With an unusually long string of holidays this week – collectively now known as Silver Week – I was able to spend a few days up in Niigata to bring Naoki and Makiko home after their two week long stay. Silver Week is awesome – almost as awesome as Golden Week. Alas, it is but a rarity coming only once every 6+ years… so I’m glad we were here to enjoy it this year!

In Niigata mid-September marks the beginning of rice harvesting. During my five day stay nearly all the fields had been reaped – quite a feat considering just how many fields there are in the prefecture. Makiko’s family has a few fields of their own: growing rice, eggplants, edamame and Japanese pumpkins amongst other things. Her sister’s family even has some farm animals! It’s quite a stark contrast to our big city life.

So – what better chance to get Naoki familiar with where all his supermarket stuff comes from, then from his own family?

niigata farm life

I’m sure he won’t remember it for very long – but the pictures and videos will last a lifetime.

Until next time, Niigata!

This entry was posted on Wednesday, September 23rd, 2009 at 3:07 pm and is filed under Buddies, Travel, Videos. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.