Valentines day

So valentines day is interesting here.... On Feb. 14th only the girls give to boys. And what they give aren't little paper valentines, they give various types of chocolate, cakes, cookies, etc. Most of the students at my junior high gave little baggies with cookies or chocolate in them to boys, but not only to boys, they give to other girls too!! I was lucky enough to have a package delivered to me from my wonderful friend Yuri, in Tokyo, with these really cute, and really good, chocolate mini-cakes!!! I was soooooo surprised, and really happy too. I of course didn't send anything to her.... Now that I realize valentines day isn't just for happy couples here, I will make more of an effort to do something next year!! Even a few of my students gave me something, even though I think that a lot of it was pity based... That's ok, I still got chocolate out of it! But apparently I have to give back to them on White day. Which is Mar. 14th. This is when all of the boys give back to the girls who gave to them... And apparently the teachers give back to the students... I still don't understand most of the holidays here, but I'm trying!

Do you know what this is?

I was teaching a grade 9 class the grammar point "Do you know what this is?" I had made a handout with a bunch of Canadian type things on it, and they were supposed to go around and ask their friends if they knew what the pictures represented. One of the, how should I put this, "less motivated" students started walking toward me. I had a feeling he was going to do something sketchy, because he had the typical smirk on his face like he had thought of something super clever and could barely keep it inside himself. So to my surprise, he started asking the correct question, but the sheet was rolled up in his hands. I told him to use the sheet, but he ignored me of course, and then said "Do you know what THIS is?" As he said "this" he pointed, of course, to his crotch. To be honest, I was actually kind of impressed, because he used the grammar I was teaching in a way that made sense and it showed that he really understood what it meant. Nice.

It's spring?

Apparently it's supposed to be the begining of Spring already, and doesn't really seem like it at all. Mainly because of the giant piles of snow and cold temperatures of Nayoro. But the "coming of spring" came with some pretty weird traditions.

The first I experienced at one of my elementary schools. They tried to explain it to me in the morning when I got there, but that was a little difficult to do. The first word translated was "setsubun" which translates as "the day before the beginning of spring." Then the word "devil" came up, followed by "peanuts." I had absolutely no clue what they were talking about. What involves the coming of spring, the devil, and peanuts??? Well, apparently you throw peanuts at the devil to chase him away, and then you will have good luck all year. Or at least that is what I got out if it. It turned out to be really fun, a couple teachers dressed up as devils, and then all of the students ran after them and threw handfulls of peanuts at them. It was a chaotic mess of flying peanuts and devils running around chasing screaming kids.

Another tradition I experienced which was a little more low key was at my friend Airi's house. She made a giant rolled sushi for me, her, and her boyfriend, and we had to eat them facing south. You were also not allowed to talk until you were finished eating. The sushi was delicious, I love sushi! Even when I have to eat in in silence facing south.