Since I had the day off I decided to have two teachers over for dinner. They are husband and wife and teach English at different schools. They've become very close friends and I decided to cook them an American dinner! I missed having Thanksgiving dinner, so my parents sent me some food from the states. I made meatloaf, potatoes au gratin, stuffing, cranberry jello, rice and gravy. Everything turned out great and my friends loved it! In Japan Christmas cake is very popular and all the Japanese people and students I've talked to are suprised we don't eat it in the states. My friend made a strawberry shortcake cake that we ate for dessert. I am not really a cake person, but liked this cake because it wasn't very sweet and the frosting was really light.
This week at school I taught a lot of New Year/post Christmas lessons. I told students about my Christmas and New Years traditions and told them what I did this year during winter break. We also talked about some of the cultural differences between how people in American and Japan celebrate Christmas and New Years. Here are just a few...
-Many Japanese spend Christmas Eve with friends and eat Christmas cake.
-Christmas for Japanese is mainly a commercial holiday focused on decorations, Santa and sweets.
-New Years is spent with family and traditional food includes mochi, ozoni and osechi. (Some classes found it amusing that my family eats a mix of Japanese and American food for New Years-sushi, pasta, pizza, mazigohan, somen, italian beef)
-On New Years Day many Japanese go to the shrine and some even watch the sunrise.
-Children receive otoshidama or money on New Years from parents and relatives. (One class was shocked that American children do not get anything like this for New Years!)
On Friday I did a lesson about differences between American and Japanese graduation ceremonies since it was a 3rd grade class and they would be graduating in March. I showed them some pictures from my graduation and my tassel. My JTE also found a youtube video of an American graduation that we showed to the students. Before class he showed me a video of a Japanese graduation and the atmosphere was much different from an American one. Japanese ceremonies are very solomn and serious. Students wear their school uniforms and parents all wear the tradional color- Black. Students are in straight rows and receive their diplomas from the principal. During all of my graduations there was a certain amount of seriousness, but the atmosphere was mainly celebratory. I did not get that feeling from watching the Japanese ceremony, we'll see if my feeling changes once March comes!
In another class I gave a brief self introduction and talked about Chicago. It was a small class of about 18 students and they all prepared short self introductions of themselves. Each person asked me a question and presented a picture of something cultural about Japan. Their questions ranged from "Can you eat fish? Do you like natto? What can you say in Japanese? How many people are in your family? Where do you want to visit in Japan?" It was really interesting seeing their pictures and listening to the story behind it. Some chose food like nabe, others chose things like Samuri and Mt. Fuji. Really enjoyed that class and learned a lot about the students and Japanese culture!
On Saturday I went to Tokyo Disneyland with friends. I'd been to the one in California, but first time to the one in Japan. It was a fun time, but a cold day. We went on a lot of rides and were able to get fast passes to some so we didn't have to wait in line. I noticed two things walking around Disneyland. One was that there were a lot of young couples there..Disneyland is a popular date place! The second is that almost everyone was walking around with some kind of warm, fuzzy Disney hat! So much so that I felt wierd not wearing one! It still amazes me how much the Japanese love all things CUTE! So..I gave in and bought my souvenir for the day. It did keep my head warm and made my Disney experience complete!
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