Sushi!

Japanese schools have something called 文化祭 (bunkasai), which translates to culture festival. My tiny school up in the mountains had one this Saturday, and I attended. The morning was a sort of ceremony/recital. Each grade sung songs and showed pictures from their class trips. A few students had solo numbers either singing or playing instruments, and the 3rd year boys put on this really funny dance number. Artwork was on display, and the morning concluded with a final song sung by the entire school.

Then it was sushi-making time.

A bunch of teachers, students, and parents gathered in the cooking classroom to make makizushi. We were grouped at tables like this:

This is actually a really good picture, because it shows all the stages of sushi development. First you have the blank sheet of nori, as shown in the top right corner. Then you spread the rice over it and add ingredients (shrimp, cucumbers, etc), like the top left. Finally you roll it, like the person is doing on the bottom left, and you end up with the final product, shown on the bottom right.

I made three rolls all together, and it was a lot of fun. The lady who was instructing said I'd gotten really good at it by the third one. :)

Once I got home I chopped the rolls into pieces:

And it was delicious.