Day 25 (F)

After class was a class meeting, then only a few of us went to the flower arranging class (ikebana). It was mecha fun. We couldn’t understand most of what the teacher was trying to tell us (all in Japanese), but we got the gist of it, and we could easily play with flowers.

Here are all of us and our finished products: teacher, Harrison, Sky, Mia, Ani, Tin, and Myra. We got to take home the flowers.

Following that, us 3 went to Umeda (about an hour away with all transit) to meet Beniko-sensei who had offered to take us to dinner at a tofu restaurant. We were 15 minutes late due to poor planning on our part and having to walk to / find the meeting spot....

It was mecha fun, and mecha delicious. Never though to hear myself say that about tofu, but it’s true. The restaurant was lovely, traditional style, with a private room. Our menu was at least 10 items long — all in small portions, but many many dishes. See these:

Most was tofu, there was also a tofu cheese dish and some veggies, one raw fish sushi-like serving (yumO-O), primarily tofu. Tofu can be cooked in a million different ways I now believe. Trying all the different dishes, some of them very delicious, some so-so. 

Dessert was tofu ice cream for the others, which was yummier, and green tea ice cream for me, which was interesting:

After dinner, which took about 2 hours, we went to a store to look at yukata, but all expensive (but pretty), walked around the department store a bit, then Beniko-sensei took us to a hotel lobby and we got tea/coffee. Here is a picture of her. Her English is excellent, and we were able to talk about many things, like living in Utah and teaching, especially the exchange program she is trying to arrange between IBU and SLCC. It was an enjoyable evening and very nice of her to take us out and around. 

Bed time, ciao.