Battling Bugs

I came across a game in an arcade that stopped me dead in my tracks. You battle beetles against each other!! What will they come up with next?

Coin Machines

Here are a couple of coin machines that caught my eye that I just had to share. They have the funniest and silliest things in these. I give you dangling Star Wars characters, and squirrels playing rugby!

The Mommas!

All of us with the Buddha in Kamakura

We had our moms over to visit us during the holidays! They were here 3 weeks and we had a blast. They really enjoyed themselves, and we loved getting to spend time with them. We took our time showing them around since we had so much time with them. We showed them Mt. Fuji, the suicide forest, Tokyo, Kamakura, and everything in between. They had delicious crepes, sushi, ramen, went to an owl cafe, fed pigeons at a shrine, picnicked on Mt. Fuji (on the clearest and BEST day EVER to view the mountain, I might add!), became pros at the train system, fell in love with the convenient stores (you simply cannot understand their grandness unless you go to one in Japan), and so much more. There was a gorgeous sunset the evening they left to go back. It was a perfect trip!

Fast Fish!

We were in Tokyo last week and found a neat sushi-go-round (aka sushi place that uses a conveyor belt to serve your food). This one was different because while general dishes you can grab are on the conveyor belt, the food you order comes out on a bullet train on a train track above the belt! It's so cool!! They had a great variety of sushi, too - they even had duck!! It was soooo good. Their fried octopus was on point, too. Best I've had yet in Japan.

Plastic Critters

Coin machines are huge here in Japan. You can find them everywhere, especially in malls and arcades. They can be stacked as much as 4 or 5 high and take up an entire wall. They have the coolest little things in them. Neat and weird little toys and figurines. Key chains and nicknacks. There are several that I want, and I finally caved and got a couple. When I say weird, I mean they have things like super realistic sushi and insects, cats inside sushi, various anime figurines that are designed to hang from your computer monitor, toys that appear to pass gas or poop, extinct animals.... you name it, you can get it from these coin machines. It's so much fun to browse them and just see all the wild things you could get. The two machines I hit up had hamsters inside food and pets drinking alcohol. I was really wanting a hamster in a cup of coffee and a dog drinking beer, but instead I got a hamster in a tub of popcorn and a cat drinking wine! But they are awesome and I love them! I want to start collecting these adorable little figurines. Not sure what I'll do with them.... maybe get a shadow box to display them, but I just love them!!

Local Grocer

Tiniest can of beer EVER!

We have a grocery store just a 7 minute walk down the road. We go there often, and the other night I found these treasures!

Longest carrot EVER!

This is actually not a slice of pizza - it's pizza toppings on a slice of bread. 

New Year's!

Kadomatsu

Happy New Year! New Year's is the biggest holiday celebrated here in Japan. It is an extremely important time of year; a time of clean starts, new blessings, and sacred cleansings. People deep clean their homes during this time (instead of in the spring like we are used to) so they can start the year with a fresh, orderly home. Many different decorations are hung and displayed inside the house as well as outside. The temples and shrines are hopping, and on New Year's Eve everyone flocks to their neighborhood shrine at midnight. At the shrines, everyone waits their turn to pray and ring the bell, as well as mingle while they drink sake and amazake. It's almost like a block party. Everyone has a great time celebrating the new year. The temples are busy, too, with much of the same happenings. However, at the temples, starting at the stroke of midnight, their bells are struck 108 times. The number signifies the number of worldly sins that Buddhists believe exist, and tolling the bells 108 times rids the new year of each one.

We got some traditional New Year decor this year, and it is customary to leave them up until January 7th. On that day, all New Year's decor must come down. First off, we got an outdoor decoration called a shimekazari. It is to be hung on a gate or front door for good luck and keeping evil spirits away. We also got a mini kadomatsu that we keep in our dining room. Usually they are quite large (3-4ft tall) and are kept outside, but I couldn't pass up this cute mini one! The kadomatsu house good and ancestral spirits during the holiday, and also bring longevity and prosperity. Normally in the middle of January, the kadomatsu is burned to release the spirits. The third decoration we got is the kagami mochi. This is a very important item, and the making of mochi is a cornerstone of New Year's events. Two mounds of mochi, stacked on top of each other, are displayed on alters in homes and shrines across Japan. They symbolize the coming of a new year, and the passing of the old one. Often, a daidai (Japanese orange) and other fruit are placed on top of the mochi, as well as evergreen sprigs and kelp, which represent strength and good luck. The kagami mochi is kept on a special cloth which is to ward off house fires in the new year.

This New Year we hung out at our shrine at midnight, tried amazake for the first time, and delighted in listening to the temple bells. It was so cool to see everyone walking from all around to the nearest shrine, and joining them in the late night pilgrimage.

Daruma doll and kadomatsu

Shimekazari

Kagami mochi with a maneki neko instead of daidai