won the competition. This autumnal (although it was incredibly hot!) sports festival was something I am very glad to have witnessed. A fun time was had by all😊
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Steven
non-member comment
Mmmmmmmmmmm Doooonuts
Looking at those donuts has made me want to put on some clothes, get in my car, pollute the environment, go to Tim Hortons, get a Boston Cream and retract all the benefits that i achieved by doing the stairs today. I haven't had a donut since July :-(