Dinner With Friends

How do you chase the cold nights away?
Drinking and eating with friends thats how.

Just the other day, out of the blue, it dawned on me that the friends I have made here can fall into two groups.

1) Other foreigners like myself, who are about the same age as I.
2) Japanese people who are old enough to be my parents or grandparents.

Make of that as you will, but these older Japanese folks have been a pleasure to get to know.

The most recent example is Reiko, one of my regular eikaiwa students, who recently just celebrated her 7? birthday (I know, but she'd kill me if I told). On this happy day, she invited myself and two other ALT's to eat dinner with her and her husband and daughter Shizuka. I'd met Mr. Enzawa and Shizuka at a dinner Reiko prepared last summer. That evening I also learned that Reiko's granddaughter was one of my 3rd grade students at the Junior High. (She's in a picture in the previous post about viking meals).

Jenny had taught my eikaiwa last month during a school swap we ALT's did and from that got to know Reiko. Nick came along because, well to be honest, throwing an englishman into any situation just makes for a more interesting meal.






Mr. Enzawa, Reiko's husband, is just another really nice guy I've been fortunate enough to meet. Now retired, he spent most of his life at sea. His last 10 years working were as a captain of ships crossing almost all of the worlds bodies of water. An incredibly happy man he is a joy to talk to and as you could imagine, he has some really cool stories to tell. He told me apart from New Zealand and Russia, he's been to every country in this world. Though he added, they were only the ports of the country, I think its pretty cool. I mentioned to him I'm considering floating back to America this summer by cargo ship and he nearly fell out of his chair. To say the least he though it was a great idea. Reiko, not much of a sea faring lady I gather, suggested I not. August is in fact typhoon season she added. Which is true.

For dinner we had what's called sukiyaki. It's good stuff and fairly simple to cook. With soy sauce, sugar and a little sake to keep things from burning to the pot, you simple add vegetables and shaved beef, stirring intermittently and with rice when cooked to your liking. The sugar, soy sauce and sake are all eye measurements so its as sweet or salty as your judgement make it.