Hakuba

Not updates here for a while but I thought I would let people know what we are up to since we can't be there over Christmas.

We decided that it would be very depressing to stay in our apartment over the holidays, just the same as any other day! So, being determined not to fly anywhere, we thought it might be nice to go skiing. We decided this in November, but couldn't do a lot about it until December 18th as the last paycheck of the year is variable to say the leats (Japanese tax systme - don't even get me started). Luckily we have a friend who is working in the Hakuba resorts this year arranging holidays, and her boss said she could give a friend discount yay! She sent us details of hotels that would be "wham-like", since we had joked that we wanted a Christmas like the video for Last Christmas. We picked one and managed to book it just yesterday, so it was all still a bit up in the air!

We packed quickly and figured out how we were going to get there, and then one bullet train ride and a bus trip later here we are, in the Hotel Mominoki in Hakuba Happo one. It is a nice hotel and the people so far are very friendly and nice, but since we got here in the afternoon we decided it would not be worth starting to ski until tomorrow. Instead we walked down the hill to the depot and got a bus to the main town (our hotel is up near the lifts, surrounded by lots of other hotels and restaurants but not many shops). It was very strange - the place was like a ghost town! All the shops were shut, and we walked around for ages looking for somewhere to eat lunch; all we could see was a McDonalds and we really really didn't want to go there! eventually we found a little place called gravity works that was sooo lovely. Homemade pizzas and pastas, lots of homemade breads and desserts. The people were fabulous, just leaving us to sit for ages and relax, we wondered around inside (we were the only customers) and investigated all the other bits they were selling and making, oils and herbs and cheeses etc. We bought some homemade sun-dried tomatoes and the lady spent ages telling us all the ways they were different from Italian ones (although she said both were nice!). I am looking forward to cooking something nice with them when we get back.

After that we walked around a bit more but it was getting very cold and the snow was starting to freeze and get slippery, so we came back to the hotel. I went down for an Onsen. The baths here at Mominoki claim to be the most alkaline in Japan (so I took all my jewellery off first!) and it was lovely - not too hot, clear water that didn't smell at all (sometimes the minerals make it a bit pongy), and best of all I had the outside bath completely to myself> I sat in the hot water looking out at the snow until my fingers went wrinkly, then we went to the pub next door for dinner.

We have already arranged our skis for tomorrow and have an early start planned, so I will take lots of photos and do another update soon.

Missing everyone,

Jenny

Japan Day

The weather has been a bit grotty for the last few weeks, we have had thunder and high winds, lots more rain than usual for this time of year. Everyone keeps saying it is so cold for April, but I am sure I remember saying for the last 2 years that it is too cold for a kimono, hope it warms up for Friday...

And it does! Yesterday was Japan Day at school, time to dig out my Kimono and let some of the moms dress me because I have no idea (I felt a lot better about the situation when I realized half the Japanese department were in there too). In Hindsight, possibly I should have hung up my kimono a few days before, as I had a crease right down my bum that wasn't too flattering. Actually, the hole outfit is pretty unflattering. Kimonos were not designed for women with any kind of curves. I really like mine, it is such pretty colours, but I can't help feeling like a trussed chicken after a few minutes. Aja asked me if I felt like a sausage, but I had to say no. Sausages bend in the middle.

Japan day is nice because there are no usual classes. Instead there are mini-courses about Japanese culture. I did kanji cross-stitch and Japanese cookery. The cross-stitch was great fun, they girls who were running it (I am just in there to supervise, students or parents run most of the classes) put on a CD and just wandered around helping some of the younger ones. Most of the students were girls I teach and it was a lovely small group so we just chatted and sewed. We were given rectangular pieces of fabric to sew, and one of the girls asked if there were any designs for the word "book" or "reading". There weren't, but I got one of the Japanese speakers to write out the symbols and designed it for her, then I stitched it too because I thought it was such a good idea! So now I have a bookmark that says "book" on each end.

I had a break in the middle and went to watch some of the karate class. There was a big group of students from a local club, and they were demonstrating as well as teaching some of our girls a few moves. I had heard about the master's finale piece from the first group and wanted to see him do it. He took a baseball bat, painted so he couldn't even see the grain, and broke it with his hand. Unfortunately they only bought one bat so I didn't get to see it, but I watched some of the fighting for a few moments and then went to my next course.

I had been looking forward to the cookery class the most as it was one I hadn't done before (I took the kanji cross-stitch last year). It was being run by parents and when I walked in they thought I was a student. They were a bit mortified and very apologetic but I take it as a compliment! There were 7 moms in the room, and a class of 20 students, so there wasn't actually any space for me to join in with the cooking itself, I was just there as crowd control (unnecessary at ISSH) or in case of emergencies. There was supposed to be another teacher there so at least I would have had someone to chat to, but she bought her 2 year-old along and then left because he wanted to put his hands in everything. I am not entirely sure why he was there, but I was utterly bored for the next hour. I got a bowl of ice-cream and a pancake at the end, but I was disappointed!

Lunch on Japan day is Ennichi (mixed ticket) lunch. Parents cook all different types of Japanese food and dish it up in very small portions so you can try a bit of everything. I had some Japanese curry, yakisoba (noodles), corn on the cob, yakitori (chicken skewers with a sweetish sauce), mini bentos with rice and sweet egg and pork, sushi and edamame (cold boiled soybeans). It is hard to eat lots of bits in a kimono but somehow I managed!

Just after lunch the Junior school gather outside and do some Japanese festival dances that they have been practising. The rest of the school watches a couple and then they are all allowed to join in. Every year it has been lovely and sunny and the cherry blossoms are out around the edges of the playground, it is beautiful.

In the afternoon there is an assembly with entertainment. This year we had a group called Ryukyukoku Matsuri Daiko, an Okinawan style drum group who use more modern music and incorporate some karate moves in their act. They were amazing, so energetic and they had people of all ages, all incredible. A couple of the pieces had two guys in a lion costume with a big snappy mouth, and they were doing rolls and running around amongst the kids. Most of them loved it, although there were one or two of the really little ones who were scared, and once they got hugs from their teachers a few more followed! The men took the costume off at the end so they could all see that it was them, but the kindergarten teachers were completely body sheltering the kids so they never saw that bit and were still scared when they came out again. The first lion put his jaw around a few kids heads which went down well, and then picked up a little boy completely and dangled his legs around in the air for a while. The kids looked very giggly and pleased when he got out, so I wonder what they said to him when he was in there. For the very last dance they asked the students to get up and join in, and the lions got absolutely swamped, trapped in a crowd of children all trying to stroke or pat or tug at the costume! They didn't seem to mind too much.

Most years there is a party afterwards, but this year there wasn't one so we went to the pub instead. It was warm and pleasant and the perfect end to a lovely day. It wasn't too late a night as Will had to go back into work today for an event that the school organizes each year, The Kanto Plains Model United Nations. Each student is the delegate of a country (not their real country) and they have debates and research issues, and then in the afternoon they have an "emergency" that they have to sort out. Will does all of the AV stuff, but he also acts out the news correspondent for the emergency as though they are being shown in real time. Apparently some of the girls this year thought it was real, even though he was in the room with them as it was shown! They were discussing the North Korean missile situation so I suppose it was plausible at least.

The nice weather seems to have gone for now though. We have had another thunder storm tonight and rain is forecast tomorrow. I hope it doesn't wash away the cherry blossoms before I get a chance to go and see more of them! The avenue at the university gate is beautiful, and there is a tradition of having hanami parties, where you take a picnic and sit underneath the trees. If the forecast is wrong, that is the plan for tomorrow!

It is finally our short attempt at half term, and it feels like along time since Christmas! We were originally thinking we would like to go away overnight to Gunma or somewhere similar, to an onsen resort like we did in October '07. As it turned out though, now is a very expensive time and we don't have as much spare money as we did then. So instead we decided to hire a car for the day and go back out towards Fuji, to see the Fuji five lakes (Fuji-go-ko) and other bits and pieces we liked the sound of. The day before was gorgeous so we had high hopes, but on Friday morning it was windy and rainy and dark.

We set off along the Tomei expressway when we eventually found it (driving in Tokyo can be difficult at the best of times - possibly leaving during the morning rush hour wasn't our best idea) and the spray made the visibility horrible. We were heading towards lake Yamanakako, the closest of the five lakes. There is an onsen place right at the foot of Mt Fuji which we wanted to try. I love onsen, but Will is not so keen on the whole nudity thing, so when I read about Tenkei I was quite excited. It has the usual single sex onsen, but it also has lots of different temperature small pools in a mixed area where you can wear swimsuits. As it is so close to the mountain, the outside baths look right up to the snow-capped cone, but obviously the weather didn't allow for that. Even so, sitting outside in a hot natural spring bath while cold rain came down and bounced on the water all around was fantastic. Will even seemed to enjoy it! Although he did get bored long before me. I love coming out of nice onsen too, as there are lots of pots and potions in the dressing room to try, and you feel all clean and warm. There was also a relaxation room with big chair/bed combinations and blankets for when you didn't want to bathe (which also faced the mountain), a massage centre and restaurants etc. We spent a couple of hours there and got wrinkly, then moved on to the lake itself. If anyone else comes over to visit, we will definitely take them there. This is what it would have looked like if the weather was better!

We drove around the four closest lakes, and had a quick look at the visitor centre. We were driving around the northern edge of mt Fuji but we couldn't see a thing! Even when the clouds started to lift in other directions, there was still a big dense pile around the cone itself. We stopped for lunch at the most remote lake, Motosuko, and at in a restaurant above the edge. For the last 2 years we have been skiing in this holiday, so we had food we would probably have been eating up in Hokkaido if we had gone, Katsu Kare (pork cutlet with rice and curry and salad) and Flatted Ramen in miso with lots of japanese mushrooms. Mmm.

When we got back outside we looked around and it seemed much brighter than before. Will wandered up to the edge of the carpark to see if Fuji had cleared. I was so busy watching him I walked straight into the drinks machine I was headed for. So I didn't find out that it had cleared, and when we got back into the car and drove out, there was Fuji, right in front of me and perfect. A little further up the road we came to a straight section with no buildings obstructing the view, so we stopped to take some photos. That's right, my camera is finally fixed! Yay!! (Well yay again). As we rounded the north western section of the loop around Fuji, we crossed into Shizuoka prefecture. We were heading for a waterfall which again I had read about and wanted to see. They reminded me of a sort of mini Niagara, as they fell all around a horse-shoe shaped lake, although obviously on a much smaller scale. It was a lot cooler down there, and a long walk back up to the car! But it was all worth it. I had spent ages getting sorted when we left the onsen, using the hairdryer and all the other bits and pieces on offer. The spray from the falls meant that by the time I got back to the car I was a big wavy frizz ball again, but i was just happy to have seen Fuji and cool water falls all in one day!

As we came back up the road towards Fuji again the mist started to lift, but it was cloudier again than it had been before we stopped. We saw Fuji for another few minutes and then the cloud obscured everything. It was a very strange feeling - in the space of two hours Fuji had gone from being completely covered by cloud on a generally sunny day, to being out in glorious sunshine and visible for miles, to dense fog that meant we couldn't see further than the edge of our current valley. Because we were driving around Fuji in a circuit we knew exactly where it was, we just couldn't see it.

And then as we got further away it lifted once more as the sun was starting to set. We were half way back to Tokyo and the view out of the back window was Fuji all pink and glowing from the setting sun. It was a lovely last view!

We had booked the car until late at night, but we were tired and felt we had already been lucky with the things we had seen that day, so we went right back into the city. We gave the car back at 6.30pm, and were amazed to find they gave us a refund for the hours we didn't use! I can't imagine that happening anywhere else in the world.We had a brilliant day!

Today I am being very naughty and filling this in while I watch a class. I have been told off for not keeping up to date, but things have been very busy, and yet again I don't have a useable camera! It broke again, so I am waiting to see if the shop will fix it. It is still withing a year of purchase, but things in Japan aren;t built to last. There is a real throwaway mentality, everyone wants the newest version of everything and nothing is kept. If it goes completely i am just going to get a new one in Britain, then even if it doesn't last least I'll be able to communicate with customer services!



Today is Freaky Friday, a charity day in the middle school to raise money for a Sacred Heart school in Uganda. The students were given free dress for Y200, but they were supposed to come as "someone else". Unfortunately, most of them just swapped clothes with a friend so they still look just like any other free dress day! The teachers joined in too, with a few of us coming as students. Ben M is wearing a full high school uniform, complete with short skirt and untucked shirt (the students keep telling him off - it is untucked because it is too small and won't do up). One of the other teachers has come as her daughter (in grade 10) who is a goth. She looks sooo good, I am going to try to get someone else to take a photo and send it to me. I am wearing a junior school pinnafore. Apparently it was specially made for a huge 8 year old years ago, and when she left it got passed on for teachers to wear. The girls who are new to middle school and wore this uniform last year think it is fab, I have had a lot of coos in the corridors. I have had my photo taken with Priya (dressed in her brothers oversized suit), and am going to add it to my collection of silly outfits I have worn recently. If I can get a copy I will put it on here.



A few weeks ago it was One World Day, always a favourite of mine, when everyone dresses in national costumes or flag colours and there are traditional performances etc. Last year a group of us were Robin Hood and his Merry Men, so this yea we wanted to do something again and keep up the trend. Even more Brits were interested, so eventually there were 7 people who all dressed up as Morris Dancers, with matching ribbons and bells and sticks. It took some coordination to get all the bits, but all in all it was easier than last year and looked terrible, which we think is great on days like that! The more ridiculous the outfits, the better.