Three things were happened in the several days during the
week of July 7. There are not too much
photos but Hiroko would like to call this Photo Diary.
The first thing is.
Two big boxes like in the photo were sent to Hiroko from
Japan. Hiroko’s brother, Yoshiteru
shipped these boxes on June 3, and they arrived Chicago on July 10. Hiroko started to worry about those packages
around July 7, that Post Office might throw those packages away because the
smell of those dried fish. Why did they
take over a month to come to Chicago?
According to Yoshiteru’s wife, Yoshiteru became Kechi (stinginess.) Yoshiteru’s wife sent many packages to Hiroko
before, she had never sent those packages by sea mail, even though very big and
heavy box. Well, Yoshiteru explained that
it was O.K.to send these packages by sea, because inside the packages are all
dried foods, such as Kikurake, Katsuobushi (bonito flakes), dried fishes, many,
many other things. The mailman brought
these packages said that they were very heavy packages. It was very heavy packages. So many different things were in those boxes. Hiroko sent “Thank You” email to him; he said
he forgot what he sent. Even though it
took almost 6 weeks by the boat and the Post Office truck, all the foods were
fine. Thanks to Yoshiteru for these
dried Japanese food packages.
2nd one was held on July 13
Elsa’s late B-day dinner. It is too hot to bake, and for Amanda too busy
to bake, so Hiroko used the Japanese sweet from Yoshiteru. All tasted the sweet, too. Dan-san and Hiroko likes the cake tasted like
Chinese moon cake. Singing Happy
Birthday to Elsa, she was thinking about her wish.
This sweet made by the Chinese restaurant in Yokohama
Chinatown.
As usual, Hiroko forgot to take any photos of foods. There were steak for each one of them, and
sausage, and tuna and yellow-tail sashimi, and Charlie’s vegetable salad, and yogurt
ice cream bar and lots of fruits for the dessert . There weren’t too much left over for doggy
bags.
Hiroko served Surume (dried squid from Yoshiteru) and everyone
tasted once but they didn’t have second serve.
Rice cracker, Japanese style cooked beef can, Dashi-no-moto
(Bonito seasoning), seaweed, etc. were given to Elsa, Lisa, and Amanda from
Yoshiteru’s packages.
One interesting thing happened. Dave found the one dried fish in the package and
talked about how to cook. Dave said
Italian cooked dried Cod fish the same way how Hiroko cooking. Finding out the Japanese word "Tara”
which was in the packages from Yoshiteru, it is Cod fish. Dave/Lisa and Hiroko laughed. Italian and Japanese cooked dried fish the same
way. It was very interesting.
Italian Pastor of Hiroko’s church wants to have the fish to
try cooking his way.
3rd one happened on July 14.
This is Dan-san’s first crop of cucumber. We laughed facing toward to east as all
Japanese do when they eat any new crop.
It was very, very tasty. It is
not his usual cucumbers. He had hard
time to find the cucumber seeds and Japanese cucumber plants the year of 2013. Until the beginning of July in 2013, the
weather of Chicago was not so great for cucumber to grow. However, it has been hot and humid the last couple
of weeks. Thanks for this hot and humid
weather for the cucumber.
Which one will be next to harvest, tomato or green beans, or
hot peppers.
July 18, Dan-san picked up this 19 inches cucumber.
Thanks to the Lord God for all these things happened.