Pan Asian Day

Today is Chinese New Year.  This year is the Year of the Rooster, which is my year.  Since a majority of my friends are also roosters, I thought I'd share some lucky/unlucky things to know from this very informative website called China Highlights.

We don't usually make a big deal about Chinese or Lunar New Year, but we usually celebrate by Matt cooking a stir-fry.  We couldn't do that this year, however, because we had plans at 5 pm tonight:  Leah's Tae Kwon Do "graduation" ceremony.

For the past two weeks Leah has been participating in an after school (at the school) introductory Tae Kwon Do program which culminated in a graduation ceremony today at the dojang, which is conveniently in a shopping plaza only a couple miles away.  Today's event was really just a demonstration for the parents and to get them to sign their kids up for more lessons, but Leah absolutely loved it.

Of course we were already planning on signing her up for more lessons.  Master Park, the instructor, was great with all the kids but more importantly, this is the only sport Leah has tried that she wanted to continue.  And trust me, she's tried a lot:  soccer, cheerleading, tee-ball, running club & field hockey.  Plus, she broke a board today.  Even Aaron was impressed.  We tried to get him to take the after school lessons but he didn't want to.  We're "encouraging" him to try a lesson when Leah begins her lessons but he is reluctant.  He says he only wants to take karate lessons but I think Leah breaking the board today helped to make him agreeable to taking a trial lesson.

Leah with Master Park.

Leah focusing on her task.

Hi-ya!  With Matt holding the board, Leah
 successfully breaks it.

Aaron was duly impressed as Leah was the
only person in her class to break their
 board into three pieces.

Having spent the first part of the evening of Chinese New Year celebrating Korean martial arts, it made perfect sense to then eat Japanese food at the hibachi & sushi restaurant located in the same shopping plaza. (We had a coupon, after all.)  Although teppanyaki is not the same for us since living in Japan, it's still fun and the kids love the fire.  (Really, who doesn't enjoy seeing an onion volcano?)  This was our first trip to Super Ninja Steakhouse & Sushi and we had a tasty dinner.

Our chef performed all the usual skills...

...including fire.

He threw in a new one that Matt & I had never seen
or experienced before:  catching sake.

So that was our Pan Asian day:  Chinese New Year with Korean martial arts and Japanese food.  I hope you have a lucky and prosperous new year.  And if you're a rooster--be careful!  This is not a lucky year for you.  Take heed of diagram near the top of the page.