Update - Showa Cultural Festival - March 9th, 2008
Okay, so I'm extremely late with this post, so sue me. Just leave me with enough money, so I can spend it at Anime Boston this week. Uh... moving along now...
On Sunday, March 9th, 2008, I went to Jamaica Plain, MA, to Showa Women's University for a cultural festival held by 126 Japanese junior high school girls flown in from Japan. I was invited to this event by Jeff, who is the Secretary and Assistant Director of Operations at Anime Boston 2008.
Of course, we enjoyed ourselves and had fun. The school is beautiful and they managed to do some nice recreations to it, such as a lovely garden with sakura trees (but they weren't blossoming yet) and a pond with koi in it or a room for the Japanese tea ceremony. Very, very pretty, I though. There were lots of gifts and prizes being handed out by the girls. There were interactive stuff as well, such as taiko drumming, calligraphy writing, or games like a volleyball-type game using a paper balloon. I played with one of the schoolgirls, hitting the paper balloon back and forth. I've played badminton as a kid and a slight bit in high school, so I'm very good at rallying. But, when the paper balloon starts flying around and I hit the schoolgirl in the face with the paper balloon by accident... uh... well... Let's just move along with the story now, shall we? We wandered around some more. I watched Jeff fail at hopscotch and totally fail at using chopsticks. And we horrendously failed at calligraphy, writing our kanji-fied names.
So, overall, Jeff and I enjoyed ourselves. At the end of the event, we got to see some karate, heard the piano played by schoolgirls, and was finished off with a song from all 126 Japanese junior high school girls.
We then went for food at Papa Gino's. ...Which I haven't been to in years. Then... I went home. Hooray!
Pictures are here!
On Sunday, March 9th, 2008, I went to Jamaica Plain, MA, to Showa Women's University for a cultural festival held by 126 Japanese junior high school girls flown in from Japan. I was invited to this event by Jeff, who is the Secretary and Assistant Director of Operations at Anime Boston 2008.
Of course, we enjoyed ourselves and had fun. The school is beautiful and they managed to do some nice recreations to it, such as a lovely garden with sakura trees (but they weren't blossoming yet) and a pond with koi in it or a room for the Japanese tea ceremony. Very, very pretty, I though. There were lots of gifts and prizes being handed out by the girls. There were interactive stuff as well, such as taiko drumming, calligraphy writing, or games like a volleyball-type game using a paper balloon. I played with one of the schoolgirls, hitting the paper balloon back and forth. I've played badminton as a kid and a slight bit in high school, so I'm very good at rallying. But, when the paper balloon starts flying around and I hit the schoolgirl in the face with the paper balloon by accident... uh... well... Let's just move along with the story now, shall we? We wandered around some more. I watched Jeff fail at hopscotch and totally fail at using chopsticks. And we horrendously failed at calligraphy, writing our kanji-fied names.
So, overall, Jeff and I enjoyed ourselves. At the end of the event, we got to see some karate, heard the piano played by schoolgirls, and was finished off with a song from all 126 Japanese junior high school girls.
We then went for food at Papa Gino's. ...Which I haven't been to in years. Then... I went home. Hooray!
Pictures are here!