24. ♡ Hanami in Amsterdamse bos ♡

A few weeks  ago my boyfriend and I went to the cherry blossom park in ‘het Amsterdamse bos’ a nature reserve in Amstelveen. The park has 400 cherry blossom trees, which were gifted by the Japanese Women’s Club as a memorial to the victims of the tsunami in 2000. Half of trees bear Japanese women’s names, while the other half are named after Dutch women.

Last year we went there too but sadly due to the bad weather all the cherry blossoms blew away. ( ; _ ; ) Luckily this year the cherry blossom tree’s were still intact and I was really excited to finally be able to have our first hanami pick nick together! (^O^)／♡

What is hanami?  

Hanami (花見) literally means flower viewing and is a Japanese traditional custom of enjoying the beauty of flowers. But  in most cases almost always referring to the flowers or ‘hana’ (花) of the cherry blossom or ’sakura’ (桜) In Japan hanami often involves a picnic party to enjoy cherry blossoms as well as food and drinks. People have Hanami parties with friends, family or colleagues under the cherry blossom tree’s and have fun! 

So here’s a peak of all the yummy food we brought with us that day. My boyfriend made a cute little snack box for us and I bought cakes, buns and other yummy snacks. As I didn’t have time to make anything. ( ^_^; ) As usual it was way too much! But believe me when I say we didn’t let it go to waste. (^_−) As we ended up eating some leftover cake and melonpan (a Japanese type of sweet bun) for dinner as we were still so full from the pick nick. ww (*^ω^*)

I really enjoyed myself while we were there. It’s such a beautiful place and not surprisingly a lot of Japanese families were having hanami pick nicks too. It was so cute seeing all the children playing and running around and trying to catch sakura petals. Because when your able to catch a petal out of the air it's seen as a token of good luck and your allowed to make a wish. And it’s believed that your wish will be granted when the cherry blossoms are in bloom again~ (o^^o)♪