Happy Thanksgiving!

Happy Thanksgiving, everyone! Few people here seem to care about the holiday, strangely. I mean, I didn't expect the Japanese to be serving turkey sushi or anything, but I was amazed at how many people had never even heard of it. Yesterday I had to totally explain it to Yukari, who seemed completely amazed. And the seminar house Otōsan had never heard of it, either. A large portion of the Americans, too, didn't realize that today was the day. I got a lot of, "Oh, is that today?" responses in class today when I mentioned Thanksgiving. I guess it's easy to lose track of time.

For lunch, though, some of my friends from the seminar house and I went to the campus McDonald's and binged on fried things. Yum! Oh, and Mom made me some cookies that arrived in the mail today, so I've been celebrating with those.

Anyway, classes today were nice and nondescript. Afterward, I went to tutor the kids in English. Again, it was a blast. I wasn't looking forward to skipping my afternoon nap, especially because I'm still exhausted from the onsen. But once I was there and teaching, I had a great time. Tomoko, the lady who runs the school, even gave us mochi (sweet rice cakes, basically) to snack on because today's topic was food likes and dislikes. Yum! Mmm, hot tea and freshly warmed mochi really do hit the spot on a cold, dreary day like today. It's the Japanese equivalent of cookies and milk, I'd have to say. The teaching was fun and the kids were amusing, as usual. They were amazed that I don't like sushi, and they had trouble wrapping their minds around the fact that the English language word for "okonomiyaki" is, actually, "okonomiyaki."

I got home kind of late and was wet from the rain that surprised me on the bike ride home, so I decided not to particpate in our makeshift Thanksgiving meal. A bunch of the Americans in the dorm pooled their monetary and culinary resources to cook things like a glazed chicken and apple pie. It looked really good, but I decided not to have any because I didn't contribute anything, and besides I was quite content with my potstickers. Sounds like a terrible Thanksgiving, probably, but it wasn't. I had a good day.

Like I said, I'm totally beat. So now it's bed time, and I hope tomorrow won't be as draining.