Exploring Japan - Haikus and Origami

What a fun two weeks in Japan! Kon nichi wa! Lots of art.

We learned about haikus (which is so fitting, since April is poetry month)

and made our own adding a watercolor picture to go with it.

This is Hannah's.

IRIS

perfect and purple

pretty, sweet, nice, kind, clueless

of yellow's secret

We also learned about origami and Hannah made these swans

and some lily pads, among other things.

This is a challenging art, because the instructions

can be hard to understand.

We enjoyed alot of good books. Many of them by Allen Say

were true stories of his family in Japan.

We also liked the Cuckoo's Haiku.

In case you didn't know, a haiku is only 3 lines.

The first line must have 5 syllables,

the second line 7,

and the third line 5.

One interesting tidbit we learned was that in Japan people will rent a dog for a day or weekend, whereas here most people will pay you to keep their dog for a day or a weekend. Not alot of people own a dog in Japan. We heard of a movie we want to watch sometime, called Hachiko. It is a story of a very faithful dog. He is famous in Japan and there is actually a monument in honor of him.

. . .

We finished our week by going to visit the North American Mission Board, which Josiah lovingly calls the "Mission Station". They showed us a video and talked to us about what they do. We learned about Annie Armstrong and the history of the NAMB. We had a lunch and then they took us on a walk around the pond, then they gave us each a goodie bag.

. . .

But that's not all. For supper, we went to Sho-Gun Japanese restaurant. The kids loved the show, and the food. I loved the atmosphere - the music (instrumental Christian tunes) and the sign at the door from Proverbs. Theron loved the steak and chicken.