Winter Celebrations 2024-2025

 

Christmas:

Blake led an English lessons for the local Japanese community members in our area on Christmas Day. After lessons in the morning, we prepared for a Japanese Christmas meal: KFC and Christmas cake. We also played some games with our neighbors and enjoyed the evening here. 

 

Dreidel Night:

We got together with teachers and had a dreidel night for Hanukkah. For tokens, we got creative and used a mix of gelt, clay, and pom-poms.

 

New Year's Eve: 

We hung out with friends for New Year's Eve at Mt. Shosha again! We took a cable car up and waited in line a few hours to ring the bell. The first 108 people got to ring the bell and received a couple of small gifts including a snake-shaped bar of soap. I was 17th and Blake was 20th. It is a New Year Buddhist and Shinto tradition. Afterwards we walked around Maniden, the temple grounds and caught a cable car down!

After New Year's Eve, we also had osechi again under our kotatsu. Osechi is a traditional Japanese New Year's food that comes in a special box that looks like a bento box. They can be quite high in price as some are meant to have food for multiple days. 

January Community Welcome for New Teachers:

There was a welcome event for the two new teachers that joined us! For the welcome event, a group of young members of the Japan Kendama Association came and taught us kendama. Kendama is a traditional Japanese toy that has a handle, a pair of cups, and a ball that are all connected together by a string. I was able to do some moves but definitely need more practice!