HAPPY BELATED NEW YEAR!!!

HAPPY 2007 everyone!!!

How did you spend the New Year's? Were you lucky enough to kiss someone close by? Ha ha. (this does not happen in Japan - what a pity...)

I spent it the old-fashioned Japanese way. We went to Hiro's hometown...on December 31st we ate toshi-koshi soba, or New Year's eve buckwheat noodles. The next day we spent lazily...eating while huddling in the kotatsu (heated table) and napping/reading intermittently. Then we spent a day after that at his grandma's.

The result? Umm...pudgy by the end of the New Year's. It is no joke - by the end of New Year's we had gained a few kilo. Our scale showed proof enough of our overindulging. It must be all those tasty rice cakes. It is customary to eat plenty of mochi for longevity (as you eat it, it stretches like fondue...meaning long life) We had rice cakes in chicken broth soup, sweet red bean soup, covered with soybean powder and doused in black sugar sauce. One rice cake is equivalent to one bowl of rice. Um, YOU do the math.