Hi everyone!
Well, it is certainly a long time since I have written on this blog…. SORRY!! I think the homepage was also down for a while and I finally got Peter to fix it.. so here I am!! Atsuko came and stayed with us for a month from the end of July to the end of August… we kept her busy doing a lot of things.. She attended Heartland school downtown and took the city bus to school every morning. She had about a 15 minute walk to our house from the bus stop and I remember it was sure hot some days!! I knew Atsuko from Toyo high school… by the way,Toyo is heading to Koshien in the spring I hear!!
While she was here, Kiyoko also came for a week. Jessica was happy to see her, as Kiyoko is a teacher at Tokueji Hokuen where Jessica used to go. Atsuko and Kiyoko cooked us some takoyaki while they were here. It was very difficult to buy octopus in Winnipeg. There is no fresh octopus, so we finally had to buy frozen. The takoyaki tasted great though..
Both Atsuko and Kiyoko had difficulties are Winnipeg airport. Winnipeg is a small airport, but they like to ask many questions. If anybody visits us, please bring a copy of our brochure to show immigration. It makes things easier.
During their visits we were able to attend Folklorama. This is a 2 week festival in Winnipeg. In the evenings, different ethnic groups dance, prepare food, and entertain. We saw displays of African limbo dancing, Irish dancing, Greek food and Brazilian entertainers. It is held the beginning of August.. a great thing to see.
We also attended the outdoor musical theatre of Rainbow stage. We saw the Sound of Music. We were singing the songs for days afterwards… Do Re Mi Fa So La Te Do!!
Hmmm.. what else, well, visits to Falcon Lake, Kenora and Gimli. These are small resorts which have a lot of summer cottages and activities. In August there is also an Icelandic Festival in Gimli as there are a lot of immigrants from Iceland living there.
We also visited a corn maze and had fun looking for clues in the corn that was taller than Peter. We finished off Kiyoko”s visit with a moonlight horse ride among some sandy hills. It was a little scary at times. But, afterward there was a hotdog and marshmallow roast around a campfire with Bob the singing cowboy. A night to remember for all of us.
Kiyoko went back to work ( and it was very hot in Japan this summer I think) and Kimiyo Ogawa came to visit. She stayed for 10 days, and the weather was already getting cooler. She brought her Billy Bootcamp DVD and amazed us with her energy. We toured the museum, the Legislative Building, Leo Mol garden and had a special visit to the casino with Atsuko. Unluckily, nobody hit the jackpot on the machines!
For all of our guests my mother graciously invited them for a special Canadian dinner. I think this was the highlight of the Canadian homestay for many of our guests.
i am sure that I am forgetting many things.. but I really would like to thank our summer guests for their visits. It was fantastic for us to meet our Japanese friends again, and to hear about life in Japan. In fact, the longer we are in Canada the more we are missing Japan. It is so strange…