Woody Memories
Ministry of the Environment/ Government of Japan
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I was an inexperienced second year student (and one of 398!) of a large junior high school, which was located halfway up a woody hill. By contrast, my elementary school, which I had graduated from the previous year, was located on flat land surrounded by many, mostly one-story, wooden houses. Both schools were in a southern part of Tokyo.
My house, which was a traditional-style Japanese wooden house, was located halfway between the two schools, approximately a half-of-a-kilometer from either. I had lived in that house since I was born. I have many precious memories of that time growing up at home with my family. The house had been built soon after the Second World War had ended by some carpenters and by my father who was handy with tools and when he was in his twenties. At that time, the house had been only one-story high. But it had been rebuilt by the 1960s, and since then it had been two-stories high. Both my brother and I lived on the second floor of this house until we both got married. So we could socialize, my mother had helped me to entertain the eight P.A. club mates from my junior high school on the second floor. She continued to have my friends over until I left home.
That spring, my friend began to leave his bicycle in the narrow street in front of our house, where he kept it until he picked it up again in the afternoon. This continued until he graduated from junior high school, except for in bad weather and at some other times. The reason why he used to leave it at my house was that his house was more than 1.5 km away from our school. As it was very steep around the school, he couldn't park his bicycle there.The only place between the school and his house where he could leave his bike was my house.
−・−
At my school, each class had a westernized alphabetical class name such as 2A, 2B, all the way up to 2H. My class was 2G. Therefore, I wore on my black school uniform a tiny rectangular badge with '2G' on it. There were three wooden school buildings at the school, one which was big and the other two which were smaller. Classes 2A to 2F were side by side on the second floor of the main school building. Classes 2G and 2H were a bit farther away from the other classes on the first floor of one of the smaller school buildings, which was known as the upper building. The end of the main building's second floor was connected to the end of the upper building's first floor by about a fifteen-meter-long walkway which had a wonderful view from it-due to the fact that the upper building had a one-story-higher elevation than the other two school buildings.
This wooden walkway was used as a gathering spot, especially at lunchtime, and at other times as a running passageway for busy students. But it sloped somewhat upwards and sometimes the walkway was very slippery. So whenever we were on it, we sometimes felt a little bit uneasy. I especially liked to walk down the walkway because I would soon see many friends and I would also soon be starting a club activity. Moreover, it was easier to walk down it then up because of its steepness.
The school's driveway in those days. Hidden top left in the trees are classrooms 2G and 2H.
−・−
Our P.A. club met before the beginning of school in the morning and again from after school until 5:00 P.M., as well as at lunchtime. But the members themselves participated mostly one day out of every four, not including at lunchtime, when usually everybody met. My friend, who left his bicycle at my house, was one of the members. He also sometimes had to go to school early and leave late because of the club's activities. This was also another reason why he left his bicycle at my house.
We had a small room called the P.A. System Room where we did our club activities, which was located in the other smaller building ― a building which was U-shaped ― and was known as the lower building. The P.A. equipment panel on the wooden wall had a lot of small silver switches and so on on it. Needless to say, the speakers in the classrooms, which weren't so good, were connected to the P.A. System Room. The switches had nameplates, "2A", "2B", and so on, above them, which made it easy to connect the P.A. system to the right rooms.
One member had the job of putting in proper order the announcements. Announcements were collected from the teachers' room and sometimes announcements were phoned in over the school's internal phone system. When the announcements came in, we read them over first. If it was an important announcement, we would announce that one first. Otherwise, we announced them in the order in which they came. We had to announce them slowly, clearly, and carefully.
We also beat a chime both before and after the announcements. We never failed to keep the right order of hitting the five steel xylophone bars which were fixed to a wooden frame. This xylophone was the same size as a small wooden chopping board. The before and after announcement melodies were different from each other, but both were made with six beats on the chime. I still very well remember, even though I haven't played them since graduation, that the period between the fourth and the fifth tones was longer than the others.
As for this club activity, I learnt that a microphone, that is to say a P.A. system, is an important medium−as necessary to people as are our mouths. This is due to the fact that information can be transmitted to many people all at once by this system. I felt the greatness of this P.A. equipment. I also learnt that announcements (or information) were important for our school life. We realized that we couldn't give out any wrong information because it was our public duty not to do so.
The school's driveway in the 2000s (the same view as in the first photo).
A gymnasium (on the right) has been built on the former Third Ground.
Off to the right of the microphone were two windows. They commanded a fine view. Looking through these windows and down through the trees-such as the maple trees, gingko trees, cedar trees, pine trees, and cherry trees-we could see a field called the Third Ground. The daily announcements had sounded amongst these trees. This Third Ground was as big as two tennis courts, if not bigger. I liked this view, especially during those days in May after the cherry trees had gained a lot of new leaves. I also liked it when it was not long before winter set in when the deciduous trees, such as the maples, shed their colorful leaves. Through these windows, we could also see the school's driveway snaking its way from the Third Ground to the Second Ground, which was located behind the upper building.
−・−
That winter, for one week in the mornings, as an extra-curricular activity of our class, the male students rebuilt a small section of the school's driveway. The school's driveway ran through the trees. We built a concrete section to replace the dirt path that had existed before. Building a path was a tough job for teenaged boys. To start with, we had to carry many tools such as shovels, spades, and trowels; and building supplies, such as buckets of water, bags of cement, gravel, and sand to the site. The portion of the path which we had to rebuild was only a few meters long, but we were able to learn many building skills by doing so.
Some days before the rebuilding, we had dug a deep rectangular pit because we needed a strong foundation. We had also constructed a wooden frame inside the pit. On the day of rebuilding, at first, we mixed together the sand, gravel, and cement with the water. We then covered the bottom of the pit with gravel and watered it. After we had mixed the concrete, and having had a big discussion about it, we poured it into the foundation pit. Before finishing the pouring, we started to make the surface flat from one end to the other using a wooden spreader. I learned that if we tried carefully, we could get a beautifully smooth surface.
In the afternoon, we softly put straw mats on top of the wet concrete surface. They remained, I remembered, for a long time-about a week. During that time, not only our class students, but also other students walked around the straw mats to avoid stepping on the freshly laid concrete. The mats were important mainly to prevent the freezing of the water in the concrete. A week was needed to set the concrete completely. I felt that waiting for the concrete to set completely taught us endurance and the value of doing things properly. If we built the section of the school's driveway well, not only bicycles, but also cars could use it for many years after. It encouraged us to think that even what we as young students made could be useful.
−・−
Some time just before my third year at the school, our yearly student lecture presentation to all of the students of the school was held on the Third Ground. Several students were chosen as lecturers from among all the school students. I was chosen as the lecturer for social studies. My topic was "A Study of Toro Ruins", which are located in Shizuoka Prefecture, and was about 6 pages long. My friend, who left his bicycle at my house, of course helped me at that time to make some drawings of objects which were used about 1,800 years ago, such as a wooden hoe, for my presentation. My memories now of this student lecture presentation are that it was held in an area which had a lot of trees and of the high platform on which I had stood explaining about the wooden buildings and tools in the Yayoi period which my friend had drawn on large sheets of paper.
−・−
Several decades after graduating from this school, when I returned for the first time, some trees which were shading the snaking school's driveway reminded me of a lot of my woody memories. These trees were like a medium expressing my old school days' experiences such as the P.A. club, rebuilding the school's driveway, and the student lecture presentation. Thanks to these living trees, I could reconnect to my woody memories of my school days of long ago.
"
My house, which was a traditional-style Japanese wooden house, was located halfway between the two schools, approximately a half-of-a-kilometer from either. I had lived in that house since I was born. I have many precious memories of that time growing up at home with my family. The house had been built soon after the Second World War had ended by some carpenters and by my father who was handy with tools and when he was in his twenties. At that time, the house had been only one-story high. But it had been rebuilt by the 1960s, and since then it had been two-stories high. Both my brother and I lived on the second floor of this house until we both got married. So we could socialize, my mother had helped me to entertain the eight P.A. club mates from my junior high school on the second floor. She continued to have my friends over until I left home.
That spring, my friend began to leave his bicycle in the narrow street in front of our house, where he kept it until he picked it up again in the afternoon. This continued until he graduated from junior high school, except for in bad weather and at some other times. The reason why he used to leave it at my house was that his house was more than 1.5 km away from our school. As it was very steep around the school, he couldn't park his bicycle there.The only place between the school and his house where he could leave his bike was my house.
This wooden walkway was used as a gathering spot, especially at lunchtime, and at other times as a running passageway for busy students. But it sloped somewhat upwards and sometimes the walkway was very slippery. So whenever we were on it, we sometimes felt a little bit uneasy. I especially liked to walk down the walkway because I would soon see many friends and I would also soon be starting a club activity. Moreover, it was easier to walk down it then up because of its steepness.
−・−
We had a small room called the P.A. System Room where we did our club activities, which was located in the other smaller building ― a building which was U-shaped ― and was known as the lower building. The P.A. equipment panel on the wooden wall had a lot of small silver switches and so on on it. Needless to say, the speakers in the classrooms, which weren't so good, were connected to the P.A. System Room. The switches had nameplates, "2A", "2B", and so on, above them, which made it easy to connect the P.A. system to the right rooms.
One member had the job of putting in proper order the announcements. Announcements were collected from the teachers' room and sometimes announcements were phoned in over the school's internal phone system. When the announcements came in, we read them over first. If it was an important announcement, we would announce that one first. Otherwise, we announced them in the order in which they came. We had to announce them slowly, clearly, and carefully.
We also beat a chime both before and after the announcements. We never failed to keep the right order of hitting the five steel xylophone bars which were fixed to a wooden frame. This xylophone was the same size as a small wooden chopping board. The before and after announcement melodies were different from each other, but both were made with six beats on the chime. I still very well remember, even though I haven't played them since graduation, that the period between the fourth and the fifth tones was longer than the others.
As for this club activity, I learnt that a microphone, that is to say a P.A. system, is an important medium−as necessary to people as are our mouths. This is due to the fact that information can be transmitted to many people all at once by this system. I felt the greatness of this P.A. equipment. I also learnt that announcements (or information) were important for our school life. We realized that we couldn't give out any wrong information because it was our public duty not to do so.
A gymnasium (on the right) has been built on the former Third Ground.
Off to the right of the microphone were two windows. They commanded a fine view. Looking through these windows and down through the trees-such as the maple trees, gingko trees, cedar trees, pine trees, and cherry trees-we could see a field called the Third Ground. The daily announcements had sounded amongst these trees. This Third Ground was as big as two tennis courts, if not bigger. I liked this view, especially during those days in May after the cherry trees had gained a lot of new leaves. I also liked it when it was not long before winter set in when the deciduous trees, such as the maples, shed their colorful leaves. Through these windows, we could also see the school's driveway snaking its way from the Third Ground to the Second Ground, which was located behind the upper building.
Some days before the rebuilding, we had dug a deep rectangular pit because we needed a strong foundation. We had also constructed a wooden frame inside the pit. On the day of rebuilding, at first, we mixed together the sand, gravel, and cement with the water. We then covered the bottom of the pit with gravel and watered it. After we had mixed the concrete, and having had a big discussion about it, we poured it into the foundation pit. Before finishing the pouring, we started to make the surface flat from one end to the other using a wooden spreader. I learned that if we tried carefully, we could get a beautifully smooth surface.
In the afternoon, we softly put straw mats on top of the wet concrete surface. They remained, I remembered, for a long time-about a week. During that time, not only our class students, but also other students walked around the straw mats to avoid stepping on the freshly laid concrete. The mats were important mainly to prevent the freezing of the water in the concrete. A week was needed to set the concrete completely. I felt that waiting for the concrete to set completely taught us endurance and the value of doing things properly. If we built the section of the school's driveway well, not only bicycles, but also cars could use it for many years after. It encouraged us to think that even what we as young students made could be useful.
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