Yesterday morning, a cohort of 6th graders from the nearby Japanese Primary School trickled into NUS Central Library Forum in two lines, albeit disorderly as they chatted excitedly among themselves. We - the university students at least 7 years ahead of them - watched their arrival with anticipation from the stairs where we were seated, wondering which of the young curious faces looking at us were assigned to us.
As part of our Japanese 3 assessment this semester, we were supposed to plan itineraries for a university tour for these 6th graders, make a brochure, conduct the tour on the actual day and thereafter write a reflection (in Japanese!). My groupmates (Hanxi, Vivian and Sherlyn) all worked really hard on the brochure designs and all, so all was good ^^
Now projects in university are more often than not a chore, but this was fairly exciting to me because how often would you even get to interact with Japanese kid? I think it's pretty easy to meet a Japanese adult these days (I've a Japanese exchange student as a project group member for a linguistics mod now), but a young child? Not so much.
So when the children arrived and sat down in their rows in front of us, I found it really hard to contain my excitement (such that my groupmates were telling me to chill and calm my "pedophile" emotions). Just less than an hour before that as I sped to school in a cab, I was searching up on conversation topics, useful vocabulary etc. on my phone. 浜崎先生 had also sent the names of the children assigned to each group, so I was committing them to memory (HAHA is this a bit extreme?). We were supposed to have five students, but one of the 6th graders was absent. Our lovely 6th graders were Kawabata Jun, Kasahara Kairi, Adachi Haru and Shiozawa Kotone (and I'm typing all these out from memory!)
Everyone (both my groupmates and the children) seemed a little shy and awkward, but I was suppressing all the excitement from earlier on I kinda just burst out with a happy 「おはよう！」Good morning! when we met them. We introduced ourselves and started on the tour. Our itinerary included The Deck, YIH, RVRC Hall and lastly Utown before having lunch there.
Along the way at the first part, the children were a little shy but politely answered our questions, like what their favourite subject is, what they would usually do after school etc. They became more open when talking about their interests.
In fact when while waiting for drinks at YIH's Gongcha (our treat for the children!), I learnt a couple of new things from Jun. He was telling me about this game called シーマン Seaman that he found interesting and wanted to try on his PS2 (he has a PS2!and here I thought kids these days don't appreciate the old stuff anymore). I searched it up on my phone and all of us watched a video on it. Basically it's an old game where you interact with this fish that has a human face, looking something like this:
http://livedoor.4.blogimg.jp/jin115/imgs/a/9/a9b65e25.jpg
HAHA I can imagine your incredulous expression now, because that was me when I hit the search button after typing out the name in katakana as per Jun's instruction. Haru and Kotone took a look and were all 「気持ち悪いよ！」kimochi warui yo! (That's so creepy!) Yup totally agree with you girls. After a while I thought it was kinda cute, and that's when Jun taught me a new phrase 「きもかわ」kimo-kawa ＝「気持悪い」kimochi warui ＋「かわいい」kawaii.
At UTown Green. From left: Vivian, Jun, Kairi, Kotone, Haru, yours truly, Sherlyn and Hanxi.
The 6th graders were given a worksheet with interview questions for us, so during lunch Haru (who insisted that I sit with her for lunch) asked me questions like why I was interested in learning Japanese, which part of Japanese culture is my favourite etc. When she asked what was my favourite Japanese character, of course I said Totoro and Naruto - to which one of the boys from the other group reacted with interest.
Gathering back at Central Forum. From left: Sherlyn, Hanxi, Kairi, Jun, yours truly, Haru, Kotone and Vivian.
After we gathered back at Central Forum at 1pm, we took a last picture with our kids. Jun commented that the time we spent was too short. Yes I feel that way too, Jun :( Haru was the most attached among the children, so she kept playing around with us. Before she left she exchanged LINE contacts with us :') (Guys I've a 6th grader as a friend!!!)
Hanxi, Vivian, Weiling (who was in another group) and I went to chill in the JSS club room after it was over since we were going to attend a language workshop by Waseda University students later. It was kinda tiring after frolicking around with the children, so I just lazed around on the couches in the room:
And that was when Weiling who snapped this shot commented how Vivian's my kagebunshin (shadow clone - Naruto's jutsu). I thought it was pretty cool so after the Waseda workshop we just had to take a picture together HAHA
Twinning wtih Vivian!
I really really enjoyed interacting with the 6th graders yesterday. They were so full of energy yet they were also polite! It heartened me to see how many things associated with childhood innocence don't really change that much even with different generations. I had this mindset that kids these days are growing up too fast - that is, gravitating towards more adult-like pleasures like make-up and brands too quickly.
That's probably more reflective of Singaporean or more westernised kids, maybe, but then again it all depends on upbringing. The Primary 5 children I used to teach in Sunday School would be talking to me about the expensive clothing brands that I'd only briefly heard of, or critique how I should wear more trendy, colourful clothing (because I only wear basics in the same few colours). But watching the 6th graders run unrestrained on the field playing an old game of catch instead of using smartphones, or talking about weird old PS2 games really made me happy somehow, as if transported to my very own distant childhood memory myself.
