Kuniko went into work this morning, and I had a few hours to kill in the morning before going into Kobe myself to meet her and two of her exchange students. I had a little ten-don for lunch and then met them at Sannomiya station around 12:30.
It was my first time meeting Hinzy (from Oregon) and Barbara (from France). Hinzy was very American (as Kuniko and I described her later) and really friendly and outgoing. She was a lot of fun to hang out with. Barbara was still learning both English and Japanese, so she was much quieter, but seemed like a really nice girl.
We took the train to Rokkomichi, and from there walked about 10 minutes to the music hall where the mandolin guitar concert was. I went to the same concert last year, so I knew what to expect, but Hinzy and Barbara were shocked to find out that the concert was expected to last about three hours long.
The reason they were interested in going to the show was because another exchange student, Mayara (from India) was performing since she is in the mandolin guitar club. We cheered her on during the performance, and afterwards we all shared a cab back to Sannomiya. Being around all these unabashedly un-shy high school girls was a little bit of a culture shock to me – just another sign that I’ve really gotten accustomed to Japanese culture.
Once we got back from the show, Kuniko and I did some shopping in Sannomiya and then headed on home. On the way back we saw that Hijiri, a bento delivery place that features steak in their bento boxes, was actually open. Usually we walk by and smell the steak cooking, but our timing is bad and they are closed. So, we bought a bento with steak and came home and ate that along with cheese, crackers, and various prosciutto from Italy that I had found in the import food section of Jusco. It was an awesome dinner. We also had a couple of beers and a bottle of Viognier that I found a while back, so we were feeling pretty good.
Tomorrow we’re back into Kobe to meet up with Tomo-chan and her husband for some burgers from Star Child. Hopefully we’ll be able to get a table – it’s Golden Week and there are a lot of people running around in the big cities.
