Kai’s Birthday Party at School and Hinamatsuri (Girl’s Day)
 Video – The class sings a Japanese Happy Birthday song to the March birthday kids (with a little English thrown in – you’ll hear “happy” in there (Happy Tanjoobi)
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Click the picture for a very cute video of Kai’s classmates singing a Japanese Happy Birthday song. One of the cool things about Japanese is that it has onomatopoeic words for feelings, not just sounds (like “bang!” in English). The kids sing “uki uki” which is for feeling excited.
 The dolls Kai made at school for Hina-matsuri (Girl’s Day and Doll Festival). The dolls represent attendants in the Emperor’s Court from the Heian Period.
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 The birthday party at Kai’s school for all the kids with March Birthdays (Kai is on the far right). The musical notes behind them read O-tanjoobi Omedetoo (Happy Birthday, with an honorific “O”)
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 That’s me presenting Kai’s dinosaur to the class. I had to explain why it was special to Kai, in Japanese (which is why I’m reading it!).
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Kai’s birthday is in March, and yesterday at his school they had a party for all the kids in the class with March birthdays, and to celebrate Hinamatsuri (Girl’s Day, aka Doll Festival). As you can see in the pictures, the birthday kids had to stand on stage. It started with one of the teachers pretending to hold a microphone and asking each of them about their favorite food. Kai’s teacher prepped him beforehand, and he knows the Japanese word for rice – gohan – so he answered with that.
Then they each had one of their parents join them on stage, to present the child’s “treasure.” Kai had me bring a toy dinosaur (it was sent to him in Japan by my father and step-mother, and Kai and I painted it together). The night before Maria helped me write up what I would say in Japanese, as it was too complicated for me to get through it without notes. I think everyone understood me, as I definitely got a reaction out of the kids with “issho ni kazarimashita” (we decorated together – for the folks in my Japanese class, I’ve put my entire, 30 second presentation below – I wimped out and wrote it in Romaji).
After that the kids sang a very cute Japanese happy birthday song, then they did a big circle dance, and we finished up with sakura mochi, a traditioinal Girl’s Day snack.
My Presentation of Kai’s Dinosaur:
Kono kyooryuu wa Kai ni daiji na mono desu.
This dinosaur is Kai’s treasure.Daiji to wa naze wa mitsu no riyuu ga arimasu.
There are three important reasons why.Hitotsu: Kai wa kyooryuu suki na no desu
First: Kai likes dinosaurs (dinosaurs are Kai’s favorite)
[I don't fully understand the role of "no" here, even after Maria explained it to me...]Futatsu: kono kyooryuu wa papa to issho ni kazarimashita
Second: he decorated this dinosaur together with his fatherMitsu: kyooryuu moderu wa America kara ojii-chan to obaa-san ga okutta mono desu
Third: the dinosaur model was sent from America by his grandfather and grandmother
[okutta is an adjective form of the verb okuru (to send) - it's outside my experience but a good explanation is here, under the "hard to understand" heading]
Ijo desu!
That’s it!
