Lunch at Junior High

Wouldn:t you think that lunch with Junior High School students would be a horror? Judging from American Junior High Schools, yes. I was told before my Junior high School visit I would plan to eat with them - would it be a huge cafeteria, roaring with noise, kids running around like they:d never been let loose, long lines and just a short 20 minutes of time to eat, like in the States? Iie! Chigau! no way! In this Junior High of about 500 students, the students eat in their classrooms. Each room receives the appropriate amount of food and the STUDENTS dish it out FOR EACH OTHER. We ate a VEGETARIAN, healthy lunch of miso soup w/ seaweed, fried tofu w/ a sauce, rice, vegetables and milk to drink. And it was so filling I couldn:t even finish all the rice. Before anyone even touched their food, they waited for everyone to be served and sit down. Then one student stood up and led the class to clap our hands and say itadakimas or let:s give thanks and eat! Then the chopsticks got cracking. The intercom came on and played J-pop tunes over the entire 45 minute lunch period. The students seemed to really enjoy it. They were happy but calm while we ate and talked about Japanese cartoons, anime. After lunch, a student led us all in another hand clap and we chanted together gochisosamadeshita or thank you for the food it was delicious. And then the students cleaned up after themselves. Clean plastic plates, metal rice containers, food scraps, paper and plastic wrappers all separated. All the students bring their own cloth napkins and plastic or wooden chopsticks so there is minimal waste and minimal cleanup. After lunch, all the students disperse into stations where they sweep, dust, wipe down, polish and cleap up the ENTIRE school. In Japanese schools the job of janitor doesn:t exist because the students work together to keep their school lovely. Refreshing, isn:t it?