On Saturday, we attended a traditional Japanese drama performance in the style known as "Bunraku" at the Japanese National Theater with the 8th grade students. It involves puppets, "singer story tellers", and Japanese shamisen players.
We met outside the theater and some of the students had forgotten their tickets which upset some of the teachers. Luckily, we were all able to make it inside.
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I sat down next to some 8th grade girls and they got nervous as they thought they would have to speak English suddenly. I tried to let them know it was okay and that there was no pressure. They ended up trying very hard to communicate with me in only English so I was quite proud of them. Everyone was handed out headphones and recorders as Bunraku is preformed in old Japanese so it is very hard to understand. (To me it is like Shakespeare English to today's English) The headphones were worn during the performance and there is a recording telling the story and explanations about things in Japanese.
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There were two performances and one explanation give by the theater members. The performances were quite long but each was very interesting. The first performance showed puppets dancing while having a sword fight. There were 4 people singing the old Japanese story and at least five playing the shamisen. The singers sing in a very particular way that is unique to Japanese drama and it is very rough on the singers as they have to make a very loud sound and for long periods of time they must preform. They always ended up getting extremely sweaty by the time they finished. The second performance was a famous story about the 3 day Shogun. Since the recordings were in Japanese, I tried to listen but the Japanese in the recording was quite formal and advanced vocabulary so it was quite difficult for me to understand exactly what was happening. Sadly, I could not take any pictures there.
Afterwards we ate lunch on the second floor of the theater building provided by the staff there. Some of the teachers laughed as they though the lunch as made especially for the kids as it had things like tempura, hamburger, spaghetti, fried chicken, omelet, and rice.
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Afterwards, I some of the the teachers took us out before we would leave the school soon. We ended up taking a boat to Asakusa and it was very beautiful! Afterwards we visited Senso-ji Temple and drew our fortunes. Then we visited the oldest theme park in Tokyo which had very old carnival type rides and "retro" decorations. It was really unexpected but also quite fun to do something with the teachers.
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We met outside the theater and some of the students had forgotten their tickets which upset some of the teachers. Luckily, we were all able to make it inside.
I sat down next to some 8th grade girls and they got nervous as they thought they would have to speak English suddenly. I tried to let them know it was okay and that there was no pressure. They ended up trying very hard to communicate with me in only English so I was quite proud of them. Everyone was handed out headphones and recorders as Bunraku is preformed in old Japanese so it is very hard to understand. (To me it is like Shakespeare English to today's English) The headphones were worn during the performance and there is a recording telling the story and explanations about things in Japanese.
There were two performances and one explanation give by the theater members. The performances were quite long but each was very interesting. The first performance showed puppets dancing while having a sword fight. There were 4 people singing the old Japanese story and at least five playing the shamisen. The singers sing in a very particular way that is unique to Japanese drama and it is very rough on the singers as they have to make a very loud sound and for long periods of time they must preform. They always ended up getting extremely sweaty by the time they finished. The second performance was a famous story about the 3 day Shogun. Since the recordings were in Japanese, I tried to listen but the Japanese in the recording was quite formal and advanced vocabulary so it was quite difficult for me to understand exactly what was happening. Sadly, I could not take any pictures there.
Afterwards we ate lunch on the second floor of the theater building provided by the staff there. Some of the teachers laughed as they though the lunch as made especially for the kids as it had things like tempura, hamburger, spaghetti, fried chicken, omelet, and rice.
Afterwards, I some of the the teachers took us out before we would leave the school soon. We ended up taking a boat to Asakusa and it was very beautiful! Afterwards we visited Senso-ji Temple and drew our fortunes. Then we visited the oldest theme park in Tokyo which had very old carnival type rides and "retro" decorations. It was really unexpected but also quite fun to do something with the teachers.
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