Obon this weekend!

Looking for something fun to do this weekend?  Go to the San Jose Betsuin Church's Obon Festival on Saturday or Sunday!

Highlights include:

• Taiko drum performance
• Sushi, tempura, other tasty food
• Odori: which is people dancing in the streets in beautiful kimono!

You can find pictures from past events in this previous blog post.

The schedule is posted here.

I will be volunteering to cool sushi rice as I have in the past.

Or, if you prefer air conditioning, you could instead attend Children's Musical Theater's production of The Music Man!  My son has a part in one of the 2 casts.  This brings back a ton of memories as my high school did this production as well.  You have this weekend or next to catch this fun show!  Click here to buy tickets.

Spring Awakening Indeed

But it is fall, not spring.  OK, letting that go...

Shown Left: Jason Hite as Melchior and Eryn Murman as Wendla in San Jose Rep's production of Spring Awakening.

DH and I just saw the San Jose Repertory Theatre's performance of Spring Awakening.  <SPOILER ALERT> For those who don't like spoilers, you should not read this review, as there will be spoilers throughout.  Just won't be possible to explain what I loved about the show without giving some of the story away.

Having listened to the lyrics ahead of time, and read the plot synopsis, DH was not sure he wanted to go.  While the overarching story is already for mature audiences only (awakening teen s_xuality, angst, and repression), there are many, many other mature themes to this play, including:

• masturb_tion (starts with the very first scene, first song, and continues throughout)
• teen s_x
• homos_xuality
• child abuse (both physical and s_xual)
• anti-religious themes
• anti-authoritarian themes
• teen pregnancy/abortion
• teen suicide

(Sorry about all the underscores.  Trying not to get traffic that will be disappointed by the regular content of this blog)

Definitely not a play you'll see any T-Party candidates attending, unless picketing out front counts.

Having heard the songs, though, and with our oldest child entering puberty, I wanted DH to come see it with me, so he agreed.  And boy, was he glad he did!

The first scene, first song, "Mama Who Bore Me" won us over immediately.  Very much an ensemble show, the female leads sang like angels--clear, melodious, and harmonious.  That is, if angels stomped around on stage in boots, pulling up their nighties, and, umm, "mastering their domain" as Seinfeld would have put it.

More Costumes--all new!

Way back at the end of January, I took an afternoon with my friend Rose to attend the Bay Area Costume Guild Annual Meeting.  Click here to learn more about this organization.

I brought the camera, and we enjoyed an excellent luncheon, with dessert, and of course, LOTS of costumes.  After enjoying an eyeful last year, I was concerned we might just see the same outfits again.  Silly me...these folks are really into costumes, and wouldn't be caught dead wearing the same one twice!

I felt visually sated after this event.  Most of the costumes evoked days gone by:

Other costumes evoked faraway places and cultures:

In fact, the costume of the woman below right was from so far away, it was another galaxy!  It was worn in an episode of the short-lived but much-acclaimed Firefly sci-fi series by Joss Whedon. (AWESOME series!) She told me the name of the episode, but it escapes me now.

Her friend wore an outfit evocative of another favorite movie, this one about a famous courtesan of Venice: Dangerous Beauty:

Rounding out the movie theme, this funky costume is modeled on one from Alice in Wonderland:

And this one evokes the programs from Tron--front and back views:

 I love costumes, and if I did not have children to rear, or a job that requires my daily attention, I could seriously get into this as a hobby.  Until the boys are up and out, and I can retire, I'll just have to live vicariously through these annual luncheons.  I'm glad Rose is on their member mailing list!

Joining the Kimchi Mamas

Hello!  I've been reading the Kimchi Mamas blog for over a year now, and submitted a guest post last year about My first Christmas Memory.  I was delighted to be invited to join as a regular contributor.  Below is an excerpt from my introduction to this new audience. If you would like to read the complete post, click here.


I never heard the term "banana" or "twinkie" until I was in college, but instantly related to the term.  Having been raised by white parents in 99% white communities, it was a real project for me to learn what it meant to be Korean.  I was fortunate to have met a good Korean friend in college, and then spend a year at Yonsei Hanguk Uh-Hakdang, learning to speak, read, and write Korean.  By the end of the year, I was able to defend myself from taxicab drivers who criticized my lack of fluency in the mother tongue.  Phew!

Growing up in an all white community, facing the inevitable ching-chang-chong and slanted eye harassment of classmates and strangers, I always shrugged off the question, "Do you speak Chinese?", asked by stupid white people who didn't know the difference between the many Asian groups.

I was greatly chagrined, after moving to California, to find that Koreans are always surprised when I try out my limited Korean vocabulary with them.  Also, waiters in Chinese restaurants invariably hand me the Chinese menu, while giving my husband the English one.  When I ask for the English menu too, they look at me in surprise, and say the same thing all the Koreans do, "Sorry!  I thought you were Chinese?"  After all these years of denigrating East Coast and Midwest racists, I have learned that apparently, I really do "look Chinese."  Sigh.

Leafy Seadragon

We've been having a LOVELY weekend hanging out with my nephew who is visiting us from the East Coast.  He is an artist, in the fine art sense, and he has been encouraging my boys to draw for him on T-shirts and cards.  We took our East Coast relative down to the Monterey Aquarium for his first glimpse of the Pacific Ocean, and a gander at our exotic Pacific sea life.  He was blown away by the Weedy Sea Dragon, and we all grinned, knowing he would be even further impressed by its cousin the Leafy Sea Dragon.

Below is Barley's rendition of the Leafy Sea Dragon, executed at his cousin's request, since Barley specializes in dragon art.  It was fun standing by, watching the other visitors check out his handiwork over his shoulder as he drew.  I felt like the mother of a famous artist watching him work.

California living

After my jaunt back East, I find myself cataloguing differences between living in California vs. the Midwest or back East.  Some things I have had to get used to living in California:

1. Wearing shorts to elementary school is perfectly acceptable, so long as they are not too short.  Bottom hem should be past the fingertips.  Shorts into October is also normal.
2. Year 1 in California, DH and I laughed at all the wimps running around in ski jackets in February.  There was no snow in sight, and our Midwest inner temperatures told us that 60 degree weather was practically shorts weather.  We don't need no stinkin' jackets!
3. Year 2 in California, DH and I learned that blood thins quickly, and we too donned wool and extra layers as those freezing 50's and 60's temperatures arrived
4. You do not need your umbrella after April or before October.
5. You only need an ice scraper if you are going to Lake Tahoe to go skiing.  I had a California friend spy the scraper in the back seat of the car that moved with us from the midwest.  She picked it up, and asked, "What's this?"  Really.
6. No autumn leaf show.  Since the weather can be warm into December, the trees all seem to give up on summer at different times.  Many of them do change colors, and there are some bare trees in the winter, but there is no one coordinating the effect.  Kind of like the rest of West Coast culture, every tree does its own thing.
7. The blondes are in the minority.  At least here in Northern California.  That might not be the case closer to LA, where some of the Koreans are even blonde.  Here, though, there is such a mix of Asian, Mexican, Indian, European, that most everyone in our child's school is some shade of tan/brown.  Even the Caucasian kids are darker than back East, since they get to run around in the sun all winter long.  
8. While there are exceptions, people are more health conscious related to diet and excercise.  Restaurants don't tend to serve you 16 ounces of steak with one carrot on the side.  DH and I still need to improve our own habits, which we learned back East.
9. GREAT restaurants.  In addition to the more easily found Chinese, Mexican, Italian and Japanese food, we have also enjoyed great Afghan, Ethiopian, Indian (North and South), Korean, Mongolian, and Mediterranean food here.  There are many others which we have not yet tried, but I am sure we will!  One thing missing from back East--Jewish delis are in short supply--and finding a good corned beef or pastrami sandwich?  Impossible.

Crazy Love and a worthy cause

A friend is involved in putting on this event below, so I am gladly sharing information to promote this worthy cause.

It can be a terrible thing to have a secret that you don't think you can share with anyone. Living a life where there is something terribly wrong, whether it is your health, a loved one's illness, a problem in your marriage, or the domestic abuse this event is raising funds to protect against...one of the worst parts is the loneliness of feeling that you are fighting a battle and suffering alone. We all need help and support at times, and no woman should ever be in the shoes of the speaker highlighted below.

Unfortunately, it does happen. My college roommate volunteered at a shelter, and helped me get inside the heads of both the victims and perpetrators by recommending I read "Men Who Hate Women and the Women Who Love Them. " Thank GOD my background is such that I could not understand how any person could believe they have no choice, or deserve such treatment. The book above helped me see how it can happen.

I have friends and family who have survived this in their own first marriages. It appalls me every time I think about it, that the beautiful, talented, smart, loving women that I call friends, could ever have thought this was the best life had to offer them. And I am SO glad they got out. It freaks me out to think I may know someone today who is still in this kind of relationship...I have some that I "get a feeling" about, but I hope hope hope I am wrong.

I am already booked the evening this is happening, but if you happen to be free and in San Jose, you might want to consider attending this event--I bet it will be very interesting. And if, like me, you have a calendar conflict, then at least click the link for Next Door Solutions to Domestic Violence and check out what they do and what they need.


"If you and I met at one of our children's birthday parties, in the hallway at work, or at a neighbor's barbecue, you'd never guess my secret: that as a young woman I fell in love with and married a man who beat me regularly and nearly killed me."'

Click HERE to register for Surviving Crazy Love and Mommy Wars: An evening with Leslie Morgan Steiner

Oct 8, 2009 5:30-8:30pm

FOR MORE INFO, CLICK HERE