Cabins, giant crabs and hot chocolate!

Hey all!
Sorry i havent written in this thing for awhile.. been meaning to but, honestly, ive been procrastinating..

So last weekend was very interesting. We went with our 60+ landlords to their cabin in the inaka (countryside) for some dinner and conversation. We were a little nervous at first cuz they dont speak hardly any english at all! But as it turned out, they tried really hard to communicate in a mix of japanese and english and so did we. I felt i gained a few more vocab words of japanese and Adam seemed to improve from the forced practice as well. I was surprised by how much I could understand and pick up from context and the little japanese I actually know. Anyway, so this cabin was absolutely amazing!! it was made of imported canadian cedar trees.. a real log cabin and it was just gorgeous!! it smelled good, was small and cozy and when the heat was turned on it was super warm! Since the husband used to be a ski instructor and is/was an avid skiier, he had all his old skiis and equipment displayed everywhere and it had a real ski-cabin feel to it. I want a cabin like that so bad it hurts. I keep fanticizing about having a log cabin somewhere near Vancouver, where its warm in the summer, snowy in the winter and where we can ski/snowboard easily. Adam was really impressed and loved the cabin too, so maybe well eventually have one like it! I sure hope so! And yes, mom, you can visit whenever you want!

The dinner they fed us was more like a feast. We had appetizers of camembert cheese and crackers, dried clams, pickled....radishes(?), salad with vegetables straight from her garden!!!, and then a HUGE steamed Hokkaido crab (the same ones we saw in the osaka aquarium). the body of this bugger was about 6 inches in diameter and its armspan was about 2.5-3 feet! the taste was incredible!! Adam doesnt usually like crab at all, but this guy had so much flavor, Adam was gobbling it down as much as i was. Now, when they cracked open the body, it was a female, so there was an egg sack there. I know it sounds gross but the crab caviar was, to me at least, delicious. it was a pale mustard yellow color, and tasted milder than the crab meat itself and was nice and creamy. i thought it was really good. Adam said it was ok (hes not much into seafood, caviar or anything but catfish.. so thats saying something!). After that, we had Nabe, which is a big pot of broth in the middle of the table and you take veggies and meat from a tray and put them in, let them cook and then take them out to put over rice. It was really good, but by this time i was already stuffed, so i only ate a little. Like i said before though, the veggies were straight from her garden and they tasted sooo different and so much better than the store bought ones it was amazing.

During all this, they were pouring us alcohol like prohibition was starting the next day! I think at one point I had a large glass of beer, a glass of wine, a glass of shochu (jp vodka) and water, and a mixed drink all in front my plate at the same time!! i didnt get drunk though.. havent been in the mood lately. But what was really funny was a dream that the husband was telling us about. The wife, Aiko was talking about how he used to be a big drinker until this dream. I guess there was a really beautiful woman that came to him in his dream and made him promise not to drink, or drink as much..... So according to her he'd stopped drinking... well maybe this night was an exception or maybe the dream didnt stop him completely cuz he was sure drinking! He even poured us a beer for breakfast! kinda strange.. but i dont think hes a drunk, so dont think that. they have to be the cutest old couple ive ever seen! They bicker, but its always in good humor and they tease each other all the time and laugh. its sooooo cute! Anyway, we slept on futons in their tatami room upstairs (ok so the cabin was a bit japanified...) and we slept under these down comforters that you could seriously get lost in! they were good enough to keep you warm in 30 below! (well maybe not that cold, but they were pretty good!).

Anyway, so the weekend was excellent and we had a wonderful time, improved our japanese and got some excellent food out of it! This week has been a little more boring, but ive been keeping myself busy enough planning lessons for the new term, reading, as usual and making xmas cards for a gift exchange. OH!! aaaaaand last night I remembered that when we were moving in, wed seen a whole box of instant swiss miss hot choclate packs!! wed stuffed them in the back of the cupboard out of sight. So, i thought, "hot damn!" and grabbed the whole box and brought it to work with me.. Adam isnt a huge chocolate fan, so i took them all. oh well! more for me! Speaking of which, its freezing here in the computer room.. my hands are almost numb, im making typos all over the place so writing a sentence is taking about twice as long to write.. hot chocolate sounds delicious right now, and im starving..

sooo... ill have to head out now and update after the xmas parties this weekend! woohoo!