Let me start by saying, librarians are the ultimate sharers. This wouldn’t have gotten off the ground if it wasn’t for another local librarian sharing her experience and then lending her items to me. But isn’t that what librarians are all about anyway? It goes without saying.

I had a page ripped out from a library magazine from about five years ago in a folder for activities to do (eventually) with my Japanese Culture Club, an after school club I’ve been running for eighteen years. It languished. Then our local library consortium held a showcase where librarians could share activities, lessons, or events they were proud of to other librarians for ideas and inspiration. While I couldn’t attend that day, I saw a presentation that was on kamishibai. And just like that, the stars aligned. I emailed her that we needed to get together and I wanted to hear all about it. We met. She shared. And then she offered to lend the materials she had purchased for her library to me to launch it with my club including a cornerstone text, Allen Say’s Kamishibai Man.

As an old form of Japanese storytelling, men often made their money selling candies their wives made for these kamishibai events happening in parks and community gathering spaces. The entertainment came in the form of an animated story featuring a stage that he could carry on his bicycle.

Two weeks ago at club, I read Say’s book aloud before unraveling the stage, putting out the candy, and sharing one of the stories: Momotaro: Peach Boy. They were engaged and hopped up on sugar. A winning combination. But I did get a round of applause at the end, so I couldn’t have been that bad. Then I said that I had three more stories and two of our club members, the president and vice president of the club said they’d practice and share two more stories the following week. True to form, they showed up during study halls a few times the following week to practice and entertained us with Issun-Boshi: The One-Inch Boy and The Bamboo Princess this past week. Heartwarming to say the least, the fact that both of them put in the practice and leaned into it in front of their club members.

Of course there’s so much more that can be done to expand upon what we did, but for a club activity it worked exactly the way I wanted it to. For the librarian who I borrowed the materials from, it is a carefully constructed project collaboration with a teacher. In any culture, storytelling and stories are the backbone, so taking the time to learn about the paper theater of Japan was informative and entertaining. To say nothing of the kindness of librarians sharing their resources to benefit students.