March 1

Today was pretty uneventful until the afternoon at least. I worked on my homework until four-ish when okaasan and otousan called me to go to their son’s house. We drove for quite a while, apparently. Ryoushinnomusuko, Gen, his wife (whose name I can’t remember) and Mana just moved in recently (when ryoushin went to help them move). Their house is very modern, but it still has a room that is entirely floored in tatami. That’s where they set up both of Manachan’s hina matsuri sets and a really pretty doll besides. When we sat down in the living room, Manachan was wearing a pink kimono and watching anpanman. She refused to look at me the whole time.

I talked with (mostly listened to) okaasan and Mana’s other obaasan while otousan went all the way back to Nisshin where he had forgotten Manachan’s present. Obaasan told me about how she lost her ability to eat meat after walking by butcher shops every day before and after high school. I’m finding it hard to understand older people, I’m not sure if it’s the nagoyaben or if it’s just me trying to get used to non-textbook language.

Once otousan got back (which seemed very long), we ate sashimi, Vietnamese spring rolls, rice with fish, and clear soup with clams in it. It was all very delicious and everyone kept telling me to eat a lot, but I did not want to be rude, so I tried not to.

After dinner, the guys talked about income, Obama, and the car market. I didn’t understand a lot, but it was interesting. Manachan’s other obaasan played Sushiya with her and Mana gave her two ojiisan’s plastic food.

When the plates had been cleared, Mana’s mother brought out a home-made strawberry shortcake. It looked like the kind you buy from a specialty bakery shop, but it was for hina matsuri, so it had the two hinasama, flowers, and other decorations on top. It was beautiful and Mana couldn’t wait to have it. When she had helped Mana blow out the only candle, her mom cut the cake into pieces large even by US standards and gave each of us one. It was delicious!

For the rest of the night, everyone talked at the dinner table and eventually, the subject changed to the hinasama. Before I knew it, I was being offered one of the dolls (“as a souvenir to bring back”) and in a mix of surprise and fear of being rude, I said multiple times that I couldn’t (accept) and that it was too big (special). I realized after I had left though, that they would not have offered so enthusiastically if they didn’t mean it, and if I had accepted it, it would have been a very meaningful gift from my host family. For the next day, I regretted my decision and tried to think of a polite way to tell my host mother.

However, when we went home, I had no time to think about it because I had realized that day that I had twice as much homework as I had expected and I was already cutting it close without the multiplier. I had expected to have to finish my letter to my sensei for Japanese and to prepare for a presentation on a part of Japanese history in history class, but I had forgotten that I would have a vocabulary quiz and have to give a speech in Japanese class. This being so, I ended up going to bed somewhere around one in the morning.