久しぶり！御無沙汰！That means ‘long time no see.’ My deepest apologies for not updating this blog. Though the newness of my home in Japan has worn off, the adventures haven’t stopped. I’m picking this up again as I set out for my winter break vacation: Kyoto! I’ve bought a new camera to record my experiences (Sony Cybershot DSC-HX5V, king of digital still cameras), and I’m committed to showing pics and posting on my blog more often.
I’ll start by telling you how I spent my Christmas season in Amakusa. I apologize for some parts of it which sound very ‘list-y’ and not very narrative, but I have a lot to cover.
All this month, I’ve been teaching my 1st-4th grade elementary school students about Christmas, showing them pictures of home with the Christmas tree and snow, explaining how we bake cookies for Santa, describing how Santa fills the stockings (or shoes, in some countries) and the space under the tree with presents, and singing “We wish you a Merry Christmas” (most repetitive lyrics, so easiest to learn).
Even with the little bits of holiday cheer in class, I still wasn’t feeling the Christmas spirit without a Christmas tree, (really) cold weather outside, freshly-baked cookies, and time spent at home with family and friends. This much I anticipated, so I was set to make sure Christmas weekend was well spent doing Christmas related activities:
To start, on Thursday I had a day off (Emperor’s Birthday=public holiday) to make mochi with some neighbors, BBQ in the back yard, and drink warm sake out of a bamboo mug. Check ‘making mochi’ and ‘drinking before 11 AM’ off the bucket list... I’ll try to upload a video of the mochi-pounding process so that you can understand. Basically you use giant wooden hammers to mash up freshly cooked sticky rice, then use flour and mold the rice gluten into patties. You can put stuff inside if you want (sweet jam), put it in soup, or grill it and eat it with soy sauce and nori.
Friday was the last day of the second semester for all the schools, so my middle school had a long ceremony in the day where lots of speeches were made and awards were handed out. I only had one class that day, my second year class. While we did half a class of the standard textbook work, we spent the second half doing a Christmas cross word puzzle and listening to my America christmas music. Santa hats were worn and fun was had. After school, I skipped the 2 hour long teachers’ meeting (probably a faux pax, but they never talk about stuff relevant to me...) and went and worked out with my middle school baseball team. Afterwards, I ran over to 大江 Ooe, the village with all the Catholics, where my elementary school kids were dressed up in little christmas elf/santa claus outfits singing Christmas carols outside in the freezing cold. After the concert, there was a candle light procession up to the church for mass. It was the first time I had seen the church completely filled up, and the first time that there was a choir to lead the congregation in worship. A good deal of my middle school boys were up at the altar as altar servers, dressed up in white robes. After church, I found another one of my student’s parents that has pretty good English. So far, both of the mothers that I’ve met that speak English have very, very cute elementary school children. Connection?
Again, sorry for the list-y-ness. I could have chosen to describe very poetically the freezing march up to the church with our candles and the warm atmosphere of the church interior filled with little children, parents, grandparents, and even some high schoolers. But I have to plow through to Christmas Day:
Waking up on Christmas day, I saw snow falling outside my window! Already a present from Santa, and without a Christmas tree! Driving 3 hours to the city, I enjoyed ‘receiving’ more Christmas presents at Best Denki, the Best Buy of Japan, where I picked up a new Sony Cybershot DSC-HX5V (featuring 10x optical zoom, 20x digital zoom, instant sweep panorama shots, and built in GPS). This will be the tool which I will use to record many more Japan adventures, and I’ve already posted pictures from my trip to Nagasaki today. Go ahead and check them out on Picassa through the link at the top of the page!
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