Fun food adventures!

Since moving to Japan I have had the opportunity to try a lot of new foods. Some are very strange but most are delicious!

My first fun food experience was on my birthday when Martin and Chigusa took me out to this great restaurant by my apartment. You order skewers of meat and they grill them right there in front of you. The sauce they used was delicious! Some of the lovely grilled food included heart and liver. I had never had liver before and never thought I would be eating heart. However, they both were delicious!

Other fun food is matsuri food. It reminds me of fair food, a lot of it comes on a stick! There, I have had delicious shave ice and an everything pancake. These are made when everything you can think of is thrown together on a grill, topped with egg, grilled, smeared with mayo and then topped with fish flakes. They are alright. I think I would like them more without the fish flakes but it is greasy, delicious fair food!

Another thing I have tried is smelt. The first picture below is of me eating it. It looked to me as if the fish had not been cleaned and I felt a little strange eatting something with a tail and eyeballs. I couldn't eat the head but Naomi quickly grabbed it-telling me it is the best part!)

These are their heads. Creepy!



Naomi and I went out to this great bar that we had heard has alcoholic milk drinks (chocolate mint....delicious!) last Friday night (9/5). We ordered some appitizers off the specials menu. The woman told us the first one was meat. She then mimed a horse and said "horse meato." We thought, "let's try it!" This is what we were then served: (yes, that is RAW horse meat!)

We were very nervous. We thought it would be cooked but new we had to try it! First, ofcourse, we took pictures and then made ourselves little rolls. We used the lettuce, shredded radish and the delicious sause to make a roll. Then we grabbed a chunk of meat and with hesitation...made our appitizer.
We were ready! I was nervous but knew we were doing this together so on the count of three (an d with a picture!) we took our first bites:

It actually tasted pretty good. the flavor was really good and the texture was the same a sushi. It was mostly the mental part being the idea that 1. we were eatting horse and 2. we were eatting raw red meat. I enjoyed my roll and even made a second! It was a pretty big feat and we were both very proud to have tried it...and know that we will never eat it again!
(the meat tasted really good but did mess with our stomachs a little...we both had tummy ache by the time we caught the train home...oh well...now we know never to eat raw horse meat again!)

izakaias and Japanese karaoke

Japanese izakaias and Japanese karaoke are two things we all love! Izakaias are really just bars but a lot of times you pay a flat fee for an "all you can drink" for a certain about of time! There is a great izakaia by my apartment that is 1000 Yen (about $10) for all you can drink for an hour and a half. (it is a GREAT deal!)

After orientation we went to an izakaia for an all you can eat and drink party. We were pretty sure the bar was not happy with us...but we all got our moneys worth! :)


Japanese karaoke is a blast. It is definitly a lot more fun that karaoke in America. In Japan you rent out a small room to sing in. Each person pays by the hour and included is all you can drink. In each room is a giant TV and two microphones. In the two times I have gone. It really becomes one massive singing fest. Below are some pictures of us at karaoke after the welcome party:

Money down the drain!

Just like the casinos in South Dakota, one thing you can find on almost every corner in Japan is a pachinko parlor. Pachinko is a strange game that is a form of gambling. It is hard to explain how to play other than you are trying to get a lot of the little metal balls. You play by adjusting the pressure at which the balls shoot up into the machine. The goal is to get them into these little baskets so the goal is to find the right pressure at which they shoot up. If you do, you get more. some people are really good (sitting with boxes of these little metal balls) and then there are people like me who suck! Pachinko parlors are not a very plesant place to hang out. They are really smokey and so nosiy!
Chigusa and Martin took us in and Chigusa, Jon and I each played on a machine. Jon said he wasn't going to play at first but then said he would because he could do better than us. Chigusa and I lost our 1000 Yen in about fifteen minutes. Jon did do better than us...I think his 1000 Yen lasted about twenty! It was a lot of fun to try but now, I don't ever have to play again!


Woohoo! 1000 Yen down the drain!!


Jon concentrating hard...trying to win the big Yen!

matsuri me! (part 2)

On Saturday the 8th I went back into Niigata City for the second part of the matsuri. This included shrine carrying down one of the main streets to the main shrine. The children made shrine like things to carry. They are not holy shrines but models of a lot of different things like Disney characters, Anpan man and the one below is a globe with flags from around the world. Jon and I watched this and then walked to the shine. It is a beautiful area with gardens and moneys! We spent time eating matsuri food, relaxing on bench, walking around the utopia gardens (that are on top of the performing arts center) and watching the shrine carrying.


Here are a group of kids carrying their shrine:

There were also many taiko drumming groups that were performing in the street. Both Jon and I really enjoyed listening to the kids play and both want to learn...it's way cool:

There real shrines were carried down the street to the shrine. The men and women were carrying this really heavy shrine on their backs. It was amazing to watch. They were singing and chanting as they did.

matsuri me!

On August 7th Namoi came into Niigata so that we could go to the Niigata Matsuri. She said her grandma was waiting for us so that we could all go together. When we got to her grandma's house she had ukatas (summer kimonos) waiting for for us. She then proceded to help us get dressed. We were then ready to watch the matsuri dance.
Naomi and I ready to dance. When we got to the Bandi bridge to watch the dance Naomi's aunt found us and then dragged us into the street to join the dance. The other ladies in the dance group quickly taught us the dance and together we danced over the bridge.
Naomi and I were so excited to get our picture taken with geishas. Behind us you can see a group of people in purple ukatas. That is the group we danced with-and we stood out like a sore thumb!
(We really enjoyed our ukatas)