delegation from houston!

Last week, a delegation from our sister city in the US, Houston, came to Chiba City! 2012 was the 40th anniversary of our sister-city relationship, but since we count them in fiscal years, having them come in March still totally counted (or that's what I keep telling myself, haha). Getting ready for them took a lot of time and effort (and much, much more on my coworkers' parts), but I think it was a great success! I had a lot of fun with the delegation and hopefully they did, too. :)

They arrived on Sunday, and for their (unofficial) welcome dinner, we went to Sakae Zushi, which is a sushi restaurant run by sushi chef Masayoshi Kazato, who holds all sorts of important positions in the sushi world and actually went to Houston last year to teach about proper sushi hygiene and was made an honorary citizen of the city. So this trip was his chance to return the favor to Houston on his home turf, and I'm glad I got to be there - interpreting for him with sushi terminology was not easy, but the meal was more than worth it! I also learned some new things about making sushi, like how vinegar is important as a disinfectant and not just a seasoning and how it usually takes three years of training before a beginning sushi chef is allowed to actually make it (though Chef Kazato did it after just two).

The next day was full of official/formal events: courtesy visits to the mayor and the chairman of the City Assembly and a welcome luncheon/dinner reception hosted by each, including traditional Japanese koto and American Country Western dance performances. It was a big day of interpreting for me, and while I definitely had some less-than-stellar moments, all in all I felt like things went by better and more easily than the past, which is encouraging (to say the least). The highlight of the day for me, though, was successfully carrying out our flash mob in the city hall lobby, which my coworker and I, along with several of our fellow city hall workers, had been practicing for weeks! It started out with the country dancer from Houston dancing by himself, followed by teachers from the Asian Western Country Dance Association (who came from all over Japan) joining in, and then us! The delegation members (and probably any random passersby) were pretty surprised, so it was a definite success. :) We also went strawberry-picking at a nearby farm (because Chiba City actually has quite a fair amount of farmland and agriculture, too), which was delicious.

With the bulk of the official stuff done, Tuesday was much more relaxed! Though different people had different activities to attend, the group I accompanied went to the Chiba City Folk Museum to try on traditional clothing and armor from the Heian period (which actually anybody can do once a month or so if you sign up in advance - a pretty cool experience, I think).  Then we were off to QVC Marine Field to watch part of a pre-season baseball game from one of the VIP rooms! The head of the delegation read a letter from the mayor of Houston aloud and took part of the first pitch ceremony, and the rest of us got to go down on the field with him, too. I also got to see a slideshow I helped make projected on the big screen, which was pretty awesome.

After that, we visited Mihama-en, a traditional Japanese garden in Makuhari, to experience the tea ceremony while admiring the view. Fun fact: Houston also has a Japanese garden in a place called Hermann Park, which is home to a stone lantern sent by Chiba City! I'll definitely stop by there whenever I end up visiting Houston (having decided I should make it a goal to visit all of our sister cities at some point in my life). The last thing scheduled for their visit was a reception hosted by Houston, at a restaurant near Chiba Port called Ocean Table, where food, drinks, and line dancing meant a good time was had by all. :)

On Wednesday we got up bright and early to send the delegation off to Tokyo, but since they had an open spot on the day tour they had reserved and were gracious enough to offer it to me, I ended up spending the day with them as well (since it was also a holiday)! I got to visit some famous parts of Tokyo I hadn't gotten around to seeing yet like Meiji Jingu, the Imperial Palace garden, and Odaiba and take a (very) mini cruise around the bay. They also invited me to have dinner with them and then wouldn't let me pay for it, which was super nice of them.

A couple getting married at Meiji Jingu, on the first day of spring!

So that was the visit from the delegation from Houston! It involved a lot of last-minute translation and on-the-fly interpretation, but also new experiences and connections - it's things like this that really make me appreciate how cool my job can be. :)

kimono trip to tokyo

For last week's kimono class, we took a trip to Tokyo! It was supposed to give us a chance to actually do stuff in a kimono for (most of) a day to see if we had managed to put them on properly and to get used to doing more than just standing around in them for a few minutes, which is usually what happens in class. It was certainly an experience, though to be honest I'm not sure it's one I want to repeat any time soon - moving around in a kimono and zori (traditional footwear that is basically a fancy, uncomfortable, and very pretty version of flip-flop) all day is no joke!

After putting on kimonos at the classroom,  we headed off to the station! Even though it's less than a 10-minute walk away, we managed to hop on a bus there, which my feet (in brand-new zori) really appreciated. Then we got on a train to Tokyo! Navigating the stairs and the gap between the platform and train was certainly trickier than usual (you can only step so far in a kimono), but about halfway through the 40-minute ride I realized that I could still lean back even with my obi, which was an excellent discovery.

Our destination was another classroom of our school (they're all over the country) in Nihombashi's Ningyocho, which I don't know very much about but is apparently a place with lots of traditional flair. The classroom we visited was right next to a place that dyes the fabric for kimonos, where we stopped first. Originally we were supposed to be able to see the man who owns the shop actually work on dyeing something, but unfortunately he was having medical issues so we just got to look around - it was still pretty cool, though. There was a long table in the center that was exactly half the length of the fabric necessary to make a kimono, and we saw some of the screens they used in the dyeing process (though I didn't have my camera at the time so no pictures, unfortunately).

After that we went into the classroom for some lectures - first they divided us by class level (beginning to advanced) for a short session. In the beginning level, they taught us practical things like the proper ways to sit down in a chair, sit on the floor in seiza position (without your feet falling asleep too fast) and get back up, go up and down stairs, etc. Next we all came together for the main lecture, which was about kimonos and obis made from materials other than silk and cotton, where we had the chance to see and touch (very expensive) examples that they told us normally would be basically impossible to get to see. Since everything was in Japanese and I know basically no vocabulary about nature, I didn't really know what most of anything was made of, but my impression was that the materials were things like thread and fibers from tree bark, grasses, etc - though they weren't stiff or anything at all. All in all, a pretty cool experience.

Next there was a long period where everybody could pick out fabric and "try on" different kimonos (since new kimonos are essentially always custom-made this actually mean draping the fabric on in a very complicated way to make it look just like a kimono), though I spent most of the time just looking at all the different patterns and materials instead.

After that, we had lunch together at a French restaurant, which was delicious (though since by then it was like 2pm we were all hungry and not picky at all). I found out that you can get something that's basically a giant bib to put over the front of your kimono while you eat, though those of us who didn't have those just used our napkins instead.

And then it was time for the long trip home! I managed to go the whole day without any wardrobe mishaps and only discomfort from my zori (not the kimono itself), so I would call the outing a success! Here's a picture of my tired but triumphant self on the way back to our classroom in Chiba:

This past week was my last official class, which was a practical and written test of my kimono knowledge! The goal was to be able to put the kimono on from start to finish within 50 minutes (it is beginner level after all) and then answer questions about the types of kimono/obi, names of parts, etc. Though when I say a test, it was very low-pressure, which is good because I definitely would have failed the written part if they actually graded us (oops). I don't think I'll be continuing onto intermediate for now, since with frisbee practice starting up again and the start of spring I think I'll just be getting busier, but who knows? There may still be more kimono adventures in store for the future. :)