Today, I explored the small city of Shibukawa. It is about 25 minutes by JR Train from Takasaki. The thing I love about Japanese trains are that the slower trains are affordable and it is easy to hop from one town to the next. The shinkansen (bullet train) is a whole other story! ;)
After arriving at the station, the five of us were kindly chauffeured to the community center. Our destination was the Shibukawa community center where there would be delicious lunch, Japanese games, and music waiting for us. When we first arrived, we could try out pounding rice mochi with giant wooden gavel-type instruments. It is very heavy and the rice is very sticky, so one must be careful not to get the wooden "stick" stuck into the rice...it very difficult and a great workout! Each foreigner was given five "hits"--this was hilarious to watch and fun to try.
After, we were greeted by the community members and requested to dive into the food. The food was delicious: I ate strawberries, sushi, sandwiches, chocolate cake, and a few other delicious treats. After lunch, we were invited to play Japanese games, including karuta (memory card game) and the Japanese version of "pin the tail on the donkey," which was with a person's face instead. One person is blindfolded while the other person must figure out where the parts of the face go!
After the games, the international music began. There were several groups that performed...music from different countries of the world. There was a group of women singing Philippine love songs, Peruvian music and instruments, and a Japanese pop group that danced to fast-paced music. At the end, all of us foreigners came up to the stage to "improvise" with the music groups...it was hilarious!
It was really great communicating with the locals in English. Everyone was really eager to speak with us in English and get to know us. We even tried out our Japanese with some of the locals. At the end of the festival, we played bingo for prizes!
Enjoy the pictures!! :)
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