ビタミン愛
"Vitamin I" was the title of this month's free lunch event that a professor from Aomori University helps lead every month. It's a way for the community members, and especially the elderly, to gather and eat lunch together. They particularly focus on the elderly as well because often times they live alone and as they say, "eating lunch with others is always more enjoyable than eating lunch alone". A member of the group who helps lead the free event explained that every piece of food that we make, and every step of the process, has love in it - from the folks who grow the crops (which were locally grown and donated for free) and we who cook the meals, to the customers who eat them.We started work at 9:00AM and had until a bit after noon to prepare the meals. We made Miso Soup, Croquettes, Salad, Chopped Apples and served green tea from Korea - all from scratch! Each time they hold this event, they aim to serve 50 guests, so preparing the food in just a few hours was definitely a group effort. Everyone was always doing something.
Among the volunteers who were helping cook the meal were Thai exchange students from Hirosaki University and Vietnamese exchange students from Aomori Chuo Gakuin University, which made the experience even more enjoyable. It was interesting because while the Vietnamese exchange students knew a bit of English, we mainly relied on our Japanese speaking ability to communicate with each other. I felt much less pressure than I do when I usually speak Japanese because all of us were around the same age give or take a few years, and Japanese was also their second language.
Long story short, we managed to pull through while getting to know our fellow volunteers. Among the group were 2 Vietnamese students, 4 Thai students, the 4 older Japanese women who organize these events, and us 5 Americans, among a few others.
By 1:30PM, the last guest was served and the folks who organized the event said that we can have free time and explore the building until 2:00PM. One of the older ladies chimed in emphasizing that "We should be here at 2:00PM sharp to start cleaning up. Japanese time, not American time."the statement rubbed me the wrong way a bit, but every single one of these women were so casual and cordial that I couldn't stay bothered for long. While exploring we went through a WWII exhibit and a "planetarium" that mostly consisted of constellation stuff. By 1:55PM we came back and helped clean. When we finished, a Japanese woman from a room that was holding a tea ceremony demonstration recognized one of the American ALTs who had been in Aomori for 5 years and invited 10 of us to watch and participate, so we did. We watched 4 girls, probably around 10-12 years old serve us tea, and the older woman in charge explained each step, each rule, and what we should say. Side note: There are TONS of rules. OMG. After that, the same older woman gave us a demonstration on the Korean Drum.
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| Korean Drum performance. She told us afterwards a story about how N. Koreans would kidnap Japanese people using the large bag things that carry the drums. |
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| Tea Ceremony with a young apprentice. |
By around 3:00PM we were all finished cooking and cleaning and so all began heading home.
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| Clockwise from Me: Andrew, _____, Shonda, _____, _____, _____, Niiyama-sensei, Mi, Bo, Som, Kelsey, Heidi, Phi, Huy, Sasha |
久保田酒
The next portion of this blog post will be about the evening where I was luckily invited to a sake tasting event by a fellow ALT who had an open spot. The ALT who invited me was actually invited by a man who has been teaching her calligraphy, and she wanted to know if I was interested as well. Since I expressed that I was, the man who was teaching her wanted to use this event as a means to get to know me better in order to decide whether or not he will take me under his wing as well. Besides me, Tiffany (the other ALT), and the man who is teaching her calligraphy, we were accompanied by many other of his friends who were all retired high school teachers aged somewhere between their late-40's and early 60's. Nonetheless, they were all very friendly -- and even moreso after a few glasses of sake.The title of this portion, 久保田酒 (ENG: Kubota Sake) is actually the brand name of the sake that we tasted. There were 6 different sake choices to choose from, and we were given glasses to try 4 of them.
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| The sake that I tasted (From L to R): Kobata Hyakuju, Kobata Senju, Kobata Manju, and Kobata Kouju |
We were also served small dishes of assorted foods on the table that included chikin karaage (ENG: Fried Chicken), Sashimi, some beef dish, vegetables, and other things. The total fee for the event was 5,000 yen, but was worth it nonetheless.
Everyone got drunk quite fast. I personally talked a lot to the man on my left (Tiffany was on my right) who was a retired high school English teacher named Mr. Ikaria (I think). He had really great English and was so extremely friendly. The sake helped make things even more casual and had a great conversation, probably around 40% of the conversation was simply laughter. The rest was small talk and conversations about sake, Japanese, and Japan. We later had a visitor from another table too who was blowing kisses to Tiffany. Her name was. Ms. Osanai and was probably mid-50's or 60's (and most likely a lightweight, happy drunk). She was super friendly, and invited us two to go to her cafe that was opening up called Cafe 0371. The title is actually another play on words based off of her name. If you take the first hiragana "letter" from each number, it spells her name, with the exception of 0. In Japanese, it's kafee zero(O) san nana ichi. If you put the bold parts together, it spells (O)sanai, which is her name!! Cool right?
Besides sitting at the table and enjoying conversation with the teachers and Tiffany, there was a stand in the back where you would first taste 3 different sakes. Then, you would try a taste of 5 different, unlabled sakes. The goal was to correctly guess which bottles were the 3 sakes that you originally tasted. Tiffany and I got only 1 of the 3 correct... we also had to make sure not to pour too much into the glasses since sake is as strong as wine.
Anyways, the night was great -- we had a lot of great conversations and, actually, I enjoyed this night more so than the Welcome / Sports Festival Enkai that I went to with my Base Schools. The older, retired teachers were much more laid back and it probably helped that this wasn't exactly a work function.
As we left, we were all a good amount tipsy/drunk, and while we headed to the elevator, one of the men in our group was saying something in Japanese, and so Mr. Ikaria translated, saying that he was jealous of my height. The other man gave me a soft slap across the cheek, but it was all in good fun and didn't hurt at all.
All in all, the drinking event was one of the most fun I've had in a really long time and by far the best drinking event that I've been to (Out of only about 3-4 drinking events that I've been to in the almost 3 months I've been here). Tiffany and I went to Starbucks at around 8:30PM after the event ended, and gave ourselves some time to sober up before biking home. We ran into our P.A. (Prefectural Advisor) and chatted with him for a bit before it was time to go.
Anyways, that was my Saturday. Hopefully I can keep this up -- Until next time family and friendsss!
