Valentine's Day

Do you celebrate Valentine's day with your boyfriend, girlfriend or partner?
Anyway, I will tell you how Valentine's Day is celebrated in Japan. Women give chocolates not only to their boyfriend but also to their boss or colleagues. Yes! It is getting very expensive day!!! However, 14th of March is called "white day" and men will give candies, cakes or dinner to women in return.
I think Japanese people like this type of events! It is very good for the chocolate companies.

I went to "a southern season". It has a large varieties of imported food. I bought some Parma ham, Iberico ham and coffee. When I went to the check out, they gave me a box of chocolates because I spend enough to earn reward on Valentine's Day.

Ninja Warrior

My husband found a Japanese programme called Ninja Warrior on Friday night. I used to watch it when I was in Japan. It had us sitting on the edge of our seat.
The programme was fun because I could hear Japanese commentary and see the subtitles in English. The commentator was quite funny, too.
It was filmed a few years ago and some of contestants looked young. Anyway, we want to watch it again!!!!!

We try to eat fish once a week at least, but it is quite difficult to get fresh fish. If it were really fresh, we could eat SASHIMI (raw fish). Unfortunately, we haven't been able to find it.
This time, I wrapped cod in foil. You can't see the fish in this photo, but it is underneath of vegetables. :-) Most white fish is more tasteless than pacific saury or mackerel.
We found frozen saury and mackerel pickled in vinegar at the Japanese supermarket. We ate them as SASHIMI. They are very tasty.

Early morning mist

I need courage to go walking early in the morning in winter. I went walking around 8am today and I could see the early morning mist. It was quite nice.

Recently, I enjoy walking more than I used to because my husband gave me an iPod Shuffle for Christmas. When I listen to my favourite songs, I almost sing or dance on the street... ( like an iPod advertisement.)

My Japanese lesson starts today. Even though I prepared the lesson, I am always nervous at the first lesson after a long vacation.

Year 2008

This is my favourite type of sushi. It is called "Oshizushi" which means "pressed". While I was in Japan last November, I enjoyed eating "oshizushi" with my family. It was very delicious!!!!

By the way, what are your New Year resolutions? My resolutions are:

1. I want to enjoy teaching Japanese and teach more students.
   
2. I've got a piano so I would like to practice everyday and learn new pieces. Recently, I have been playing Beethoven's "Pathetique" and some Chopin waltzes.
3. I've started Japanese/Spanish language exchange - I want to improve my Spanish.
   
4. We joined a Japanese tennis circle. We will be better players in the end of this year!!!
5. Stay healthy and enjoy food!
6. Update my blog often :-)
   

I wish you all a good and happy new year!

Christmas dinner

A Merry Christmas to all of you!

The TV news predicted it would snow on Christmas Eve, but it didn't. It was very warm day instead. BBQ roast chicken and vegetables are now our traditional Christmas dinner. We bought a huge chicken from a farmer's market. The price was a bit expensive than the supermarket, but the taste was great. The chicken was juicy and tender.

My husband was in charge of cooking the roast chicken. I only cut the vegetables and made marinades. Oh, I forgot to tell you. I made foundant chocolate too.

Piano

Playing piano is one of my hobbies.
I started playing piano when I was 4. I suddenly decided to visit my old piano teacher. My teacher is 76 years old now. She is very well and still teaching some students. She used to have 2 Yamaha grand pianos, but she swapped one of them for a Bosendorfer grand piano which is very good quality. 　

She values the auditory training method very much. During the lesson, she would play chords. We had to name the notes and write them down quickly. It was really good aural training.

I usually play the same pieces, but I decided to try to learn some new pieces. I like Chopin, Beethoven and Morzart. Now, I am trying to play "Piano Sonata #8 In C Minor, Op. 13, "Pathétique" - 2. Adagio Cantabile". It is very difficult, but is wonderful piece.

Autumn

Here it is!!! Autumn season has come. I didn't expect the autumn colours to be nice this year. There is a drought around here. Many trees have died. However, we saw some trees like this picture and it reminds me of autumn in Japan.

There are many places famous for beautiful coloured leaves in Japan such as Nikko and Jingu mae. If you have a chance to go to Japan, I recommend to go in autumn. You would enjoy great autumn food such as matsutake mushroom and chestnut.

The leaves have been changing colours later than previous years because the climate is warming.