"When you wish upon a star..."

At my conversation class on Wednesday, everyone wrote a wish to tie to a branch.

We did this because July 7th is a special day, called Tanabata in Japan.

Here are our English wishes. You can (kind of) see that my wish is for safe travels. :)

In addition to making a wish on Tanabata, people hope for clear skies so that two lovers from a folk tale are able to meet each other. According to the story, the Milky Way separates the star-crossed lovers (literally star-crossed, ha), and they're able to meet only once a year, on July 7th. Click here for the story and to learn more about Tanabata.

The lovely folks of my English conversation class. :)

The Tanabata festival in Kuji is the first weekend in August, which is when my family will be visiting. Yay!