Surprise Confections
I was minding my own business doing some English vocabulary review in the teacher’s room yesterday afternoon. Just before 5th period began, one of our math teachers runs in and asks me if I speak German. I wish I did. But I don’t. I told him so, and shrugged, as if to say “hey, it was worth a shot asking.” He then threw an apron at me. This is usually reserved for the home economics teacher, so I was confused. Why am I doing mathematics in German while wearing an apron? Well, it turns out that part of the job-hunt program here brought four fellows from a Matsuyama patissierie. The lead confectioner was a wonderfully kind bearded German man. He spoke no English (Japanese either), and I spoke no German. But we got along quite well.
I went and participated with the ebbing and flowing pool of students. They all have responsibilities to take care of, and the lesson spanned 2 periods. Some were there the whole time; some only for the first half, some only for the second. I watched the German gentleman sculpt some animals from marzipan. Then he had us all split into groups and try it. I successfully made a marzipan rose and a marzipan pig. I even decorated the eyes with white chocolate (and normal brown for the irises). Then, we went back to the front of the room where we learned how to use a piping bag made from wax paper to write in frosting. Again, we split into groups and tried writing - at first on a silpat non-stick sheet, and then on an actual cookie. I wrote in English and Japanese, using block letters, cursive script, kana and kanji. It was good fun.
Lastly, they announced that my supervisor’s birthday is tomorrow. So they brought out 3 larger cookies and asked us to use what we’d learned to write her some birthday wishes. All in all, it was a really nice surprise at the end of an otherwise incredibly boring day. 