Last week we made Hanami Dango with my friends. Hanami Dango can be translated as sweet dumpling (Dango) for cherry blossom viewing. This sweet is enjoyed during the spring season in Japan. April has passed so quickly and I was so busy. There aren’t many cherry blossom trees in Shenyang especially where we live. But I wanted to take advantage of it being April and enjoy the feeling of spring, so I asked my friends if we could do Hanami Dango making with our children. They said absolutely YES!!

The ingredients that we used for this sweet were Shiratama flour, rice flour, and some water, and we kneaded them together until the dough became able to keep the shape of balls. To make the dough into a pink color, I added some Sakura, cherry blossom powder, and also matcha powder to make some of the dough green.

It was so cute that the children made some marks or different shapes of Dango so that they could identify which one was their creation when we cook them.

There is nothing impossible if everyone gets together and plans with positive energy! It was really last minute when I asked my friends if they could join the Hanami dango-making with me. Some of them brought bottles of water for cooking dango and also let me use their pots for boiling the dango. One of my friends shared her talent for making a bowl of matcha with everybody. Another friend of mine brought her arts & craft materials to teach our children how to make Sakura-shaped Origami and other fun crafts.

One of the children suggested we sing a Chinese song that they learned at school. And they started to sing the song while making the Hanami dango.

It is not easy to live a place that you have never been to, however I saw how the children are brave living in such a new enviroment and are even enjoying it. Also one of the children told us that if we could go outside and eat the Ohanami Dango near some cherry trees. Unfortunately, the weather wasn’t great so we had to eat them in the room.

Another child was looking at her Dango in the pot while they were being cooked. She looked so happy and I could tell she was excited to try them out. I asked my daughter if she liked her Hanami dango and she replied saying “It didn’t taste like anything!” I think because I forgot to put some sugar when we kneaded the dango, daughter…! But I like that she was so honest! It was so much fun making Dango and it became one of my memories in China that we made with my friends with joy! I told my daughters that we should do Ohanami under the cherry trees and enjoy Ohanami Dango next time we go to Japan!

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