Episode two, in which the children become educated

So our plan was to give the kids a week to acclimate to Japan and get over jet lag and then start sending them to school on Monday of our second week. That was the plan…

After getting the paperwork all filled out on Tuesday, I gave their school a call mid-morning on Wednesday, figuring I’d try to come in and talk to the principal, get a list of things we need, etc. Well, the principal had other plans. He had apparently been informed that our paperwork was complete the previous day and had actually expected them to show up that morning. Since the school day had already started, he recommended that we come in the next day instead. No need to plan ahead, he said, just show up fifteen minutes early to discuss a few things and they can start the day. Wha? That’s it? I travelled 6,500 miles to get here and you want me to just throw my kids into Japanese school with no planning? Well, okay I guess.

So that’s pretty much what we did. The principal seemed to be taking this whole “weird foreign kids coming to our school” thing in stride, so I decided to do the same. We did take them in to buy the basics, which in this case meant the school gym clothes and yellow hats for walking to school, but other than that we decided to put things off until the next day.

What every fashion-forward Japanese elementary school student wears for gym class
Note the 東 symbol? That means “East” as in Suita East Elementary School. Yes, our kids once again attend school in East.

The next morning the four of us set out for their elementary school. Near the beginning of our walk, we saw a lot of kids wearing suspiciously familiar yellow hats gathering not far from our house, and figured that the kids in the neighborhood must gather there to walk to school as a group every morning. The walk took about twenty minutes and although it was near a fairly busy area it seemed very safe, with a pedestrian bridge at a strategic point to cross over both train tracks and a busy road. Once the kids get used to the route, I don’t see any problem with having them walk it with the group. When we arrived at the elementary school, we were escorted into the principal’s office, which looks like every other principal’s office in Japan and, according to J, in Taiwan as well. But the principal was very friendly, very welcoming, and very eager to help the kids start almost immediately. We met the kids’ teachers, learned about the systems for communicating with them via notebooks sent home with the kids, talked about a few things the kids would need… and off they went to class. Just like that. They just walked off and joined their classes. It felt very surreal, but I liked the fact that the school staff were treating it so matter-of-factly. It helped me put aside my doubts and just accept that this was just a part of the experience. Of course they just went off and joined the class. That’s what they were supposed to do.

Jocelyn has a good breakdown of their first day on her site, so I’ll just link to that here and move on to the rest of the week.

Long story short, the kids walked to school with the rest of the kids rather than with us the next day. Eli also wanted to walk home with the other kids instead of us, so we let him, but we went to pick Mikki up. Both of them were also taking the whole thing in stride, and we didn’t get much from them about what went on all day except the same old brief responses we get back in the US. Eli made friends almost immediately and even went out to play with a kid from the neighborhood after school the second day. Mikki was a bit less outgoing than we are used to her being in a more familiar environment, but I think she’ll open up soon too. The exposure to a completely foreign environment has also spurred the kids to a renewed interest in learning Japanese, and we have them both working on hiragana practice in lieu of the actual homework. All in all, the first three days went extremely well, and I’m sure the next few days would have gone well too if not for, well… that’s a story for another blog post.

Coming soon: Episode three, in which our heroes face many hardships