Christmas Day 2014

Spending Christmas away from home feels strange. 2014 was my second time to do it, and this time I had to work on Christmas Day! I'm not really sure why because there was nothing there for me to do, but Christmas isn't really a holiday in Japan. It's more just for couples. I put chocolates on everyone's desks in the staff room at work and asked to use a bit of my paid leave for the afternoon.

In the evening I went round to Anita's house with Ana, where we were going to have some traditional Japanese Christmas food - KFC and cake! Every year in December people reserve their Christmas box of KFC chicken, and then queue up to pick it up at Christmas. Apparently, (according to Wikipedia) this started in 1974 when KFC started promoting their Christmas Party Bucket.

Me and Anita went to pick up our box at the nearby KFC. We also got beer, mikan (satsumas, because winter), After Eights (because I missed Christmas at home), and Ferrero Rocher (because I had some left over from giving them out at school).

We also picked up a Japanese Christmas cake, which is much better than our fruity British Christmas cake. Normally Japanese Christmas cake is sponge cake with cream and strawberries on, but we went for a chocolatey version.

So I spent my first Christmas in Sendai with these two :)

Kappabashi 2015

Kappabashi or "kitchen town" is an area that specialises in kitchen goods and everything needed in restaurants. They also sell lots of the wax and plastic food that you see outside of so many restaurants. It's withing walking distance of the temples in Asakusa. Even if you're not buying anything it's fun to look at all the plastic food and some shops sell kits for you to make your own.

In the shops there are all sorts of plastic food models: Italian food, sushi, ramen, rice bowls, nabe, ice cream, drinks, key rings with food on, vegetables, pizza, burgers, sweets, cakes. If a shop or restaurant sells the food, you can probably find plastic models of it here.

Being within walking distance of the temples I went for a quick walk down Nakamise shopping street (that road always reminds me of the school trips I went on to Tokyo). In the afternoon I went shopping in the shopping centre around the base of SkyTree. I still haven't been up the tower, I will at some point.

The next day I met Kaori in Yokohama. We used to live next door at Global House in ICU during my year abroad. So we hadn't seen each other for a few years. It was nice to catch up after so long, and hopefully we will again soon whether it's in Japan, New York, England or somewhere else in Europe.

The yummy matcha cake and matcha latte at Nana's Green Tea

Hirosaki 2016

Hirosaki 弘前 (Part 2 of my weekend in Aomori)
Hirosaki is famous for its castle, which is beautiful during the cherry blossom season. However, in 2015 the castle was moved to a nearby site for construction to the castle walls. This happens every 100 years. It's particularly impressive because the castle is moved whilst it is fully intact!

 

On my way over to the castle park, I stumbled upon a Yosakoi dance festival. This is a traditional type of dance that you see at festivals all over Japan. There were lots of dance teams performing in different parts of the city.

After watching the dancing I went to see the castle and the surrounding gardens. Neaby the park, I visited Neputa Mura, another museum about the Neputa festival and other loacal specialities. Some staff members taught me a rhythm on the big festival taiko drums and then we played them together. Around the museum there were shamisen performances, craft corners where you could have a go at making some local crafts, and decorations from the Neputa Matsuri festival.
 I had a local set meal at the museum's restaurant. It included: kenoshiru - a miso based soup with carrots, radish, konnyaku, burdock and tofu; kaiyaki miso - white fish, scallops, tofu, onion and egg cooked in a scallop shell; rice; and pickles.

After dinner I walked around the Fujita Memorial Gardens. I stopped in a Japanese house for matcha tea and a sweet to enjoy while looking out over the gardens.

On my way back to Hirosaki Station I caught the end of the Yosakoi festival where someone from each dance group was lined up along a road, waving their giant team flags to music.

Aomori 2016

Aomori 青森 (Part 1 of my weekend in Aomori)
Rokkonsai is a festival started in 2011 after the earthquake and tsunami, as a way to lift the Tohoku region's spirits. The main parade at the festival features 6 of the region's festivals, one from each prefecture:

• Sendai Tanabata
• Fukushima Waraji Matsuri
• Yamagata Hanagasa Festival
• Akita Kanto Festival
• Aomori Nebuta Festival
• Morioka Sansa Odori

In 2016 the festival was held in Aomori City, so I decided to head up to visit.
When I arrived I picked up some apple pie from the festival street food stalls, as Aomori is famous for apples. I watched some live music in Aoiumi Park by the bay before heading to Nebuta Warase, a museum dedicated to Aomori's festival, the Nebuta Matsuri. The museum shows the atmosphere and history of the festival. It also shows the structure of some of the floats used during the parade.
During this festival, which happens in early August, enormous colourful floats are pulled along the streets. They are all built by local teams and businesses. Some of them can be about 5 metres tall. After seeing a smaller version of the Nebuta Matsuri at Rokkonsai, I hope I can go to see the full festival sometime.
I walked to one of the main streets for the festival where people were starting to sit along the side of the road to watch the festival. There were so many people, but I managed to find a space to sit where I would be able to see.

Akita Kanto Festival - The people holding up all of these lanterns were balancing them on their heads, noses and backs.

Morioka Sansa Odori - The largest taiko drum festival in the world.

Sendai Tanabata Festival - ...is hard to show in a parade, as it is made of big decorations throughout the city. Sendai had suzume odori dancers in this Rokkonsai parade. This is the city's traditional dance, using fans. One of the Sendai Assistant language teachers made it into the Sendai official dance group.

Fukushima Waraji Matsuri - They are carrying a huge waraji traditional straw sandal.

Yamagata Hanagasa Festival - Dances with conical hats with local flowers on. (This picture was taken earlier in the day, when I could get a better shot.)

And of course the Nebuta Matsuri!

After the festival, I joined the crowds heading back to the station, where I took the train over to Hirosaki. I then headed to my chosen manga cafe, called Super Freaks.

My booth at the manga cafe.

It had a soft flat floor which extended under the desk. On the desk, there is a computer and a TV.

ALT life: English boards

Like most ALTs in Japan, I had an English board at my Junior High School. I tried to keep mine updated about once a month. It felt like a good opportunity to chat to teachers and students. Often when teachers were walking past they asked me questions about the theme of the board. I had conversations with the tea lady about Christmas, breakfast around the world and other international topics. When students saw me updating the board, some would stop to say hi or try out some English.

Here are some of my boards:

 My first English board! 

Post cards, map and photos. I think I added a small self introduction about a week later with basics like "My name is Becci." "I'm from England." "I like....." etc.

Hallowe'en!  

Lots of pictures and some photos of my past halloween costumes.

 Bonfire night!

Trying to explain this one during class, in basic English that the kids might understand, was a challenge. 

"We make a man" "We make a fire"......"We burn the man....."??

Students: 「怖い！！」　 Scary! 

Not in the photo, but just underneath this I posted info about the city wide English comic contest. The poly pocket at the side is full of blank comic sheets for the students to take and draw their own English comics.

 Christmas!!

I made lots of Christmas tree, stocking and circle shapes in Christmas colours before class.

 Depending on the year group, they had to write 1 sentence on their card. The best ones went on the board.

"For Christmas I want a..." "Next year I will..." "Next year I want to..." etc.

Lots of the students seemed to write about boyfriends and money.

(I've made this one big so you can read what some of the students wrote)

 New Year!!

Pictures and a few pictures of New Year in different countries

 This board was a bit of everything. 

It was the start of a new year so I put a welcome message to the new first years, and welcome back messages for everyone else. I put a small self introduction at the bottom. At the top there is a bit about Easter and St Georges Day. 

I made a post box out of a cereal box and red card, with little explanations in English and Japanese. I got so many letters from the students. Most students wrote one letter that I replied to. But there were a few students who wrote loads of letters to me. At the end of the year I gave the students who wrote the most letters little gifts. 

On the bottom left there is a small magazine made by ALTs in Sendai. I added the latest copy every month, so there were lots to read by the end of the year.

 In my second year I started having regular themes on my board. I kept the post box and the ALT English magazine at the bottom.

At the bottom of the board there is an American/British English poster. On the front of each flap there is the American word and picture. Underneath there is the British word and Japanese word.

At the top there is the round the world section. This month I featured breakfast.

Advent Calendar!!

I put up different coloured cards with numbers up to 24 on them. On the back I put a different feature of Christmas. Every day I turned over a different card. 

Christmas pudding, German markers, dinner, lights, crackers, advent calendars, cards, reindeer, mince pies, pie for Santa and carrot for Rudolf, hot Christmas in Australia, Queen's speech, pantomime, mistletoe, Nativity plays, carols, New Year fireworks, tree, The Snowman, Santa, presents, chocolate log, Christmas stockings, Christmas Eve

 I started adding a words in different languages section too, with the katakana pronunciation underneath. (Hopefully I researched that section correctly for the languages I don't know..)

I started adding a themed vocab list in the bottom left. 

My favourite part was the white board and pens. Picked up for 100 yen. Every few weeks I wrote a new question.

One kid wrote "I am God's chaild." O.O

Yokohama 横浜 Jan 2012

When I originally made this blog I was still too busy being a student to keep this up to date, but now I'm trying to go back and write about some of the cool places I visited the various times I lived in Japan. Writing about something I did 5 years ago (wow! really 5 years?!??) might mean that I miss some stuff and end up coming back to these posts later as I remember things.

Yokohama 横浜 Chinese New Year

The time of year that we went meant we had accidentally timed our visit perfectly for New Year celebrations and parades. When we arrived we went straight to the China Town area. There were so many people! We tried on some of the Lion dance heads, then made our way through the busy streets with strings of lanterns overhead to where the parade would take place.

After watching the parade we went to Kantei-byo temple, just off the street where the parade had been. It seemed much more colourful and elaborately decorated than a lot of temples I'd visited. 

  In the evening we headed over to the Minato mirai area to see the skyline and take a few purikura.