long time no blog :-(

hi everyone, thanks for all the comments! sorry, but i accidentally threw away the menus for that last week's posting!

KYUUSHOKU is taking a bit of a break while i pursue making more music in tokyo! but i would still like to post articles about wonderful japanese school lunches.

please feel free to share these pictures and stories, it has been a whopper of a time experiencing japanese public school lunches. more to come, i still actually have a lot of photos i never posted..........

it's official

Hello there friends. I had quite an exciting week in kyushoku land--on Monday one of my schools was chosen as the site of an English workshop for an entire ward of Tokyo. So that meant one of my music-filled English classes was on display for about 100 Japanese and foreign teachers and a panel from the Japanese Board of Education. Imagine my heartburn. The class itself went pretty well, I didn't scream at or throttle any of the children. Victory! The "workshop" afterward was more harrowing, basically all the teachers and experts then dissected my class and teaching style. All the while I had to sit at the front table next to all the Bigwig Public School Directors and I even had a little name card and had to make an impromptu speech ENTIRELY IN JAPANESE. It's kind of funny how that happened, because I a) have no experience teaching in Japan and b) cannot give formal speeches in Japanese. Somehow we all got through it, and as a reward I got a very nice kyuushoku (see Monday). Boiled gyoza with a nice daikon radish salad!

Since I'm very tired now, I'll spare the details and just post photos. That's what we all want to see anyway, right?

Monday:


Tuesday:


Wednesday:


Thursday:

fried wonders!

Below you see the kids made me a fancy sign yesterday to go with my delicious lunch. "Youkoso" (ようこそ) means "welcome." Aww shucks. Actually the table I sat at was a group of sophisticated girls who needed to know every breathless detail about my love life. In contrast, today a different class spent the entire lunch period showing me all the weird/gross shit they could do, mostly bending their fingers all crazy-like and flipping back their eyelids. I have to say both groups were equally charming.

As for the food, it was a delicious week: Fried fish! Fried noodles and fried egg! Fried croquettes! Fried anything is so undeniably good. And in Japan it's done nice and light, not oily or anything.


[clockwise from rice]

- rice (gohan ごはん)
- potato stew (jagaimo no nimono じゃがいもの煮物)
- fried fish (tatsutaage たつたあげ)
- milk (gyuunuu 牛乳)
- miso soup (miso shiru 味噌汁)
__

[clockwise from noodles]

- fried noodles (yakisoba 焼きそば)
- apple (ringo りんご)
- fried egg (tamagoyaki たまご焼き)
- milk (gyuunuu 牛乳)
- seaweed soup (wakame sūpu わかめ スープ)
__

[clockwise from rice]

- rice (gohan ごはん)
- milk (gyuunuu 牛乳)
- sauteed cabbage (kyabetsu sotē キャベツソテー )
- croquette (bīnzu korokke ビーンズコロッケ )
- egg drop soup (tamago sūpu 卵スープ)

school assembly magic

For some reason I was made to perform for the school assembly today. The principal just kind of told me when I showed up in the morning. I think they must have run out of assembly ideas. So to spite them I played some real crazy free improv, like hitting the keys with my elbows and screaming into the strings of the piano, etc. Nice! I wish I could have gotten a video of that. Needless to say I got absolutely zero reaction from the teachers and children afterward. Let's see if I get fired. Well, at least the food was good...


[clockwise from the toast]

- almond toast (āmondo tōsuto アーモンドトースト)
- milk (gyuunuu 牛乳)
- corn salad (kōn iri sarada コーン入りサラダ)
- pork 'n beans (pōku bīnzu ポークビーンズ)
__

[clockwise from rice]

- rice (gohan ごはん)
- orange (mikan みかん)
- tofu hamburg (tofu hanbāgu 豆腐ハンバーグ)
- boiled butter potatoes (jagaimo no batāniじゃがいものバター煮)
- milk (gyuunuu 牛乳)
- miso soup (miso shiru 味噌汁)

Q-shoku reading

For any kyuushoku fans wondering what kyuushoku is exactly (not just the food but the cultural issues surrounding it) -- here is a great article I found in the Japan Times by Roger Pulvers. It gives probably the best description of kyuushoku I've found to date, as well as a passionate and enthusiastic defense.

In fact, the Japan Times carried a few other great articles as well, a basic Q&A, as well as a fascinating one by Alice Gordenker. Here's just a small sample of what she had to say regarding the pedagogical aspects of kyuushoku:

This meal is the basis for lunchtime instruction, which is why Japanese educators sometimes speak of school lunch as "a living textbook." The teacher stays with the class and eats the same lunch, talking to the children about nutrition, good eating habits and the foods in that day's meal. The lunchtime lesson is called kyushoku shido and is part of the school curriculum.

Although that's the ideal, I've found the wholesome lessons of school lunch vary by teacher and by grade (younger ones tend to get more instruction in this regard). But all and all, something worth considering!

sexy body

It just doesn't get better than that. A fat, bespectacled little 9 year old boy standing on his desk next to mine, pulling off his shirt (that lands in my soup), rubbing his belly asking me "sexy body?!!" Only, it sounds like "se-ku-shee boo-dee?" The perfect lunch time entertainment.

How do you answer that question anyway? If you say yes, you're obviously a creepy pervert, but no just lowers this poor fat boy's self-esteem further.

Such kōans you'll find only here on kyuushoku.blogspot.com. According to Wikipedia, "English-speaking non-Zen practitioners sometimes use kōan to refer to an unanswerable question or a meaningless statement. However, in Zen practice, a kōan is not meaningless, and teachers often do expect students to present an appropriate response when asked about a kōan."

Suggestions?

In the meantime, please vicariously enjoy this food I had today. It was PTA day so they made it extra nutritious and Japanese to impress the parents, I think. It was tasty.

[clockwise from rice]

- rice (gohan ご飯)
- miso soup (sumashi jiru すまし汁)
- milk (gyuunuu 牛乳)
- grilled mackerel & japanese vegetables (saba no misodarekake さばのみそだれかけ)


And yesterday's:

[clockwise from stew]

- "autumn" stew (aki no shichū 秋のシチュー)
- milk (gyuunuu 牛乳)
- seaweed salad (kaisou iri sarada 海草 入りサラダ)
- wheat germ toast (haiga tōsuto 胚芽トースト)

slacker

Hey there, fancy kyuushoku fans! Sorry, I've been real busy and haven't been able to upload new photos. So here are SEVEN new lunches. Unfortunately this month the schools have slacked off and not given me a copy of the menus, therefore the photos are unlabeled. If you are dying to know what something is, just ask ;-)

I'll spare you the witty commentary for now, things have been business as usual. I am still being asked very hilarious and strange and beautiful questions from children, such as "Have you seen a rocket," "Do you masturbate," "What's your favorite shape," "Do you like the Tokyo Tower," "What sort of thing makes you feel good," "How much can you eat," "What do you look for in women," and it's opposite, "Are you divorced" . . . I'm also compiling a list of awkward English words on t-shirts, it seems the younger the child, the more nonsensical the English. Then again, living here is certainly deteriorating my Engrish ;-(

As for the delicious school lunch, here goes: