Elementary School Visit One part of my job is to help run workshops at Japanese elementary schools, where we teach about different cultures. Last week was my first time participating and I wasn't sure exactly what to expect, but it was a lot of fun! There were about 100 3rd and 4th graders that gathered in the school gym for the workshop to listen to several presentations and participate in group activities and games. All the Hippo members running the workshop wore different types of traditional dress from around the world and taught the kids words in different languages. I always thought that Japanese children were really shy compared to American kids, which was true for most of the Japanese kids I had met when they were with their parents, but it turns out that as a group they are not shy at all! I realized this when I found myself at one point surrounded by lots of little voices saying “Su-chan!” (my Japanese nickname) as I was being physically pushed backward by a crowd

Kawagoe Multicultural Festival This last weekend I attended a festival in Kawagoe with the members of the Hippo family club from that area. Together we marched in a parade and performed several songs that we had been practicing, one from Korea and one from Mexico.  I played guitar along with a few other members and everyone sang. It was fun! The Kawagoe Hippo club At the festival there were lots of different groups performing and people dressed in different traditional costumes from around the world. For the parade, my Hippo fellow asked me to wear a traditional American costume, which is hard because the U.S. doesn't really have it's own national traditional dress like a lot of other countries do. What's the U.S. equivalent of a kimono? The thing about the U.S. is it's big and comprised of people from a lot of different cultures and it doesn't have a very long history as a country comparatively. So when people ask me what traditional American dr