Yokohama's Ramen Museum

This past Tuesday, I journeyed out to the famous Shin-Yokohama Ramen Museum. (If you follow the link, click on the icon in the center and it will display the guide book in English. Otherwise, go to this link for an explanation on the "Tokyo Food Page".) For an entrance fee of 300JPY you get to walk through a very short exhibit on how they make the ramen and all of the different kinds of ramen you can get all across Japan, then you enter the "Ramusement" section (seriously, the website actually uses that word...), which is where the photos were taken. Well worth the trip; it was definitely "ramusing."

Photos:

• Top: This is actually inside the building (the clouds are painted on the ceiling). The whole thing is set up to look like a town, just post-WWII, during the time ramen noodles were invented. We were standing at the top of the stairs looking down on the whole thing when I took this picture. All the "shops" at the bottom are actual ramen restaurants. My friend Emi and I ate at the one with the red sign in the bottom-right corner, which featured Kumamoto ramen that has garlic in the soup. Delicious!!
• Bottom left: This is what I would look like if I was a half-naked, middle-aged Japanese man. :)
• Bottom right: another view of the "streets" they have set up inside the museum.

Eugene's Sayonara Party

Photos:

• Top: At the end of the night when we were splitting the check, I made a point of telling him "not to touch his wallet." (You're not supposed to pay for your own going away party.) This was the response I got.
• Middle left: I asked everybody to look natural and this is their idea of "natural". Laura was pretty surprised, too.
• Middle right: Take a good look at this one. It's probably one of the only times you'll ever see Kraavor smiling in a photo. He threatened to kill me after he realized that I'd secretly taken the photo.
• Bottom left: (Most of) the gang. I still can't figure out what Eug is trying to see.
• Bottom right: This is Laura and I making the scary face. I think she did a better job than me in this one. :)

A statue, Tokyo Tower (again...), and yet another Japanese beer poster

Photos:

• Top left: Statue near the entrance to Zojoji Temple
  
• Top right: This is what the base of Tokyo Tower looks like. I'm always amazed at how much bigger it looks when you're standing at the bottom...
  
• Bottom left: view of Tokyo Tower from somewhere in Roppongi
  
• Bottom right: yes, another beer poster. I always laugh when I see this one. Mostly because I didn't think it was possible for anyone to get this excited about a can of beer. Ironically, this love of beer is one of the primary causes of the growing (pun intended) weight problem that the Japanese government has recently begun a national campaign against.
  

More food, and also a food container

Photos:

• Top left: I went to a bakery with my friend and this was the cinnamon roll that I bought. To the untrained eye, it probably looks like a pretty unoriginal pastry. I prefer to think of it in a much more exciting way: a cinnamon roll volcano.
• Top right: This, while not necessarily food-related, fits into the food category because it involves an item that is intended to contain food. This is actually a photo of our building maintenance crew's solution to a strange leak in our ceiling. No joke, the professionals in their uniforms came in and taped a plastic take-out container to our ceiling and then just left it there. Nearly two weeks later, it's definitely still there...
• Bottom left: my host mom taught me how to make "gyoza," which are incredibly delicious dumplings made with minced vegetables and either pork or beef.
• Bottom right: close-up view of my finished product. How did I do? :)

Food!!

I noticed a theme in some of the photos of places I've been to recently:





Photos:

• Top left: buy your Ramen or Soba noodles in a can! This vending machine is at the train station in Akihabara.
  
• Top right: Right next to that same vending machine is a "Milk Stand", a convenience store for milk--and milk products--only. You can get cold milk, hot milk, apple milk, orange milk, "fruits" milk (whatever that means), strawberry milk, coffee with milk, milk enriched with iron...you get the idea. Japanese people have an affection for dairy that is sometimes inexplicable.
  
• Middle left: the Wendy's in Ginza sells "humbergers". Mmmmmm...sounds musical!
  
• Middle right: Mustard packet from a family dining restaurant. Notice that it goes well with "frank frutes." I hope that means it also goes well with sarcastic vegetables.
  
• Bottom left: Tokyo Midtown had a special "Sakura Cafe" (sakura = cherry blossom) set up on the lawn especially for the season. Nearly every item in the cafe had some kind of sakura theme: sakura ice cream, sakura wine coolers, sakura sandwiches, etc. My friend ordered a wine cooler and it came complete with an actual cherry blossom in the glass!
  
• Bottom right: No, you can't eat this poster. So I guess in that sense I'm drifting slightly from the theme. But this poster does tell you not to make food messes on the subway. Instead they just recommend that you "Please do it at home!" :)
  

Cherry blossoms, farewells and Japanese beer posters...

Photos:

• Top left: My housemate's farewell dinner, the night before she headed off to Australia.
  
• Top right: My coworker Kenny's farewell dinner with students at a yakitori place in Omotesando. We all thought it was his last day of work because our boss hadn't given him any classes to teach in April, and then found out two days later that our boss changed his mind and put him back on the schedule again...so I guess it was more of a "we're glad you're not leaving" dinner. :)
  
• Middle left: Char and I made my annual trip back to Shinjuku Gyoen to see the cherry blossoms last Thursday. (See last year's posts here, here and here if you want to see more photos.)
  
• Middle right: Good thing the garden is so ginormous; there were people everywhere, even on a weekday, out celebrating ohanami (cherry blossom viewing parties).
  
• Bottom left: another shot from the same garden
  
• Bottom right: not exactly related to the other photos, but I get a chuckle out of the ads in Tokyo for a new kind of beer: "BEER FINE"
  

This is what English looks like in Japan:

Photos:

• Top left: I couldn't have said it better myself, unless I knew what they were trying to say. And then, of course, I probably COULD have said it better.
• Top right: Pretty much, this is my favorite sticker out of them all. I guess there's no real problem with the English, but where in the world did the toilet come from?
• Bottom left: The nature really is so important. Wow! (That's my favorite part.)
• Bottom right: Good advice is always to be found on packets of tissue. And by always I mean sometimes.