長崎Nagasaki vs. 福岡Fukuoka

I was lucky enough to score a ticket to the game, but Fukuoka can't seem to score much at all...
I'm amused by the song they're using - sounds just like "Dinah (won't you blow your horn?)"

solar eclipse

Though weather conditions were not ideal, we still got glimpses of the celestial event the other day.

a little sideways...

(not as in the movie!)

For some reason, my keitai (phone) is now saving my photos in a way that doesn't let me edit/rotate them. I have no idea why this was saved sideways, but, oh, well!

This is from the baseball game the other day. Unfortunately, our team lost, but we all were quite impressed with the solar eclipse that coincided with the game. It made things a bit cooler in the stadium. :) On the way to the stadium, I was teaching kids the "Take me out to the ball game" song, but we didn't have a chance to use it during the game, since they had so many other cheers! These kids do an aMAZing job of cheering for each other! Every time our team was up, so was the entire school - on their feet, doing some kind of cheer. It was pretty exhausting, but so much fun!

...out of the mouths of babes...

I'm cleaning out my desk, and just found one of my notes about a recent student assignment where students described their favorite teacher (I was the example, so they couldn't choose me :) ). When I was checking their "scripts" these two gems cracked me up!

"He is around face."

"He has short hear."

Hmmm...sound like anyone you know? ;)

Play Ball!

Wow! Our baseball team is playing in a championship game in Nagasaki, and the whole school is here to cheer them on!

Momonoke-ki

On the way back from our trip to the beach, we stopped for this delicious snack at a lovely cafe in Obaama. Can you guess what this is?

...and forget festival food, we found coconut-curry flavored Doritos at the drugstore on the way to the fireworks festival. Yum!

...and fireworks!

Yea! Found the beach!

Afro Girl

(I'd be interested to see what these"Afro" people would do with someone if they walked in and asked for an afro!) I'm just admiring the sights along the very long and windy Shimabara road. Allegedly there's a beach at the end of this (^O^)/

Hooray for ice cream!

Yesterday I corrupted my students by teaching them how to make banana splits...but my ice cream maker didn't work! We ended up using store-bought stuff instead. No dramas. BUT, since my machine worked today, we made Oreo cookie ice cream on the verandah during lunch time! Yay! You can see that it was just torture for my little cuties...

take 2...

It still needs a little more work, but I couldn't finish until bits were dry (and at 10:30 last night, I was too tired to wait for it to be!). Painting like this is so different from what I've done before in the U.S. I love the way the fude (brush) feels as it gently coaxes watery images out of the paper.

Tanabata

The Star Festival (Tanabata) is July 7. This bamboo branch was out in front of my market. Children write wishes on colorful strips of paper and tie them on the branches.

Painting Fujisan

If my history is correct, cavemen believed that if they painted their prey, they'd be able to catch it. Capturing it in a painting meant conquering it in real life. (OR - I could be making all that up, since it's SO HOT my brain is evaporating!)
Anyway - maybe painting Mt. Fuji will help me conquer IT. Here's my first attempt.

Happy 6th!

Hope you all had a great 4th of July weekend!

Oura Catholic Church

I may have posted a photo of this before, but I found this church again on my walk around Nagasaki the other day. I'd looked forward to going to Mass there, but I don't think they do that any more....

Something that this church makes me think about is how lucky I am to have the freedom to practice my Catholic religion. It's hard to believe that here, right here, in Nagasaki, 26 people were brutally murdered - actually crucified - because of their faith. Catholics had to go underground for a long time, and I think it's amazing that they survived at all. Some were banished to the islands (the very ones I was going to go to last weekend), and I've seen how these Christians cleverly disguised their Catholic symbols in the Shinto and Bhuddist imagery, as a matter of survival. When the Nagasaki Foreign Settlement was established in the mid-1800s, the foreigners brought their faith with them, and though the ban on Christianity still existed, the Japanese government apparently couldn't prevent the newcomers from building churches in the settlement. The road still wasn't easy for Japanese Christians (their religion being outlawed and all!) - but it seems like this church was a beacon of hope for the people.

It is the oldest wooden church in Japan, and I think it is the only artifact of Western origin that has been designated a Japanese National Treasure.

Link to more information about Oura Catholic Church

Movie of Oura Cathedral

Website for the 26 Martyrs