It was a weird day at school, right in the middle of a week broken with holidays. I had just two classes, so it wasn’t too tough. In Matsubara sensei’s class one her student’s mothers had passed away yesterday, so she had gone to the memorial, and she had lots of things to organize at school for the student, who was going to miss the next week.
In Matsubara sensei’s class we held a spelling bee. It wasn’t really that official, the rules were not quite understood, but in the end everyone at least spelled a word correctly.
In the afternoon I was free to study, so I focused on grammar. I’ve done a little better on grammar lately, but will it be too little, too late? Soon enough I’ll find out.
After school the ESS club joined up to watch a scary movie. There were two other girls who weren’t in ESS, but the group that was there is really the core group. Some of the second year students have been busier chasing boys, so my group is the girls that prefer studying and goofing off to fraternizing with the men.
I hit the road around five o’clock, and caught the train back to Futami. Soon after I was over at Denya meeting up with Atsuji-san. Kuniko was out drinking with Chiemi-chan this evening, so it worked out great that we both had someone to party with.
Atsuji-san spent a lot of time in the states, mainly in Colorado but also in California. His English is great, and we enjoy drinking together and switching between languages. As each of us drink more, we switch between languages more often. So, it can get kind of confusing.
The master and I talked about the upcoming wedding, and we were thinking about the second party, what everyone will do, and a Denya party with my family. Everybody is getting really excited about it. Atsuji-san is going to try to take the day off to come to the second party, so that was good news.
I had brought along the hot peppers that I had grown on my back porch. They grew from the seeds that Sara had sent me a long time ago. I let them ripen on the vine for a long time, and they turned a brilliant red color. Finally last weekend I harvested them, and I had five or six. I ate a few at home, and I brought the rest into the yakitori for the master.
The master asked me how to serve them, so I advised grilling it. He grilled it up on right in front of us, and then he cut it into three pieces and poured ponzu sauce over it. It was sweet and delicious, not spicy at all.
I told him that eating it raw would give you plenty of heat, and so he cut one up into rings, wrapped them around some grilled sausages, and served those. They were very spicy – Atsuji-san and I were sweating. The master cut one up and gave raw pieces to the two part time workers, and also one to another customer. They were gulping water like mad, and the customer looked like he was in genuine pain. I’ll never forget the look on his face – total shock. How could something be that hot?
I split around eleven o’clock and walked in the door just a minute or two ahead of Kuniko. She also had a good time tonight. She told a great story of trying to find a restaurant that wasn’t packed in Sannomiya. Tomorrow is a holiday, so everyone was out drinking.
