JET Christmas Party and Kyoto (again)

On Saturday night we had a JET Christmas party at Lee's house in Ichinomiya. It was just the 8 of us, which was nice, and way less stressful than Thanksgiving. We had egg nog (my first time--not a fan) and a ton of junk food, rice, stir fry. We were going to watch a movie but we ended up just hanging out and listening to Christmas music, talking, and playing charades, which was hilarious. About half the people there had never played before. We also did a sort of a secret santa exchange. The rules were, everyone had to buy a present but the limit was 100 yen (about a dollar). Then at the party we all swapped gifts. Some of them were pretty funny. Caitlin got an entire dried squid. Spencer got a can of Spam. It was a classy night all around. 

JET Christmas Party

On Sunday I went to Kyoto for the day to have lunch with Marcus-sensei, my Japanese professor from last year at Wash U. She's in Japan for about a week, and luckily Kyoto is close enough for a day trip (only not really, and it was a very long day, but I'm so glad I went). It was great to see Marcus-sensei, especially since now that it's been close to half a year that I've been here, I've been starting to feel a little, not homesick, but culture fatigued. We had a nice lunch, and then I spent the afternoon sightseeing. There's so much to see in Kyoto, this was my second time there and I feel like I've barely scratched the surface of what there is to see. I will definitely be going back again (probably more than once).

I will upload photos ASAP.