Suddenly, everything has changed.

I love you Internet, for keeping me in touch with home.

I hate you Internet, for keeping me in touch with home. 

Rice planting season. They have ceremonies for the beginning (or slightly after the beginning) of the season. The women dress in Kimono, and stand in knee deep mud and water planting rice, while the men pound drums, play flutes and juggle some sort of crazy stick. We received an invite last Sunday to visit a rice festival. The planting started at 10am, and at 5:30 there was a party to celebrate. So being the lazy foreigners we are we wound up at the party in the evening, but missed the planting. I regret this now, but had no clue what I was missing at the time. 

I had met a woman named Naomi at my sports festival (see below, me running like an ass.) her and her husband (and their four children!) live in a Buddhist temple north of the town I teach in. My good friend Adam teaches her kids at one of his schools. They like foreigners, and speak really impressive English. So they asked us to come out and visit the town festival. We showed up prior to Naomi getting there...therefore upon entry into the party, we met about a dozen terrified faces staring back at us. They had no clue what we planned on doing there, or how we got invited. But of course, this is Japan...they cant deny us, (they could...actually...) nor do they grasp enough English to ask exactly why we are there.  So we nervously entered and sat down at a open table. 

Pretty quickly one of the locals came and asked us who we are and who we know. He was being polite about it, as it only takes about three seconds of talking to Adam, Ryan or myself to realize we come in peace. He understood that we know Naomi, and Adam teaches next door, and like that we became guests of honor. Of sorts. 

I was driving our group of Gaijin, and therefore could not drink. However, everyone else at the party seemed alright with drinking, and proceeded to. Heavily. I have come to find this is a "Drinking Culture" but they just cant handle it the same way we can. They were sauced early on.  But quickly after our delicious meal (complete with plenty of curious guests sitting by us for a few moments.) came some more drinking, and a famous Shimasen player from Tokyo put on a concert for us. How she wound up playing in this tiny town hall is beyond me. (click this link...she was not the blonde woman. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YhtXZAFom7A )

This concert became a sing along with all the participants, and after she let the three of us play her guitar. Ryan pulled out some Nirvana. I was very impressed. 

For a few hours after the concert we found ourselves talking with literally everyone at the party. One of the planners came over and asked Ryan and I to talk some sense into his daughter. Apparently she had no "direction" in life. She just graduated High School, and had no job or plans for college. I mostly talked with her about pop-stars I didn't even know about from America. I failed. Ryan really wanted to reach this kid. He quasi-adopted her.

At one point one of the locals was trying to offer me a drink. I denied. He said "you are right, it is not safe to drink and drive, the police station is next door."

I laughed and said "Yes I know."

He replied, "But the police officer is over there." and pointed to a belligerently drunk man rolling backwards onto the floor a few tables down. 

If these sorts of things keep happening to me, it is going to be quite difficult to pry myself away and come home.