Usagi Humiliation and other stories...

So after my winging and huffing about having to go into school on Sunday for Sports Day I actually had a great time! It was a relatively cloudy day (although I still managed to got burnt!!!) and the kids were all totally pumped and beaming at the prospect of cheering, running, and partaking in a bit of gladiator style ultra-violence. (ie those weird pole games and shoulder wrestling. How I love the disregard for safety in this country!) Even though the temptation to sit on my arse and doze off was strong i actually made myself mill around chatting and cheering with the students an even partook in the super competative parent teacher tug of war...then came the teachers event which I could have escaped doing but foolishly didn't.
The point of this game seemed to be to make the teachers look as ridiculous as possible. We had to don weird wigs/masks (from the 100yen of course)and I ended up wearing a spangly pair of rabbit ears which had all the ichi-nenseis cooing "kawaii" at me even more than usual. Anyway I had to be partners with the office scebe (perv) who has about 3 teeth and a permenant vacant grin. The game involved scrambling under a mesh net then running around a baseball bat 5 times so when we were good and dusty/nausious he had to catapult a ball from a see saw that I was somehow suppost to catch in a basket attached to my back. To say that I struggled with this is somewhat of an understatement. I could hear the commentator going "kyasarin sensei oshi!" and thinking it was was never anywhere near close! The other teams seemed to manage it in 5 or 6 goes... In the end the PE teacher took pity on me and threw it into the basket for me.
This is in front of the entire school their families. If only I was blessed with co-ordination.
Anyway that night at the enkai (which I also contemplated skipping but actually ended up getting wasted at and singing smap into the early hours at karaoke) I was totally ripped the piss out of by a lot of my co-workers and the students parents...this actually made me aware that a)they feel comfertable enough to rib me and b) that my japanese has vastly improved if I can understand when I'm being made fun of! I remember at last years event being a total wide eyed bystander and being totally lost in the japanese at the enkai...I've come a long way, baby:)