My students and I went to eat amazing Japanese sweets at Cafe an-an in Portslade.
We had Japanese afternoon tea themed around Reiwa (令和), the new Japanese era which started on May 1st.
My favourite was the elderflower tempura (so good!) and 水信玄餅 mizu shingen mochi - the clear "raindrop" mochi.
Also, I learned that the Japanese word for elderflower is エルダーフラワー (erudaafurawaa).
Noriko-san, ありがとうございました！ Thank you very much for having us!
Last year went super quickly. And we did a lot of new things at Step Up Japanese! Here’s what my students and I got up to in 2018.
I was a vegetarian for ten years…then, I moved to Japan. I lasted about two weeks as a vegetarian in Japan, before swiftly abandoning my principles in favour of late-night ramen and fish for breakfast.
That's not to say that being vegetarian - or even vegan - in Japan is impossible. It just wasn't for me. But did you know that lots of wagashi (Japanese sweets) are naturally vegan?
I hadn't really thought about it, until I learned that Cafe an-an in Portslade was running an Afternoon Tea event for World Vegan Day on 1st November.
Here are some pictures of the tasty food I managed to take on the day - before I ate it all.
Many people believe you need to live abroad to get speaking practice in a foreign language, but this isn’t true.
Similarly, people often assume that if you in Japan, like I did, you’ll pick up the language easily. But that’s not necessarily true either.
If you speak English, it’s possible - indeed easy - to live in another country for years and not become fluent in the language.
I didn't make any year-long New Years’ Resolutions this year. Instead, I decided to set myself some monthly language-related challenges. I’ll decide them as the year goes on, and I’ll probably do one every other month.
In January, I decided to speak Japanese every day for a month.