1/2
My host university in Nisshin offers a home stay opportunity for either one day or one night. Mine is scheduled for tomorrow aka six hours from now. When visiting a Japanese person’s home it is customary to bring a small gift or food that the family can share. So I got the bright idea to make a cake, but that was before I remembered that I can’t bake. I had a box of instant brownie mix and I figured that I would make a cake out of it. But then I decided to make icing, and cookies in case the cake failed, but I didn’t have enough powdered sugar or eggs. So I ended up with a burnt cake, weird cookies and non-whipped icing because I don’t have a mixer and I couldn’t do it by hand.
Lesson learned: Never start baking without proper ingredients or better yet just don’t bake. So in the end I woke up early and ran to the store and bought fruit and chocolate to make a fruit basket with. :(
1/3
My host mom was scheduled to come and pick me up from Proxy at 11 am. I accidentally ran into her at the tea ceremony earlier this semester and then later went to a small party with some friends of hers. But this was the first time I was going to meet more of her family besides her youngest son. She has four children, three sons and one daughter who was about my age. And one cat and one dog. It was cool to spend time with them. They made takoyaki (bather balls that are fired with various things in them but usually squid) for lunch. Then we just chatted for a while and watched a local college race on the television. Later on we had sushi for dinner. “Sushi wa daisuki!” ( I love sushi) I didn’t really get a chance to talk to her older kids but it was still a really nice visit.
1/6
This winter break went by so fast. Full of “I’ll do it tomorrow” or “there’s still tomorrow.” Looking back I realize that I slept the majority of my break away in a cocoon of warmth. The only major accomplishment besides completing my homework was I finally sewed some of my clothes that I’d been meaning to do for a few months. Well, we have a couple of weeks back and then we have a longer spring break. I’m going to plan and do more over it. I’m going to try and bike to Sakae at some point, it’s about 30 minutes away by train or about 9 and a half miles away. I’ve never biked that far so I’ll see how well it goes.