Matsuris Abound

This weekend the plan was to finish going through my apartment and packing everything up - I'm getting there but I've not finished quite just yet.

I'd chosen this weekend because if I send some boxes home this week they should hopefully arrive home around the same time as I do plus I didn't have much else planned. The first years are all up in Tokyo for the recontracting conference (can't believe it's a year since I was there) so I thought they'd be less going on and fewer distractions. But I've decided distractions are good and it would have made for a very boring blog if all I had to write about was cleaning my apartment!

Ise-ebi Matsuri

On Saturday afternoon I went down to Shima with Miki, Tetsuya, Asako and Michael for the Ise-ebi matsuri. We ate some delicious Ise-ebi miso soup and wandered around. I had to leave before the main events in the evening started so Miki arranged for me to see some ebi dancing and to have a go myself, I actually thought dancing like a prawn was a lot of fun! (ebi for non-Japan readers translates as prawn or shrimp I guess but these things are really big, almost like a mini lobsters - either way it's weird to have a dance for them).



Yaki- Niku

I took the train from Shima up to Tsu to meet people for dinner and to meet Anne Marie, another one of Aileen's brill friends from back home. Yaki niku is where you cook your own food on the table, it's cool and I got to eat lots of red meat mmmm! After we were sufficiently filled up with yaki-yasai and niku, beer and sake; Aileen, Momo, Anne Marie and me went off to karaoke. It was fun, we put in loads of songs we've never done before as well as the old favourites and sang away to our hearts' content. I was particularly excited about the latest additions which included the Zutons, the Kooks, the Editors and KT Tunstall!!!

Saio Matsuri

Last year a group of us who were given the amazing opportunity to take part in a local festival in Dave's town. The main part of the festival is the parade, where those taking part walk the streets wearing incredible Heian period costumes.

This year I obviously wasn't taking part, which didn't bother me too much and I think I actually preferred it from a spectator's point of view. Don't get me wrong it was so generous of them to invite us to take part and it was a very memorable experience but there's something I don't like about being the token gaijins involved in a Japanese event - let's face it I don't know how many six foot, white people were wandering around Meiwa in the Heian period.

I think the history of the area is amazing but then again I really like this kind of stuff, if you want to you can read more about it here and also on Dave's brill website.

After the festival we headed over to Meiwa Jusco, drank coffee and did PURIKURA! Who would have guessed it?! Stewart, Aileen and Anne Marie came to mine for a spot of dinner which was a nice end to a lovely weekend, ah ....

(On Friday when I said I'd get back to writing about karaoke and purikura I didn't know that that was exactly what I was going to end up doing ... honestly!)