hello kitty holidays

one "weekend" late in november (which is almost never saturday and sunday for nova teachers, it was tuesday and wednesday for me, wednesday and thursday for jill) jill and i made plans to go to takamatsu for a little starbucks and to start our christmas shopping. and in the evening we would meet mariko for some dinner and drinks.

well after lolly-gagging in starbucks for far longer than normal people (it feels a little like home... plus there's great people watching) we attempted to do some shopping for people on our lists. sounded like an easy enough task, to pick out some cute japanese themed stuff to mail home. and yet all we came away with that day was a 3-foot plastic christmas tree and some hello kitty decorations. we made plans to go to takamatsu *again* the following weekend - and this time really get some gift buying done.

christmas presents started arriving in our mailbox, along with some confusion trying to pick up packages at the post office, and our flat started to look really festive. we began planning our christmas eve and day feasts, as well as a post christmas detox day before we headed to tokyo for new year's.

christmas eve day was so balmy that we could open our balconey doors and let the air flow in. after watching "pirates of the carribean" for the second time over a breakfast of poached eggs and hollondaise it was time to get ourselves moving. we rode our bikes to vivre in utazu (the shopping center extrordonaire) without coats to purchase our holiday feast supplies. we came away with ¥10,400 worth of groceries packed in our bike baskets and our backpacks (which seems like a lot of money - it's about $100 - but we did get 4 bottles of wine and ¥1,000 worth of beef, so i'd say it was pretty good) and headed home to start preparations.


our christmas eve setup
we spent christmas eve like i do at home every year. we watched christmas movies (my family sent a tape with some of the classics on it - a charlie brown christmas, rudolph the red-nosed reindeer, and white christmas). and we drank and ate (edamame, gyoza, chili shrimp, sushi, pistachios, pringles, and mulled wine).

christmas day was the strangest ever - for many reasons. in the morning we had a lovely, holiday breakfast of bacon sandwiches and mimosas. but then jill had to go to work (while they love christmas in japan, it's not *really* a holiday as most people are shinto and buddhists). i spent my day doing laundry, going to the store to buy jill's christmas gifts (they were open, since it's not a holiday), i painted my nails, and pretty much sat around watching movies until jill got home from work.

then the real holiday began. we started by opening some wine and our presents. then we began preparing our feast. we started with a butternut squash soup (from a carton). then we had a japanese flavored beef stew, mashed potatoes, green beans and corn, broccoli citron, and of course more wine. by the time we finished we could barely move.


christmas dinner (notice the mobile phones at the dinner table)
we had planned to meet some of our friends at karaoke to sing some christmas songs, but in the end didn't feel like getting off the couch. we watched "pirates of the carribean" again (a gift from my lovely girls) and drank more wine. all in all it was a lovely day, but strangely didn't quite feel like a real christmas....

panini e birra

i know, i know... i'm already off my schedule for posting. but i've told myself it's because i wanted to give everyone i e-mailed about this site a chance to view the first posting at their leisure and decide whether or not it's amusing/interesting enough to read on a regular basis... or i could just be a procrastinator. ;P

this postcard is one i wrote to my family on st. patrick's day from milano, italy:

"..since arriving in italy i've discovered just how bad the french "panini" are, here they are sooo delicious. in france they are just warm. also had a can of beer from the sandwich stand on the side of the road. have decided i'm not doing enough casual european drinking. you can even get beer at McD's!"

it really was very amusing - there was a small hut that made sandwiches and some picnic tables right on the side of the road. luckily it was a sunny and somewhat warm day.

it was a quiet st. patrick's day in for me. the hostel had a kitchen available for guest use, so i cooked up a packet of instant risotto milanese accompanied by a bottle of white wine. from my personal journal:

could be the vino, but i'm v. excited about my upcoming travels. keep thinking of molto mario!

i have food on the brain at all times... a few days later i got it into my head that i could re-create a spinach and ricotta panino i had in milano by simply buying and mixing spinach and ricotta... i do not reccomend this.

next post will be posted next week (first week of may), i promise!