Apple Bobbing

A pumpkin I carved with Tesia and Makoto

A bunch of third graders asked me to have a Halloween party after school on Friday, which I was more than happy to accommodate, they made a huge effort to come find me and ask me in English, which blew me away! Not teaching these kids meant I really did not know what to expect, did they want to play games or just chill out, should I dress up or would that be really un-cool? They are about eighteen years old so I tried to think of what I would have wanted when I was in school, which made it worse because there is no way in hell we would have asked for a Halloween party at that age. So I just got loads of sweets, baked some buns (always a safe option), put on a wig and had some games prepared as back up. I also had no idea how many would be coming.


One girl in a witchy hat comes in the door shreaking followed by about 15 others, and lots more shreaking. They unpiled bags of junk and just kept shrieking. I braved the question….do you want to play a game?

The Halloween Team

So we played apple bobbing for about 30mins (which they had never even heard of), they were endlessly entertained by this, then I hung apples from the ceiling and they tried to capture them with their teeth, also endlessly entertained by this game and then we played a solid hour of blind man’s buff. I have to admit I was also endlessly entertained, it was like being 12years old again plunging my head into buckets of freezing water to fetch apples. What really surprised me is the boys that crept in and joined in after much encouragement (boys and girls in Japan do not interact very well at all, at all). I had some teenage girl magazines from Ireland with me which the boys adored and even took home to borrow for the weekend. Could you imagine an 18year old boy in Ireland reading a Mizz magazine?

Apple Games

Clever girls



Narumi