Another bonenkai

 As I left home the sky was beautiful.

 I took the subway to Sendai Station and then went through and out the east exit, the side that I do not go to as often as the west side where there are more stores. I was going to the building that is straight ahead in the picture. When they first built it, the building contained a large electronics store plus some small shops. The electronics store could not compete with the one that was behind me when I took the picture and closed. Now the building is full of small shops and restaurants.

  The bonenkai was for the members of the Sendai Book Club and more than  half of the regular members show up for a meal at this restaurant, which claims it specializes in pork, but in reality the menu was much the same as at any decent izakaya.

 Out side the restaurant there was a large sign showing pictures of the various dishes that they serve.

 And by the door, they had this sign to whet your appetite.

After nearly three hours of eating, drinking (I had iced tea), and socializing we left. There was no nijikai because it was a work night and all of us are a bit on the old side. We made a mistake in the elevator. We went to the basement floor but discovered that there was no way to get into the subway system. We did, however, get a chance to see this pachinko shop. Pachinko is a pin ball machine game in which you pay for the balls and when you are finished they buy back any that you have. It is actually a game of skill and there are people who make a living at this.

JALT Bonenkai

 As you probably realize, I am not posting things on the day they happen, but a while later. On December 16, the local chapter of JALT (Japan Association for Language Teaching, a professional organization that I help found back in 1978) had its bonenkai. I think I posted about bonenkais before but, in case you missed it or more likely did not understand my ramblings, I will explain again. The bo means forget in Japanese, nen means year, and kai means meeting. So, a bonenkai is a meeting to forget the year. It is a time to go out with the other members of a group that you belong to and eat and drink, a time to have fun and to forget that bad things that might have happened to or within the group and reestablish positive relationships for the coming year. Each group that you belong to will have a bonenkai during December, so it is a busy month for most people.

The JALT bonenkai was held after a regular monthly meeting during which there were academic presentations about language teaching. Nearly 40 of us, teachers and many spouses, went to an izakaiya, a Japanese eating and drinking establishment, where reservations had been made long before. The meal was nabe, dish or pan in Japanese. This is a pan of soup and vegetables that sits in the middle of the table and each person takes what they want and eats from their own small dish. The meat was beef, although sometimes it might be something else, thin sliced so that it cooks almost immediately. The meat comes on a large platter and, to eat, you take a slice with your chopsticks and put it in the soup, just long enough to start to change color. You take it out of the soup and place it in your dish, which contains a beaten raw egg. The hot meat partially cooks the egg that coats its. The combination sounds terrible to most foreigners but, once they try it, they find that it is delicious.

This is our nabe and a dish of raw eggs.

 We sat at two long tables. While we were eating, we stayed in our seats but later people started moving around so that we could talk to all our friends.

 Here is another view of the group.

 These are the two people who were sitting across the table from me. I only see them at JALT meetings so it was good to have a chance to chat.

 Toward the end of the bonenkai, Japanese functions have clear beginnings and ends, they had a free raffle with teaching related materials as prizes. My wife won a dictionary. Also two of us, the oldest two members, received life time memberships to the Sendai Chapter of JALT. One interesting point, I was drinking tea, not beer like most of the others. Look carefully at the certificate that I am displaying.

After the bonenkai, there was a nijikai. Ni means two or second, ji means time and kai is the same as in bonenkai, so a nijikai is a second party. After the first party, in this case the bonenkai,  the group splits up into smaller groups of closer friends, some people may go home, but others will move to a new location and continue partying. One of the reasons for this is that many places have a time limit. You pay a flat fee and can drink as much as you want. Once this period is over, you move on to a new place. Back in the days when I went out drinking with my friends, we often went to three or even four different places before giving up and going home.