Let's Make Curry

At Sojo University in Kumamoto, where I am, as you all know by know, spending a semester abroad, a two-day festival with all the trimmings is set to take place in just a few weeks. All the faculties will participate, putting on a vibrant showcase of activities. At least, that’s the plan. The festival will feature numerous food and game stalls, a large stage with various performances, and a spectacular fireworks display. There’s even a special guest - a pop idol from Tokyo. I imagine the whole thing will feel like one of those heartwarming anime episodes where the entire school plans a festival, only for the city to be attacked by ugly alien monsters - or something along those lines.

Recently, I joined a fun and vibrant group called Sojo Buddies - a lively mix of Japanese and international students from various faculties at Sojo University. The witty group organizes exciting events in Kumamoto and beyond, plans excursions to interesting places, and occasionally meets for meals at delicious restaurants. Since good food brings people together, we’ve decided to run a food stall at the festival, serving spicy curry and other delicacies inspired by Sri Lankan cuisine. To ensure we know what we’re doing, and to avoid making fools of ourselves at the festival, we held a group cooking session, followed by a very essential taste test - and it was a complete success.

Cooking with such an amusing group was a nice experience, even though my main contribution was aggressively breaking pasta into small pieces - just as the recipe we received instructed. In the end, we were all quite pleased with the result. I got to meet many new people, and we capped off the evening by watching a live broadcast of a local basketball team’s match. We’re more or less confident our food stall will be a gigantic hit at the upcoming festival, and the more money we raise, the grander our after-show party at some izakaya will be. Now, we eagerly await the festival at Sojo University. Hopefully, no ugly alien monsters will decide to attack our city in the meantime.