Taiko, Tulips, and Three years!

This past weekend was Ricky and I's three year anniversary! We celebrated by going to festivals. On Saturday there was a Taiko drum festival in Narita. It was really cool, tons of different drum bands from all over the world playing in the streets all over the place. There were mostly taiko drums, but there were also some steel drums, and even some xylophones.


Sunday was the tulip festival here in Sakura. It celebrates the 300th year of the friendsip between Japan and Holland. Amsterdam and Sakura are sister cities so there is a big windmill here and the plant like 130,000 tulips. It is beautiful and you can dig up 6 tulips for 500円 (that is like $5). So we dun up some tulips and ate lot of fair food. Yummy yummy!

Hanami and Penis festival

So this weekend marks the end of the Sakura (cherry blossom) season in our area of Japan. The sakuras were beautiful and the weather has been beautiful! Last weekend I went with friends into Tokyo for some shopping and to see the sakura at Ueno park. We had a lovely day of Sakuras, swan boats, goldfish, and FEVER! (don't ask, we spent way too long in an arcade playing medal games:) Unfortuniately Ricky has to work on Saturdays so he missed all fun.

On Sunday we went to Yokohama for a the Kanamara Matsuri aka Penis festival. Apparently it is a shinto religious festival the is supposed to help with fertility. You can look it up on Wikipedia. It was a very interesting event. When we got there, there was a parade of groups of men and one group of transsexuals carrying giant penises down the street. Good weekend! more to come later

How to make okinamiyaki

Okinamiyaki is a Japanese "anyway-you-like-it" pancake. To make okinamiyaki you will need:

flour
water
egg
cabbage
green onion
carrots

and any other ingredients that you like. It can be made with seafood, pork, beef or even chicken.





Start by mixing a slurry of flour and water

Add your chosen ingredients. We like cabbage, carrots, bean sprouts, onion, dried mini shrimp, shrimp (frozen is okay) green onion, and mushrooms.

Add an egg and mix it all together.

In a frying pan or an electric skillet make a thick "pancake".

Cook a few minuets on each side or until they are brown on both sides.

Top with okinamiyaki sauce (much like BBQ sauce), mayonnaise, fish flakes, and nori (seaweed) flakes.


EAT!

Weekend in Nilkko

Well this weekend is the last weekend that Ricky and I were both not going to be working on Saturday and Sunday so to celebrate we decided to spend the weekend in Nikko. Nikko is a fairly historic town about 3 hours north of Sakura. We left on Saturday morning and took the train up. It was colder there, and they was still snow on the ground even though it was sunny the entire weekend. We stayed at a famous Western style hotel that opened in the mid 1800's called the Nikko Kanaya Hotel. It was a huge, beautiful hotel and I loved it. It reminded me of the hotel from the shining, and it even had old black and white photo's of fancy dress balls from the 20's up on the walls. Our room was really nice too, it had beds with real mattresses! and the best part was the big windows with a beautiful view of the mountains, the river, and the garden below.

On Saturday, after we settled into our hotel, we did some sightseeing. First we saw the Sacred Bridge, and then we walked along the river and found some smaller shrines and a huge graveyard. Things in Nikko close really early so afterwards we just took a walk around the part of town where we were staying and the decided to eat dinner at the hotel. Dinner was delicious. They had a French restaurant in the hotel and I ate veal cordon-bleu style and Ricky had pork milanesa. After dinner we relaxed in a private onsen that was in the hotel and then went for drinks in the bar there. We went to bed pretty early after watching Star Wars I in Japanese (hey it is good in any language).

Sunday we got up early and went for breakfast at the bakery that was owned by our hotel. We took a bus across the famous zig-zag road across the mountains that took us to the Kegon Waterfalls. You take an elevator over 100m up through the bedrock to get to the bottom of the falls. The day was warm and sunny and the falls were beautiful, unfortunately we couldn't stay long because we needed to catch the bus back to the Toshogu shrines. After taking the bus back across the other zig-zag road we made our way to the various shrines that Nikko is famous for. Toshogu is the most famous of the shrines and it is known for the 3 monkeys (hear no evil, see no evil, and speak no evil), the 3 Buddhas, the sleeping cat, and the crying dragon.

Overall it was an awesome trip and we were both very sad to leave Nikko, especially the hotel. We will definitely be going back!

Ricky's 1st Post!

Hello everyone! I know all you followers are dying to read about our new adventures. This is actually my first blog post! So tell me how you like it or if you have any suggestions! Here is Anpanman which is a very famous cartoon character for children here:Just thought you'd like to know...

Well this past weekend was quite eventful. On Saturday we went to Costco. Yes, it was amazing. We bought even more taco seasoning, bread, black beans, re-fried beans (we like fiber), Doritos Hint of Lime chips (to go with the beans) and English black tea. It was a good trip and well worth the trek there.

Sunday was a very happy day for Erin and I...we received a bit of heaven
above in the shape of a cat. We named her Nezumi (meaning "mouse" in Japanese). We decided to change the name from her previous misnomer, Birdie. Which, if you ask me, is a silly name. She was quick to warm up to us but recently she has been a bit chatty at night. But we can see the potential and she will make a good substitute for Leloo. We are fostering her for now and she is up for adoption at www.japacancatnet.com.

Monday was also an interesting day. Erin, Joe, Jenn, Sean and I all went to a historical town named Sawara. Many of the old houses and buildings have been persevered; which is uncommon here as older
houses around 50 years old or so are usually torn down. It was neat to see all the old style homes. The town also has a nice river running through it. After a hasty lunch, we all departed and went off to work.

Today has been somewhat boring. I was going out on my bike to explore more of Sakura but it seems that the Good-Luck-Riding-a-Bike God was not with me since my tire tube exploded when I accidentally ran over a pothole. It is going to cost about ¥2,500 (around $28US). It was an awkward effort trying to get the bike shop mechanic to understand what I was wanting. But everything was figured out and I am getting my bike back in about 15 minutes from now. Good thing the shop is about 20 steps from the apartment...

Well I hope you enjoyed my first post and we will be sure to update more often. Tomorrow is Erin's birthday so I am sure we will have fun pictures to come.

Shopping and Earthquakes

Well so far we have experienced two earthquakes in Japan. They were both in the morning, but the first one was really weak. I thought Ricky was shaking in the bed and I was about to tell him to stop, but then I realized it was just an earthquake. The second one was this morning and it was stronger than the first. It woke us up... and then rocked us back to sleep:)

This weekend was awesome. We went shopping at Carrefour, which is a french supermarket. It was really nice. We ate Italian food. All you can eat pasta, salad, drinks, bread, and desserts!! yummy yummy. Then we bought some taco shells and taco seasoning, crusty bread, and two kinds of cheese! Ricky also found two nice work shirts. Today we went to LalaPort which is a HUGE mall. It was really really nice with tons of stores. I got lots of work clothes, two pairs of pants, two shirt, two sweaters, a cardigan, three pairs of socks, and an undershirt. Ricky got some work pants, socks, and work shoes FINALLY. Sucessful day overall.

Weekend Ski Trip

So this weekend Ricky, Lulu, Justin and I went to Gala to go skiing. It was a really nice setup when you got off the train the ski rentals and locker rooms were adjoined to the station. Then you took the gondola up to the slopes. Once we got up there we decided to go up and take one of the beginning slopes to warm up. So when we got to the top there was a sign that said easiest slope and had an arrow, so that is the one Ricky and I tried. As it turns out the arrow was pointing to another slope further to the right and we really did an intermediate slope... oops! Well long story short it was really hard and we fell, me more than Ricky. Anyway I have a lot of bruises to show for it. After that we found the beginners slopes and that was way better.

Today was a good day too. We slept in really late! and when we got up we went to lunch at Coco's a fern bar type restaurant. I had a taco salad and chicken quesadillas they were so good!! yea Mexican food! Then we went to Beisie, which is sort of like Wal-Mart. There we found a portable region free DVD player it was perfect and it was on sale.

After we got home the postman came with a package that Ricky's parents had sent us. They sent thermal clothes for Ricky, toothpaste, toothbrushes, gummy worms, gummy bears, deodorant, yellow rice, soup, grape jelly, and some other things too. Very nice and thank you very much Leyva's!

We finally have internet!!

So it has been a really long time since I have been able to update since we haven't had internet for about 6 weeks. Well we had a really nice Christmas here. On Christmas eve we went to the National History museum of Japan which is here in Sakura. It was really nice but very big. It had five different exhibit halls of different time periods in Japan and it took us so long to go through them all! Luckily there was an audio tour that was in English so we knew what we were looking at. Afterward we went back to the house with Jennifer and her sister had had some delicious Christmas cake and played the wii:) After that Ricky and I opened our presents. I got a new duvet cover and pillow cases for the bed, a new kitchen knife, and Japanese style socks. Ricky got a red Swiss army knife and a Japanese T-shirt. On Christmas day we went into Tokyo to see the Christmas lights. We went to the area around Tokyo station first but there were not many lights there. Then we went to Ebisu which is part of Tokyo and they had beautiful lights and next we went to Roppongi. That is an area of Tokyo where a lot of foreigners live and Tokyo tower is there too. Tokyo tower is the Eiffel tower of Tokyo and it was really nice with all the different color lights on it,

For new years we went back to Roppongi with some friends and went to a bar and a club there to countdown the end of the year and ring in the new one. It was a really good night until we were heading home. Usually from Sakura to Tokyo we take an express train. However, since the trains do not usually run past midnight and they were only running because of the new year only a local train was running which stops at least 20 times more than the rapid. Long stoy short it took us 3 1/2 hours to get home!

After the new year I returned to work as normal. All my classes are going really well so far and I like most of my students. The kids classes are fun because we get to play a lot and they learn really quickly, and the adults always have interesting stories and good advice about Japan. Ricky has been doing more PR event and teaches every Thursday in a town Goi because the teacher who was there had a stroke over the vacation. He will begin his real job at the end of February working for the other ALS school in Sakura.

Last weekend was really fun. We went to Tokyo to see Sumo!! It was really exciting and even though some of the wrestlers weighted as much as 500 lbs. they were still so quick and flexible! It was amazing they could all lift their legs higher in the air than I ever could. Afterward we went bowling and to an all-you-can eat shabu-shabu resturant. It was delicious and we all ate far to much.
Well not to much else has happened. We got the internet and payday was this week so it has been a good week so far. Tomorrow we have to wake up really early to go to a PR event so it will be a long day!