I love strawberries, and it is strawberry season here! Lucky me! Strawberry season is from December to May, and the strawberries here are so perfect and juicy and sweet. Seika treated us to a strawberry-themed fancy afternoon tea. It was everything I could have hoped for. So many different ways to enjoy a strawberry. Some items were sweet and some were savory.

Here’s a description of the menu items, thanks to Google Translate’s Google Lens

Seika’s boyfriend headed back to Tokyo, but first, we stopped at a ramen spot. It was very good. We ordered by using an iPad at our table, and shortly after, the food arrived.

Ume Matsuri

Ume means plum in Japanese. Right before the cherry blossoms bloom, the plum blossoms bloom. I am here during plum blossom season, and I was eager to experience that. In Osaka, an annual plum blossom festival is hosted at Expo 70 Commemorative Park. Seika and her brothers family brought me to the festival. We posed in front of the famous Tower of the Sun sculpture.

The blossoms are blooming a bit later this season as it typically from mid-February to mid-March, and some of the buds haven’t opened yet. But enough blossoms are blooming that you can really smell the fragrance. It is a nice smell, like a very rich honey flavor. We took turns smelling the blossoms.

Then we sampled some plum sakes. Seika told me what to say to the person when I was giving her the money for the sake tasting.

She also taught me what to say to the person when we were done and we were turning in our guesses of which ume sake was which.

Ume sake is very sweet.

Seika’s brother bought us ume udon to try. It, of course, had a plum in it. To me the plum is very sour and salty and fruity. It is a one-of-a-kind taste. I was an overwhelming flavor, but also an intriguing flavor.

Then Seika brought us on the Osaka Wheel, the largest ferris wheel in Japan at 123 meters. It had clear floors and offered some nice views.

Hinamatsuri

Hinamatsuri (Doll Festival), occurs on March 3rd and it is a festival to pray for prosperity and happiness of girls. They decorated with Hinamatsuri artwork that Seika made with her kids when she was an English teacher. We celebrated by having temaki-sushi for dinner.

Seika’s Mom prepared a delicious spread of various seafoods and vegetables. I tried EVERYTHING, including things like raw squid, cod eggs, raw shrimp, raw scallops, fatty tuna, perilla leaves, Japanese mayonnaise, and even imitation crab that actually tastes like crab!

There was even a cake to celebrate my arrival to Japan 🫶

I am so blessed 🫶