結婚式！

先週お姉さんの結婚式のためにアメリカに行ってきました！

すぐアメリカに着いたら、料理したり、買い物したり、準備の手伝いで、とても忙しくなった。寝る時間もあんまりなかった！忙しかったけど本当に楽しかったです。

結婚式の２日間前、独身パーティーをやりました。姉ちゃんの希望どおり、女子７人で夜ご飯を食べに行って、セラミックアートを作りに行きました。

Friends since childhood!

結婚式の日、起きて、皆の化粧とか髪の毛をしました！

結婚式は教会でありました。宗教の式なので、いろいろ伝統的な習慣をしました。

”楽しんでね！”

"誓います！"

指輪の交換！

Just married! 結婚したぞー！

アメリカの結婚式のパーティーではいろいろな習慣があります。まずは、新しい夫婦の「ファーストダンス」があります。前に２人の特別好きな曲を決めて、パーティーで２人だけでダンスをしながら、皆は見ることになっています。

そして、姉とお父さんのダンスがあるし、新郎とお母さんのダンスもあります。

 

夫婦にびっくりさせるように、皆がパーティー中秘密に嫁と新郎の友達は夫婦の車を飾りつけします。いろいろ書いたり、物を掛けました。

ケーキを一緒に切って食べさせた！

お姉さんと旦那さんの幸せを見たら嬉しかったです！
　

キリシマ祭！

In April, my taiko group was again requested to perform at the yearly Kirishima Festival at a little local shrine. Kirishima is the name of a red-flowering bush which is the flower of Noto cho.

This is my favorite taiko event that I have performed at so far. In fact I much prefer the festival performances, but surely that is because I love festivals so much. At any rate, other than the wind, it was a beautiful day and a joy to play! We were followed by a shamisen player accompanied by a man wearing a gorgeous turquoise kimono who sang a few folk songs. After that we snacked on yakitori, ohagi, and kibidango and partook in the bingo tournament held for all the guests. Like normal, our group headed to Hachiban Ramen (Hachiban is a Japanese fast food, ramen chain) for lunch before putting the drums away and calling it a day.

Our taiko drums set up at the entrance to the Kirishima-lined staircase leading up to the mountain top shrine

After going home, I took a walk to my favorite local shrine. It is another well known "kirishima spot," but I had not yet seen it in Spring when the kirishima are blooming. However, in Summer, Fall, and Winter I have always thought it was incredibly peaceful and gorgeous.

Imagine my surprise when I walked up the stairs and found the grounds of the temple covered in red blooms! The bushes that I had only seen in their green leaves before this had transformed the wooded area with dispersing red blossoms.

イチゴ狩り

Last month, May, was the peak of the strawberry season here in Japan!

Japanese strawberries are the best. They are at least three times as sweet as the average strawberries you can eat in America. Seriously, the first time I ate a freshly picked one last year, I felt like I was eating candy!

This year, a friend invited me to go strawberry picking at the local strawberry park in our town. Matsunami, one of the villages in Noto cho, has a "strawberry park," which consists of several strawberry gardens, each farmed by different people, located along one road. Every year in May and June the strawberry fields are open for "all you can eat strawberry" trips. You pay the fee, receive a small plastic cup to put your stems in, then walk into the net covered strawberry field to pick and eat strawberries for as long as you want!

So we went one Saturday morning and feasted on the tasty, ripe strawberries, freshly picked off the plants. In the span of about an hour I probably ate at least 50 strawberries! Which seems like a crazy number now....

ともばた祭

At the beginning of May one of the villages in my town has their very unique annual festival. In the village of Ogi, where the main industry is squid fishing, the yearly Spring festival is held on the sea itself!

Decorated boats circle around the bay, with flags and rainbow streamers trailing behind them in the wind, with the sound of taiko drums booming as they are played aboard the sailing boats.

On Saturday morning, I joined my junior high school students from Ogi to raise the flag on one of the boats and then ride around the bay! The students spend several weeks every year making one the huge flags to be featured on one of the festival boats. In the past, children made all of the flags representing each neighborhood, however in recent years since the population and number of children decreased so much that the everyone in the neighborhood, adults included, must help with making the flag.

Once we all arrived, we all gathered by one of the boats that had its long pole laying down, stretching across the road and into the yard across the street from the dock. There we slid the huge banner the students made for it onto the pole. Then we split into two groups and pulled on ropes angling out from the sides to raise it up, while several men of Ogi directed.

However, once we got it upright in the air we saw that the banner was snagged and not pulled all the way down. Since they could not loosen it by shaking the banner the men decided that pole needed to come back down. So the men carefully and slowly lowered this 75 foot tall, huge wooden pole. As they lowered it it swung back and forth a bit, dangerously swinging close to the two buildings on either side of it. In fact, a man inside the house came out onto his balcony to calmly watch as the pole narrowly missed his house by a few feet.

Once the banner was smoothed out, the students were called to reorganize to raise the flag-boat once more. Next the students were split into three groups and we boarded three different boats. The boys played taiko as we zoomed around the bay a few times, enjoying our ride in the beautifully bannered boats.

田植え

It is spring now which means that in the past month all the farmers have been busy preparing, flooding, and planting their rice fields!

Over my two years residing in Japan, I have come to really enjoy the rice field scenery. I like to watch how the image of the rice field changes with each season.

A couple weeks ago I was invited by my friend to go and see rice planting myself! At the nursing home that her mother and sister work at and her father lives in they were having a rice planting day and barbecue for the volunteers.

Some of the rice fields near the care home are actually owned by the home and it seems that locals from the neighborhood volunteer to take care of the rice paddies. There were about a dozen older gentleman and ladies working in the rice paddies when we got there. They had one machine that laid the rice seedlings out on the paddies and several other people were planting by hand. The very last paddy, in a group of seven paddies, was planted by everybody together by hand. Rice planting is actually quite easy, you literally just stick a few seedlings into the water flooded paddy and they stay upright. But it must be tiring to be bent over for hours while you plant, which I imagine is why little old country ladies are all permanently bent over here!

After the volunteers finished the planting everyone headed to a tent set up next to the care home where we had a barbecue. It was typical Japanese BBQ fare- pieces of delicious beef, beef tongue and pork; loads of cabbage, carrots, and onions; and then yakisoba to finish off the meal. They also had a little karaoke tournament, in spite of the constant drizzle of rain that day!

艶遊会

Higashichaya- a teahouse district in Kanazawa

Recently I got to partake in an experience unusual for the general public in Japan and even more unusual for a foreigner- I went to a geisha dinner party!

Kanazawa, the capitol of my prefecture, is one of the cities in Japan that is famous for its preservation of old Japanese culture. There is an area called Higashi-chaya where the old teahouses are now located, many of which are around 180 years old. Higashi means East, while chaya means teahouse, so the name means "East teahouse district."

There are only three teahouse districts that are designated as Cultural Assets of Japan, with two (this one and another) located in Kanazawa and one located in Kyoto!

Geisha are female entertainers. They spend years studying cultural arts such as tea ceremony, playing traditional instruments like the shamisen and taiko, singing, and traditional dances. Geisha are an easily recognizable figure of Japanese culture since their costume is characterized by layers of fine kimono, heavy white make up, and large, elaborate hairdos. They generally spend years practicing the arts before they can become a professional and begin entertaining at dinner parties and special events. 

But, in Kanazawa, geisha are called "geiko." There are 43 geiko in Kanazawa, the youngest is 25 and the oldest is 82. They say she is an incredible player of the shamisen and that she is constantly busy with bookings to entertain!

Another ALT and I heard about one teahouse in Kanazawa that opens its doors to the public for a special chance to experience a dinner party, but only four times a year! Furthermore, there are only seats for up to 30 guests. We were both very interested in this once in a lifetime opportunity and we made sure to get on the list a couple months in advance! In general, like most tea houses, only members are able to book a party. 

On the evening of our dinner party we arrived at the tea house in Higashi chaya, where we paid our fee and then were welcomed into a long waiting room where we sat among the other guests drinking the hot tea that was served to us. 

Soon we were led up to the second floor to a large tatami mat room that was prepared with individual tray tables and cushions for each guest to sit at. Several attendants of the tea house, the Okami (the woman who owns and operates the house) and the three geiko she ordered for the party served beer to everyone for an opening kanpai. 

The okami san, Hanako Baba, opened the dinner with welcome words and a short introduction to her teahouse. She explained that it has been in operation since 1820. Also, there are no geiko permanently at her house. Rather, she requests geiko from other teahouses (there are 5 I believe) in Kanazawa. Hanako also explained that the regular custom for paying the teahouse is not to pay for a party on the day of, but instead a bill is tallied for the customers account. Then, twice a year in August and in December, she takes a bill to the customer's place of work and collects payment. 

She also explained how you can only become a member if you are introduced by someone who is already a member. Furthermore, if you introduce someone you become that person's guarantor. So if the new member cannot pay his bill, the initial introducer must pay for it. Evidentally it is quite a commitment to give someone an introduction to a teahouse.! It is amazing to me that these customs are still carried on in the way they were hundreds of years ago. It really was like stepping into another world. 

Sliding doors on the perimeter of the room, featuring hand painted images of geiko. This series of panels represents each of the four seasons

An alcove on one wall displayed these handmade thread balls which are one of the handicrafts of Kanazawa

This small tea room is special because it features gold tatami mats. Yes, the tatami are made with gold thread wrapped around the bamboo

One of the geiko came to chat with us during the beginning of the night. She was very kind and even gave us her "business card." It is a long thin rectangular sticker with just her name and some decorative flowers on it. She and a nearby guest laughed as they explained that it is said if we fasten a geiko's name card to our wallets it would bring us money. 

Soon the geiko began to perform. One girl played the shamisen while the other two danced in sync with each other using fans and cherry blossom boughs as props. Next, they played taiko. Then the okami came to us and invited us up first to play drums with the geiko. Of course all the Japanese people in the room were impressed and warmly applauded us after we finished. "Coincidentally," a newspaper reporter arrived to snap a picture just as we played the drums, the okami laughed and said we would likely be in the newspaper the next morning.

After inviting all the guests up to play, the geiko began playing a game where you clap and tap a wooden bowl, which either player can take away at any time. Both players must follow the sequence correctly as the music gets faster and faster. The geiko invited several guests up for the challenge.

We picked a lucky night to attend this dinner because it was coincidentally the same night as a small yearly festival in which a parade of people dressed up go down the streets of Higashichaya and dance to the music of the shamisen played by several people. After our dinner was finished, it was perfect timing for the parade so the attendants of the tea house opened up the windows and let all the guests enjoy the parade from the second floor of the teahouse.

On our way out of the teahouse, the okami was waiting with gift bags for each of us. When we had arrived earlier that evening she had asked if it was ok that we were served a different meal from the planned guest fare. There apparently had been a mix up in reservations or something and they did not have enough for everyone. She apologized for the change in our meal and presented us with an atonement gift of kinpaku (gold flake) face creams from her line of beauty products. I can only imagine how expensive the creams are, made with seaweed and rice bran extracts with beautiful flecks of gold leaf mixed in. Actually, it was almost a lucky mistake that they couldn't feed us the right meal, because I would probably never have bought the cream myself (its expensive!). So this way I get to use face cream fit for a princess!

Our party with the Okami, the lady who owns and operates the teahouse

After leaving the tea house we ambled down the street and waited for the parade to return. Once they came back to a small plaza area they danced in the center of the waiting crowd. For the last ten minutes of the event they dropped the cords the audience was standing behind and invited the crowds to dance with them together. Of course, loving traditional dances, I was all about it and jumped right in line to learn the dance!