Mari - diary

Instant noodle

This is the ranking of National Trends in Instant Noodle Demands. I could guess China would be No.1 and I thought Thailand or Indonesia would be No.2, and the rank of Japan would be high. BUT! I didn't suppose USA is No.4. Do you eat instant noodles often?? What is your best noodle? In Japan, there is a huge number of instant noodle types, cheap ones, expensive ones, soy sauce base soups, pork bone base soups, etc.

Maybe you know the Nissin Cup Noodle series, but the kinds of soup are so different from Japanese ones. You can check it on wikipedia. My favorite taste is Curry, I want to try the Crab taste of China, and the Tom Yam Goong of Thailand. I am not sure I want to eat the Broccoli of Germany and the Cheddar Cheese of Mexico.

And do you know the Maru-chan brand? I saw many Maruchan products in CA before. In Japan they are well known for their instant  Japanese Soba and Udon series. But I can tell you ramen is much better than that, I recommend real Soba and Udon, not instant ones.

I think the most expensive instant noodle that you can buy anywhere will be Nissin Goota. It's about $3. The most reasonable one would be Nissin Chicken ramen or Nisshin Demae Iccho, they are about $1.

I heard Ippudo, famous for Kyushu type ramen (Pork bone base soup), is getting popular in NY now. Nissin collaborated on such popular ramen shops: Ippudo, Sumire (miso base soup), Santoka (salt base soup) and they had released a special ramen like this.

If you come to Tokyo, you may try this shop 'Akiba-noodle'. They have over 400 kinds of instant noodles and you can pick out, walk and eat what you want. Here is the inside of the shop.

good night

This is the biggy bank project from Spain. I was interested in that project, because piggy banks are really popular stuff in Japan too. This is a Japanese typical piggy bank. Cute right?

Since this is the first day of GW, I went hiking and I am too tired to write my blog. Sorry, I will pick this funny post from the US and go to bed now, good night.

Golden Week has started!

Golden Week has started. I will be off tomorrow. I am super happy now!

This is a good idea, people support elderly people who live alone. In Kyoto, elderly people hang up a red rose ornament around their entrances in the morning and take it off in the evening, so that neighbour people can know they are okay. When the rose is not there, somebody visits to check them out.

This is a Japanese Anatomical chart. Hmm, gross, but those pictures have some mood.

Since I don't go to KFC, I didn't know KFC Japan had changed their logo. Just a few years ago, many shops used the old logo. But they didn't change this part: The life-size statue of Colonel Harland Sanders stands outside of every one of the more than 1,000 KFC outlets in Japan, and is dressed for the season as Santa Claus, in a jolly red-and-white suit. And in Akiba, he wears maid clothes. Is this okay?

I am eating this chesnut as snack now. We say 'Ama Guri', ama means sweet and guri (kuri) means chestnut. I love this because it has natural sweetness. But my American friend said it has no taste. Japan, China and some Europe countries eat chesnuts as snacks. Americans don't eat them? Amaguri is an old snack but usually it was sold with hard skin. That chesnuts snack could be popular because they sell it without skin. Actually the name of the snack is 'Amaguri Muichaimashita!' It means I removed the skin of chestnuts. And it is one of a natural sweet series. There are Edamame (I pulled out the edamame from the skin!), Corn (I removed the corn kernels from cob!), Sweet potatoes (I cooked potatoes!), etc. We couldn't eat those outside before, because we needed to cook them to eat and they were hard to eat with skins. And also we had an image amaguri was a drunk father's small gift, edamame was a snack for beer, and sweet potatoes were a lonely snack, because they makes farts. But now we can enjoy those anywhere because of the natural sweet series in a small package, small portions, cut into small pieces without skins. Good.

Rainy Saturday

Good TV ad from Italy :-)

This is a funny post: 'Is Okami The Worst Box-Art Gaffe Ever?'. I think MEGA MAN (rock man?) is much worse and Star Chess looks like a painting that I drew in art class when I was 10 years old.

I found this news today: 'Gillian is terrified of buttons'. I wonder if buttons would be related to some bad experience for her and she might have forgetten it.
Did you know this 'Flogos' ? It's a bubble AD on the sky. I found the video os flogs today. Here it is.

I will go to Tokyo Mid Town tonight for dinner, and maybe I will try 'Okawari'. Okawari means 'one more helping'. After one bowl of rice, we say 'okawari!', then you will get one more bowl of rice. At Okawari, you can pick foods from various types of small shops. If you like, you can choose a piece of Pizza + miso soup + a piece of Tempra. :-)

Sushi Prince

Wired.com Exclusive: Watch 'Wanderlust,' Bjork's New 3-D Video. Hmmm, interesting. Do you know she protested to China about the Tibet issue in concert in China? She won't be able to enter that country again for a while. I appreciate her valiant attitude. Today someone wrote a bomb warning on the Nagano Station page and the Beijing Olympic page of Japanese wikipedia. Zenkoji temple is in Nagano, it may be related to that issue. Zenkoji had graffiti spray-painted a few days ago. I hope the warning is just a bad joke.

This is the official site of Sushi Prince goes to NY. It's a crazy comedy movie about a Japanese Sushi chef. Look at this trailer. Ha ha ha so silly. That prince is Koichi Domoto of Kinki Kids. He is a popular idol of Johnny & Associates. I thought Kinki Kids would fit for the cast of Death Note film, Koichi could be Kira, Tsuyoshi could be L.
Today I found some funny foreign sites and no domestic ones.

This is today's best site 'LSD vs Alcohol vs Tree'. Cute!! I laughed at IKEA, Lenin, Schwarzenegger...ha ha ha.

Andy sent me this cute site : 'Animals on the underground'. Since Tokyo has a more complicated subway map, we may find a lot of animals. Hope someone tries it.

I thought it would be an initiation of a new cult in the Blue cloak. But it was 'Record-breaking Mentos and Coke explosions' news. Here is the video (so so).

This is a funny flash game 'Billy Suicide'. Help him and stop his suicide. I could't stop it and he shut his head in the toilet. ....orz

This is "the 10 Most Comfortable Airline Economy Seats". Wow JAL is ranked in?? I agree that flight attendants are so kind and food is okay but I am not sure about the facility. By the way, do you know you can eat CUP NOODLE in JAL if you ask them? Please try when you are so hungry. They will give you one. I love using Singapore Air because their food is good. Here is my post of the ranking of airline food.

Domokun

Waaa Cute!! I love House Martin series. Bright Idea is cute too.

Domo kun is a character of NHK Network. What is he? I don't know, he is a strange creature who likes rice. His TV animation is getting popular and is aired in 64 countries in the world. Here is an official site.

Softbank will release a transformers-like cell phone 815TPB. Its main feature is the cell phone transforms into a robot with special parts and also the robot will talk to its owner because it is an intelligent learning type. This post tell the details of features. I think the Char type was a good idea. But this??? I don't think so.

Ha ha ha. This is funny. I mentioned SMAP is a very very popular idol group in Japan but they sing soo bad, tooo bad, they could never improve their singing ability. Actually I almost get a headache when hearing their songs. But since they are so super popular group in Japan, their bad singing was a sort of an untouchable issue. However, I read this funny article. TOTO guitarist Steve Lukather got mad at their singing when he appeared on SMAP's variety show SMAPxSMAP.

Nifty Portal Z has a funny post today. I picked food samples in my blog sometimes, they're food samples for display in the show window of restaurants. We can see them everywhere in Japan, but I have never seen them in foreign countries. (Tell me if you have them in your country.) By the way, since the samples are made from wax, of course we can't eat them, but she tried to make edible food samples with good ideas. Put some oil on Sushi and it looks like a food sample. Gelatinated Curry looks like a food sample. And frozen pasta looks like a food sample (yes, this one!). Ha ha, funny.

He has gone

Ahhhh, so cool. I want this: 'Knife hook'.

I know I shouldn't laugh, but I can't help but laugh when I read this news: 'Priest's helium balloon flight goes wrong'. I hope he is floating somewhere in the ocean too.

Wazakura Kobo makes unique Japanese design keyboards. Zipang is a keyboard covered by gold leaf. Wazakura has a cherry blossom design. I like this honkawa, it is made from real leather. After a while, the leather will shine and become a nice color like a well-worn leather bag.

I often mentioned that I love Kuniyoshi Ugawaga and picked his artwork sometimes. My favorite Ukiyoe is Kingyo Zukushi and today, I found this: Kuniyoshi's Kage (shadow pictures). The shadow looks like a goldfish, but it is really a fox and his.... it's funny. I really love Kuniyoshi.

This is the official site of the new DS game 'ikatan' that will be released in autumn. The picture is of Surume (dried shredded squid). There is no information about what kind of game it is. Hmm do I roast Surume? Or when I scratch the touch pen, I can smell Surume?

I will go to Tokyo

I wrote Zenkoji refused to host the Olympic torch relay and there are some threats on the Internet for Zenkoji, but Zenkoji said they won't resort to legal action now as sad joke. I am glad to read such comments of Zenkoji. They don't upset so easily.

Ora Tokyo Sa Ikuda (I will go to Tokyo) was released over 20 years ago. It is hot on Youtube again as a Japanese first RAP in Aomori dialect . Its lyrics are funny, he is such a country boy and wants to go to Tokyo. But we have a lot of such country country country areas still now (maybe they have TV already though) in Japan. It will be nice to visit such a place, you will know the real Japan.

I am not sure what you call this insect (if you don't like insects, don't open) in English. I guess it will be Bathynomus doederleini. We say 'Daio Gusoku Mushi', Nifty Portal Z made its stuffed animal. Look at this. Cute???

'What does moe mean?' is an English lesson book in which Japanese explain about moe culture in Akihabara. The situation is a Japanese person visits Akihabara with his foreign friend and explains everything in English. But it will be good as a moe culture book for foreign people too. I will find it in the book store and report about it :-)

Prefecture Brand Power

Great! This is LEGO SHIBUYA. Look at this! Can you believe this is LEGO? They didn't miss the Hachiko! (what is Hachi?)｡｡Here is Asakusa too. 見てみたい！

Japan has 47 prefectures and maybe around 700 cities. Do you know some? Can you tell some city names? Usually Japanese can tell all prefectures but it is not an easy job.　Nikkei Reserch has released an interesting report: 'The ranking of prefecture brand power in Japan'. They made the ranking from results of a survey on various points like recognizability, people's will to visit, will to live, uniqueness, etc. Here is the result.
1.Hokkaido
2.Kyoto
3.Okinawa
4.Osaka
5.Tokyo
6.Kanagawa
7.Hyogo
8.Fukuoka
9.Kagoshima
10.Nara
Hokkaido has the greatest quality and quantity of nature in Japan, and it is rich with good foods (not particularly cooking, just materials like sea foods or potatoes) but as brand value. I thought Kyoto (as the most historical place) or Okinawa (unique foods and warm nice weather, unique culture from their independent or occupied history) would be No.1.

But on 'The ranking of city brand power', Kyoto is No1 and No2. is Yokohama. Here is the results.
1.Kyoto (Kyoto)
2.Yokohama (Kanagawa)
3.Kobe (Hyogo)
4.Sapporo (Hokkaido)
5.Kamakura (Kanagawa)
6.Hakodate (Hokkaido)
7.Uji (Kyoto)
8.Fukuoka (Fukuoka)
9.Nagasaki (Nagasaki)
10.Furano (Hokkaido)
Kyoto, Kanagawa and Hokkaido are each powerful cities. Most of them are old historical places and also they had important ports for trading with foreign countries.

And they told the worst prefecture too: it was Tochigi. Do you know Tochigi prefecture? Do you know where it is? Tochigi is in the Kanto area above Saitama. Actually Japanese know about Nikko but they don't know Nikko is in Tochigi. I must agree Tochigi is a much less impressive pref. Then the Tochigi Association of corporations asked for ideas about a Tochigi catch-phrase. Well, the strongest one would be 'forgotten prefecture'.

Anyway, when I checked the wikipedia, I found this post : 'List of records of Japan'. I didn't know Japan has some interesting world records. The oldest hotel in the world: Hoshi, Komatsu, Ishikawa, opened in 718 The largest tomb in the world: Nintokuryo Tomb, Sakai, Osaka, 46ha. The tallest statue in the world: Ushiku Daibutsu, Ushiku, Ibaraki, 120m. Theme park with the most visitors in the world: Tokyo Disneyland, Urayasu, Chiba.

I can tell the 50 states of the U.S.A (actually when I drink with my friends, it can be a good game to tell the names of the states). I tend to forget Rhode Island, Delaware and Vermont.

Great handmade Knits

ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha Cute!!!! Great handmade Knits.

I really love this site 'YOUNG ME NOW ME'. So many great photos. I like this one.

On May 3rd and 4th, a T-Shirt summit will be held at the Tokyo Science Technology museum. You can buy many rare and funny T-shirts with nice designs.

I am not sure what this is, but maybe these are Swedish TV commercials of some snacks 'Hot Tub, stop hungers'. You can see a Japanese version on the right. There are two aquarium tanks, each with a lot of piranha inside. One tank is hungry and one is full from the snack. They put expensive watches into the tanks and people try to get it....The piranha on one side are not dangerous because they ate snacks already, but the other side is.... I am not sure what was point of this ad, but at any rate I can tell the narrator is not really Japanese and the people in the ad are not Japanese too. The American version is worse.