Hello everyone!!!

I have once again disappeared for several months, I am sorry! My life has become so busy, but it is also so fulfilling!!

For this newsletter, I want to talk primarily about my new hobby/community/exercise: yosakoi dancing!!

I’ve been waiting to talk about this one until I had some more videos and pictures to share! Around two months ago, I joined a Yosakoi dance team. Yosakoi is a form of dance that originated in the 60s that blends traditional Japanese dance moves with modern music. I LOVE it! It’s a huge commitment, but it has been so so much fun and has been such a great opportunity to meet new people in Japan.  You can read more about it here.

My team is made up of about 70 members: maybe 50 dancers (15 of which are international), flag wavers, and staff for props/backstage. I began learning the dance in October, and made my debut in December! Not only is it great exercise, but it has also helped my Japanese so much already and lets me engage with Japanese culture in a very hands-on way!

It feels like I’ve found a family-like community that I had been lacking since I played team sports in high school. I even have a Japanese Mama and Papa on the team that always make sure my kimono is on properly and fix anything I break. 

Now, we are training for the big Yosakoi Soran Festival in Hokkaido in June! For this tournament, we have extra dancers joining from all over Ishikawa and even neighboring prefectures to dance with us. Our team for this tournament is around 100 people!

That said, we are currently crowdfunding to help offset the costs of taking 100 people across Japan for this tournament. If you are able to help at all, it is extreeeemely appreciated! Donations can be made directly to this website: https://camp-fire.jp/projects/view/644518?list=search_result_projects_popular 

The website is in Japanese, but can be translated. However, if you prefer to make a donation to me on Venmo, I can submit it on your behalf! My Venmo username is @laurencuppy. 

Besides yosakoi, I have just been trying to enjoy life in a Kanazawa winter. The prefecture has gotten an insane amount of snow this year, way more than normal, and this Southern belle does not like it! A fun quirky thing about this area is that it rains and thunderstorms constantly in fall/winter, so I haven’t been seeing much of the sun, and when there are thunderstorms, it almost always also hails. I have seen more hail this winter than I ever have in my life. As I write this, it is currently snowing again. Fingers crossed, it’s the last snow of this winter!

My students are great and almost finished with their school year! March is the last month of the year, and is filled with many exciting events that I’m excited to share about soon.

Thanks for reading!