End of the Year Parties

At the end of a year, people in Japan typically hold end-of-the-year parties called "bounenkai (忘年会)", which means "forget-the-year party". Usually, class mates or colleagues gather together to relieve their stress from the past year at the party. Today, I joined the party hosted by my Japanese friends.

A kind of hot pot, which we call "nabe", is one of the most typical Japanese winter dishes. Usually, we set a big electric pot filled with a boiling soup on a table and add various vegetables like carrots, cabbages, mushrooms, etc, and various kinds of meat like chicken, fish, sausages, etc, into the pot. We like to eat this dish, especially on a cold day, to warm our bodies up. At today's party, the host cooked "kimuchi nabe" by adding kimchi into a typical miso-based soup. I usually cannot eat spicy food, but this dish was so yummy that I could not stop myself from refilling my plate :)

Also, it was very fun to talk with other Japanese people in the university. I don't usually have a chance to talk in Japanese, as there are no other Japanese people in my lab. Even though I'm getting used to communicating in English, it still consumes a lot more of my cognitive resources than speaking in Japanese. So, this was a good and refreshing moment for me :)