The Hofers Take on Japan - Part 1

So last week i was lucky enough to recieve a well timed visit from my parents. They arrived on Sunday, which coincided with the last week of school, meaning lots of random activities like cleaning day and a closing ceremony, which i was lucky enough to avoid! We spent some time in Kyoto, Hiroshima, and Osaka. They spent the first nights in Hikone and were able to meet some friends and my J-gparents. So that was fabulous. And thanks to their visit I got to see and do some things i'd been too lazy to on my own.

We spent one afternoon at Kyoto's beautiful Kiyomizudera. Now, while i can't support its campaign to be named one of the "new seven wonders" i will say it was a pretty fabulous, if not all together authentic experience. The street leading up to the temple is called 'Tea Pot Lane' and for good reason - its full of pottery stores. What they dont tell you in the guide books is that its also full of sweet shops and other fabulous touristy finds. We may not have been lucky enough to see the sakura (cherry blossoms) this week, but we tasted many sakura delicacies including sakura mochi (rice cakes), sakura ice cream, and even sakura cream puffs. Yum. Oh, and we saw REAL Geisha. or women dressed as Geisha posing for pictures at one of the biggest tourist attractions in Kansai. Take your pick.


In kyoto we stayed at a traditional ryokan, so my parents got a taste of the wonders of japan - sleeping on futon, wearing yukata, and eating fish and rice and miso for breakfast. It was actually really fun, if slightly less than appetizing.

On to Hiroshima - We arrived in the late afternoon, just in time for me to continue enjoying my horrifyingly-bad-yet-entertaining book instead of enduring the Hiroshima Peace Museum for the second time. I just wasn't sure i was up for the trauma of it all. Luckily Mom and Dad didn't miss it and we met up for a walk through the peace park. It was gorgeous with the warm weather and the sunset. The next day we took the ferry to Miyanjima to see the famous floating Torii, and wound up taking a cable car/hike to the top of the mountain. It was beautiful, but too foggy to render any fabulous photos.

And the next morning it was up and off to Osaka. Unfortunately it was rainy, but luckily our shnazzy hotel is the kind that lends you great big umbrellas, so we rushed off to see Osaka Castle and get some shopping in before our final dinner/drinks/night together. The week ended with a jolt too - while the rents were on their way to the airport i was awoken by an earthquake! Luckily i wasn't near the epicenter so it was pretty mild in my area, but still a little freaky.

In the end, it was a phenomenal week full of sites and tastes and fabulous conversation and fun with my parents. Im so glad to have been able to share this part of my life with them, and look forward to sharing it with more visitors in the future :)

and then there were two - gradumatation

Today the san-nensei students graduated. I share the sentiments of my friend Erin - some of the coolest kids in the school are gone. And i'm sad. Don't worry, i'm not like really sad. No waterworks here (shock to all). In fact, when i looked around during the graduation ceremony,
i was the ONLY female teacher not crying (and this was not during some student speech or sad song but when some chick from the Board of Eduation was speaking). And when i told one of my JTE's that i didn't cry at my high school OR college graduation ceremonies, she looked at me like i'd just killed her puppy. But really...

In any case, in spite of the cold, the 12+ hours of no sensation in my toes, the rain, and all the tears, it was a good day. The ceremony was held in the *unheated* gym, which i didn't think would be a problem last week, but then it snowed yesterday and all bets were off. Mostly the ceremony was attended by the students, staff, a bunch of flunkies from the BOE that no one knew, and the mothers of the third year students with SWETT corsages of lace and silk and paper and fake pearls. And everyone, and i mean everyone, wore all black. Freaky (i even partially complied).

After the 2 hour ceremony all the first and second grade students and teachers lined up outside to say goodbye to the third years. There were two rows of students, a huddle of teachers near the entry-way, and the school band playing just inside the main doors to the school. It was a love-fest as all the third years came out sobbing, flowers in hand, and notes to deliver to friends and teachers (i got quite a few that reminded me how sad i am that they're leaving... unlike the 2nd years they actually can speak english!), some handshakes, and finally i whipped out the hugs. I mean Japan is hardly a society known for hugging and physical affection, but come on, these kids were bawling and red-faced and waving good-bye to me and offering their had and i just couldn't take it. A few of them even know how to hug back :)

Most of the students had disposable cameras too (and mothers standing off to the side with digatal photo cameras AND video cameras) so we took lots of pics. Here are the ones i managed to snag on my own camera. In a few days after students email me ones from their cell phones i might post more. Assuming i dont spend the rest of my life regretting giving my cell-phone info to an entire class of 9th graders. Yikes.

from way back when - hina matsuri and whatnot

So, I'll be the first to admit it, I've been lazy. Here are some details from my life lately and the accompanying pics. I'll try to keep this brief.

Hina Matsuri - On March 3rd we celebrated Girls' Day, or Doll Festival in Japan. For Hina Matsuri all families with daughters set up a display (usually a gift from the maternal grandparents) with many many traditional japanese dolls. There are the 'king and queen' dolls, so to speak, the old-women-serving-sake dolls, the musician-dolls, the old sage-esque men dolls, and more. Plus a carriage, minaiturized dishes and even miniture fake food. They usually also give an offering of real food. My favorite part of the festival is that, while it is supposedly a celebration of girls, the only thing (besides the fact that girls are supposed to like dolls) that actually has anything to do with the daughters is the fable that if you don't put the display away the day after the Hina Matsuri the daughter(s) will not get married. Honestly.

These pics are from the doll display at my friend Keiko's house. They had me over for dinner the friday before the festival and served seasonal specialties (basically anything peach or strawberry flavored) as well as sakura mochi - rice cakes that are sweetened and flavored with cherry blossoms and wrapped in cherry blossom leaves.

We also made special food for the Hina Matsuri the Thursday before hand at the j-gparents. We had omlette chicken rice (basically fried rice with some scrambled eggs) which we shaped into dolls and decorated. It was fabulous. Thats right, i'm 22 and i love any excuse to play with my food.

what else has been going on? Not alot. Some hanging, some chilling, a few trips to the gym, a couple of movies, a haircut and lots of driving places in Shannon's car. Here's a pic of me enjoying a cone of blueberry-gingerbread ice cream before seeing Dreamgirls with Shannon. Oh, and my new haircut. The ice cream - total heaven. The movie - maybe not quite there.

and for absolutely no reason whatsover, other than to increase the randomness of this post, here is a pic of Keiko and I doing purikura ages ago. Now, in case i haven't filled you all in on the wonder that is purikura, its basically a photo booth where for the low cost of $4 you can print out about 30 self-decorated pictures. Woohoo. I'm becomming a pro.

redoutable - another chance to applaud my fabulous j-gparents

So seriously, the best people in the world. Tonight they had me over for din, as per our Thursday routine, and served MEXICAN FOOD. Basically it was fajitas without the tortillas but so good and actually spicy and just some kind of wonderful. Then Tadashi shows off a) his quickly improving english skills (they complement eachother so well - he always knows the english for plants and flowers and places that Yoshiko doesn't) and b) his new dance steps. Sweet.

Then he ran off to his dance class and Yoshiko and i got down to business - sweet potato cake and a discussion of her latest editorial. So we spent an hour talking about the uranium situation in Tehran, active and passive voice in writing, movies, the upcoming presidential election, and her latest read - the autobiography of Hilary Clinton. There is no way in life that i will ever be as cool as Yoshiko.

In other news, my apartment smells like a combination of bleach and kerosene. To some this may seem both obnoxious and dangers, but those are the sad uneducated populus, unfamiliar with the quirks of life in Japan. The kerosene - its the first week of march and after a day of temps in the 60s we're back to frigid japan. The bleach - the beauty of the cold Japanese winter, besides the complete lack of wintry whiteness and life without central heating, is the humidity of the winter. What happens is that the poorly sealed windows and doors let in the humid and cold air outside. Then i turn on the kerosene heater and heat the humid air, which forms condensation on the inside of the windows. Because it doesn't stay warm and because the air always remains humid, the condensation doesn't dry but rather forms mold... not just on the inside of the windows, but really everywhere. Luckily i have finally found the solution to the mold issue: KABI KILLER!!! Woohoo! all i do is take out the spray bottle of super-concentrated bleach solution, spray it all over, pass out on the floor from the fumes, and when i wake up the mold is gone!

So thats my life. Or at least the smells of my life.

For the sake of all that is holy...

How does this happen? Sunday it was gorgeous: sunny, 68 degrees, a gentle breeze, the beginning of ume blossoms on the trees. Nothing could have been better than taking a walk in the late afternoon in light pants and SHORT SLEEVES! Then today i wake up to a mild day - 40 at 7am but really windy. Thus by lunch i was biking to the post office in torrential winds and the beginning of sprinkles. Some how the temp dropped about 10 degrees from 1 to 4 and i somehow wound up biking home in crazy, swirling, painfully cold snow. Its just annoying. The second time it snows in my town EVER and it has to be in March, just when i'm done with winter, ready for Spring weather and spring clothes and spring flowers and spring travel. Come on already, what is this, Wisconsin?