My First Paid Dance Gig in Japan

Matt and I attended a Halloween-themed English production on Sunday night. We proudly donned our costumes again and headed out in quite a lot of rain for a three-hour show (yes, THREE HOURS). A mom of one of Matt's students runs a juku (cram school), and asked me to choreograph a little dance for three girls as part of the show. They wanted to do "Chinese Tea Dance" from The Nutcracker, and I was happy to oblige with a little Western-influenced ballet. The girls are amazing, as you can see from the video. I set the dance in one rehearsal of less than an hour, and practiced it with them only one other time for about a half-hour. What I wouldn't give to be this talented! Check out the video, linked via youtube:

Our new ALT friend Tony, who actually taught at both of our schools last year, came and participated as well. He played Sherlock Holmes in one skit:

Tony also created "animal charades" where teams of one parent and one child stood up and the parent acted out animals while the child had to try to guess. One point for Japanese, two for English! Matt and I became Vanna Whites and kept score. It was ridiculous to see all the parents jumping around and the little kids trying to guess! The most difficult? Zebra. I mean, how does one charade the concept of stripes? The best part of this section: in the program, it was unfortunately titled "Let's Play with Tony."

We also participated in "Quiz Time," where we had to make up a question about ourselves for everyone to guess. People held up A, B, and C from the stage and we dutifully trotted ourselves out like show ponies and made up pertinent questions. We announced the winners of the costume competition: a Japanese umbrella, a home-made skeleton (with glo-in-the-dark tape), a cute little trash-bag wearing witch, and a delightful pirate. For the "final humiliation," as Tony dubbed it, we were presented on stage for the remaining dregs of parents and students and asked about our experiences with the production.

After all of this, though, the woman gave us a small envelope with some money for our time. It was very sweet. She hadn't originally budgeted for us, but she managed to pay us anyway. It took us completely by surprise. So I guess this is my first paid dance gig in Japan!

We walked home in more rain and proceeded to make a late dinner. This isn't important at all, it's just funny. I had extremely frozen fish and I pried it apart, sending one piece across the kitchen. I think it wanted to go back to the sea. With my fancy hair and pj's, this was a very strange scene. It was delicious though, especially after all that English.