So I had my last classes with the third-years and the teacher had me give a short impromptu speech, in English, at the end of each of the three classes, which was basically something like "I was only here for six months, but it was fun teaching you, and good luck in the future." And she had arranged for one of the students to say a couple words for me on behalf of the class, in Japanese, except for the class with the American-born girl, who used English. I got a little poster with messages from all the students from that class too.
Then I had my last classes at the elementary school and the sixth graders had little notes with messages for me too. Unlike the middle school third-years who I won't see again though, I'll be seeing them again every day at the middle school now. They all had gotten their yearbooks that day too, so just before I left for the day a few of them came to the teacher's room to have the teachers sign them, so I got to sign a handful of them with a short message in English that they should be able to read in a year or two. Then, since I don't have a car and the school is outside of town, I took the bus back with some of them as I normally do, and I heard them chatting behind me saying "How do you say poop in English?" "Ask the teacher." So I turn around with an amused look on my face and they giggle and ask me, and I told them. I figure with so many of the middle schoolers already too shy to talk to me I better build up as much rapport as I can.
So the third-years at the middle school got their yearbooks a little later too, and there were a bunch that came to the teacher's room to get signatures, but no one asked me. :( Then, just as I was leaving for the day, the one girl who interacted the most with me, the student council president, caught me heading out the door and asked me to sign hers, so there was that at least.
Next came the middle school graduation. At all the assemblies we always sing the school song, so I had been trying to memorize it since I knew we'd be singing it at the graduation ceremony too and I figured that would be a good time to 'debut' it, and then what do they spring on me but that we're singing the town anthem, and the prefectural anthem, and the national anthem too, but oh well, I managed to get one of the four down. (By the way, I found out that the town anthem is what plays every morning at 7am over the town loudspeakers, and our prefectural anthem is better than a lot of countries' national anthems.)
Aside from all the songs the ceremony was pretty much the same as in the US, and then all the teachers and other students lined up outside and we applauded them as they left. In the more southerly parts of Japan the cherry blossoms are out by this point in the year, but since we're up north, instead of falling cherry blossom petals in the background, we had falling snow.
Then that night was a party for the parents and teachers, arranged by the PTA. I wondered how willing the parents would be to try to talk to me, and it was only towards the end of the night after they had drunk enough that some of them called me over and we talked a little ("How old are you?" "What does ALT stand for?" (it's Assistant Language Teacher) and in English, talking about themselves, "Crazy parents!") The mother of the student council president mentioned above also took a selfie with me. We also played a quiz game with a few prizes during the dinner, so it's not like I was just sitting at the table silently the whole time.
Then the elementary school graduation was a few days later. The ceremony was similar to the middle school one in that there was a lot of singing, by the audience (the anthems), the graduates (to the parents and remaining students), and the remaining students (to the graduates), but the diploma presentation was a little different. After getting up on the stage, each kid immediately stops, faces the audience, and says a little something about their future, like what they want to be when they grow up. Then they continue on to the center of the stage to get their diploma. Also, the song that plays during the diploma presentation is this:
Normally I wouldn't bother noting that, since how would I know if they play the same song at every elementary school or not, but the scene was exactly like a scene from the movie Battle Royale (which, if you're not familiar with it, is similar to The Hunger Games), so in that context it was actually kind of creepy for me. The other thing was that the graduating kids all wore their new middle school uniforms, and I realized just how much I relied on their fashion to help distinguish them.
So at the elementary school party that night I was greeted at the door by a woman who looked disturbingly like her daughter. I mean she looked EXACTLY the same. It was like those pictures you see of pet owners and their pets looking exactly the same. And it wasn't just her either, at least two of the other women there looked pretty much exactly like their daughters too.
So at the middle school there are dedicated English teachers, which means I have at least a couple people I can easily talk to at the parties, but since the elementary school teachers teach everything, none of them are experts in English, and really none of them have very good English at all, so I had no refuge to sit with. I teach the fifth and sixth graders every week though, so I have the most rapport with those teachers, so when I saw the fifth grade teacher I ended up sitting with him. The others sitting at the table were some of the fathers, and across from me was one old guy that I don't know what his relation to anything was. He ended up being the one most willing to talk with me at the start though, and I don't know if he was teasing me thinking I wouldn't understand or just got drunk early or what, but he went on with this story about "You know Trump? You know how he wants to build that wall? Well I was going to build a wall once. You know that mountain over there? Mount Chokai? That's my mountain. I own that whole mountain. And I didn't want to share it with anyone else. I didn't even want anyone to be able to look at it. So I was going to build a big wall all around it. But that mountain's so tall, right? So the wall would have to be so tall, and I didn't have the money for it. So I didn't build it." Later he was going on about something else I don't completely remember, something about how after kids grow up they're not grateful for everything their parents did for them when they were kids, and he didn't think that I was understanding what he was saying, so I repeated it back to him in simpler terms and he was all like "To think that a foreigner can explain it in Japanese like that even more simply than a Japanese person can!"
They had also given everyone a number when we came in, and it turned out to be for a prize drawing. They called out a few numbers, and then they just kept going, and then I realized they were actually going to end up calling everyone's number, so in the end mine got called too, so I ended up with some dish detergent. Then for the entertainment they had a plate spinner. This guy was pretty old so that made it extra impressive that he could do most of the stuff that he was doing.
I was talking a bit with a couple of the other guys sitting nearby too, and towards the end one of them was asking me about "nijikai" and I was trying to think how that would be written to figure out what it meant. 二時回 (two hour times)? 二時会 (two hour party)? Finally one of the other guys came out with the English word "afterparty" and then I finally remembered the word 二次会 (two next party). I had work the next day, no classes, I just had to be in the office, but it's always good to try to build rapport with the people in the community, so I agreed to go. And on the way out the door who stops me but the mother of the girl who asked me how to say "poop" on the bus. She apologized for her daughter, and then proceeded to ask me how you say "poop" in English...
Then we piled onto a bus that was waiting and it drove us through town somewhere until we got to some izakaya. I didn't know exactly where in town we were, but I figured they would make sure I got home somehow, or in the worst case it's a small town, and I'd probably be able to walk home from anywhere. So I sat with the dads and managed to have various conversations, a portion of which revolved around what my "type" is, such as asking me to choose between Rei and Asuka, and my knowledge of Japanese sex terms finally came in handy. (エス, エム, 巨乳, ぺったんこ. No, I'm not going to translate them!)
Later one of them noticed that the tail of my tie was backwards, so I demonstrated the unorthodox tie knot that I use. Later on they asked if I liked ramen and invited me out for ramen sometime and I exchanged LINE info with all of them. It was really late and I had to be in the office the next day, but I stayed until the end and someone DDed a bunch of us home. The next day I realized that I had lost my tie clip during the tie tying demonstrations, so I had to go back to the izakaya a couple days later and retrieve that. And a couple of the father's messaged me telling me not to forget about our ramen date. And that was the end of the graduation madness.
So then a few days later we had the closing ceremony and spring break started, and eventually we got the announcements of which teachers would be leaving and which new teachers would be coming. We lost our vice-principal who I really liked, one of the office workers, and a couple of the teachers I never really had much interaction with, although one had been here for seven years and I was under the impression that teachers later in their careers like that were more stable, except for maybe promotions to different schools, but I guess not. So then we had the going-away ceremony for them, which was the last time we got to see the old third-years, and then we had the going-away party the same night, and then the new teachers came. Even though no English teachers were transferred out, we got a new English teacher, so now we had one for each grade, but one of the English teachers is going out on maternity leave, so we got a temporary replacement for her as well. And then we had the welcome party for them, and then the welcome ceremony and opening ceremony the next day, with just the new second and third-years, and then the entrance ceremony for the new first-years the next day.
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