A very different world at work!

Today was the first day all of the students were at school. We had opening ceremonies for both the Junior High students (680 of them) as well as the senior high classes (700 plus). It was an amazing experience so totally culturally different than my previous experience as principal. This how they proceeded (no photos because it was WAY to formal for me, in the position of honour, to take out my camera.

I arrived in the gym after all of the Junior (grade 7/8/9) were seated. I was escorted to the front in one of the positions of honor (as principal that is a given here. I have the best placed shoe locker for my inside shoes, I have the best office in the school to meet foreign standards, our class is class number 1, a rare honour in such a huge school!).

I sit down, not quite being sure of hwat was happening because all instructions were in Japanese. then the gym goes silent... and I mean ABSOLUTELY silent. All 800 plus Junior High girls sat, with their hands on their laps, waiting quietly without a sound. We probably waited 10 minutes (can you imagine that in our schools?) in absolute quiet until the board of directors finally filed in. Apparantly we were all waiting for the owner of our school to get here (the owner is a multi-millionaire passionate about education who owns several universities and schools).

After that there was a whole series of speeches. After every speech all students would stand up and bow to the speaker who would return their bow. As the speaker would walk by me and the other Japanese side principal they would bow and we would bow back. The assembly must have lasted 80 minutes and during that entire time the girls ALL sat quietly and focussed on the speaker; feet on the floor and hands in their laps. Wow; I was amazed.

In the afternoon the same assembly happened with the senior high girls. This time as they walked in the band played beautifully. At the end of the assembly a 200 girl choir sang the Hallelujiah chorus. 

After the assembly I did a little exploring around the school before heading back to the office. As I got to the sixth floor I was concerned to hear yelling and wacking going on at the end of the hall. I ran up there thinking that I needed to intervene.

Well... welcome to Japan. It turns out this was a highly disciplined group of 30plus girls practising their required course of Kendo which involved aggressive attacks, hits and parries with the bamboo poles. They were extremely well organized, skillful and did this all with no teacher present. Check out this video.

The next afternoon Shelley came to the school because I really wanted here to experience this. This time we dropped in on the Naginata club. We just stuck our nose in the door to get a glimpse. The minute we did the entire group of thirty girls came running over and stood at attention around us with their spears to show respect (!!!!).

We asked to watch them and they got all in a fluster getting us set up in comfortable chairs and ensuring that we had the seats of honour. Then they proceeded to do astounding demonstrations of skills for us. It turns out that the Japanese national Naginata champion is a student at our school. Check out this video.

It has been a real pleasure to see the level to which adolescents can rise if society expects it of them.