Happy Halloween

To do list from the last few days - a retrospective

-Get last minute gifts. done
-Take friend to the airport so she can get home in time for Christmas. done
-Play violin for Xmas Eve.done
-get a new cat and name it Walter. done
-Buy short skis for new years eve outing. done
-get used boots. done
-buy snow pants on sale. done
-work new years eve but take off a little early. done
-take a nap before going to Afton Alps for the night. done
-ski for a couple hours with friends and have a blast. done
-find myself unable to execute a turn on the last run. done
-crash into a packed bank. done
-experience excruciating pain. done
-go to the ER. done
-get told that my right shoulder is fractured in three places. done
-ring in the new year sitting in a hospital gown, snow pants and Sorel boots. done
-Go to sleep on my sister's couch at 2am. done
(thanks to Dan & Sandra for bringing me to the ER and driving my car to my sis's house, and for moral support. Thanks to Becky for picking me up and helping me get medication. Thanks to Ken and Becky for letting me use their couch. Thanks to two year old Miri for saying in the cutest voice possible, "What's the matter, Uncle Matty?")

Merry Christmas

My special holiday gift to my blog readers (and especially Jean, Christina and Liz) is an elf dance.

Enjoy in moderation (and with sound).

Carving Pumpkins

I spent the afternoon with my sister and niece today and we carved pumpkins. I was glad I had been able to do this last year when I was in Japan (see last year's post, but don't rely on me to link to it because Blogger doesn't make it easy for us Mac users who have Safari for our browsers). Anyway, after having some miso soup and a cup of Chinese tea tonight, I broke out the mini tripod and ventured out to the front porch to photograph the two pumpkins I carved. I took this first, uninteresting, shot using the night time setting on my camera:As I was unhappy with the look of it, I decided to try the manual setting. This is the first time I have successfully used the manual setting on my camera (after trying to photograph stars while camping) since I bought it from Michel (who, if he were here, would still be trying to insist that I just paid him money to borrow the camera and that it is rightfully his). I love night shots like this:Happy Halloween!

Pics from My Holiday Week

Well, first, here are some pictures that Kanako sent me from our daytrip to Nasu. As we left the onsen, this friendly, but hesitant dog came over to meet us. Here he is, sizing me up. A moment later, he went off to chase a car:

Kanako was able to snap a pic of what the onsen looked like as no one was in the women's bath yet. I'm not sure how it is at other places, but at this one, one side was hot and the other side was scalding. I put one foot in the scalding side before deciding to stay on the hot side:

On New Year's Day, my students Tomoko and Isao invited me over for a traditional meal. It's called osechi. While these days, most people go to department store food courts to order this meal, Tomoko made hers. It tasted great:

This was followed by cheese fondue:

And here are my gracious hosts. We had a great time listening to jazz, eating and drinking, and then watching Eric Clapton and Led Zeppelin concert DVDs:

Two days earlier another student, Aiichiro, and his son, Motoki, took me to Tochigi city. This smaller town was at one time a merchant town - with the river running through it and heading toward Tokyo, it soon became an important place for people to transport products from the country to Tokyo. Today, it is a quiet town with some lovely spots along the river where you can get an idea of how the city might have looked 100 years ago. This building is a city office and might have at one time been the prefectural office (I believe Tochigi prefecture used to be divided into two prefectures):

Here's an example of some of the old buildings you can see in Tochigi - this kind of building is a bit more rare in Utsunomiya, which had to be rebuilt after being bombed in WWII:

Here I am on a bridge wearing the cool Eddie Bauer hat that Setsuko gave me for Christmas:

And here I am with Aiichiro in front of this cool broom and wicker type shop on the main street. We stopped in and looked around a bit. Pretty cool stuff:

Here's another view of the river and an old building that once was a store house and is now a museum:

Next we went to see Ohira-san, Tochigi's mountain. Michel has climbed this bad boy more than once, but today was cold and I was not about to freeze my ears off climbing, so Aiichiro drove us to the top:

Here I am at the lookout point at the top:

We found tons of padlocks attached to the fence surrounding the lookout point. They all had writing on them. Turns out, lovers go there and put their names on the lock and then lock it to the fence as a symbol of their ever-lasting love (n.b. We also saw places where the fence was cut and locks were removed):


We stopped at a small restaurant and had some snacks. This is konyaku. It's a gelatinous substance made from a (sweet?) potato starch and is served with yuzu miso (citron flavored miso sauce):

This is dango. The small balls are made from rice powder and then they are covered in sweet bean paste (one of Michel's favorite things to eat):

I also tried amazake, which is a warmed sweet, thick sake. It was perfect on this cold day:

We headed back to Aiichiro's house where Fumi had prepared everything for nabe. Nabe simply means pot, so this meal was served in a pot at the table. It was made of a simple chicken broth with small chicken drumsticks, Chinese cabbage, chrysanthamum leaves, tofu, mushrooms, noodles, and green onions (after depleting the veggies and meat from the pot, udon noodles were added and then gyoza):

Here I am with Fumi, Aiichiro, and one of Fumi's friends who came over for dinner as well. We all had a great time eating and drinking and enjoying each other's company

I'm continually impressed with the level of hospitality I've seen here. I was feeling a bit down about spending the holidays alone in a foreign country, but so many people invited me out or to their homes. I had a very memorable holiday time indeed.

Tomorrow? Back to work.

Day After Christmas Blues

Well, Christmas alone wasn't as bad as I thought - of course, getting to be with my family would have been wonderful, but things were still good. On Christmas Eve, I went with Stacy and Motoki (thanks for driving, Motoki!) to Jichiidai where one of my students, Yoko, attends church. We were met by Moto - one of our brilliant discussion students - outside of the church where the church choir was assembled. They sang carols outside until the service started. The service was really nice and Yoko played piano and sang with the choir. She even typed out the Japanese carol lyrics in Romaji (Romanized letters) so we could sing along. Another one of Stacy's students was there - she brought homemade marmalade for Stacy, Moto, and me - it was wonderful. The one funny thing was the fact that the candlelight service candles were not candlelight service size candles, but instead, birthday candle sized candles with pieces of foil wrapped around the base. Still, the service was much like the Christmas Eve candlelight services i am used to - it was nice.

Also, the students here at AEON have been so generous to me this Christmas. I got,
-2 green hats (from two different students)
-Tea
-Chocolates
-Pottery

On Saturday, some wonderful gifts arrived from my parents, and today I got cards and a package from my sis and one of my brothers. All weekend I have been talking to my family - On Christmas Eve night, I got on iChat with my brother in Houson and watched the kids open presents and even read a children's storybook version of the Christmas story to the kids - my brother held up the book to the video cam and I read it to them. It was the next best thing to being there. Today I talked with Becky while I opened up the stocking stuffers she sent to me.

All of this was great and tomorrow I will chat with the whole family at my folks house, yet today was a bit of a let-down. The weather today was, in a word, gloomy. Heavy rains started last night and got heavier throughout the day. The winds picked up and my shoes got soaked on the way to work. On the way home, I took the bus, but waiting for it, my suit got soaked, my shoes got resoaked, my backpack got soaked, and my umbrella nearly broke. I thought about it and realized that I am glad that I don't normally live in such a climate. In spite of the cold of Minnesota in January, I think I prefer it to the cold, clammy feeling of soaked shoes and socks as I go to work. Hopefully, things will clear up during my days off so I can enjoy the hot springs and the ski slopes.

Four Seafood Pizzas, Three Whi-ite Russians, Two Silly Reindeer, and a Salary Ma-an in a Red Dress: A Christmas Party AEON Style

Well, this AEON party was not a well-planned affair, but sometimes it's the unplanned events that prove to be the most enjoyable. We'd talked about having it at a restaurant with lots of food and drink, but no one seemed to think about reserving a room at a restaurant until two weeks before the night of the party. Year-end parties are HUGE here in Japan, so every restaurant within a mile radius of school was booked on the 16th. We then decided to have a potluck party at the school - similar to what we did for halloween. We talked about, and even planned a game for the evening, but luckily, the party ran itself and everyone had a good time without the staff having to resort to mixer type games. Mind you, if we had planned it a little bit better, we could have had a white elephant gift exchange which would have been a lot of fun (in this society of shopping for and owning the latest clothes and accoutrements, I would have been sure to have walked away with a Burberry scarf or a Louis Vuitton wallet).

Michel and I decided that we would do a little planning of our own to insure an enjoyable evening. After quaffing a couple shot glasses of a quickly mixed drink, we went to the bathroom to change out of our work suits and into more casual attire. The day before, we bought these silly reindeer headband/masks and goofy glittery bow ties. Then in one of the classrooms, we broke out the ingredients for our evening's refreshment. Here's Michel proudly holding two of the ingredients:

We mixed the Kahlúa, milk and Stoli in a plastic pitcher and then got out our Christmas mugs from the 100 Yen shop out and poured ourselves drinks for the evening. We waited a bit for a few of the students to arrive before making our appearance. Zen was one of the earliest to arrive. Zen had had some wine before coming and was all ready to enjoy the party:

Soon, more guests started to arrive and we were all surpised when our former part-time teacher, Fumiko came into the room. Madoka had secretly invited her as a surprise for staff, teachers, and students. Here she is with Satomi and a couple students getting ready to chow down some seafood pizza (I did eat one piece, but I may have to order a pepperoni pizza for dinner tonight just to make up for that one slice - it wasn't that bad, but I just can't get used to it):

After a bit, Yoshiko donned my antlers and bowtie and the newlyweds posed for this pic:

When Michel and I went downstairs to let Yuichiro (one half of the crazy guys) into the building and the first thing he said was, "I need the bathroom," we thought he had been waiting outside the building for sometime and had to go, but when he came through the doors, we realized his real reason for needing the bathroom. Like at the Halloween party a couple of months ago, he decided to wear a dress - a santa dress (but he did include his cat ears from the last costume and made sure to cover his armpit hair with flesh colored duct tape - shudder). Here he is posing with Michel (Note to Michel: this is not as bad as the pic I could have posted):

Later, Kotaro put on the mask and was delighted to be surrounded by Madoka, Fumiko, Miki, and Stacy:

Here's Junko and Seiko (two of my advanced level students with our school manager, Yoshiko):

And here are the two goofy reindeers (did I actually just type an s after that word to make it plural?) with Yuichiro and Yoshiko:

It was good to see Kei too, as I never get to teach her anymore (Jess, she was thrilled when I told her you thought her skin looked so beautiful in the Halloween pics):

And here I am toward the end of the night (still wearing that awful tie) but happy to get a few minutes to catch up with Fumiko and see how she was doing. Fumiko and I used to always have our lunch at the same time on Saturdays and would have interesting chats - I miss that:

I think I took off at around 1:30 and was handed a box of doughnuts on my way out - hooray!

First Week of Advent

Advent - the four Sundays before Christmas on the Christian calendar - started yesterday. Celebrating Advent has been a tradition in my family for years, and is one that I've continued on my own. It's generally considered a time of spiritual preparation for celebrating Christ's birth.

I was talking to one of my brothers on Skype the other day and we were both feeling rather disillusioned by the commercialism of the season - here in Japan it too is a holiday run by department stores. And in a predominantly nominal Buddhist culture, it has little religious significance. What we have here in Japan is a kind of hodge podge of ideas of what people think an American or European Christmas should look like, so it is generally mismatched, gaudy, and geared toward spending. This is fine if you are a person for whom the holiday holds no specific spiritual meaning - it's a nice time of year for spending time with family and giving and receiving gifts. But beyond the shopping, gifts, and Santas, all of which I enjoy, I need it to mean something more significant. I am far from perfect, and Christmas carols that talk about "...the dawn of redeeming grace..." or about how "...hate is strong, and mocks the song of peace on Earth, good will to men..." stir something in me. So today I bought my four Advent candles - one to light each week - and will await Christmas in perhaps a more quiet, introspective way than I have in recent years.

I also wanted my apartment to look a little more festive than it did. So I bought a mini Christmas tree from the 100 Yen store and decorated it with some lights and little snowflake ornaments. Then I wrapped my garland of Danish flags (not "controversial" Danish cartoons, mind you) around the tree. I'm happy with the result. My little ten tatami mat-sized space of Japan looks a little warmer tonight:

P.S. I also made a plum pudding that is waiting to be eaten on Christmas Eve.

Halloween Post - or - how I accidentally closed my blogger window and lost my almost finished post with uploaded photos and how I am really mad

I'm not sure why I get so angry when things like having to repost everything on Blogger happen to me - I mean, I live in an age where such things only take a few minutes, but for some reason, I get almost livid when things like this happen. Anyway, today was our Halloween party at school. I had to be at work at 11am after not sleeping well the night before. We often have open Sundays where we interview prospective students and offer special lessons. I had to work today and was lucky enough to have signed up two prospectives who will be starting next week. For my special lesson, I taught how to make pumpkin pie and how to carve a jack-o-lantern. We only had one student sign up for my special class. But as it was Kentaro - who's a great student, I didn't mind having only one.

Here's Kentaro rolling out dough for the face on top of his pumpkin pie. I pre-made the pie dough, but beside that, he made the whole thing by himself:
Here we are about to put the pie in the microwave/convection oven. In Japan, things are very specifically done - for example, when you are in the kitchen you wear a stupid apron, like the ones we are wearing. You don't see any other style but these weird, cumbersome things. But as I didn't want to get flour on myself, I wore one:
After making pie, we carved jack-o-lanterns. It was fun to see the reactions of Kentaro and the staff as we lit them and put them in a darkened room. People just don't really carve pumpkins much here so it was fun for everyone to see how they looked all lit up:
At 5:00 the first party guests arrived. Here's Kotaro, one of our brilliant students, who walked in and casually took off his jacket and put on a lab coat, transforming himself into a pretty convincing doctor:
Meanwhile, Kentaro donned his costume. Clowns generally scare me, but somehow Kentaro's sunglasses-wearing, pig-snout-sporting version, made me laugh hysterically:
Here's Satomi, Michiko, and Michel (a.k.a. Lucifer sensei) as the party was beginning:
Yukiyo and Sayaka decided to be Shibuya high school girls and did a pretty good job looking exactly like them - right down to the makeup. They look exactly like many students I see on the street every day. Here they are with two new students who's names I don't know - Michel and I call them "the crazy guys" because, as you can see from the picture, they are quite mad. The one in the pink Chinese dress is a huge baseball fan and not only knew that Minnesota's team was called the Twins, but also that Torii Hunter played on our team:
Setsuko also wore a Chinese dress. Here she is with Stacy, who was a giraffe this weekend:
Emiko, like the crazy guys, did some cross-dressing for the evening. I loaned her a cigar I had so she could be a gangster. Mayu dressed as another kind of Shibuya girl - Her makeup may look extreme, but it is EXACTLY what you see some of the girls doing in Shibuya:
Kei, who is another of our brilliant students put on a halo for the evening and is sitting here with her classmate's (Aki's) daugher, who made a cuter cat than the crazy guys:
We had a contest for best student costume: Aki, who is a gorgeous, wonderful student (mother of the cat in the last picture), played her part as a disco king to the hilt and was flanked most of the evening by the two crazy guys (who came in second place):
Here we all are at the end of the night:

All in all, it was a lot of fun. We have a great crew of students and this batch in particular were all really social and got to know each other better tonight. Now I'm at home sipping wine and feeling better that this post is almost complete and I can post it without losing it again.