February 22, 2017
Dear Virtual Diary,
I forgot to write about my time at Yoshiura and a certain event that unfolded that left me humbled and grateful.
With the Board of Education I work for it is common practice for all the English teachers in the area to all visit one school, this is typically called “English Day”. On this particular day (February 6th) we all headed to Yoshiura. Spending time with the kids was great, but one particular experience was special. We had a Calligraphy 書道 = しょどう class with the 5th graders. After practicing writing various amount of Kanji. They sprung the surprise of creating a Japanese name for each of us.
Dwayne, phonetically, is broken down in Japanese as Do-U-AY-IN. Phonetically in Japanese it is ドウゥエイン it really depends on how you pronounce it but I usually go with this way of spelling it in Japanese.
The students gave me the following name: 努羽上音, which pronunciation wise is similar to the phonetic layout mentioned above. Here is the really tear jerker though.
The students took turns breaking down the English meaning of each Kanji, in English.
The first character 努 stands for giving one’s full effort.
The second is 羽 wings.
The third is上 up or above.
Last is 音 music.
They basically said that they chose these Kanjis because it best describes me. A person who always gives effort to soar above challenges and enjoys music. Now I cannot convey the level of cuteness in which the students presented our names in Kanji, but believe me when I say it was a tender moment in my life, without a doubt.
Kids are great.