Rice and Ramen

The best part about having friends and family visit me here in Japan is that I get to play tour guide and show off my city--in this case Tokyo--and my obviously extensive and amazing knowledge about it. Every so often, however, having friends and family visit means I get the opportunity to visit someplace I've never been before, in which case the trip means I get to show off how well I can use Google and read signs in train stations (both of which, I would argue, are valuable skills). My mom, who came out for a long weekend, and I decided to spend a few days in Sapporo, the capital city of Hokkaido. We found some fairly inexpensive flights, booked a hotel, and thought the matter done and dusted. But only a few days after making all our arrangements, Hokkaido was rocked by a  magnitude 6.7 earthquake  that left at least 30 people dead and the entire island without power or water for several days. But after carefully monitoring the situation, and checking-in with the local U...

 For all of its sprawl and historical significance, it's easy to forget that many of the buildings in present-day Tokyo simply didn't exist prior to the firebombings of 1945. But there is one neighborhood that was spared destruction-- Yanaka, an area of the city known for its artisans and literary aficionados. Yanaka is proper shitamachi (lit. "under city") where, during the Edo Period (1603-1868), the "lowbrow" merchants and artisans lived. So perhaps it's appropriate that one of Yanaka's main attractions is the so-called "Yanaka Ginza," a stretch of pedestrian-only street that has many mom-and-pop stores, mainly specializing in food. Entrance to Yanaka Ginza. Stumbled upon a wagashi (Japanese sweet) shop and had the best daifuku (mochi and red bean) I've ever had. A few blocks away from Yanaka Ginza is Yanaka Bochi (or Yanaka Reien) cemetery, a large (it has it's own police box!) public cemetery known for its spr...

Every time I look over at my desktop calendar at work, I have to do a little double-take: what do you mean it's already July? And yet the mind-melting midday temperatures and humidity consistently remind me that, yes, it is in fact the height of summer in Japan. That means it's time to take daily frigid showers and do whatever it takes to not miss garbage disposal day or risk your apartment smelling like a decomposing trash heap. I know, that's the image everyone definitely wanted when they opened to this post. So I'll move on (but, in case anyone is interested, you can put food scraps and stuff you don't want to smell into your freezer until you're ready to throw it out!) Moving on for real this time. A few weekends ago, I got a shot at redeeming the fun yet somewhat haphazard  Golden Week Nikko adventure . Having learned from the previous trip, we bought train tickets in advance and confirmed exactly where and when transfers would occur and this ti...