Hail Oden! Maruken Suisan 丸健水産 (赤羽 Akabane, Tokyo part 1) | It's Not Sushi ft. The Germanator

Music by MANNY MARX. http://manymarx.com

The Germanator and I went out one last time before he headed back. We hit up Maruken Suisan, thus far, the best oden shop I've been to in Japan.

LOCATION

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Odawara Ramen - Aji Ichi Houjou（小田原らーめん鯵壱北條。）| It's Not Sushi

Finally working through some of the backlogged videos. First up was a random ramen encounter at Aji Ichi Houjou in Odawara. The four of us were all working at the same part-time gig and we are all big fans of the bowl so it was only natural that we dined out at one of the local establishments on our lunch break.

Raw Horse Meat, Kanda, Tsukemen and more | 7 Days, 7 Minutes (2015-03-09)

Published on Mar 26, 2015

Music By DJ Russel CrossFire https://soundcloud.com/russellcrossfire

00:00 Kanda Dusk (Kanda, Tokyo)
00:58 Horsepower (Aoyama, Tokyo)
01:58 Spring Skies (Kawasaki, Kanagawa)
02:58 Spring Projections (Mitsukoshi Department Store, Tokyo)
04:04 Ishii Tsukemen (Ginza, Tokyo)
05:04 There's always room for one more (Shibuya Station)
06:03 Scrambled (Shibuya Crossing)

Random Japan Phone Snaps #5 ランダム携帯で撮った写真

Sometimes I snap things with my phone that I only ever use once or intend to use in the future but never do. They gradually build up till I drag them all off my phone into a dump folder, where would usually spend the rest of their digital eternities...

Until now.

Enjoy these random images of random times in random Japan.

  

          

  

Fukuoka (Hakata) Ramen - Mamenya (満麺屋) - It's Not Sushi

Join me as I degust on the best Hakata style Tonkotsu Ramen I've ever had. Mamenya in Fukuoka, the home of Hakata style ramen is a must for any ramen fan. It's beyond epic.

It's Not Sushi - Tachibana Tsukemen (Chikuma, Nagano) (麺屋たち花 - 長野県千曲市)

In Chikuma City, Nagano Prefecture, That cat's dad and little bro introduced me to an amazing tsukemen (dipping noodles) restaurant around the corner from Togura Station.


麺屋たち花
LOCATION

It's Not Sushi - Sasadango

Over the new year when I went home to Nagano with the cat, Her mom gave us Sasadango. What's Sasadango? Watch the video to find out :p

Yes there are subtitles. Make sure you have them enabled :p

It's Not Sushi - EPIC Japanese Curry!

Curry House Kojika (location: http://goo.gl/maps/4uavX)

In Ofunato City, Iwate pref. Makes the best curry I have ever eaten in Japan.

Strawberry fields

Let me take you down 'cos I’m going to strawberry fields…

Yeah strawberry picking season is here. At the Harada Strawberry Farm, ¥1200 (R120) gets you 30 minutes, a plastic tray and unlimited condensed milk top-ups. A ¥1200 box of strawberries holds about 36-40 strawberries.

To make it worthwhile, you need to be a fiend.

For me that’s something that comes naturally…

The BEST Ramen I have eaten*

*up till this posting anyway.

Ramen is a part of life here in Japan and it is safe to say that if you are here, you will eat a fair amount of it. The quality ranges from cheap and cheerful to mind-blowingly delicious. at the top of the mind-blowingly delicious pile is a place that I have discovered pretty close to home…

Osaka Koi no Uta

 
The Kansai trip continued…
After a short night in a capsule hotel In America-mura we kick-started our Osaka (s)troll day. We basically hoofed it around the famous parts of the town. Being the (forced by checkout) early birds, Jacqueline and I decided to take a stroll to see what we could see… it was a rather long trek that took us from the top of Shinsaibashi, Over Dotonbori, to the bottom on Namba… and then all the way back :p
We didn’t buy anything, we didn’t really do anything. Just looked at stuff. It was good.
Take and Keiko joined us after they had gotten up :p lazy buggers… We then did it all again! No shit we basically walked everywhere again. No shits… I walked more than I had in a long time that day.

This time however due to the fact that our capsule accommodation was un-available that night we had a bit of a goal. to find somewhere to sleep and stash our stuff before we went out to the club.
The trip took us through the side alleys and backstreets of Namba and the surrounding area up a hill with some of the most amazing and bizarre (and expensive) love hotels I have ever seen!

Without finding any accommodation to our satisfaction we had okonomiyaki for dinner again and chilled out before finding another cheap ass love hotel in the cheaper district down the hill from the other place. That night was spent at a club called Giraffe where I got to see how Osaka likes to party… and Jesus H Motorboating Christ does Osaka know how to party. Yeah its no Jozi debauchery but unlike Tokyo where peeps got to clubs to be seen, In Osaka they are actually there to have a good time! I can’t wait to dig up MY people down there. If the trendy group are any yardstick, those Osakans who party to actual music (as opposed to that stammering, stuttering down syndrome hip hop crap) will be batshit insane.

ONE MORE THING!!!! THEY HAVE TAKOYAKI RAMEN IN OSAKA!!!!!

Not that I actually care about octopus balls but I took the picture of the sign for those of you who do… really… ;)

YEAH! Meccha Holiday!

OSAKA! It took me too long to get there.. and it is taking every ounce of my willpower to not cancel my contract and go there! Yeah I have nothing to do… yet… but I will make a plan… OK, Sanity returns…
Yeah. WOW! I have heard from many a gaijin how awesome kansai is… NONE of them have ever been to cape town.. so none of them know the half of it! Take the best of Cape Town (I am a Jozi boy so the mountain doesn’t really factor into it), merge it with the best of Japan and thats what Kansai… and in particular Osaka is. Sure Kobe looks like CT and even has a mountain and beaches (more of that in another post) but Osaka has the vibe.
We met up with Keiko and Takeyasu at the Sky Building in Umeda. Its an architectural marvel and we marveled at it.. but our tummies were like SCREW YOU, so into the basement we delved. of to the side of a hard to find passage way we found a hole in the wall okonomiyaki shop called KIJI. The master bade us welcome and as we waited for a free table he came to give us our orders… yes. He didn’t ask us what we wanted… He told us. and we said yes. He was right of course. it hit the spot and the taste was mindblowing. but yeah what an experience.



After that it was off to Shinsaibashi to find ourselves diggs for the night.
That was only the first few hours in the city that I would someday like to call home…

<I LOVE KANSAI>

Shoyu salty balls

Curry Udon at Toyohashi Eki. Surprisingly good. But the experience was marred by the spillage of Shoyu (soy sauce) on my bag. My boxers now have brown, salty stains on them.

But damn that was a good curry udon.

-- Blogged in the field.

Location:Gamagōri City,Japan

Montecasino in Japan! Venus Fort, Odaiba.

Before I went home, when I was last in Odaiba, we went through to Venus Fort (I have the urge to call it Venus Frot for some reason, even though I like the place)
The big deal for me was the uncanny similarity between it and Montecasino back in SA. Basically the whole indoor outdoors Italian jive. I am willing to bet that there is a link somewhere but to be honest, I couldn’t give two shits in a chardonnay.

I was rather homesick at the time (read: the tail end of a bitter winter) and anything that reminded me of home, even the places I where the scum gathers was refreshing.

I must say however, I did enjoy the place a whole lot more and unlike Monte, I actually cannot wait till I go back there again. Not so much for the decor or shopping, but the Food. Russian food in particular.

I ate my first ever Borscht and Josephine Henrietta Christ!!! it was good. Every bite down to the last drop of soup. Spectacular. And it was not just my naive tongue either. Luka has experience from the old country and he agrees that this food does the Motherland proud.

in soviet russia, food eats YOU!

Update~ KONYAKU!

No, I didn't sneeze… No, its not Japanese for cognac… No, I didn’t insult your your mother…well maybe I did but that has nothing to do with this.

Konnyaku is a jelly like substance which is made using this weird ass root that grows underground for 2-3 years. It is supposed to have 0 calories and is supposed to be good for you. I dunno about that but it does taste pretty decent.

I was invited to the konnyaku making shindig at the Shimogo (My Neighbourhood) community centre. I figured that it was free food and i got to meet the community… uberWIN.

 

I was essentially there for 2 hours speaking to the grandmothers of the community about various things while they made the konnyaku (men don't make konnyaku it seems) They were fun and cute as most old people are and It was a refreshing change. I particularly enjoyed the way the 2 eldest  talked about their days in nursery school together and used each other’s nicknames from back then.

After that it was time to eat. It was akin to a feast. All in all it was a good day.

If any of you are ALTs or just Foreigners in Japan, How do you interact with your community? Do you also get invited to these events? and do you accept the invitation?