柳川

I had a great week last week! I saw Caol again on Thursday for more 焼肉 (yakiniku, BBQ) and karaoke. To celebrate the Pitch Perfect 2 trailer coming out we only sang songs from Pitch Perfect or the new trailer. It was a lot of fun! I also got together with Lisa again. We're both from Kitakyushu, but didn't hang out much until we both met for the after-JET conference in Tokyo. We had a great dinner together at the Turkish restaurant in Kokura and then went to karaoke. It was another great karaoke night and I really look forward to seeing her more before we both head home in August.

Saturday I went to 柳川 (Yanagawa) on a school trip! The teachers, principal, and vice principal. They rented a huge bus and we all arrived around 8:30. The teachers in charge had loaded the bus with drinks and snacks and we started our two hour trip south. Yanagawa is famous for it's wide canals running through the city and is a popular tourist destination because of its riverboats. They boats were long, probably room for about 10 - 15 people. We were there on the last day of February, which was also the last day the boats had 炬燵 (kotatsu, heated tables) on them. The boats run all year long, so for winter (December - February) they put kotatsu on the boat to keep people warm. The kotatsu spans the length of the boat and, like all kotatsu, has a large blanket to put around your feet and keep the heat under the table. It was so much fun seeing everything from the boat and our guide was great at pointing stuff out. The boat dropped us off at a restaurant for lunch were we had boiled eel, Yanagawa's specialty food. Some people bought snacks for before the meal, deep fried eel spines! I tried one and it was not too bad surprisingly, although I'm not sure I'd eat another. The eel for lunch, however, was incredibly good!

We had some free time after lunch and I did a bit of souvenir shopping for a small さげもん (sagemon). I also saw a beautiful hina doll and sagemon exhibit for 雛祭り (Hina Matsuri, Girl's festival) on March 3rd. Sagemon are hanging decorations typically used during 雛祭り and Yanagawa is one of the most famous places in Japan for these types of decorations. We saw hundreds of them and they were all incredibly beautiful and detailed.

We eventually found our way back to the bus. We started traveling back towards Kitakyushu, but stopped once more about 40 minutes into the drive. We stopped to tour Kitaya brewery in Yame. We did a quick tour of the brewery and were given free samples of their award wining sake. In 2013, the brewery won the International Wine Championship in the sake category and we got to try that winning sake along with others. Everything was really good and I can see why it won! We headed back to the bus and back home after our visit and arrived back at school by dinner time. We all went our separate ways for dinner and I was glad to be home after a long, fun day.

Sunday was uneventful, I just cleaned and ran some errands. This week should be quiet again and mostly preparation for next weeks graduation. My last school day at Shinozaki is tomorrow before I start visiting many different schools. I will be back at Shinozaki next week for graduation on Thursday, but that will be my last day at Shinozaki. I'm really sad to be leaving, but I know I'll still be able to see many of the teachers outside of school and I couldn't have asked for a better place to work!