We created “American style” homemade school lunches with the students.
I think it’s so funny that even though WE are the foreigners, the usual dialogue from Japanese teachers is, “Isn’t Japan so interesting? Don’t you have a hard time eating our food? Aren’t our customs so peculiar?” They want to hear us say things like that. It’s how they see themselves. Funny because it’s their country and I would think it might be the other way around.
So today we turned the tables. We surprised them with shocking, REAL American culture. Everyone made their own bag lunch and then we ate sandwiches together and talked about it. Almost everything was new to the students (including making a meal for themselves, which mom usually handles). The students were surprised by our many strange customs, but they had fun!! We ate:
- peanut butter and jelly sandwich
- raw carrot sticks
- celery and peanut butter
- original Lays potato chips
- one apple each, without cutting it into slices
- a health bar
- two Oreo cookies
- a juice box
- and we packed it all into a paper bag
Our students are pretty bad at discussions this year but some topics might include:
- What does this meal have in common with your usual bento?
- What do you think of the health balance of this meal?
- How many calories are in this lunch? (advanced math and research required
- What do you think of the bags?
- How ould you create an American-style bento?
- How ould you pack a Japanese-style bag lunch?