Konnichiwa....

....this means 'Hello' or 'Good Afternoon' in Japanese! We had a wonderful afternoon at the Japan Festival in downtown Salt Lake City.

The weather was incredible, the food yummy, and the culture was pretty cool too. I had to attend one diversity activity and write a short paper on it for one of my classes at school. It is due on Monday and I have had the whole semester to do it.

Of course I left it until the last week and this festival was the only thing going on this weekend that would qualify as a diversity activity. Dont the kids look so thrilled to be here in this picture! Ha ha...they were hungry and not in the mood for mom to take pictures :)

Im not complaining though because I loved it. I really enjoy learning about different cultures. I was amazed to find out that Salt Lake City actually has a 'Japan town'...although there isnt much left of it since we built the Salt Palace convention center over the top of it! It was started in 1907 by Japanese immigrants and the Buddhist Temple as well as the Japanese Church of Christ are still standing and in operation in their original locations. We were able to walk through the Buddhist Temple which was really cool....there was a display about the Japanese Interment Camp that was here in the city and lots of pictures of actual families who's descendants are still here in Salt Lake City. A sobering reminder of a really difficult period in history.
We also saw some demonstrations of Japanese martial arts. The boys were really excited to watch them break boards and bricks with their bare hands!

Oh the violence...why do boys love it so much? They also showed us some of their sword exercises.

There was a fashion show with girls in Kimono's....so cute...I wanted to buy Addie one!

and of course we ate some food! Addie and Evan played it safe with a Teriyaki Beef bowl but Ian.....believe it or not....was determined to try Sushi. Blech! Denver tried to talk him out of it because we know how Ian is with food, but he insisted.

He ate half the roll in one bite and was chewing....and chewing....and chewing.... Then he wasnt chewing anymore and just staring at me. I asked him if he was ok and he shook his head and then proceeded to tell me that if he swallowed it, "he would probably regurgitate." Those were his exact words! Bah ha ha! I tried hard not to laugh but I did let him spit it out. Im proud of him for giving it a try though. He says he would try it again if it was made with salmon?! Goofy kid.....

It was good time...always nice to get outside and enjoy the weather. I love Festival season :)