I had to pass by and see the Christmas Illumination in Odori area, Sapporo this evening. I couldn’t believe that I took a photo of the illumination. It’s not so gorgeous but OK, isn’t it? Christmas, for most of the Japanese, is an annual event without religious meaning. Telling you the truth, I don’t like this season and I do know the reason why. It was when I was 5 or 6 years old, I wrote a letter to Santa Clause and wanted to put it into a mailbox, but my parents, or could have been my grandparents, tuned it down. I recall I begged and cried but in vain. …
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Forget-the-year Party
The illumination lights for the Christmas season in downtown Sapporo look somehow shabby without snow. With or without the snow, December is the month for “forget-the-year party, ” which is a typical “follow-up social activity” in Japan. The Japanese go out to dinner and drink not only with business colleagues, but also with vendors, customers, friends and sometimes with relatives. We are not surprised, therefore, to hear that a sales person has the party almost every night during December. The follow-up social activities in Japanese businesses have been slowing down due to the continued staggering economic conditions and partly due to the mentality of the younger generations who make much of individual activities rather …
Getting trees ready for snowfalls
Landscape gardeners in Hokkaido are expected to have painstaking craftsmanship to hang tree branches so that they would not be broken by the heavy snowfalls during the winter. Those bonsai trees, like the ones we find in the front yard of the Hokkaido Government office, every one of them are taken care of by the professional hands. I recall that my grandpa had that knowledge and technique, however, I did not get the chance to learn from him.
Munich Christmas Fair in Sapporo
I hear that this annual event in Odori Park was started to commemorate the 30th year of Sapporo’s becoming a sister city of Munich. Both cities, famous for beer production, hosted the Olympic Games in the same year, 1972, winter in Sapporo and summer in Munich. The idea of this event is to enjoy the atmosphere of the Munich Christmas Market in Sapporo with hot wines and German sausages. Night time, therefore, is the high time, I guess. It’s definitely not a time for beer, but HOT wines? I’ve never come across hot wines before, but they are spiced and mulled and offered during the Christmas holiday season. Thank you, but I’ll …
First Snow of the Season in Sapporo
My regular jogging course, Shiroishi Cycling Road, was finally covered with snow this morning. I will probably have to wait for the next spring to run on the road. Sapporo, however, has some excellent indoor running courses so that runners like me wouldn’t get choked during winters. One of them is Sapporo Dorm, the home ground for Nippon Ham Fighters, a Major League Baseball team in Japan. The 716m running course in the Sapporo Dome is arranged behind the top of the stand, and so it’s available only when there’s no event in the field. I should also add that the Dome does have a well equipped training gym, which is …