Mochi Pounding

On Sunday, Ben and I made mochi.

Mochi is delicious, it’s a sort of sweet sticky mass thatgoes well with dozens of toppings/fillings. My favorite mochi is topped withmiso paste and Nori, Ben’s favorite is kinako a sweet powder made from soybean flour.

For anyone who has not had mochi before, it has the consistencyof uncooked bread dough, and is slightly sweet, though otherwise mostlyflavorless.

We made mochi the old fashioned way. The glutinous stickyrice (mochi rice) was steamed, and then added to a hollowed out stump (mortar).We took a giant hammer (pestal), and smashed up the rice the rice quicklybecame crushed, and started to form a homogonous mass. One person would hammerthe mochi, another would fold the mass in a neading fashion.

Food tastes better when you’ve made it yourself, and ittastes way better when cooking it involves using a giant hammer.

Check out this website if you are interested in making your own mochi.

Mochi Making Recipe

Fantastic Weekend

SUPER AWESOMETASTIC DATE!

Last night Ben and I went on a ridiculously fun date. Sometimes the best thing to do in life is look into the eyes of the person you love, and then challenge yourself to do everything in your power to make them happy. Last night when I looked into Ben's eyes I saw our favorite restaurant, karaoke, and an arcade. Luckily for me, it was apparently exactly what I wanted to do as well.

Ben and I had so much fun that we forgot to take almost any pictures, the dinner was amazing, our favorite dish was bell peppers stuffed with meat, with okonomiyaki sauce, and curry mayonaise. It fantastic.

Karaoke was fun! Instead of singing infront of a room full of strangers, each group gets their own nearly sound proof room. You can pull up your own songs, and make a queue. There were lights that flashed and changed colors to the music, and ridiculous music videos played in the background. It would have been almost romantic, if either Ben or I could sing. 

The arcade was probably the most fun part, Ben and I couldn't understand the games very well, they are so much more elaborate than back home. There were games where were half Magic the Gathering and half arcade game. You slid cards around on a sort of touch screen to choose your battles, and power ups. Some of the people in the arcade had dozens of cards, and almost, nearly looked cool while playing it. There were cool dancing games, and a game I thought was a dancing game, I danced infront of the machine until a guy watching me couldn't help himself and started laughing, he made a patty-cake gesture, at which point I realized there were very large buttons on the machine, and was suppose to be hitting them. It really fun once I figured out how to play. My favorite game was the taiko drumming game, it was sort of like guitar hero, but with giant taiko drums that you could really wollop. 

We had so much fun!

How to Use Train

If you are planning a trip to Japan, you will use the trains. Here is my how-to guide for trains in Japan.

I will assume that you already know your destination and local nearest station. If you have internet availability, pull up Hyperdia.comto find the best route, and print that out or write it down, the important things to note are  1. The line name 2. The direction of the trains 3. Transfer stations. If you don’t have internet, or access to internet, there are information desks in all train stations, as long as you have the station you want to get to, they can help you out.

Next make your way to the nearest train station, look for a large map on the wall, under it will be ticket machines, there is a handy English button on all of them, so for the most part they are really easy to use. There will be a large range of ticket prices, I recommend paying the smallest amount, and then paying the difference at your destination, otherwise you run the risk of over paying.

Once you have your ticket head to the gate,  there will be a slot for you to grab your ticket at the other end, make sure you grab your ticket, otherwise you can get in a lot of trouble, and sometimes will have to pay a large fine.

Next find the direction you are going, today we are headed to Hachioji, which is listed on the sign (if we were headed to Sagamiko, which is in the same direction, we would have needed to have known to catch the train in the direction of Hachioji and Shinjuku, which is in the same direction).

Wait for your train…

When the train arrives be sure to stand to the side of the door so that passengers can exit first. If you are in a really rural area there may be buttons to the side of the door that you have to push to open the door.

On the train listen for your stop, usually the train will inform you in both English and Japanese what the next station is. If you couldn’t understand, look out the window for a sign that has in big letters, the station you are at, and the name of the next station and previous station written in appropriate directions.

If you have to transfer, you do not need to get a new ticket, just go to your new track, and continue on your journey. If your transfer requires that you change train companies (example: a JR line, to a Keio Line) then you will have to pay, and get a new ticket.

Once you have arrived at your station, take your ticket to the Fare Adjustment machines (usually near the exit gates, and well labeled). Select English language, and then insert your ticket. Pay the extra amount, and then take your ticket to the exit gate. Insert your ticket into the machine, and then leave, you will not get your ticket back.

It sounds more complicated than it is, good luck!