JAPANEXILE

Starting on the 21^st November with our official joint birthday party (as Craig’s birthday is on the 26^th, and mine the 22^nd) this was undoubtedly the longest birthday I have ever had. The past two years I’ve planned and held parties at home , so its quite strange to not be remotely involved in the planning of any of it this year. I was told two weeks prior that this was when my birthday party was and I should probably come along. Anyway, so the first party was mainly with students of our respective English classes, who make up the bulk of the people we are involved with on a regular basis anyway. Kenzo and Oumouri-san plus Hiromi and a few others from the Board of Education made an appearance. There was a pair of girls who were joining our class the following week who had been invited along to meet everyone. One of which I could have sworn I knew. Which I in fact I did, Craig and I had met them whilst rather drunk at our Welcome party two weeks prior. Whoops, nice introduction, a good long grope. So that was pretty funny. The star studded event was held in “The Japanese Room” at the Sogo centre. The feast provided by the guests I believe, and as usual there was a despicable amount of leftover really good food. Of course they couldn’t resist showing “Hokkaido chu Hizakurige” (Our TV Show) at the party. Followed by the never ending stream of presents, so that again I was rather embarrassed by people’s generosity. It was a really nice party actually, definitely a change from the party I would have had at home! I haven’t had that many presents since I was about 8 years old. Other highlight had to be the spelling they came up with for Craig on his cake “Kuratagu”. Genius. We only had the room booked until 9pm so the party was cut a little short and moved on to the only Karaoke bar in Toya. Unfortunately not many people could come, and the Karaoke machine was a little antiquated to say the least. Still, Karaoke is fun whatever. And only having old songs just means more Queen, which nobody ever gets tired of listening to song very poorly…

All the way up until the 26^th we were thrown parties. At the schools, nurseries, and of course the obligatory trip to the Guten Tag for Craig’s big day. Party at the elementary school was particularly nice, card from every students and a hand made present. (Mine was a cardboard box with a cardboard Pikachu on the top, and of course a Japanese flag to make it complete) I couldn’t help but laugh when I saw it, but I was touched. J No birthday can be celebrated without doing something traditional though. So off to Sapporo it was the weekend after for real celebration!