Graduation

Today I attended Naruto Technical High School’s graduation ceremony. It was very similar to graduations in the US with a few exceptions.

Attendants and dress: The teachers, current students, family, and the mayor attended. The students wore their uniforms, and everyone else who attended wore black suits except for about three mothers and one male teacher who wore kimonos. I was shocked by how few family members were there. It looked as though there was no more than one guest per graduate!

Shoes; Everyone had to change their shoes before entering the gymnasium, which meant that I had to change from my indoor shoes to guest slippers or gym shoes. There was a special cover over the gym floor, so I didn’t really understand why we were changing our shoes. All the teachers and I wear our indoor shoes outside at that school because the hallways are outside, so it never really seems to be about keeping floors clean. Anyways, the graduates had special green slippers that are only used on graduation day and the guests were given guest slippers. So here were all these men and women changing out of their dressy shoes and into slippers at the entrance of the gym. Many of the teachers changed into gym shoes. I usually find dressy shoes very uncomfortable, so I like the idea of changing out of them, but I’m still baffled as to why people were even wearing dressy shoes in the first place if they knew they weren’t going to be wearing them for the actual ceremony for which they dressed up.

Ceremony: All of the English teachers were off attending to something, so I really had no clue what was going on or what I was suppose to do. This is what I observed though. The graduates processed through the audience that was mainly made up of the current younger students, sat down, and the Principal began the diploma giving. The speeches came later. Lots and lots of ceremonial bowing took place throughout the ceremony. But when you think about it, bowing rather than handshaking makes the ceremony go a lot faster because it cuts out all the walking to, on, and from the stage. You can bow from a distance. And of course there are fewer germs exchanged. I had to bow with the teachers every once in a while, although I have no idea what I was bowing about. Anyways, when a student’s name was called, he stood up, yelled (sometimes obnoxiously) “HAI” which in this situation means here/present, and remained standing until everyone in his technical major was standing. Then a student representative of the students in that major walked up to the stage and received all of their diplomas at once. They all bowed to the Principal. And it went on like this through the three majors of computer science, machinery, and environment. AFTER the diploma part, about five or six people gave speeches including the Principal, Mayor of Naruto, leader of the PTA, and the student leader. One thing in particular that I noticed was that there was absolutely no laughter during the entire ceremony, so there must not have been any jokes told. About 80% of the students were sleeping in their seats and a couple were listening to music on headsets attached to their cellphones. Afterwards the graduates processed out and changed their shoes.

Afterwards: Everyone was much more cheerful and pictures were actually taken by the few parents that were there. Each homeroom had a special little get together afterwards. Some of the students came up to the staff room and thanked certain teachers and took pictures with them. All the teachers had a special catered box lunch. The brown red bean rice is eaten on special occasions for good luck.