St. Valentine's Day

This week I found out that Japan celebrates Valentine's Day a little bit differently than America... but I suppose I shouldn't be surprised by that by now!

First of all, the holiday is called "St." Valentine's Day, and secondly, the tradition is for women to give chocolate to their sweethearts. That's it!! No teddy bears, no flowers, no candy conversation hearts, no little cards, and nothing for women!! But before all of you lovely ladies out there have a meltdown, I did find out that there is a special Japanese holiday on March 14th called "White Day", and on that day men are supposed to return the favor of chocolate to their sweethearts.

I thought I was in the clear for this holiday since I do not have a "sweetheart" in Japan, but as it turns out, it's also polite for the women of Mitsui to give the men in their department a gift of chocolate! So one evening after work this week, I went shopping with the other 2 ladies in my department, Ema & Mari, to pick out chocolate for our men.

This shopping experience was unreal. I'm not talking about picking out candy from the holiday aisle at Meijer or Wal-Mart. The Japanese take shopping to a new level!! We started in the basement of a local department store, Meitetsu. Usually the basements are "markets" and have a variety of foods to purchase, but during this time of year, the entire basement was transformed into a candy gallery!! As far as you could see there were counters filled with boxes of chocolates and about 200 tiny Japanese women looking for the perfect arrangement for their sweethearts. I could not believe it because I've been to this market a few times on my way home from work. I almost didn't recognize the transformation, and the amount of people was crazy!! All of the chocolates were arranged in fancy boxes, ranging from $3 to over $50!! I obediently followed Ema and Mari around, weaving in and out of people and gazing into glass counters. I have no idea what we were looking for, maybe a good price or a "handsome" arrangement. How do you choose chocolates without tasting them?!

Finally, Mari said "Okay, let's go". Thank goodness... we were ready to leave. Umm... no... we were done looking at that floor. Next, we moved up to the 7th floor where, unbelievably, there was three times as many candy counters and about 500 more Japanese women!! Seriously, I was flabbergasted! We milled around some more, and then we stopped to have a conference. Should we get each man something different? This question just made me laugh!! I made that decision... NO, everyone is getting the same thing. If it was this difficult to choose 1 type of candy, there was no way I could handle shopping for 5 boxes! So with that decision out of the way, we just had to find an acceptable choice. We settled on a small box for each guy with 8 pieces of chocolate for about $6.

The entire time I was shopping, all I could think about was thank goodness we don't have this tradition in America. Can you imagine me at Transfreight last year? I'm the only woman in my department, and I'd be buying chocolate for 10 men!! If I spent $6 on each of them, what would I get in return on "White Day"? It better not be a $6 box of chocolate that they all went in on together!! But then again, do I really need $60 worth of chocolate? (Hello, 10 extra pounds and 4 cavities!!) For future reference, if this ever occurs, I'll take a Butterfinger and a new pair of shoes ;)

Back to reality... the guys at Mitsui did seem to appreciate our chocolate on Friday, and we'll see if the ladies get anything in return on March 14th! (I'd love to see how much time they spend picking out our boxes of chocolates!!)

On Wednesday, I also found out that one of my new friends in Japan is getting married this Sunday, February 14th! I asked her if she was excited about it, and she told me "so-so"!! Apparently, she is disappointed that she's not moving after the wedding. She's going to continue living with her parents, and her new husband is moving into her room! So she had to spend Thursday (our National Founding Day holiday) cleaning her room and making space for his things!! Again, I can't imagine this ever happening in America... too funny! They are also not taking a honeymoon next week, but she did say they would take a trip some time this summer.

Happy Valentine's Day to everyone!!

Thanks to Mom and Gma for sending me yummy care packages! The chocolate-covered seafoam from Mom didn't stand a chance! It didn't even make it to V-Day!! My favorite treat from Gma was instant dry milk. (I know I'm crazy!) I immediately made a batch and used it to make mint chocolate Jell-O pudding (which I'll eat on V-Day)! You never realize how many things you want to eat require milk until you don't have any! (FYI--they do have milk in Japan, but I think it tastes awful and refuse to drink it. And I'm not the only one... Kawakami from work won't drink Japanese milk either. He won't even put it in his coffee! He says the milk ruins everything and makes it taste bad!)