Kids' X'mas party at Yuzawa

Had a fabulous breakfast feast at the ryokan - a fish that you grill on your individual stove, chawan mushi (steamed egg with stuff inside), this strange slightly whitish, slightly transparent piece of agar-agar thing with green specks in it (no one could explain what it was but it tasted quite pleasant), a plate of strange stuff (slimy squid in ink, a block of salty yellow fish roe, etc) mushrooms, rice, pickles, miso soup, and apples as dessert.

Then went for another dip in the outdoor onsen before heading off to my children's X'mas party. There were only 4 girls at the party, but they were really excited and cute. They ooh-ed and ahh-ed at the photos I showed them of our Orchard Road X'mas light-up (Thank you Ewen!). Each "ooh" was louder than the previous one. Their reactions were really funny!

After the party, I had lunch with the other 2 teachers before taking the train home. The train station was packed with people arriving in Yuzawa for a weekend of skiing/snowboarding. They were obviously from Tokyo. It was so funny seeing the looks of amazement on those trendily-dressed Tokyoites when they saw the amount of snow on the streets and wading in the snow in their soaked leather boots.