Some recurring storylines in Rising Daughters™ are school-related events involving our kids such as the annual Sports Day held by elementary schools. I also have a habit of mentioning elections and democracy because I am "a fan." Elections help to mark the temper of the times.
Here's another blogpost along those lines.
Sports Day: the end of an era for the Rising Family™
Naomi and I have a love/hate relationship with sports days. We love the opportunity to see our daughters energized and interacting in their school environment. Watching them compete in their individual events, collaborate in team events, and to observe them in their learning space where they are developing as people is always a treat. Still, we hate the early-morning line-ups and jostling for a position to get an unobstructed view of the kids in action. The competition among parents for a decent picnic spot in the school grounds is Darwinian. Naomi always created a lunch box feast which took plenty of time to prepare in the early morning. The videos and photos we took over the years, and the memories made, marked the kids' development during their formative years.
Marina is growing up and nearing the end of primary school. This became clear to us after seeing her perform splendidly at her last Sports Day extravaganza in late May. It was a shorter, scaled-down version of the day-long fiestas of yore. Lingering Covid pandemic restrictions on large groups created a staggered event wherein different grades grouped together to limit crowd size. But the symbolism of the athletics was unchanged. The thinking being that physical exertion and sports build character, and a sound body nurtures a sound mind. Marina was smiling and goofing off with her school friends for three hours in the sun. Her sprint relay team won in the combined sprint category.
It was our last time to attend Sports Day. Other parents we chatted with laughed when they told us that after six or more years of attending the day-long "traditional" sports days, the shorter version was perhaps the only social benefit of Covid. No lunch, sun tents, sunscreen or patience were necessary. As veterans of the day-long events in the past, we also welcomed the compressed time. Yet, it being our last time, there were mixed emotions: pleasant blue skies yet the air tasted bittersweet. Daughter #2 is definitely a pre-teen.
Election season ends sadly
In July, the election campaign sound trucks started plying the streets, rapidly repeating candidate names through loudspeakers and blaring their platform messages. The election billboards went up in my neighborhood, with aspiring politicians' photos and party affiliations vying for attention.
This was for the July 10 election involving half the members of the upper house of the Diet vying for a term of six years. It was great to see many women candidates, some wild-looking posters, and wacky characters standing for election even for the stolid upper house. I was interested to see how Japanese people would vote and what choices they would make for society.
Things took a horrible turn with the assassination of former PM Shinzo Abe on July 8. It carries a deep meaning that the election went forward as planned despite that despicable act of bloodshed and cowardice that shocked Japan and the world.
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| Courtesy of Time USA LLC |
I was taken aback, too. "Politically-inspired violence strikes even in safe and stable Japan?," I thought. It was a dispiriting realization. Nowhere is immune to it.
I made a point of raising this politically motivated murder with Lady E. and M. I wanted to hear their thoughts, to see what they heard at school. Not much was said at their schools, except for expressions of sorrow, but we discussed it anyway at home. It's necessary and character-building for them to learn about the occasional evil that lurks in the world.
