Christmas Party!

During my last class with my Japanese teacher, we started talking about how much fun it would be to have a Christmas party and a gift exchange. I offered to host the party and we agreed to both help with the cooking. We set the gift exchange price at about $10 and set about inviting friends. In the end there were 6 of us. My Japanese teacher and her friend Noriko (who went to Kyoto with us earlier this year), one of my conversation partners, Masako, and Russell's conversation partner Kenji.

This didn't turn out to be the best planned venture. Please understand that I am going to have to explain everything in minute detail because I still can't believe how well it went considering how *ahem* slapped together it was on my end. It ended up going amazingly well when you consider that the day before the party Russell and I hadn't planned anything, had no food, had no idea what we were going to cook, hadn't cleaned (since before Russell's sister had visited), and generally didn't seem aware that we were about to host a party.

The day before the party I decided that we needed some activities, so I went out and bought one of the afore-mentioned gingerbread house kits from Ikea and all sorts of crafty stuff for making Christmas stockings. The evening before the party I made up a bunch of basic Christmas stockings out of felt (since that was the time consuming and boring part).

The morning before the party, Russell and I cleaned and then ran down to the grocery store to figure out what we were going to cook. End decision: Pasta salad and Waldorf salad along with a variety of snacks. At this point we still thought my Japanese teacher was going to be providing the sukiaki (meat cooked in broth and dipped in raw egg) though that ended up falling through and she brought a roast chicken instead.

Masako and Kenji came right about on time. Culture note: according to Kenji, a good Japanese guest tries to arrive about 10 minutes before the set start time of the party. He was aware that the tradition was different in the West, so he very kindly asked beforehand when he should actually plan on arriving. We were way not organized enough to give him an answer, so we agreed on "anytime!"

Once they had arrived, we needed to wait for our last two guests (who were wrangling roast chickens) so I had them start on the ginger bread house. Neither of them had ever made one before and after dutifully gluing the broken pieces together with frosting, they weren't too sure how to go about decorating. I demonstrated some shingle patterns, a window and some flowers, and they had the idea. By the time everyone had arrived, we had a gorgeous little gingerbread chateau, which to the amazement of the decorators actually stood up (and stayed up through the whole party no less!).

Once the gingerbread house was moved to another table, we broke out some snacks, did introductions, and then got down to stocking decorating. This also took some prompting to get everyone in the groove. I started cutting out letters for mine and gluing on holly leaves, etc. Once everyone started gluing the creativity started to come out. Noriko created little Christmas packages for her stocking, Masako made a tinsel ball face, Kenji expanded on the face idea and made a tinsel ball Santa face, and Keiko (the desinger in the bunch) kept hers neat and simple with a sophisticated "K" set just so at the bottom of her stocking. We had a lot of fun and by the time we were finished we were ready to eat.

With the help of the roast chicken and a creme brulee cake from Keiko and Noriko, our two salads turned into a feast. None of us had much experience carving a chicken, but Keiko turned out to be the most intrepid meat stripper in the bunch, refusing to waste the slightest bit of chicken goodness, and we soon had a huge pile of meat. The salads went over well - especially the Waldorf salad, which no one else had heard of before (apple, walnuts, raisins and some mayonnaise if you count yourself among the confused). The mayonnaise bit had always turned me off to this dated side dish, but we had recently had some at Cafe Kei and Russell was familiar with it, so we decided to go for it. I have to admit I am coming around to it - so long as it has had some time to sit.

After dinner was the cake. This was really a fancy cake. It had a thick cookie base with a thick pudding layer and was nicely "bruleed" on the top. It was originally decorated with a pile of 5 strawberries and a sugar Santa. Since there were 6 of us, we cut the cake and then gave each person a strawberry or a Santa. Russell called the sugary fat man.


The last event of the evening was the gift exchange. Everyone drew numbers and then chose a gift (or stole a previous gift) in the order of their numbers. Russell went first and got a scented candle (Japanese-style scent, it was noted). Kenji went next and got the hat I had knitted two days before the party (when I probably should have been cleaning or otherwise planning). Masako went next and got a lego giraffe kit. She was very pleased. Noriko followed and got a scented candle (this one from Yankee Candle and deemed decidedly American in scent). I was #5 and since there hadn't been any stealing yet (which seemed a shame) I stole the giraffe and Masako ended up getting the chocolate whack-an-orange from Russell. Keiko was last and since her own gift was left on the table, she stole Russell's scented candle and he opened the last gift: a Monburan shaped candle (Monburan is the Japanese version of Mont Blank and is a kind of cake/sweet with chestnut paste and cream). The gift bag also included a cookie from the cafe Keiko helped design and a spongy, not-for-eating faux french toast key chain.

The gifts had been given.

I set to work on my giraffe, we chatted a bit and when it was time to go, I retrieved everyone's stockings (which had allegedly been drying near the space heater in the bedroom) now stuffed with (rather cheap) stocking stuffers. We said goodbye to everyone and then sat around marveling at the fact that everything had gone so well. It was a lot of fun and definitely put us in the Christmas spirit.