It worked! I made some persimmon and rice pudding, adapted from some stove-top rice pudding recipe I discovered somewhere on the vast internet sea. This means it's time for another recipe post!
Persimmony Rice Pudding (Adapted from some recipe somewhere else that had no persimmons in it at all)
Ingredients:
3/4 cup White Rice, uncooked (If you can get your hands on it, I highly suggest mochi rice, as it's texture lends itself best to rice pudding)
1 1/2 cup Water
2-3 ripe Persimmons (Note that if the persimmon is somewhat dark inside and has a lot of grainy-looking dark spots, this is actually a good thing. This is actually an indicator that it is ripe.) *Edit: After a second go at this, I would say that three normal-sized persimmons or four small-sized persimmons are good, plus an extra persimmon for garnish.
2 cups of milk (You will use 1 1/2 cup and 1/2 cup separately)
1/3 cup Granulated sugar
1/4 tsp Salt
1 Egg, beaten
1 Tbsp Butter (I'm tempted to say that butter is optional, but I haven't tried it without, so I can't say for certain)
Optional Ingredients (I do not recommending using these all together, they are each their own variation):
1/2 tsp Vanilla (optional)
1/2 tsp Ginger root (optional)
Nutmeg
1/4-1/3 cup Raisins
Directions:
Peel, deseed and cut one or two persimmons into small cubes. Whether you use one or two depends on how strong you want the flavor to be. Either way should taste good.
Mash the persimmon. You may use whichever method to do this you prefer. I use a mortar and pestil, but I realize that this is a long and tedious process that many people do not have the time or patience for. That, and many people don't own a mortar and pestil. You can also use a food processor or a blender. Whatever makes it look like orange slime works. *Optional step: If you are adding ginger to this recipe and you are using fresh ginger root, add it here and get it all properly mashed up along with the persimmon.
In a pot or saucepan that you think can handle 4 or more cups of this stuff, bring the water to a boil. Add the rice and mashed persimmon. Reduce the heat and allow it all to simmer for 20 minutes.
Stir up the rice mixture. Add 1 1/2 cups of milk, salt and sugar. Stir and cook over medium heat until it is thick and creamy. This may take another 20 minutes, it may not. It all depends on how cooperative your mixture feels. *Optional step: If using raisins, add them here. I abhor cooked raisins, so I will never be using this step. But some people like them, so this step is for those people. If you are using powdered ginger, add that here as well.
Slowly stir in the leftover 1/2 cup of milk and the beaten egg. This is more important for the egg than for the milk, as the egg will start cooking immediately and you want to get it as evenly mixed into the pudding as possible. Also, you may wish to turn down the heat a little at this point, so as to keep the pudding from popping out at you.
Continue cooking for another two minutes while you STIR CONTINUOUSLY. Don't stop. Really.
Remove from heat and stir in the butter. *Optional step: If you are using vanilla, now is the time to add it.
Dish the pudding up. Peel, seed and cut up your second (or third) persimmon into small pieces (strips, cubes, little hearts...you choose!) and place them on top as garnish or put them in a bowl for people to add as much or as little as they want to their own pudding. Heck, do both! *Optional step: If you are using nutmeg, sprinkle it sparingly over the top of each serving before adding the persimmon garnish.
That's it! This recipe should feed at least five people. Unless you eat a whole, freaking lot. In which case, shame on you! You should have saved some for the others!
Dinner itself was a mishap (a delicious mishap, but a mishap nonetheless), but that was due to my being distracted by the pudding when I should have taken some noodles off the burner, resulting in some very mushy yakisoba. Mmmm...mushy yakisoba.....
We've been eating a lot of new things, here and there, in addition to the plethora of things we've eaten in past trips to Japan and foods available in the US. Today, I'm going to tell you about some of the fruits we have here.
To the right are two fruits we have in the house right now. The one on the left should be easy to recognize. It's an apple. For the most part, apples are the same in Japan as they are in much of the rest of the world. This particular type of apple is usually used by the Japanese around festival time to make candied apples. The fruit on the right is a persimmon. There are several different kinds of persimmon, some of which need to be overripe before they are edible. Luckily for us, the Japanese tend to put things in stores when they are exactly ripe (except for tomatoes, which are usually sold frustratingly under-ripe).
Oh! I should put something in there so you can tell the sizes of these fruits. How's that? I bought a persimmon a few weeks back, just as they were getting in season. I ended up mashing it to a pulp and throwing it into a beef roast. It was pretty good! We got two more persimmons from one of Nat's coworkers (and our neighbor), so we just ate those plain. Then she gave us three more, along with some mandarin oranges. We ate all of the mandarins and I have plans for our current persimmons. Secret plans! If they work, I shall reveal all at a later date.
For those curious about the flavor of a persimmon, it's very sweet. When properly over-ripe, it's almost too sweet and can be used as a substitute for sugar in many recipes. When not eating the raw fruit, the Japanese sometimes dry it and eat it as a candy or as a sugar substitute. When under-ripe, it can be rather sour, due to its high tannin content. While some foods are lauded for the health benefits of their tannin content, persimmons have a bit too much and are best avoided until they ripen up quite a bit. After all, tannic acid is named because it was used in leather tanning. I think you might imagine what an immoderate amount might do to your stomach. If you've ever considered eating acorns, be aware that these are also reported to have a high tannin content and must go through a process to leech the tannins before they are good to eat. One or two probably won't hurt you, though (I used to eat an occasional acorn on the school playground as a child).
Back to the subject of Nat's coworkers giving us fruit, another coworker gave us some Japanese pears around the beginning of the month. Apparently, he had a surplus of FREAKING HUGE and insanely delicious Japanese pears. If we get more, I will smear a slice all over my computer screen in hopes that you guys will get a chance to taste them. Just thinking of people half a world away licking their computer screens wants me to try it right now.
Yes, I know it doesn't work that way, but a wild imagination has to get some use every now and again.
I guess that last picture might not really help you understand the actual size of the persimmon. The spoons in our house don't really come in sizes most of us from the States are used to.
Perhaps, I meant that you might want a better understanding of the size of the apple. That's right. We have miniature apples. Japan has normal-sized apples, too. These were just in the store for the festival season. As I mentioned above, these apples are typically candied (like American candied apples, only smaller...and sometimes different colored candy, like blue). I originally thought they were plums when I saw them at the grocery store. The price looked good, so I picked them up and noticed that they were, in fact, not plums. The novelty was too exciting to pass up, so we've been eating miniature apples for the past week. After some research, I discovered that Japan was not the only country with miniature apples. France also has a cultivar or two. So do some other countries, but I never got around to finishing my research. They taste like your average apple (as in, not any of those specific apples, like Red Delicious, Granny Smith or Gala; they just taste like "apple"). They're not incredibly filling, but a good snack for tiding one over until mealtime. Likely, they're going to be out of stores soon, if they aren't already. The demand for them in Japan appears to be extremely seasonal.
Nat pretty much said most of what I'd say about our day for the most recent kimono festival. It was all pretty fun. Nat didn't get a chance to record some of the more amazing fireworks, though if you watch her videos closely, you might catch a glimpse of one of the kitty-face fireworks or one that looks suspiciously like a pair of glasses. We also had smiley-face fireworks, bunny-face fireworks and a few that looked like sunflowers, the Yosano town flower. It was pretty amazing!
For the past few weeks, Nat's been trying to get a good picture of the spiders around here. We finally got a one. While I was hanging clothes out to dry, I snapped a couple photos of one that's been hanging around on our balcony. To best see the image, you should probably click on it for a better view. That way, you can see all of her stripes and colors! This spider has been back there for almost as long as we've been living here. Her web survived the typhoon we had (which is pretty amazing!). She's about as large, if not larger, than the size of the palm of my hand, if you count the legs. In this picture, she is busy trying to remove one of Nat or my stray hairs. It must have drifted over from the clothesline.
She is a jorō-gumo, also called a golden orb-web spider or nephila clavata (for those who like to know all those specifics). Like many of the prominent animals in Japan, there is folklore associated with them. Supposedly, these spiders can turn into beautiful women who attract and eat men. Those two bulbous bits in her web are her stinkbug victims. I imagine one of the two is the retarded stinkbug I rescued three times from unrelated fates. Also, in this and the next photo, you can see our neighbors' rooftops! They're made of stone or clay tiles. Some people even buy metal tiles, nowadays, but the traditional tiles are still used on the older houses.
You should probably click on this next picture for a better view as well. This picture gives you a slightly better idea of how big the spider and her web are (hint, her web extends past the sides and top of the picture). You can also see the remains of yet another stinkbug.
While I'm at it, here's a picture of the laundry. Amazingly, you can't even see the spider or her web from this distance (she's in that far corner there). I had often wondered how the bugs manage to fly into such obviously enormous webs. This somewhat convinces me that spiders aren't just preying on stupidity.
Now we just need to snap a photo of some suzumebachi (giant hornets),an oniyanma (giant dragonfly) and one of the various giant cicadas and we'll have a giant Japanese bug collection started! I guess there are also the stag beetles, dung beetles and such to take photos of, but we haven't seen them yet. Also, it's getting cold enough that we may not see more beetles for a while.
This next picture (the one to the left) is one of our nearby rooftops. Most of them have some sort of decoration like this in the top corners. This is a more simple and common one. Some of the more ornate buildings and castles have statuettes of fish on the corners to ward away fires.
That's it for now. No new and exciting recipes to share. We shouldn't have any more festivals to worry about for at least another month or so.
Well, this has been a fun week. The beginning of the week was quiet, because the kids were all home with swine flu. Everyone but the third graders, anyway.
I put up a huge construction paper Jack and Sally from Nightmare Before Christmas in the English room. I haven't taken a picture of it yet, but I will, and when I do I shall post it. Thursday I went to Ishikawa elementary, and Friday I went to Iwataki elementary. (And had school lunch again. Whee!)
Now, these two elementary schools are soooo different. Ishikawa is very small, and only has one class per grade. The children are polite and sweet, and always help me to understand them. They're very well-behaved, but still very vivacious kids. Iwataki elementary is very BIG, there are three classes per grade. The kids are rowdy and raucous. The three boys who always scream after me when I'm on my bike going home are in this school. The teachers are more strict with them, and every time I come out of class, the school secretary asks me very sternly if any of the students asked me any inappropriate questions. I have no idea, because I can hardly ever understand their Japanese. When I ask them to slow down or tell them I can't understand, they stare at me and then run away. But they're back two minutes later with another question. Both are adorable in their own way. XD
Friday night we went out for karaoke with some visitors from Yosano's sister city, Aberysthwyth, Wales. (I think. Welsh! OI.) The karaoke machine was old and kept screeching. I thought I sounded awful (I sang "Blackbird" by the Beatles and "LoveFool" by the Cardigans and I don't remember what else) but Alex said I sounded great...husband filter? :3
Saturday was a day to shop. Toshiko came by and took us to K-Stanky where we FINALLY got our new printer/scanner and I bought a new camera! It's so cute! I love it! And it was on super sale. So you'll be seeing a lot more pictures from here on out since this new one is a ton more portable (and comes with a rechargeable lithium battery pack instead of having to change out AA's all the time. <3). style="font-style: italic;">Chirimen Kaido Kimono Matsuri, or the Silk Road Kimono Festival. Yosano is famous for its special type of crepe silk, so this was all about that. Yay!
PICTURE TIME LULZ
First, we went to a rich silk merchant's house from the 1800s that had been kept in very good condition. Yay for really old-style Japanese houses!
This is one of the kimonos worn by one of the owners of the house. His surname was "Tsuru" which is Japanese for "Crane." The little white circles on the back and sleeves have cranes in them. Yay for cranes!
This room had a lot of really neat decorative screens and stuff. But I won't bore you with every single picture I took.
There's a bit of the deer-decorated shoji sliding door in this picture, and the entrance to the house. And some tatami mats. Yay tatami mats!
Here's the other side of the deer screen. Yay for deer? Again? There were also some beautifully decorated closet doors. Everything is painted very ornately in this house.
Here is the garden that is bordered by the guest rooms. This little garden is specifically for guests to use. There's a bigger one in the middle of the house (the house is shaped like a two-story square ring) but this one was so cool I just had to take a picture. I love Japanese lanterns and stuff.
This is all of us sitting in the room upstairs together! We are, in order from left, (I don't know), Myeko, Aberysthwyth person, Alex, me, Kimiko, and (I don't know). Ambiguity is fun!
Look! Look! The sliding doors had baby chick handles! HOW ADORABLE IS THAT!? I don't have much to say but I love it.
Okay. There were at least two bathrooms in this house. These two pictures are both of Japanese baths. The one on the left is embedded in the ground. It's kind of small around, but it's very deep. My dad, who's pretty tall, would probably be able to sit in it and have water coming up to his chin.
The second is another type (probably older) of bath style - an outer bath. Notice the little stool to help you get in it, and the cover that keeps the water warm so multiple people can use it in succession. Before you get grossed out, remember - the Japanese don't wash in the bath. They wash thoroughly BEFORE getting in the bath, because they keep in mind that other people will want to use it after them. The bath is just for relaxing.
Here is a bridal palanquin. In olden times (the Edo period) Japanese brides were delivered to their husbands' family's estate in these thingies on the rejoicing shoulders of their servants and/or families. It kind of looks like a crunch to me.
It brings a whole 'nother meaning to 'mail order bride', doesn't it?
Here's one half of a traditional old Japanese kitchen! Note the sake bottle, baskets, etc. That's actually a really old sink in the picture.
What you can't see, is that hanging above was a kind of water spout, and there was a pump off to the side and on the floor. There was a pulley system that, when you pressed the pump, it would pump water up and through the spout, and water would fall from above into the sink for use.
And here's the stove!
As you can see, it kind of looks like a brick oven. But the doors underneath are for burning wood, and weren't used as ovens at all. They were more just for heating the 'stovetop' above.
The circular parts on top with the wooden lids are for rice. They're actually pretty deep, and the stick-spoon thing on top is an old fashioned rice paddle.
The wooden box thing is a steamer, for fish and vegetables.
And that's Kimiko over in the corner. Hiiiiii, Kimiko!!
Once we got out of the house we got to (had to) take a picture with the Kimono Queens, who just happened to be on their way in. They're all wearing the long sleeved furisode that practically scream "I'm brightly colored, female, and single!"
My shirt is pooched weird. Ugh.
But Alex sure is cute!!
Then, we went to this place; another traditional Japanese residence that was attached to a Buddhist temple, for an informal tea ceremony. We drank matcha, which is sweet, creamy green tea that is whisked until frothy. I really like matcha. It's goooood.
Also, curiously, there were CD's hanging on long strings from the roof of the shrine. Alex and I curiously looked at them for a while before asking Myeko what they were for. She answered "To scare off the birds." Genius!!! At very least, birds that are more interested in shiny things would smack into those instead of the windows.
There were a handful of street performers around, and I wanted to get a picture of them. So of course, when I say anything (or even make the motion of raising my camera to my face) the camera is immediately taken from me and I am shoved into the picture that I had really rather been candid, with hapless Alex dragged behind. This type of entertainment is called Chin-don-ya and consists of people dancing playing and chanting in the streets. Apparently it was an old form of advertisement, actually. This troupe came from Osaka, it seems, to perform at the Kimono Festival. See the look on my face? WE ARE NOT AMUSED.
One of the big events of the kimono matsuri was the kimono parade. It's where, aptly, all the people who wore kimono parade slowly down the silk road, with the Chin-don-ya people blaring and dancing in front. Everyone behind them got to shuffle behind slowly in their geta, or traditional Japanese sandals (the ones that KILL). The Aberysthwyth (sp!? Whatevs) people also were put into kimono and haplessly walked by.
HERE IS A VIDEO. HA HA HA HA HA.
This was the beginning of the parade. You can hear the Chin-don-ya people playing, and at the beginning was a troupe of people dressed as if for a traditional old Japanese wedding, with all sorts of old costumes. The two ladies at the end are Toshiko and Kimiko. The conversation was basically Kimiko protesting that I was taking video and me playfully responding that she wasn't allowed to protest since they made me take the picture with the Chin-don-ya. XD
Hey look! Lots of people in kimono!
There were a lot of gorgeous kimono today, but it was a lot colder. A lot more people are seen here in their fall and winter kimono; not as many bright colors as usual. In fact, I think the only people I saw wearing bright colors were the UK kids....hrm.
This is Yuuko, posing alongside a giant, anthropomorphic grain of rice.
Yes, the grain of rice is wearing a kimono.
Oh Japan.
Hey look! Some classic cars!
They had these on display too. I'm not really sure why. But hey guys, isn't this cool! Old cars! ...or something.
These two are Toshiko and Junko, who were in the video. This is probably the best picture of Toshiko I could have asked for. She's definitely an Enneagram type 7. Anyway, Toshiko and Kimiko are both in our eikaiwa group, along with Junko from before. Toshiko is boisterous and fun. Her English is fantastic, and she loves to tease me about everything. Kimiko is much more gentle-natured and very sweet, but she's a little forgetful, frequently late, and has a 'second stomach' for sweets. :) They and the rest of the group take really good care of us. After we finished at the matsuri, we went home for a little while and then went back out to watch the fireworks over the bay. We saw a lot of my students there and met a couple of the students from Wales, as well. I took two videos of the fireworks, but I'll only subject you to one of them; the first one is easy to find on Youtube (same title, just part 1 instead of 2. :3)
So, Nat has told you about most of what happened at the kimono festival. I get to show you the photos!
This first picture is probably the last one that got taken. It's right outside the house of the family who lent Nat her kimono and helped us put them both on. Everyone remarked on how well Nat's purse from Calabash matched her obi (kimono belt). The men's kimono I'm wearing is technically too small for me (in all dimensions), but was considered good enough. If I were wearing one more properly sized, the collar would have closed a little higher up. I should have also worn a different style of undershirt as that really shouldn't be visible. Also, sitting became awkward. Normally, a kimono shouldn't open in the front just because you sit down. Since mine was too small, I usually ended up holding the fish on my lap to keep the folds in place.
Next is our lunch. Technically, this was most of Nat's lunch (3-11) and part of Maryann's lunch (1 and 2), but Nat didn't get her full lunch in the photo, so this will suffice. I outlined the lunch so you can see how many dishes are actually involved.
1. Mochi covered in red bean paste - This is dessert. We ended up having more for tea later. 2. Tempura fried shrimp and vegetables 3. Chilled soba noodles in...a particular broth intended solely for cold noodles. 4. Dipping sauce for the tempura 5. Sashimi (raw fish). There was some sort of fish that Nat had already consumed by the time she took this, squid and a huge prawn with the head and tail still attached, but the middle was bare meat. Everyone took off the head. 6. Pickles (not pickled cucumbers) 7. A spicy octopus and cucumber salad 8. Soy sauce 9. RICE 10. Green tea 11. Clear soup (with a fish sausage ball and kelp)
A lot of people ended up not finishing their meal for one reason or another. Most people were too full.
After lunch, we ran around and won some prizes. As Nat mentioned, I noticed a tour guide slowly walking up to us on our right. I thought she looked like she was trying to offer to show us around. Since we didn't really need showing around (particularly since Ken, Yuko and Taichi were with us), I looked away and noticed a photographer trying to snap a picture of us from the left. I quickly went back to looking candid. After I looked back, both the photographer and the tour guide were scurrying away. I was amused.
Somewhere during the running around for prizes, we met up with the rest of our group and caught a ferry that did a quick trip through the bay and back. Since this festival requires you to be in a kimono to participate, only people wearing a kimono could ride (yes, even the baby). It was really nice. It's probably hard to tell in this picture, but the obi of the woman second from the left (in the gray kimono) has a playing card pattern on it. It was really fun seeing it. Most kimono and obi have more traditional motifs (though a group of ladies won the award for best obi; their obi were tied and pinned to look like various flowers in the back). While we were on the ferry, a group of seagulls started following us. One even landed on one of the masts. A grandmother started rooting around her grandson's bag for a biscuit to offer the seagulls. Meanwhile, a hawk decided that it wanted a seagull lunch, so it started diving through the flock. The seagulls, never deterred from the prospect of a meal for themselves, continued following the ferry in a more elusive pattern. The grandmother finally found a biscuit and held it high above her head for the seagulls (who were too busy evading the hawk to notice). In the end, the hawk never caught a seagull, the seagulls never got any food, the grandmother resigned to feeding the biscuit to her infant grandson and there were a whole bunch of jellyfish floating in the channel. It was all pretty impressive while it lasted.
This is a group picture. It is not even close to including everyone. The mother and father of the house are not in the photo (as well as some random boy I noticed, peripherally, who was watching TV and did not partake in the festival). Also, we had separated from Ken, Yuko, Taichi and Maryann long before this picture was taken. I don't even know everyone's names. The people I do know are Junko-san (far left; a member of our English conversation group and our driver for the day) and Ai-chan (second from the right in bright red). This is also a perfect example to tell you about different types of kimono. At least ones worn during this time of year. You might notice that Ai-chan is the only one wearing a kimono with long, draping sleeves. This type of kimono is only worn by unmarried women (everyone else in the picture is married, in elementary school, male or a dog). They are typically made with brighter colors and bolder patterns, though a delicate color or pattern is not uncommon. The long sleeves are believed to be more suitable for attracting a male suitor. There are traditional poems and plays saying as much. The bright kimono worn by Ai-chan's cousin (second from the left) is a children's kimono. These kimono have the tendency to have more eye-bleedingly bright colors and more outlandish themes (some young boys' kimono have cowboys on chartreuse), though neither are necessary. Men's formal kimono (like the one I'm wearing), tend to have the most sedate patterns and colors tend to be dark or masculine. Khaki, black, navy, gray, brown and olive green are typical colors for men's kimono. Also, I'm the only one wearing the geta (Japanese sandals) that are elevated with a couple thick strips of wood. This isn't really a men/women thing. These were just the ones available I thought would best fit my feet. But it's also a good way to show you some different kinds of geta. The tabi (toe socks) I'm wearing are technically too small for me as well, but they actually got on my foot. The more traditional tabi I was originally offered...I would have had to cut off my toes to fit into.
Junko-san and Nat.
All in all, it was a lovely day. I guess there was rain either last year or the year before (or both). We were home by 5:00, which somewhat surprised me. The family who helped us put on our kimono live right next to the bay where I walk, sometimes. I had even said hello to the mother and the grandmother on one occasion. It was really fun.
This is a picture of our funeral home neighbors after a storm (perhaps the typhoon, but I don't think it was). There was a brilliant rainbow that Nat caught just as she was getting home from work.
The above says "Komaru ne..." which means "That's worriesome." It's used generally when there's a feeling of impending doom; a little different than being worried properly.
Doom cloud over the school right now.
We sent the first graders home today for swine flu.
Today was the Kimono Festival in Miyazu, right on the Amanohashidate. I took a few pictures so I'll put them up in a later post. It was a lot of fun!
First Junko (from the English Conversation Group - pronounced June-ko) picked us up. She's super sweet. She took us to her friend's house where a bunch of people were putting on kimono. This was a really huge house....the daughter of the house had been Kimono Princess last year, and like...I think they collected them or ran a kimono shop or something, because they had a ton of kimonos. The mother was about the same general size as me, so I wore a pretty black kimono with white butterflies on it, and a pretty dusky purple obi (the wide belt) with a silver and violet tie on it. They put up my hair with these cute pink flower pins and I wore Japanese toe socks. I'm sure I was cuter than I felt.
Japanese sandals are MURDER OH GOD. As I type this post, my feet are crying. Literally crying. I remember the first time I came to Japan I got a cute pair of shoes for my aunt, and now I'm realizing what an awful present that must have been because oh god.
Anyway. There were lots of really cute kimonos today. There was a girl with cute poofy pigtails in an orange and green kimono who I wanted to take a picture of, but she vanished before I could. Later, she won some contest. So I guess a lot of people shared my taste. We walked around a lot, and had lunch at this restaurant all together. (We met up with Yuuko and Taichi and Ken, three of our twentysomething Japanese friends who are all very good at English, at the festival, along with Maryanne, one of the other JETs in the area.) I took pictures of the lunch because it was epic Japanese.
Then when we got out, we were considering what to do next when Alex ('cause I didn't see) noticed a tour guide sneak up alongside us and a photographer sneak up along the other side of us, snap a quick picture of our group (mid-conversation) with the tour guide beside us, and the two of them slunk off. So we'll probably end up in some tour brochure. If I find it I'll scan it for laughs, but...seriously!?
Actually a lot of people were taking pictures of us. It was fun. "Foreigners in Kimono" will be the theme of next month's VOGUE-U.
We rode on a boat...
We got our pictures taken near the rotating bridge...
We drank complimentary green tea and ate mochi (pounded rice cakes - sticky and chewy - with sweet red bean paste on top. It's supposed to make you wise. Oo) and talked with some other JETs we met there.
Uhmmmm....
Oh! There were lotteries and stuff. Last year Holly (the JET who was here before me) won the huge TV we have now. I won a cute little wrap made of local silk for my lunchbox.
Alex won a big honkin' fish.
It was pretty epic. We ended up giving the fish away to Junko, but he carried it all around the festival with him. What a guy!
There was a lottery at the end, too, and I won a soy sauce set, and Alex won some soba noodles, so that'll be fun.
They made me and Alex enter the "couples" kimono contest. I'm glad we didn't win.
The second graders were all sent home for the second half of the day today. We've got a total of five kids who've come down with the swine flu. All the teachers are really paranoid now, because it's come out that it can cause aneurysm, especially in children under 15. Soooooo....yeeeeaaaah...
Alex's farfalle (below) was AWESOME. There was lots so I took the leftovers to school for lunch and ate them smugly while the other teachers drooled. I'm so lucky. <3
I went to elementary school by myself. There's a huge hill that I challenged myself to bike all the way up. It doesn't really LOOK that steep, but it's loooooooong. And winding. I made it about half way and DIED. I was walking the rest of the way up heaving. Something to work up to, I guess.
Elementary school kids really make me feel like I don't know any Japanese. Plus, I forgot my self-intro materials, and my dictionary, AND my school slippers, so I just felt like an all around loser.
But one of the kids ran up to me and we had a conversation that went like this -
Little boy: Natalie-sensei? Me: Hm? Little boy: DYNAMITE!!!!
So, I finally made dinner with my purchases at the import store. I call it creamy pesto farfalle with chicken and broccoli, but the cream sauce and the pesto sauce weren't mixed at all (though you could probably mix them, if you wanted). I messed up a little, but it still turned out alright.
Creamy Pesto Farfalle with Chicken and Broccoli
Ingredients:
Chicken breasts (de-fatted, de-skinned, about as many as you would have people to serve, though larger breasts or smaller eaters may allow for changes)
Farfalle pasta (enough for however many people you're feeding; substitute other pastas as you feel the inspiration)
Pesto
Broccoli (one small head feeds two people...heads in America are rarely "small"; cut into bite-size florets)
Flour
Salt
Black Pepper
Thyme (ground or crushed)
Olive Oil (again, I don't like Extra Virgin since I find it bitter, but you might enjoy it)
1/2 Onion, diced
3 Cloves Garlic, minced (not crushed)
Lemon juice
Shredded parmesan
Cream Sauce:
Butter (I forget exactly how much, maybe half a stick? Salted butter is probably best, but I have no idea what kind I used and it worked fine.)
Flour
Milk
1 Beef or chicken Boullion cube (optional, I didn't use it this time...you'll also need some celery salt if you do this....and, very important, unsalted butter)
Directions:
Tenderize the chicken. If a piece looks like it might be too thick to pan fry, keep a knife, plate and fork handy while you're cooking so that you can cut it into slices near the end.
Start cooking the farfalle according to directions. Add a little olive oil to the water in order to keep the pasta from sticking to the pot while you are busy with the chicken.
Mix flour, salt, thyme and pepper together in a wide dish. Place the chicken breasts in the dish and flop them around until they are well coated with the flour.
Put some olive oil into a frying pan (keep the bottle handy, you may need to add more as the flour will absorb some), heat the pan and add the chicken, onions and garlic. (This is one place I messed up. I sauteed the onions and garlic first, then added the chicken. I ended up burning the onions. Hopefully adding them at this point won't result in failure. )
Turn the chicken fairly often, making sure it doesn't get much more than a golden brown. Somewhere in the middle of cooking, add about a capfull (or half a capfull) of lemon juice over each chicken breast. Add more oil as necessary, since it will absorb into the four and onions. Once the chicken is looking done, feel free to slice open a thicker part of the chicken and check if it is done. If not, slice the chicken appropriately and return to the pan just long enough to finish it up.
At this point, the pasta should be done, so go ahead and drain that.
Refill the pot with just a little bit of water, add the broccoli, cover and place over low heat. Once the broccoli is a bright green, wait half a minute and take it off the heat and drain.
Place the pasta into bowls or onto plates (bowls is probably better, if you have pasta bowls), add the broccoli.
In a sauce pan/pot melt the butter. Once melted, add flour and stir. Once well mixed, add milk (and bouillon cube) and stir until thickened. If it's too thick, add more milk. Remember how much pasta this has to spread amongst. If it looks like you don't have enough, try adding more flour and milk (I've never had to do this, so I don't know if it works. Tell me how it turns out, if you try it!).
Once the sauce is ready, you may either mix in the pesto or add both to the pasta separately.
Slice the chicken into short strips and place on top of the pasta.
If you didn't burn the onions and garlic too badly, drain them and pat them with a paper towel. Add them to the pasta. (Also, please tell me if the alterations in this step worked!)
Add shredded parmesan
Yay!
So, that's that. Even with blackened onion bits, it was delicious.
I'm trying to get myself to post more. In addition to having readers, I know that keeping this blog is the best chance I have of remembering this time. I mean, I have a hard enough time remembering what happened this morning, let alone a year ago.
Ummmmm...so Friday. Friday was Mime Time. I was so freaked out. Japanese people dancing and bouncing around in harlequin outfits. ugghghhghhh.
It was fairly entertaining though. They CAME INTO THE AUDIENCE, however, which caused me and Ms. Matsuda to cling to each other in terror. The whole time they were looking for people to sink their fangs into and drag onto stage to submit to their horrible whims we were murmuring "Kuruna, kuruna, kuruna, kuruna..."which translates to "Don't come here, don't come here" etc. They took Tatesawa-sensei, the popular second grade teacher who lives in the apartment below mine. He's a really nice guy. I felt bad for him, but as soon as they chose him (He was sitting right next to Ms. Matsuda) we looked at each other and said "Sei-fu." (safe.)
They effectively humilated them in front of their peers before sending them back into the crowds, thoroughly humbled by their brief stint in the world of mimery; the memory of the colorful harlequin hats that were forced upon them likely to be repressed in the bowels of subconscious memory for decades and influence how they treat their children.
But I got invited on the class trip to Kyoto!
This weekend I was like "I'm going to make the BEST LUNCH EVAR to bring to Kyoto." so I got to work. I tried to make my mom's rice balls with cheese, but I had no idea what I was doing, so what I ended up making was closer to...cheese...onigiri...which was still pretty good, but not my intention.
The meatballs I made alongside them, however, were FAN-FLIPPING-TASTIC. I'm so proud of myself. I used...
- 'bout a half cup/cup of panko (breadcrumbs) - around a pound or so of hamburger - around three tablespoons of worcester sauce (however the heck it's spelled.) - a healthy couple tablespoons of leftover skordalia (Though you could probably just sub in about like five cloves of garlic, heeheehee. <3) - TABASCO SAUCE. What probably amounted to two tablespoons of tabasco sauce. I'm drooling just thinking about it.
That's right keeds. Worcester, garlic, and tabasco.
Rolled 'em up and pan-fried them in a little bit of vegetable oil and they were awesome.
So I packed them all in a lunch for today.
Woke up really early this morning ready to go, put on my cute clothes, got everything ready and --
nobody was here. I fidgeted around. The school janitor showed up and was like, "Have you been waiting here for a while?"
Turns out the school trip is actually on Wednesday, not Tuesday. I wrote Wednesday on my schedule and everything. I'm just dumb.
I went home, and came back to school about forty five minutes later, changed and with like zero will to teach. I looked at my schedule for the day and it looked as though I only had three classes, so I was like, "Oh, well, at least all my classes are in the afternoon; I can wake up in the morning."
Then two of the teachers came up to me, about ten minutes apart, and were like, "First period is with me. :D" "Can you help me in second period?"
GRUMBLE.
When my brother used to get yelled at or in trouble when he was little, his big sparkly eyes would tear up and he'd say, with his little cute baby speech, "I'm NOT having a GOOD DAY." and go stomp off to pout. We used to laugh, but holy crap did he know what he was talking about.
Also on Friday I had elementary school with the three little kids I always see on the way home from middle school. It was fun. I got to eat school lunch with them. There was pumpkin soup.
Last night, Toshiko offered to take us to the import store. We went and found things...like peanut butter, salsa and pesto! Most of the store was normal Japanese groceries with a few imported or hard-to-find items sprinkled about the store. After we were done there, we went to a roller sushi restaurant.
A roller sushi (also called conveyor belt sushi) restaurants have all of their tables arranged around a conveyor belt which carries plates of sushi and other food items past each table. If you wish to eat something going by, you just grab it. The plates are color coded and an employee counts them all up at the end and puts them on your bill. You can also order sushi to be sent to your table. At the particular restaurant we went to (Kappa-sushi), a little train delivers the food you ordered from the kitchen. There is also a hot water dispenser, stacks of cups and containers of tea and condiments at every table, so you never need waiting staff until it's time to leave! It wasn't my first time to a roller sushi restaurant, but it was still fun and amazing. Also delicious. The three of us ate ¥2257 (roughly equivalent to $22.57) worth of sushi. In America, that same sushi would likely have totaled at least $80. Delicious!
The teachers all still have to come to school. So I ran through the rain and strong winds until I got to school. It wasn't really so bad though; not as bad as Michigan severe thunderstorms, so it was just kind of fun. But everyone was like, "WOW YOU WALKED TO WORK ARE YOU OKAY D:" when I got back so that made me giggle.
I looked up the cockroach and found out that it was a male Oriental Cockroach. Wiki it if you wanna; I don't feel like digging up the link. I'm really relieved it wasn't female. Then I'd have the creepy crawlies at night and be on the search for (yech) eggs.
Apparently on Friday there is a professional mime coming to the school to perform for the students.
A clown is my friend.
A clown is my friend.
A clown will not bite me and throw me in the basement.
A clown will not bite me and throw me in the basement.
Yep, as Alex said, we had the culture festival this weekend. :) It was great! All the kids really did their best.
I had to stand up and do a speech in front of the entire school and the parents that were there after the English Recitation. I was insanely nervous; my heart was pounding in my ears. But after the speech, a bunch of the teachers came up to me and told me how beautiful it was (wat? I just told them that the kids worked really hard, and their parents should be very proud of them. I guess that's high praise?) so after that I was a little disappointed that more of the parents weren't around. You know, once I made sure I didn't completely ruin it.
I was working at the brochure table for most of the rest of the day, handing out programs and greeting the parents. I got to meet a lot of the parents this way, and got a lot of blank stares. It was fun. XD
The Snow White play was actually a little operetta, which was adorable. My favorite second grader (one of them) played the lead, and it was so funny to see all the little kid singing vocal arpeggios and really, really hard parts!! All of them were girls. That was cute too.
During the intermission periods, Alex got to meet Kawaii girl and What's Up girl. Kawaii girl said, in a very demanding tone, "I love her." and grabbed my arm. Alex responded by grabbing my other arm. It was hilarious. At the end of the little confrontation, Satoko declared herself Alex's rival. The other students were in stitches.
The PTA chorus got a heaping helping of NAT PROJECTION POWER. I was in the Alto section, right next to the blasting men. The Altos actually got the melody for part of the song (a situation which, as a chronic Second Violin, I'm utterly unused to) and the music instructor kept pushing us to sing louder. I didn't want to drown anyone out but....I can only be told to be louder so many times before it's time to Unleash the Beast, so to speak.
So I projected. And suddenly the Altos were loud enough, as suddenly the rest of the Alto section raised their voices to blend in, and I pushed my voice to be audible over the men.
The men still won, but we were audible, so I was happy.
The other song we sang was this weird samba song that was sung very rigidly. With whistles. Tambourines. And a set of bongos. The Japanese crack me up.
So when we got home, we were both pretty zonked out. But over the weekend....
At least, I think it was on Sunday? Anyway.
I was lying on the floor playing computer when I felt SOMETHING CRAWL OVER MY LEG.
I froze. "Okay...something just crawled on my leg." I matter-of-factly stated to Alex. "Something significant." I caught my breath and calmly turned around.
There was a MONSTER COCKROACH about the size of my thumb. Granted, my thumb is kinda small, but still... DANG that thing was big. And fast. I sprang up and turned on the light and it ran and hid. I asked Alex to grab a container or something I could smack down on top of it, and we got this plastic measuring cup he never uses.
So I moved and shifted everything, warily kicked things, and made loud noises in the vicinity I thought it was, but it didn't show itself. I turned the light off and settled in to wait, staring at the room while I went about my business.
Finally, it came out! We sprang into action, and it ran back into hiding, but we saw where it went - behind the music shelf, which we kind of checked halfheartedly before, since it's really the only feasible hiding place in the room. Alex moved the shelf and out it came and I smacked the cup down on it.....
...catching it right in the midsection.
Its head and forelegs were outside the cup and its back legs, wings and tail were inside. I was like, "eew." But when I went to slide a piece of paper underneath it to throw it out, it started batting at the paper like a cat. It was still okay! I was shocked and fascinated. It was kicking its legs and batting its forelegs as if nothing was wrong, and having this huge cup crushing its midsection was just some inconvenience. This did pose the problem of what the heck we were going to do. If we moved the cup, it was a sure thing it would just scamper off again. But we needed to get it out of there. I wasn't about to just grind it into the tatami.
So we came up with the idea of the Gokiburi Guillotine. Gokiburi is Japanese for cockroach. We got a big magazine, opened it up, and slid it under the front half of the cockroach. Then we closed the magazine. And pressed on it. The results were crunchy and unfortunate, but the cockroach wasn't moving any more.
We checked the house really thoroughly and are certain it must have just snuck in through my bag or something, because there aren't many places for critters to hide in our place. So I'm not worried about an INFESTATION or anything. But still, that was nasty.
On a much more pleasant note, I got the best present ever yesterday. One of the students shyly gave me a piece of paper, on which she'd idly doodled a sketch of my face. It was flipping adorable. I have it magneted to our fridge. <3 Once we get a scanner at K-Stanky I'll put it up.
Oh god! What if the Japanese eat cockroaches? I DO NOT LIKE WHERE MY RECORD IS HEADING.
So, this past Saturday was the middle school's culture festival. Nat will probably have her own things to say about it which will be more insightful than my own, but here's my experience.
First of all, it went really well. It was completely different from what I expected, but a lot like an elementary/middle school talent show in the US. Though it was all day long. I got there in the middle of the jazz band's thing, but they were one of the first groups to go, so I didn't feel too late. Besides, parents were coming and going the entire time. There were student arts and crafts on display all around the gymnasium (which is in a separate building from the rest of the school). The students did really well. The first half of the day was performances by the various performance clubs (the jazz band, a choral group, etc). There was an all-girls musical/operetta version of Snow White (the kids need to learn to project their voices, but they still sounded good) and the students who did best with the English recitations got to (had to) recite on stage. Out of all of this, there were only two boys on stage. Both of them were from the first year English recitation. I was a bit surprised at how few parents came to support their children.
Lunchtime came and I walked home, ate some food and wandered along the seaside until it was time for the second half to begin. When I walked in, I was almost floored at the amount of parents that arrived for the second half. The seats were mostly full with several parents opting to stand in hopes they may better see their child/children perform. My faith in Japanese parenting was restored. The first performance was the PTA chorus (which Nat is in). They did really well, even if the men drowned out the women when the women were supposed to be singing an important line and the men were just singing "lalala" ("rarara"). The students demanded an encore. The PTA chorus obliged. Then, each class was called up to sing a song. Their performance would be judged and winners determined later. The first-year students were noncommittal, especially the boys. Second year were better and third year really put their hearts into it. I was somewhat surprised. Some speeches were made and the judgment of the class songs was announced. The third-year student announcing the program was in tears because her class lost. The student giving a speech immediately following the announcement was also in tears, as she was also a third-year and her class also lost. There was also a song by the entire student body, but they didn't fit on stage. They ended up having to make a half-circle that spanned half of the gym.
The day ended with a speech from one of the music teachers and I went grocery shopping before walking home.
The next two days were uneventful and relaxing.
Today, I went grocery shopping again. Usually, when I'm at the grocery store, I buy a lunch so I don't have to worry about cooking for myself and only have to cook dinner. I saw some salads and I thought they looked good, so I bought one. I'm eating it now and have discovered that it is a spaghetti salad. I know that when most Americans hear "spaghetti salad", they think of some sort of pasta salad, like one might make for a picnic or a potluck. No. Don't think that. That is not what this is. This spaghetti salad is spaghetti noodles with a regular chef salad on top. Lettuce, cucumbers, tomatoes, sliced eggs...that sort of salad. It came with a soy-based dressing and is actually very good. But it offends my salad and spaghetti sensibilities.
Well, I'm back. Which is good, 'cause I was going crazy.
The hilariously ironic thing is, I was feeling all bad about staying home...last night, Sekiguchi-sensei (one of the English teachers, and our neighbor. She's awesome and really sweet.) came by and said to me, in no certain terms, "I think you always working too hard! You need to rest! You need to take breaks!"
When I came in this morning, also, the vice principal stopped by my desk and said in Japanese what equated to "You always come in early, teach extra classes, and stay late. Don't overdo it...you need to take it easy!" so that kind of made me happy.
But yeah, the hilariously ironic thing, is, for real this time, when I came in today there was a survey on my desk that was sent from the Board of Education. Someone was doing a survey on culture shock among ALTs in Japan, and stress.
-Have you been getting headaches? -Having trouble staying alert and awake? -Paralyzed by nervousness? -Having hot and cold spells? -Scared and panicky for no good reason? -Worrying unduly? -Have trouble getting to sleep at a decent hour? -Feel run down for seemingly no reason?
And I was like, "haha....oh."
So I'm now confident in saying that I'm not really SICK sick, I just must have had a stressplosion. And everyone seems to understand about it. In fact, people seemed amazed that I came back today.
I really need to like destress somehow. My friends have been saying so for years. It's just how to do it....
And now, for your amusement, the 3rd grade recitation for the culture festival. I've been helping the kids practice this for a couple months now, and they're going to recite the whole thing, in English, in front of the school on Saturday. As an American, it makes me kind of giggle nervously.
A Mother's Lullaby A big old tree stands by a road near the city of Hiroshima. Through the years, it has seen many things. One summer night, the tree heard a lullaby. A mother was singing to her little girl under the tree. They looked happy, and the song sounded sweet. But the tree remembered something sad. "Yes, it was some sixty years ago. I heard a lullaby that night, too."
Me: Uh oh. This isn't gonna end well.
On the morning of that day, a big bomb fell on the city of Hiroshima. Many people lost their lives, and many others were injured. They had burns all over their bodies. I was very sad when I saw those people. It was a very hot day. Some of the people fell down near me. I said to them, "Come and rest in my shade. You'll be all right soon."
Me: [glancing off to the side, scratching cheek nervously]
Night came. Some people were already dead. I heard a weak voice. It was a lullabye. A young girl was singing to a little boy. "Mommy! Mommy!"the boy cried. "Don't cry," the girl said. "Mommy is here." Then she began to sing again. She was very weak, but she tried to be a mother to the poor little boy. She held him in her arms like a real mother.
Me: Oh man, and people say I'm drama...[shifts uncomfortably]
"Mommy," the boy was still crying. "Be a good boy," said the girl. "You'll be all right." She held the boy more tightly and began to sing again. After a while, the boy stopped crying and quietly died. But the little mother did not stop singing. It was a sad lullabye. The girl's voice became weaker and weaker. Morning came, and the sun rose, but the girl never moved again.
Me: BAD END! BAD END! HIT RESET!
Not to make light of anything that happened as a result of the bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, but....aaaaaaawwwwkkkkwaaaaard.....
