Friday, February 02, 2007

Happy Birthday Kumi!




We threw Kumi a surprise birthday party, with Masami's help. I'm not sure the concept of a "surprise birthday party" really made sense to them since the Japanese really don't celebrate birthdays past like 7 years old or something. Apparently, this was the first year that she's ever received a birthday present from her husband!

Nevertheless, "the girls", Becky, Leigh, Jannie, and I vowed to put our kimono skills to work and wear kimonos to this special event. My bedroom was a madhouse of flying kimonos, nagajubans, and obis. Paul and I hosted the party and had a fantastic time preparing and cooking. With that many people there, we ended up taking down one of my sliding doors and making it the long dinner table! We made a very delicious, rich, fish chowder, roasted rosemary potatoes, and my mom's famous spareribs and pineapples. The rest of the dinner was supplemented with sushi contributions from the girls and (taken from my high school games-popping balloons with questions written inside for Kumi to answer, such as: "When did you get your first kiss from Masami?", "How many boyfriends did you have before you married Masami?", etc.)

Kumi actually had us all over the night before since she had no idea that we were planning the party the next night, and we stayed up late teaching them fun card games like "Slapjack", Sevens", and some other crazy slapping game that Leigh sort-of knew the rules to. Games really do bring people together- it was definitely one of the best nights I've had in Japan.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

This is really cute that you threw this party for Kumi. Her initial reaction was probably, "Oro?" accompanied by elated tittering while covering her mouth. Way to score brownie (or anpan) points!

Anonymous said...

Anonymous was me...sorry having problems here.