Last Wednesday, although my toe was still hurting, I went to Yokohama to teach HK5. It was the biggest class so far, with 5 ladies in attendance! It was the girls from the first week, one from the second week and a new one! It was a good class, and after, we went to the HKE favorite bagel place for lunch. After lunch I met up with Miwa. We went to a really nice cafe overlooking a park. We had a few fancy desserts and a few coffees. We were there for a while, but finally it was too cold to stay (it is finally starting to get cold here), so we left and went to Center Minami for me to buy a jacket I had been eye-ing at Sports Authority.











Friday was my 25th birthday!! During the day I called my grandparents (Hi Nana and Grampy!) -- it was so nice to talk to them, and I called because Friday was my Grandfather's birthday as well. I took it easy during the day (still resting the toe), and at night I met Nick and a few of his coworkers at Outback Steakhouse in Ebina for my birthday celebration. We had a wonderful time! The manager gave me a free glass of champagne for my birthday and Nick's coworkers bought me a mini chocolate cake and flowers. They made it a very special and memorable birthday for me, and I appreciate it so much! That night, we got home and stayed up late playing chess, rummy and poker!



So, because we were up so late on Friday, we slept in until noon on Saturday! We had planned to party in Roppongi Saturday night, but after waking up so late and partying Friday, we decided to just take it easy on Saturday. We went to Yokohama to buy Cirque du Soleil tickets, but after talking to the ticket place, we found there were no good seats left before we leave in March, so we decided not to buy the tickets. After that we looked at some very expensive watches ($20,000 for a watch? I don't think so...), and I finally found a pair of boots!! I never thought I would find boots in my size here! We went back to Zama and had dinner at the Gyoza place at Zama Station, and called it a night early.

Sunday we went to Aikou-Ishida, where the Nissan Technical Center is (Nick's work). NTC is pretty far from the station, but we walked there anyway, used the bathroom at reception and went back. The actual NTC buildings cannot be seen from reception, they are in the hills and woods (how very secretive of them!), and the whole thing is really in the middle of nowhere. By the time we left NTC, my toe was hurting, so we found a bus, and went back to the train station. On the way back to Zama, we stopped in Hon-Atsugi for shopping and dinner. We were shopping for a blanket (it is getting really cold at night now), but we didn't find anything in our price range. In order to kill time before dinner, we grabbed a coffee at Cafe du Monde and looked around in the hobby store. For dinner we ate at Saizeriya (no idea if I spelled that right!), which is the restaurant Nick had frequented in Sano. They have an excellent Italian salad there. That night we played more poker and watched a movie at home.

Yesterday, I met Miwa in Sobudaimae station, and we bought a picnic lunch at Odakyo OX and went to Sagamihara Park. This is a huge and beautiful park, not all that far from our apartment! After our lunch, we sat out on the grass and chatted. It was very cold in the shade, where our picnic table was, but sitting on the blanket in the sun, we were very warm.

I told Miwa about Cafe du Monde, and she was very interested, so we decided to leave the park and go there for coffee and beignets. This time, I opted for Cafe au lait, instead of my normal American coffee because the coffee shops only provide something called "coffee fresh" to use for cream, and the substance is not natural -- it does not require refridgeration, which means it must be packed full of harmful preservatives. The cafe au lait was very good, and Miwa and I split a plate of two beignets. The beignets are smaller than I remember -- maybe they are smaller here than in the US? So, we were able to enjoy them without feeling too guilty! :) When I got back to Zama, I went grocery shopping and went home. Nick called while I was in the grocery store, and he got home 2 hours earlier than usual! I made tacos for dinner -- hmmmm thank you Ortega!

Today I will be cleaning, doing laundry, etc. Tonight I am meeting Nick and Amemiya-san in Hon-Atsugi. We are going to talk to a Japanese teacher at the YMCA for our Japanese lessons!