Alex Quinn's Japan Journal

4/16/2005, School party for teachers moving to other schools

In Japan, spring is the time when everything changes.  The weather changes quickly from nasty cold to pleasant warm spring weather.  The cherry trees blossom all at once and then the blossoms are gone in a couple weeks.  Many companies hire mainly in the spring.  So, if you want to enter the workforce, April is the time to do it.  And, school districts change around their staff in the spring.  They always move a few teachers from each school each year, partly to combat corruption.  (The idea is that there'll be more corruption if you have the same folks together year after year for decades.  Anyway, they always have a party to send off the departing teachers and welcome the new ones.  This year, we lost some teachers who had been at our school over 10 years.  Two of them were math teachers who I liked and talked to often.  I, too, was sorry to see them go.  The event was held at a Chinese restaurant in Himeji.  It was very well organized.  It was held in a banquet room with a very nice set menu.

Octapus, ham, green eggs, and other stuff.

Do you think this lobster is smiling?  We were talking about that at the table.

Spring rolls and other stuff.

People at my table.  The guy with his hand up is the principal of our school, Mr. Suei.

It struck me that dessert was much healthier than dinner.  Dinner included lots of deep fried food.  Dessert was fresh fruit.

There were also some pastries, but I didn't try them.

Nothing in particular.  But, this gives you the atmosphere of the party.

Mr. Togo was a math teacher and an avid cyclist.  He has travelled extensively in his life, especially for long bicycle trips all over the world and within Japan.  He gave me travel advice on countless occasions and was very helpful.

Mr. Nishimura was a math teacher, too.  He was also our school computer system administrator.  He frequently helped me get connected to the resources within the school to do things I needed or wanted to do.  Besides that, I enjoyed talking to him frequently.

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