The Way of Sushi

Welcome back everyone!

So the past few days have been a lot of fun and I have plenty to talk about.

On friday after classes, Hi-C, the international club, threw an okonomiyaki and yakisoba party. Only a few of the international students actually went, but a lot of Japanese people were there. Shun and Daiki went so I had some people to talk to. I also got to talk with some people I hadn't seen in a while and also meet some new people. All of the International students got spread out to different tables so we could talk with Japanese people. I sat with Daiki, my friend Saaya, Tom, and three other girls I didn't know too well. Two of the girls and I were in charge of making the Yakisoba while Daiki's group made the okonomiyaki. All of the food turned out pretty well, we made so much of it that we couldn't eat anymore by the end.

After eating I got to hang out and talk with Shun and some other friends which was nice because I haven't really had many chances to hang out recently, everyone has been really busy. Hopefully we will able be able to get together a few more times before I have to go back to America.

Saturday was also a pretty eventful day. It started with a host-family luncheon. This is where all of the host-families and their host-students (most of them anyway) went to hokusei and had lunch together. All of the international students had to give a speech in Japanese thanking their host-family and then we got to talk with other host-families and teachers.

After the luncheon, Emily, Eric, Mal, Euna, Tom, Michelle, and I got together and then went to Shin Sapporo so we could go to the Aquarium there. The aquarium was pretty small, but there were a lot of different kinds of fish and other animals there. It had seals, otters, eels, and even penguins. There was even a point where a penguin came out into the hall way and you could take pictures with him. We also got to stick our hands into a fish tank where the fish would go to your hand and eat up all of the dead skin. It felt really weird, but was pretty neat to experience.

After the aquarium we met up with Daiki and then went to go eat Ramen for dinner. We went to the place we went before where there are a ton of Ramen shops set up to like like an old-fashion town. We went to a different place this time, and I got Curry Ramen. It was really good, it tasted like soup curry, but with ramen noodles.

After dinner a few of us went to our friend Kazuma's apartment. There we hung out with some of his friends and had a little party. It was a lot of fun, but unfortunately I had to leave a little early in order to catch the last bus home.

On Sunday Euna and Mal once again came to my house for lunch. But today's lunch was not just any lunch, it was an intense sushi making experience. My Otousan decided to teach us how to properly make sushi. We first started by learning how to form the rice into nice rectangles. It is actually harder than it looks. You need to press firmly, but not too hard in order to make it into the proper shape. You also have to use the right amount of rice. 

Once we graduated from that level, we got to add fish and other seafood sashimi on top of the rice balls. This also had a trick to it, you want them to stick together and the riceball to fit perfectly under the sashimi. Once that was done you should have a beautiful array of sushi which you can arrange beautifully. . . and then eat.

The sushi was really good and we had a lot of fun making it. It is great to see Otousan having fun with us and wanting to teach us new things because he is usually very shy since he can't speak english well. But we had a blast.

Monday it was back to school. This starts the last week of classes here at Hokusei. Next week is all exams plus the speech that I have to give. I also have an exam on Thursday, so there should be lots of fun studying time to come. However even though I have a lot of school stuff going on, I want to make sure I have a great time in Sapporo with my friends while I can. I am sure we will come up with some fun stuff to do during the last 2 weeks here.

Stephen