Monday, December 22, 2008, 1:00 PM
Kumon 50th Anniversary, KAO and Kumon Global Youth Forum in Japan!
This year, Kumon’s 50th Anniversary was held in, Japan, birth place of both the founder and the method of learning that has been a huge impact to many lives. A team, of 6 completers from the Singapore Completers Club (SKCC), was sent to the Land of the Rising Sun, to grace this memorable and exciting event!On day one of the conference, Arvin, Aaron, Candy, Hsiang Ling, Htet Mon and Michael were greeted with the cold, chilly, winter morning air of Japan, but their spirits were burning as hot as the sun! During the KAO day conference, they valiantly fought the ZZZ-monster (thanks to horrible 1-hour jet lags, and Arvin didn’t sleep at all during the first night, cos he’s just crazy >.> as usual) to keep awake, and learn from other instructors, as they present their case studies on how “Excellent Students” were able to move up the levels in Kumon through the Jet Plane progress.
Eventually we came to the highlight of the conference, where awards were given out! We had our dear instructor Mrs. Leong going up twice!! On behalf of everyone in SKCC, CONGRTULATIONS! You’ve made us proud!
The fun started in the evening where we had our dinners! Imagine Kumon completers from all the other countries finally being able to meet up again from last year! It was a fantastic time of friendly reunion and tons, tons, TONS of photo-taking sessions! Yes, all completers are cam-whores :D As old and new friendships were forged and strengthen, the glorious Japanese food, ala buffet style, made the boys want to burst out of their formal wear!
Hence, day one ended late into the night, and before we know it we had day two! All of us were sent to the Tokyo dome by bus, and did I mention? The air was getting colder and colder by the hour. Brrrrrr!!! Once again, we had our usual morning battle with the sleepy-monster, as we did our best to stay awake during the morning 50th Anniversary Conference! The stakes were higher now because, the main language that day was in Japanese! We all had our translated headsets on and the fight begins… Ding! Ding! Ding! Round Two!
We were presented with the history of Kumon, the founder’s dreams and visions for his method of learning, and a brief introduction of Kumon’s plan for the next 50 years!! All’s well that ends well, and with that, the completers were taken away to Chizan-So(once again I hope I spelt that right), for our Kumon Youth Global Forum.
There, Professor Hiroshi Tasaka, author of To the Summit, gave us a philosophy lesson on, “How do we find Joy”. For once, the sleep-monster did not attack us, as we hungrily scribbled notes about his teachings, and applying it personally on our lives. He ended with this note, saying, when we talk, we must have Spirit and Wisdom. So much for Jedi powers eh, May the force be with you. RAWR!
The completers then had a chance to share their dreams and visions in groups, where we inspired and shared our values and concepts with each other, based on Hiroshi Tasaka’s lecture. It was a enriching and edifying session for all of us!
Once again, the high time of the day was during the Completers’ Networking dinner! Hurrah! The Japanese completers put on an item for us and taught us all a new song!! Michael didn’t sing it cos he was just too horrible at it, and was not concentrating on anything at all that night. He blames the many bowls of rice he accidentally ordered on the previous night (the problem with not being able to communicate in Japan). Back to the Networking Dinner, everyone had to join in some dance which we were only told much later on it had something to do with calling out dead spirits, in Japan culture, HURRAY!
So that kind of ends the day, and the Singapore Completers went back on our bus to our hotels, still wishing the day would never end L. As a last burst of cry, we made a whole lot of noise on the bus with the completers from Phillipines and Indonesia!
Alas, the conference ended, and guess what, there’s one more next year :D, so for all you completers out there who also want in on all the fun, DO COME FOR ALL OUR SKCC ACTIVITIES!!! Who knows maybe next year, you will be typing out this post ;P
This is Michael here signing off and on behalf of the SKCC Committee,
WE WISH YOU A MERRY CHRISTMAS AND A HAPPY NEW YEAR!!
Tsk Tsk,
Michael,you've forgotten to mention two of the other highlights for the seconday day of conference!
well,ie......we made our COMPLETERS' FLAG with our handprints after Professor Hiroshi Tasaka's speech.
I guess all of us enjoyed doing that flag.yea?
TADA~ with our nicely handprint flag (:
oh yes,
dinner was not meant for us to just eat & make friends but also learn from each other.
wonder why do i say that?
because.......we had group presentations during dinner whereby, each group presented about what they have discussed during the group's discussion earlier.
being completers,we had our own great ideas on how we want to contribute to society in order to build a better world.
That was simply great & wonderful.!
one of the groups presenting...
Alright.
I shall stop here.
oh by the way,this's Htet Mon.
Hope both me & michael did not miss out anything.
Merry X'mas & Happy New Year in advance :D
one of the groups presenting...
Alright.
I shall stop here.
oh by the way,this's Htet Mon.
Hope both me & michael did not miss out anything.
Merry X'mas & Happy New Year in advance :D
