Nayoro, kendo, pachinko

Last weekend I headed up to Nayoro for a dinner party with some other ALTs.

On the way there I saw this shop.

 "It's a good shop, maybe". Too bad it was closed at the time.

 If I ever go to Nayoro again, I'll try to check it out.

 Dinner was great. Look at this fancy sashimi platter.

And here's a big ol' nabe. The perfect winter dish.

The junior high kids are doing kendo in gym class. They suit up with all the armor and everything.

 I've taken fencing classes, but it would have been cool to do it as part of the actual gym curriculum, alongside my fellow classmates.

I don't get the barefoot thing though. I would understand it if they had a separate tatami room just for kendo, but this is the same gym they already wear shoes in to play basketball and volleyball.

The third grade elementary students made these pachinko crafts in art class.

I really like the manta ray one. There sure are a lot of creative things they get to do in art! I wish I could attend those classes but with 6 grades, my elementary class schedule is always busy.

Too much snow

There's big snow here. There's so much that I'm actually running out of places to shovel it. That big pink push shovel is pretty handy.

 The snow piling up on the roof looks like toothpaste. When it falls down it re-buries my steps.

 I used to get disappointed by the lack of snow back home. Now I miss how it would reliably last for about a week at most. Seriously, this snow has been here since late November.

 It's still pretty neat to walk around through narrow pathways between walls of snow. They're so tall they obstruct my view of the street. I guess they'd provide a good barrier if a car swerves off the road.

I wonder if there's going to be massive flooding in the spring.

Ice Festival after dark

Part two of the Ice Festival, when the sun goes down and the lights come on.

The coloured ice glowed in the black light.

And they shined coloured light on the ice sculptures.

 Group photo!

 The magic green forest was spooky.

The hollow ice cups had candles put inside.

 Kind of odd that they didn't use a red light for the phoenix.

 At least they used red for Iceflame.

If you stand at the right angle, the green light from the trees shines though the snake.

 It also makes this deer look very Christmas-y.

 At seven, we all gathered on one side for fireworks. A nice way to end the night. Unlike most of the fireworks shows I've seen back home, this one wasn't clear about when it was over. There were about three short pauses where we thought the show might be over but it turned out to keep going.

On a different topic, here's a sweater I saw. I think it would suit Lauren.

This is from Sunday. I cooked clam chowder for dinner.

 A good time to break out that Terra bread I've been saving.

Higashikawa Ice Festival

On Saturday I made the journey out to Higashikawa for their Ice Festival.

It's smaller than the ones in Asahikawa and Sapporo, but it's also held like a month earlier, so that's a big draw.

Ice sculptures.

"R".

 "Swordfish".

 "Descent". It's like a four-armed lion man I guess.

 "Iceflame".

The path up to the main area was scattered with broken coloured ice. It looked like candy. A bunch of little kids were picking up chunks and putting them in bags.

 "Sweet trap"

 "Friends"

If a woman, a kangaroo, and a cat can be friends, why can't we?

 There were about a hundred little snowmen. I assume people in town could come and make them for the festival.

 That one's a Weezing!

 There's a Totoro and a Baymax.

 Hello Kitty, a Minion (of course), Domo-kun, Mickey Mouse, and a Muppet (maybe Elmo?).

Snow sculptures. I think these were probably done by kids, because there are a lot of video game characters. It's Kirby!

 An Inkling.

 Eevee.

 Da Pump with U.S.A. This song sure has been popular around here.

A cute bun-bun in a frame, perfect for pictures.

 Another Totoro.

 Snorlax!

 Heart of ice.

And here are the biggest, fanciest ice sculptures. "Celebration".

 "Emotions".

 "Phoenix".

 "Dragon".

"F".

 The anatomy on this one was a bit off.

 And I'm not sure what this one is but there's a bird and a fish in there.

 There was a big sledding slope for the kids too. It had some narrow slides made of the coloured ice.

 Here's a little house with a happy dude out front. Oda said she helped out with this one.

 These ones were outside the doors to the town hall.

 There was a big pile of ice on the forest trail for some reason. It was like an igloo but there was no opening.

 Had some nice hot borscht for lunch. Haven't eaten beets in a while.