Well what do we have here? Why it's Tohato brand Caramel Corn snack! This is a lovely snack encased in a cute package. The snack itself is similiar in texture to the Cheetos brand puffed snacks (not the hard crunchy ones) and has a nice sweet flavor. The original Caramel Corn is supposed to taste like caramel, thus it's name, but I'm not sure how caramel it tastes as much as it tastes sweet. However you will not find a speak of popped corn in this bag, but you will find a few peanuts hiding in the bottom.
Now really Easter and Japan have nothing to do with each other, but I thought a little story that is related to Easter would be appropriate for today. Well many people know about Peeps, they are a sugar coated marshmallow Easter treat that is shaped like rabbits, chicks, eggs etc. Well Shouma always likes to try American candies and I thought 'which is the most unpleasent candy we have?' - Peeps of course!
Well this recent article caught my attention on the Mainichi daily news because it had Yokohama written boldly in the headline, so I surfed right over. The basic gist of the article is Yokohama is now employing a senior aged crew of 11 manner police, which will soon be released to work on the subway's afternoon routes.
The nicest thing about the location of where I stayed was it's proximity to the Mycal complex, It was really just on the block in front of our apartment. So it was really easy to go to the Saty supermarket, McDonalds (there were 2), the theater, or the department store. I don't know how many times I bothered Shouma to go with me to buy gashapon! And Saty, while usually crowded was just delightful after 9pm when they would mark down the parishables. I wish I would have learned about that a bit earlier on.
I wish things were set up like this around here. I can't just walk to the supermarket, I could walk to McDonalds (if it were worth it) but there's sidewalk only halfway. I know it's the American way to make everything as big and spreadout as possible, but really it's not convinient especially if you don't have a car. Well here's a nice picture looking down towards the Mycal complex!
Back in Feburary I blogged about Japanese style Valentine's Day, and now here we are a month later (so fast! I can't believe it) and it was just White Day on March 14th. White day was invented as a day for the man to return the favor to the women and give her some chocolate. Really it should be white chocolate, or perhaps marshmallows, because it's White Day and thats why the National Confectionery Industry Association made White day - to sell white candy!
Imagine it, you are working your cushy teaching English in Japan job. But now imagine doing it while dressed up as Naruto, Haruhi, or Amuro Ray. Pretty sweet huh?
So whenever I happen to ask a Japanese male what his favorite food the answer often includes steak or hamburg, or both! I've never been a real big fan when it comes to red meat, so I just generally don't include it in my diet. But when living in Japan with a man who everytime you ask "What would you like to eat?" answers with an enthusiastic "Steak!" it becomes a bit difficult to avoid. The only time I ever had real trouble was when we went to eat at Red Steak House in World Porters in Yokohama. They really truly only had steaks, the only non steak (or hamburg) item on their menu was curry. Now at that time I didn't acquire the taste for Japanese curry yet. Suffice to say, it became a bad evening.
Well besides that night, I did become more adventurous after awhile. Of course I had to try McDonalds, that's right McDonalds! Ooooo! The first time I tried Japanese McDonalds was in Kamakura. I had chicken McNuggets, which was a bad choice but I got all flustered when I reached the front of the line and had to decide quickly. You see they didn't have the full menu displayed above the counter, instead they chose to randomly post it over some seats in the middle of the dining room. And then when I got my nuggets Shouma dropped them all over the table. Another bad evening.
So next time when I finally got to see the full menu at McDonalds I was able to choose something we don't have in the US - the McPork! Yeah it's not a hamburger but - Oh glorious McPork, how I miss your salty sweet tangy flavor, and your tender texture! But seriously, the McPork rocks and I recommend highly. I also tried the teriyaki burger, which was good as well but, come on, the McPork is 100yen! Its nice because it doesn't come with mayo, unlike most everything else in Japan but I didn't know it the first time I ordered. So I told Shouma "I don't want mayo." he replies "Ok" but just stares at me for awhile and asks "So what do you want?" Apparently he didn't know the word Mayo, but he has this terrible habbit of just saying ok or yeah when he doesn't understand. So I got frustrated and walked away. Another ba- you see the pattern??
Anyway, I ate the McPork about 5 times! Another burger I tried was the Mos Burger of course! This is a burger chain that is native to Japan and therefore worth a try. Mos stands for Mountain Ocean Sun (I've heard Sky also), I'm not sure what its meant to mean (if it means anything at all) and they have a interesting menu. Check out an English translation of their menu. I only ate there once, which in retrospect is regrettable, and I had the regular Mos Buger. It was a good burger, not great, but pretty messy to eat. Its really nice that they serve you on real plates and glasses, and the interior is pleasant as well. Next time I want to try a rice burger.
I had one other burger, which was apparently a famous burger in Japan, but I forget its name. Shouma's father and step-mom brought it back from a trip to Kawasaki. Well it was a burger with cheese, bacon, egg and mayo on it! I whiped off the mayo but I'm afraid to think about how many calories were in that....
Have you seen the Suntory Boss canned coffee commercial series featuring Tommy Lee Jones? Well if you haven't I would suggest surfing over to YouTube and searching for them, it's just a delightful little ad campaign!
Well tonight I put together my first bento ever, yay!
Well this is my first writeup for my trip last Nov-Dec. Its rather late, but I just didn't seem to be in the mood to write any blow by blow recaps of my travel adventures. I got in the mood for it after visiting some other very nice blogs that featured many pictures and nice explantions of their activities. I became nostalgic for Japan and decided to go ahead and do some write up even though they are awfully late haha.
First up is my trip to Hakkeijima island with Shouma. This island is basically a large aquarium/amusement park. It was terribly expensive, as many things are in Japan, we both purchased day passes for about 45$ which allowed us to enter all attractions in the park. I mean without the pass riding the rollarcoaster once would have cost us 1000yen each o_O;; Basically there were about 5 rides, an aquarium, a touch aquarium and a dolphin house where you could walk through a large tube and enjoy watching dolphins swim all around you.
First we had to ride the bus to the train station. As always the bus was clean, quiet and on time.
Looking out the window of the bus. This is a Kaiten Sushi place, which I passed many a time but never got to eat there even though I really want to j-j
From the bus we got to the Negishi train station and took a train so a private station where we boarded a train that had no drivers. It was a rather nice train but it was really well heated. We rode that until we got to the stop for Hakkeijima.
This is the station stop at Hakkeijima, you can see the exit on the left side of the pic, and a hint of the combini attached to it on the right side.
Looking out from the station was a lovely view.
First we had to walk down a long rode way to get to the gates of the aquarium, then we wandered around in main plaza before heading over to get the tickets. We argued about which type to buy before settling on the most expensive. We then walked past the tallest drop tower ride in the world? in Japan? which Shouma boldly told me he would force me to ride. We then entered the Sega Arcade they had there and I got to do puri kura for the first time! It was so fun but Shouma decided to tell me I had to pick 4 of the pictures with only about 3 seconds left, so we ended up getting only 1 pose for 5 bucks ><**
Then we went into the aquarium. They had lots of wonderful animals I had never seen before, it really was a lovely aquarium. The pegiuns were very popular!
This was a really neat escalator that went up through a large aquarium full of sting rays.
After the aquarium we went and walked trough their mall sized complex of independant gift shops. They also had a gashapon arcade and 100yen shop. I raided both, haha! I got a mirror and cute towel from the 100yen shop, I think I got something else, but I can't remember... After that we ate at a place that advertised as being an all-American restaraunt. I got a cheese pizza, it had a very flat, thin crust, but wasn't very good. Shouma was a bit disappointed in his restaraunt choice after he learned there were a couple all you can eat buffets there.
Then we went to the Dolphin house and rode some rides. We rode the rollarcoaster twice which was one of the least frightening ones I ever rode, but it was fun. Of course Shouma told me not to scream alot so he didn't become embarrased, but he ended being the one who screamed. Ha. We also rode a little viking ship, however it didn't do 360 and was rather boring. However it seemed to elicit many a squeal from the Japanese patrons, including Shouma. He also chickened out of riding the drop tower, thankfully.
We ate some crapes from a stall next to the drop tower instead, they were good I guess. The last thing we did was go to the touch aquarium. We got to pet dolphins, a small whale, sharks and sea-cucumbers. We had to wait a long time to touch the dolphins and whale because they really didn't seem to want to be touched. So we stood there waiting and waiting and Shouma kept getting sprayed by the whales when they came up to breath. Touching the little sharks was the most fun, but Shouma was kinda squeezing and upsetting them. By then it was dark and cold, so I got a folder and super cute cellphone charm and we headed home.
This was a tower ride we rode between rollarcoaster rides. It shows a lovely 360 view of Hakkeijima.
Well one of our local art museums around here had a Japanese art exhibit as their traveling/special exhibit. I went with my mom to check it out, sadly it was mostly screens and kimono. The kimono were lovely, don't get me wrong, I was just expecting something a little more well rounded I guess.
