Japanese Italian Food

Today was a national holiday to celebrate the autumnal equinox. Since they had the day off, the Morimuras took us to lunch at an Italian restaurant down the street. Fox chose Italian, thinking he might get some chicken parmesan. Well, the waitress had never heard of chicken parmesan. In fact, the restaurant didn't even have chicken. Instead, you could order spaghetti and shrimp, spaghetti and crab, pizza with tuna, mayo, and shrimp, pizza with eggs and bacon, or potato gratin with egg and barbecue sauce. Now, Fox doesn't eat shrimp or eggs--so he settled on pizza with corn, ham, and pepperoni. I got a salad with shrimp, potatoes, lettuce, and seaweed--and ate my salad with chopsticks. It was actually really good. I also had some delicious mango juice--Yum!
At lunch, Fumi and I were talking and she asked me what an American does if they can't find a spouse. She asked incredulously, "You mean they just live alone for the rest of their lives?" I said yes, what do they do in Japan? "They find another person who is looking for a spouse through a matchmaker! If they are LDS, then they meet up at a Conference. There is a long list of names of who there is looking to get married, so they take down phone numbers, talk long distance, and get married." She thought it was amazing that America doesn't have matchmakers and people actually remain single their whole lives! I was equally astonished that Japan still has matchmakers! It's kind of funny to find out little quirks about this culture.

After lunch, we went to a gym where your outside shoes couldn't touch the inside of the gym. You either had to wash your shoes or change into another pair of gym shoes before you set foot in the gym. Or you could shuffle around the hallways in some issued slippers, like I did. After the gym, I took Fox to a store I found that has cheap peanut butter! Hooray! So now you don't have to send the gallons we requested. (No, I'm not a gigantic fan of peanut butter. That's Fox. But I make a really yummy peanut sauce that is peanut butter, soy sauce, sugar, and vinegar that is great on the TONS of noodles and rice we eat!)
Stay tuned for pictures of Kiwi-flavored KitKats! ~Amy

A Strange Sort of Feeling

Amy and I have noticed something about Japan while we've been here. Nearly everywhere you look, you can find English words. They're on buildings, advertisements, magazines, product packaging, and corporate names. Sometimes the English is good; other times it's not. It is very weird to be half way around the world and still have so much familiar stuff from your own culture all around you.

Amy mentioned it the other day in the context of coming home. The way it feels right now is that we never even left America. We seriously feel like we're in a very large Japanese version of Chinatown. It's like being in an unfamiliar place that still feels recognizably like home.

I wonder what this feeling means about us as Americans. To see the adoration and accommodations that the wonderful people of Japan have and make for Americans is somewhat embarrassing. I would never expect to see a foreign language used in America the way that English is thrown around here. In fact, I even remember (shamefully) seeing signs in America that were entirely in Spanish and thinking, "Why couldn't they just learn English and put their signs up in that?!?!?!" Whereas here, people see the signs in the foreign language (English) and actually slow down to try and read it. They love it. This has really opened my eyes to the fact that this is a ridiculously small planet which we all share.

Around the House

We are continuing to explore our house and the neighborhood around it. Last night, we discovered that the control panel outside our shower room turns the vent in the shower into a dryer. That explains the hangers in the bathroom! We also recently went to an electronics store and were surprised to find $600 rice cookers and countertop dishwashers. It's always fun to find new stores and then it's not so fun when you look at the prices! Anyways, here are a few more pictures for you.
Cash likes his girly high chair:

When we turn the kitchen light on at night, it attracts bugs to the window, which attracts some geckos. We usually have two on the window, but sometimes there are four--and they really enjoy their dinner. They also enjoy our front garden!

Marugame Castle

Here are some pictures from our trip to Marugame Castle yesterday. It's quite a steep hike to the tower, but the view is beautiful. The castle is about twenty minutes away from our house, in the center of downtown Marugame.
Cash is excited!

There is a moat surrounding the castle, filled with swans, fish, turtles, and the occasional crane.

Getting ready to hike up:

The view from the top:

The castle tower:

Food Finds

My one concern about moving to Japan was the food. Would I be able to find anything to eat that was not fish flavored? What about baby food...and pizza...and ice cream? Well, my one concern has been my least worry out here. The food is amazing! That's not to say it's not strange. You can't buy tortillas or cheddar cheese. Bread is a dessert and comes in huge white slices, already loaded with butter and sugar. The baby food is fish flavored--codfish to be exact--but I did find sweet potato and pumpkin and apple flavor. Yes, the cantaloupes are $16, but the pineapple, honeydew, and bananas are regular price. Grocery shopping is a great adventure, especially because I can't read the label. Is it bad for me? I have no idea! I can't read the ingredients! Maybe that's why I'm enjoying the food so much. Is this flour or tempura flakes? Is it barbecue sauce or plum sauce? Who knows? It's just great fun for me to go grocery shopping on a budget when I can't read what I'm buying. Luckily, I can recognize soymilk, eggs, and noodles. Hooray!
One thing that's especially fun is the pastries here. Japanese people love fancy desserts with their tea. Every grocery store has a bakery with huge cream filled croissants, sponge cake, chocolate mousse, mochi...yummy. Mochi is my new favorite dessert, made from gelatinous rice flour. A popular cartoon character here is anpan man. Anpan is a roll filled with red bean paste that is very popular here. I love it. You can also find pizza in the bakery. Pizza here has a ton of different toppings. We saw one with bacon, weanies, and ketchup the other day. Sweets are also huge here. I got a white chocolate lemon aero bar the other day. We did find peanut butter--$2.50 for a small jar--but it was whipped and so worth it. Fox and I are just so overjoyed that we have loved everything we've tried..and everything I've experimented with cooking. I could devote a whole blog to Japanese food...maybe I will.

This "pizza" is a slice of bread with a smattering of cheese and corn kernels. Very popular.


Below is a box of mochi ice cream I bought. It's so yummy. The mochi are tiny, though.

Funny English

People in Japan are obsessed with American culture. Everywhere you go, you hear American music playing (complete with swear words, since they don't translate here), and there is some English on almost every single building, package, and product. The fun part is that most of the English isn't translated correctly. A Japanese man explained to us that it's kind of like how in America, people got really obsessed with Chinese characters for tattoos and stuff, but the characters always meant something completely off base. In our case, we get a huge laugh out of it---in fact, I'm sure you'll all be getting souvenirs with funny English. Here are a couple of examples from our stay in Osaka on our way to Marugame. Enjoy!

Our House

Cash and I are standing behind our house. The mountain in the background is "Little Fuji". We don't actually have a backyard--it is a huge rice field, as you can see. In fact, no one here has a backyard. Our neighborhood is close groups of houses and businesses built together on concrete.