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A taste of Japanese at “Japanese from Scratch: All About Bento!”
10/09/2015

24 people had a chance to learn all about bento – Japanese boxed meals – as well as some basic Japanese  at the Japan Foundation London’s Japanese from Scratch workshop for absolute beginners of Japanese language, which was held on September 8th and 9th.


Led by Mio Tsunematsu, Assistant Japanese Language Advisor at the Japan Foundation London, the workshop began with an introduction to the concept of bento in Japan, and the basics of what a good bento should contain. The introduction to bento also explored looking at what bento mean to Japanese people and the role bento play in Japanese culture.


This was followed by learning useful Japanese language, including vocabulary for common food found in bento and how to express likes and dislikes in Japanese. This vocabulary, and other useful words and phrases to do with eating in Japan, can be found in the Japan Foundation’s Marugoto A1 textbook and website.


Finally, participants enjoyed practising their new Japanese language skills by making partners their ideal bento using stickers!


Some of the comments from participants included:


“I enjoyed how interactive it was.”
“It’s been interesting and fun.”
“It was a great introduction to Japanese language and culture.”
“Everything was really nice! Thank you!”


We would like to thank all the participants for coming, and hope that this session has inspired them to learn more about Japanese and Japan!


You can view more photos from the event on our Facebook page here.