Owarimashita!

It is now summer vacation at Taiwa Chuu (although the students will of course be at the school every day). It is also the end of my time there. Friday was the last day of the term and the school had the end of term ceremony. The end of that ceremony was a farewell ceremony for me. The principal gave a speech about me. Then I gave a speech to the students, which I did in both English and Japanese (and I was told that the Japanese was comprehensible). A student gave me a speech, also in English and Japanese, and another student presented me with flowers.
Then all the students made two rows for me to walk through as a send-off. (A gauntlet if you will, but a friendly gauntlet). I walked through, saying goodbye, shaking hands, giving high fives, a few hugs, a few students shouted "I love Rita". This all took quite a long time.
Later, I had to give another speech to all the teachers. I also baked brownies as a goodbye gift for the staff, so I passed those out. In the evening the English teachers took me out for dinner.

Bonus cute story. I put up a "Goodbye" bulletin board, with a letter to the students and teachers and a sign saying "Keep in touch with Ms. Rita" and my email address. A couple of my students read the sign, and not understanding the idiom "keep in touch" they touched the paper.