Today I had my second visit of the year to Yogo Gakko - the school for mentally handicapped children. When I was there back in September I joined the elementary classes, but this time I was to visit the senior high section. I was told not to bother preparing anything for them but as I left the house in the morning I grabbed a santa hat that mum had posted out to me. When I arrived, I was greeted by one of the teachers who spoke very limited English but was very warm and welcoming. There were four teachers in the class with the students and all of them were bounding around with smiles on their faces. The kids were all smiling and got very excited when I walked into the classroom. From what I was told and what I could see, the stuents were aged between 15 and 18 years old with varying degrees of disability.
I kept my introduction as short and as animated as I could manage, and they all stared up at me with curious expressions and politely listened to the translations from the teacher. I then moved on to talking about Christmas and plonked the hat on my head. The whole room filled with laughter, cheering and clapping as they showed their enthusiasm. I was so pleased I'd brough it with me! After I spoke about Christmas, those that were able raised their hands and waited their turn to ask me a question (in Japanese, which was then translated) about turkey, santa and the reindeer. I even sang Rudolph the Red Nose Reindeer for them! I then passed the hat around the room for them to try on and for their teachers to take pictures of them. As with the elementary children, each student has their own personal photo album and so they were all extra keen to be snapped wearing the red santa hat.
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