Family Fun Fair

We enjoyed our first Family Fun Fair, which is a huge school carnival and fundraiser for many organizations on campus.  We saw lots of friends and had a great time wandering through the fun.

 

I understood why the baseball games were cancelled - the FFF took up both fields and the soccer field as well.  Lots of inflatables and games for the kids to enjoy.

Surprisingly enough, the first thing Ben wanted to do was ride the (tiny) horses.  

After playing and getting plenty wet and sweaty, Alex performed a few songs with the choir.

There was lots of good food to be found, even ice cream corn! hehe

The USA booth was selling frito pies, so along with sausage from the Aussie sizzle and some Mexican empanadas, this family went home happy.

Reunited and it feels SO good!

Ben's Strings Bash

Ben got to take part in the annual Strings Bash, where all the strings students from every campus come together.  They performed Ode to Joy all together first, then each strings section played two songs.  Unfortunately, I can't share the videos on here but I got some great pictures from the JIS website and my camera.

Ben has enjoyed learning the violin but has already told me several times that he just wants to focus on the guitar next year :)  In 8th grade, guitar will be an elective at school!

 

Alex's Performances

Last weekend, all the JIS choirs came together for a concert.  Both elementary schools, the middle school, the high school, and the adult Indonesian choir each performed separately in turn.  Here's the highlight of Alex's turn with the PIE choir.  He's on the far left, middle row.  When the video shakes, it's because I couldn't stop laughing!

For the grand finale, all the choirs came together for one song together and I've gotta say, it left me teary!  The lyrics say that we all laugh, all cry, all feel hunger, all feel pain...We are one world, one people, and we all bleed the same.  To hear voices of all ages from all over the globe singing the words together was incredible.

Alex is on the front row.  The video is in two parts because it was too long to share.

Finally, Alex's class performed a really interesting Chinese song at their weekly assembly.  The recorder may not have been his first choice, but he did a nice job (once he finally woke up and realized his group's part had started!).  I love getting to see the kids learn something new and show it off to the world.