Awesome Golden Week: Mon. May 3

(Random note: This is my 200th post!!)

Monday I did a quick pan fry of shiitake mushrooms and beef (the unused portion from what I purchased for the "soup") and added some colour with mini tomatoes for lunch.

Then I went shoe shopping at Shimamura. Since I've been buying a fair bit of white/beige/light coloured clothes recently, I wanted to get some flat white shoes that I could walk comfortably in for long periods of time. I didn't find any shoes that I liked, but I did get a white shoulder bag for only 580 yen. ^_^

After Shimamura, I took a bit of a walk along the Oirase River to admire the cherry blossoms. As lovely as Kanchogai Dori is, I'd have to say that I prefer the peace and quiet of hanami along the river. Kanchogai Dori is quite congested with traffic and tourists, but along the river I barely saw any cars or people and I could hear birds tweeting and even a (confused, perhaps) rooster cock-a-doodling! It was also a nice sunny day with a warm (if strong) wind, so I felt totally energized by the walk.

As I walked back to my car, I thought: "Days like this, I feel like I could live in Towada forever."

And then it was back to shoe shopping! I went to Chambre/Avail next and found not only the comfortable walking shoes I was looking for, but also a pair of white wedge sandals. Since I still had time before my nihonbuyo practice (okeiko　お稽古), I decided to head down to Uniqlo to take advantage of the new Golden Week specials I'd seen advertised in the morning fliers.

I thought that since I'd just been there on Saturday I'd be quick, but I still ended up spending about an hour there. Seeing that some things I'd purchased only a week or two ago at regular price were then on sale for 500-1000yen less, I resolved that I would stop buying things at Uniqlo at full price--unless I was going to wear what I bought the same or next day. (And when there are new sales every weekend, there really is no need to buy anything at full price.)

After Uniqlo I had just enough time to go home and drop my purchases off before going to okeiko.My friend Yu-san also came to okeiko so it was pretty fun. Then the two of us (Yu-san and I) went to Sheep's Bakery and Cafe for dinner.

The menu isn't all that varied, and the food--while tasty--isn't particularly spectacular, but the atmosphere is really great. It's a very stylish, "grown-up" kind of place. I quite liked it and wouldn't mind going again in the near future.

Both of us chose the "Beer Plate" for dinner. It comes with a beer (can be substituted for any beverage of equal or lesser cost--I had a Shirley Temple), "Canadian" burger, onion rings, salad, and mixed nuts. That night they had apparently run out of beef, but they told us we could still order it if we didn't mind getting "bacon" instead of a beef patty. When they said bacon I was expecting something like a BLT, but it was more like peameal bacon, so it was heartier than I expected.

We also both had the berry sauce "Sheep's Parfait"--bread with vanilla ice cream and raspberry sorbet topped with frozen raspberries--for dessert. It was yummy! 

Speaking of the parfait, when I was looking through the menu to decide what I wanted for dessert, I noticed some small errors in the English translations: 1)ジンジャーエール →EspressoGingerale; and 2) 生ハムとモツァレラフライ→Raw Ham & Fly Mozzarella. When I pointed out the mistakes to Yu-san, she suggested that maybe we should point it out to the staff. But we didn't want to seem officious/meddlesome (お節介) so we debated for a while about whether or not we should say anything.

Ultimately, when we were ordering dessert, Yu-san decided to ask first about the "EspressoGingerale"--"Is this an original drink?" The waiter seemed to take our inquiry pretty well (right away he was like "Sorry, it's a misprint"), so she (Yu-san) went ahead and mentioned that we had actually noticed another misprint and explained that difference between "fly" and "fry."

After hearing the explanation, the waiter was like "Oh, that's kind of bad, isn't it" (それはまずいですね） and shortly after we could hear him tell someone else back in the kitchen that F-L-Y was the word for an insect in English. I expect that I'll see the corrections on the menu when I go back next. ^_^  

Following dinner we met up with a friend of Yu-san and took a walk along Kanchogai Dori to see the cherry blossoms at night. They were pretty, but unfortunately with my camera it was hard to take good pictures. At any rate, it was another great day of hanami for me!

Awesome Golden Week: Sat. May 1 & Sun. May 2

Deciding to stay in Towada for Golden Week this year turned out to an excellent decision. It was probably the first true 休み ("yasumi" literally meaning "a rest" but also used to refer to breaks, vacations and holidays) I've had in a long time.

On Saturday I went to Uniqlo--again. @_@ This time, however, I had a new money saving plan set before going.

See, I never really save to go traveling, I usually just divert a month or two worth of savings to paying for plane/train tickets, hotel accommodations, etc.. (Hence my savings haven't really grown in the nearly 3 years I've been in Japan.) So I decided that I would try to actually start saving money for trips the way I saved for the 2007 Eurotrip:

1) all money spent on clothing/shoes/bags/accessories & the like will be matched with a 50% contribution to my "travel fund" (i.e. if I spend 1000yen on something, I have to put 500yen into savings);

2) all 500yen coins go into savings;

3) any funds I receive apart from my salary/gifts (for example, mileage reimbursement money) will go directly into the "travel fund"(rounded up to the nearest thousand yen).

In five days using only strategies 1 & 2 I've already managed to put almost 15,000yen into my travel fund--which should tell you something about just how much I've been spending recently on clothing. @_@ I guess it's a kind of spring fever?

Anyway...

Following Uniqlo was grocery shopping. After I came home, I did some housekeeping and then cooked a real dinner for the first time in months! It was a very passable 牛肉と野菜クリーム煮, a.k.a. beef and "vegetable" (really just eringi mushrooms and onions) cream "soup."

After dinner I spent a bit of time online, but then in a very rare move, I actually went to bed super early--10pm!!

Sunday I had lunch with my friend Yu-san at Kaze no Hiroba, an "organic & natural" shop with a cafe that serves homemade fresh/natural/organic foods. It's a great place for a leisurely, relaxing lunch! I also love that starting from April the cafe only opens on weekends because they have farm work to do on weekdays! I was a little greedy and had the "plate" lunch, plus the sweets selection plate ("プチスィーッ盛り合わせ) , as well as a homemade lemon soda. =P



Next we went for a walk along Kanchogai Dori/around Chuo Koen. The cherry blossoms were beautiful (although they were not in full bloom yet--only at about 80%) and it was warm and sunny! After we had walked up and down Kanchogai Dori, we stopped at Primero Bakery (next to the JTB) for melon pan (I had chocolate chip, Yu-san had maple flavour). Then since it was nearby, we went to check out Sheep's Bakery & Cafe. Yu-san treated me to a cinnamon roll and then we went back up Kanchogai Street and headed for City Hall (where I had parked my car).

I got back home sometime between maybe 5pm and 6pm. I had (plenty of) leftover soup, but I still had groceries to use up, so I made 油揚げとなすの甘辛煮 (simmered salty-sweet abura-age (deep fried beancurd) and eggplant). It's a dish I've made numerous times but I still need to refer to the recipe every time... ^^;; I also made a super simple ブロッコリーのツナマヨ焼き (broccoli baked with tuna & mayo). It wasn't the type of dish I'd serve company, but it was super fast and easy and required few ingredients so I'll probably make it again sometime...

A productive holiday

In a rare move, I spent most of my Showa Day holiday out and about (instead of holing up in my apartment).

I started my day at Uniqlo--taking advantage of the Golden Week sales. Thankfully I had received a (belated) birthday card from my parents yesterday, so I actually had money to spend there. =P

The purchase I was most pleased about was the One Piece t-shirt. When it was on sale about two weeks ago, I went to Uniqlo at night so all the One Piece shirts were gone. This morning, I was there at 10:30am and got my One Piece shirt right away. The store opened at 10:00am, I believe, and by 11:30am only about two dozen shirts One Piece shirts were left--and none of the design/colour I had. It's pretty crazy how popular One Piece is...

After spending two hours and pretty much all of my birthday money there, I went to the Towada library. There I picked up some guide books about Iwate (I may be taking a weekend trip down there at the end of May) and Kanazawa/Gifu Prefectures (I *will* be taking a long weekend trip down there in October!!).

Following that I headed to Kanchogai Dori (around the Chuo Community Center parking lot) to watch the taiko group I practice with perform and to help with setting up, etc. Since there were so few members (only 5!) and it was a very informal performance (with not so many spectators since it was cold, wet and windy) I actually got to perform a bit as well!! I only joined in the 3 pieces I've (partially) learned so far, and I made lots of mistakes, but it was fun! I definitely feel more motivated to practice now!

When the performance on Kanchogai Dori finished, we were supposed to move to Chuo Park for a night time performance, but since the sakura haven't bloomed yet, most of the food stalls were closing early, so that was canceled.

I hadn't eaten breakfast, and only had a couple of pieces of fried chicken, 1 rice ball, and 1 oinari-san (seasoned rice stuffed in a fried tofu shell) for lunch, so I was pretty hungry. Since it was a cold day, I decided to head to Padock for some yaki (baked) curry to warm me up. ^__^ It was delicious.

After dinner, I headed to Towada Jusco for ice cream at Baskin Robbins. (Double scoops are 31% off until May 5th!!) Since I was in a shopping kind of mood, I also ended up buying a brown handbag I'd been eyeing for a while, as well as a pair of white wedge heels (sorry, you can't really tell they're wedges from the photo).

All in all I felt like it was quite a productive (if expensive) day for me. ^__^

It did leave me wondering, however, when I turned into such a girl! I mean, for the longest time most of my money went to books, manga, anime and hockey, but I think that so far this year I've spent as much on clothing/accessories as I have on books/manga/DVDs/CDs combined! @_@ I guess I should probably blame it on Uniqlo! =P

Where's spring?

Cherry blossoms were already out in Hiroshima/Osaka/Kyoto/Tokyo two weeks ago but it's currently snowing in Towada.

For the most part I'm thrilled to be living in Aomori Prefecture (and Towada in particular) but I do wish right now that spring would hurry up and make an appearance!

It sucks that I had to put on a winter jacket to go shopping for spring clothes at Uniqlo today. (I really want to be able to start wearing some of my more recent purchases!)

As I mentioned in a recent post, next weekend (Apr. 24-25) is Towada's Yosakoi Yume Matsuri and Sakura Yabusame--i.e. horseback archery under cherry blossoms. But as things stand right now, I'm pretty sure the sakura won't be out in time for the festival. (I also feel sorry for the Yosakoi dancers--they're probably going to be freezing dancing out in the streets!)

On the bright side, though, the sakura blooming later this year increases the chances that they'll still be really nice during Golden Week. (Usually they're on their last legs at the beginning of May.)

Since I don't have any particular plans (apart from covering all of the Towada eikaiwa classes while everyone else is on vacation) for GW, I was thinking I'd try to get down to Hirosaki for hanami (cherry blossom viewing). The last time I went was two year ago when my parents and Brenda and Cecilia came--and unfortunately it was raining that day (although it was still really pretty).