On the up

Frequent visitors of this blog can attest to the fact that I clearly have a love-hate relationship with Japan. Some days I can hardly contain my excitement about a steaming bowl of Hakata ramen, or a temple hidden in a backalley, or a meeting with a friendly local. Other times, the language barrier, throngs of manic cyclists and lack of Western food really frustrates me & I have to stop myself from jumping on the first plane home! Last weekend though was filled with several 'up' moments, making me feel happy to live here. On Saturday we took the ferry out to the seaside park Uminokanamichi (say that fast 3 times!) to check out a Global Village Festival, which turned out to be very relaxing & fun. Our Kiwi friend Jenni tried her hand at the Brazilian martial art/dance capoeira, Vaughan finally got to play hackysack and I just enjoyed the atmosphere and some lovely foreign food :-).

Vaughan's reliving his days in Cusco with the truly disgusting Peruvian softdrink 'Inca Kola'!

Very cute 3-year-old boy performing an Indonesian dance

The capoeira group getting ready for action & below: Jenni getting amongst it!

The following day we hosted our first all-Japanese dinner party, which made me slightly nervous as many cultural faux pas could be committed without me even noticing! Luckily Yukino, her friend Kaki & his girlfriend Kayo were keen to forgive us our crap Japanese and bad tablemanners, so an excellent time was had by all ;-). It was also a first on the culinary front because Yukino & Kaki combined forces to teach us how to make okonomiyaki, a fried battered pancake filled with cabbage, pork, shrimp and spring onion. Truly delicious and from now on served to anyone coming for dinner (you stand warned)! Yukino, Kayo, Kaki & Vaughan with our fourth piece of okonomiyaki in the middle