Christy Gamache: November 2005

American Thanksgiving

I'm ever so thankful for being a Canadian, living in Japan, and still getting to celebrate American Thanksgiving! Today I was invited for Thanksgiving dinner to my pastor's house. We had dinner in our church sanctuary which is the lower level of their house. There was so much wonderful food, and laughter, and good fellowship. It reminded me once again of how much I really do have to be thankful for.

My wonderful adopted family including Mike and Rowena and Patrick (my pastor and his wife and son, from Texas), Tim and Susan and kids (missionaries from California), Nancy, Maryanne, and Mike...

Winter Hits!

Wow....the snow is here and I think I'm ready for it! My heaters are on full blast (why not when my apartment building has unlimited heat!), the snow tires are on my car and my winter jackets are unpacked. The only thing that remains is to take my skis out of my storage shed and put them to good use (note the beautiful mountains in the picture...site of the 1972 Olympics and just a 20 minute drive away!). I can't say that there wasn't a little bit of dread when the snow first fell...just thinking of the next five months of snow-shovelling, windowshield scraping, careful driving, coldness etc. had me cringing. In Hokkaido, there is none of this snow-and-melt-two-days-later thing that B.C. has going on. But, I'll deal with it and make the most of it!

Northern Horse Park

Last weekend Momoko, Saori, Keiko and I went to the Northern Horse Park in Tomakomai. From the name I was expecting it to just be some big park with a bunch of horses. I should know by now to never expect so little from Japan! It turned out to be an incredibly beautiful park, with (of course) many horses, big barns and huge rolling fields. But, it also had many other things like a golf course, mini-golf, go-karts, a big lodge, restaurant, carriage rides, and a pottery studio. Saturday was pretty rainy so we stuck to the indoor activities. First we had a fabulous buffet lunch. It was definitely hard for me to restrain my Canadian-sized appetite down to the socially acceptable Japanese-sized appetite! After lunch we made pottery in a big studio. So, a great day with very fun friends : )

Momoko, Saori and Keiko making fabulous pieces of art!

Ishikari World Fest 2005!

For the past couple of months I have been working together with the International Association in Ishikari to organize their fourth annual World Fest event. Once again we had the fabulous theme of food (always a sure bet for drawing the crowds)! I was in charge of recruiting ALTs from all over Hokkaido to come and set up a food booth complete with samples and information/decorations from a place of their choice. Nine other ALTs came and we had booths representing Mexico, America, Canada, Japan, Hawaii, Italy etc.
Also the day held other events such as making a 75 foot long sushi roll, and learning how to make soba noodles from professional soba makers. Very "oishikatta"!

Me and Stephen at our Canadian clam-chowder booth...

Learning how to make soba noodles...

The giant sushi roll...

Me and some of my students wearing our BINGO prizes!

Happy Halloween!

For the past month I have been planning a big Halloween Party for the elementary kids in Ishikari. Over a hundred kids showed up, plus their parents, plus 25 volunteers!! It was crowded, crazy and fun! We made about 40 jack-0-lanterns, hit jack-o-lantern shaped pinatas, bobbed for apples, painted faces etc. The kids all had a blast celebrating this foreign holiday. It was so much fun to see them lose all inhibitions and just have fun for a day.
After the party we took all the pumpkins to a dark road in Ishikari (which we named the "Shady Mile") and displayed them for two nights.

In the midst of preparations....Lori and I make pinatas... Thanks Lori!!