bbqs past and present

Fall 09: epic bbq that took 6 hours to start. it was dark by the time we ate. so worth it.

we had a bbq at yomiya koen this past weekend. i ate many of these.

homemade anpan man cookies. courtesy of aki/taka.

food. coma. story of life.

himawari fun run

A couple of weeks ago, some of the taiko peeps and I participated in a fun run to raise money for people in Haiti. This involved: eating lots, taking turns running for a period of 7 hours, me running for the first time in i don't even know how long, sore muscles, napping, unnecessarily racing people, fun (obvi).

taiko debut

we had a taiko performance this past saturday. DEBUT! i lava it!
* check out the awesome taiko threads!

the sibs

the sibs came to visit for spring break. first night: my apt decided to stop having running water [seriously used extra water in teapot to wash our faces; listerine to brush teeth. sadlife.] skype w/ mama the next day: sibs: "tasia lives in filth and doesn't have running water". tasia: fml.

otherwise: tenjin, dazaifu, kitaq, taiko!, hiroshima/miyajima, deer, FOOD, yatai, lots of shopping, TOKYO!, beau getting upset with all of the girls for shopping for too long, onsens w/ the gparents (dots), monkeys, ferris wheel, bribri's clear umbrella photo shoot, kenji, purikura!, those rice in replacement of bread burgers at mos burger, decoden, missie not having any impulse control when it comes to shopping, akihabara maids and otaku (beau: [passing by a group of otaku trading yugioh (sp?) cards] "at least I'm not like them"... tasia: [flashbacks to brother withering away in pajamas in front of the tv eating cheetos and yelling at fellow world of warcraft people. le sigh], DISNEYLAND and KAO, getting sick after the teacups, shinkansens, LOVE.

spam

This has nothing to do with Japanese adventures but: everytime I open my spam folder in gmail, it gives me suggestions for recipes featuring spam. Does big brother google creepily know that I am a foodie? I have been keeping a list of all of these amusing suggestions...they include:

• spicy spam kabobs
• spam imperial tortilla sandwiches, spam veggie pita pockets
• spam breakfast burrito, spam fajitas
  
• spam casserole, creamy spam broccoli casserole, spam skillet casserole, french fry spam casserole
  
• spam veggie strudel, spam hashbrown bake
  
• spam primavera, spam confetti pasta
  
• vineyard spam salad, ginger spam salad
• spam quiche, savory spam crescents

I am intrigued... okay not really.

Yakushima cont.

because one post cannot contain the FANTASTICAL EPIC AMAZINGNESS that is Yakushima.

on the way back down from the Jomon sugi hike... we discovered a lake/river/miscellaneous body of water. twas perty. and ice cold.

second day of hiking: very green. this is the inspiration for Mononoke Hime. appropriately, it is the Mononoke Hime trail.

My legs were so tired. But the view was worth it.

On the way back up to Fukuoka, we stopped off at Kumamoto. This prefecture is famous for basashi- ie raw horse meat. It was ooookay. Not my fave.

* side note: Yakushima reminds me of the countryside of Hawaii. And the people are SO nice. Our minshuku guy drove us around everywhere (side side note- we ate delicious flying fish, passion fruit ice cream, burgers, and coffee...among other things), invited us to drink shochu (alcohol made from potatoes [sake=rice]), and took us to line up an hour earlier than the supermarkets opened to buy a special Yakushima shochu that is in limited supply and really delicious because of Yakushima's really clean water. or something. I love him!

**Minshuku Ryoujou no yado-- message me if you want to go to Yakushima and need accommodations!

CONCLUSION: best golden week ever!

Golden Week: Kagoshima/Yakushima edition

I went hiking in Yakushima for Golden Week. It is a world heritage site with lots of thousand year old cedar trees. It rains 50% of the time and is tropical and beauteous. Hayao Miyazaki (creator of totoro, ponyo, howl's moving castle, etcetc) was inspired by the landscape on Yakushima in his animation of Mononoke Hime (ie Princess Mononoke- watch it!).

To get to Yakushima, you have to take a train to Kagoshima and a 4 hour ferry to the island. After getting to Kagoshima, I was waiting for my lunch and had a view of Sakurajima (above)- the active volcano that regularly spews out ash every hour or so. AMAZING!

Eco bento lovely minshuku lady made us for our hike (inside: musubi, fish, other deliciousness)

On the way up to Jomon-sugi (a supposed 10 hour hike; in reality- 3.5 hours up and mostly because it was crowded and all the simpletons were getting in my way. jk, not really.)

deer just be chillin everywhere

This is jomon-sugi. It's somewhere between 3000-7000 years old. This is what we were hiking to. I was not impressed. But here's a picture anyway.