okonomi-yaki

I found a nice okonomi-yaki restaurant in Setagaya-area, Tokyo. The store's name is "Bochi-bochi". The building is quite unique good old Showa period style. It makes us feel calm and comfortable.

Okonomi-yaki is a dish like pancake but no sweat, vegetables in it. They are grilled on a big iron plate (4th image). Its recipes depend on the region. This restaurant's is Osaka style.

"okonomi" means "favourite" or "as you like", "yaki" means "grilled". As thease words, you can mix anything you want, for example squid and rice cake, leek and beef, prawn and so on. My favourite taste is pork and kimchi which is Korean style pickle. It's crispy and a bit sour. Mmmmmm, yummy!!

It costs about £3.5 for one okonomi-yaki. Also you can choose toppings such as egg, garlic, ginger pickle etc. Lastly, we usually put okonomi-yaki sauce which is like HP, mayonnaise and dried bonito. I love to put a lot of dried bonit as much as I can! Try it!

O-bon

This season, we're in "O-bon".
It's a Buddhist custom. Traditionally, people believe the ancestral spirits return to the family on the 13th August. So we go to the grave to pick the ancestor's spirits on that day and send them off to the grave on 15th of August. (the date depends on the area). We visit our family grave, clean it, and present fresh flowers and incense. Many companies close over the O-bon holidays from the 13th to the 16th of August, we take this opportunity to visit the family or take a family trip. So, highway, train, and air traffic are usually quite congested over these holidays.

When we pick them up or send them off, we have to guide them with lanterns so the spirits don't get lost. Also,we lit lanterns or small straw fires at the entrance of house to welcome them. I think these customs are not common nowadays, but many families do gather to visit the family grave.

Accompany with this, the event called "bon-odori" is held in many areas. (see images) Dancing around a tower at night. There are a lot of booths that sell grilled chickens, grilled noodles, candies and so on! That's much more beautiful and enjoyable than spirits things.

How strange! Japan has quite high technology but we still believe spirits or ghost things. In my opinion, respecting ancestors is nice so I would love to continue this customs. But I am worried, the sky shoud become overcrowded year by year because spirits never decrease because people die every second in all over the world. So when I become a spirit, I might feel cramp. How can I solve it?

Thinking

I was thinking in the toilet.
"the seat is quite low."
Yes, the toilet seats in Japan are much lower than the other country's obviously.
I've been to the UK, the Netherlands, Italy, Turkey, Canada, and Thailand. But as I can remember, Japanese one is the lowest.
In my opinion, the reason is our legs are shorter than the other's. That is sad :-(
But I can be proud of its function. It's super. It has heating system, shower, shower massage and dry function with the seat. You need just press the button then it works. They're incredibly comfortable. You can find this kind of toilet in normal houses or high class stores or new office buildings mostly. Actually, it was quite hard to live without these super seats when I was living in the UK. I don't know whether it's popular in any other countries. But I would recommend if you haven't tried it.

Fireworks festival

This season, lots of fireworks festivals are held in Japan. There are about 90 festivals in just metropolitan area this year.
Usually, the fireworks are shot for about one and half an hour. People go to the site to see the fireworks. Some people go to there 2 or 3 days before the day to keep the best position to see the fireworks. It sounds silly but we do really. We love fireworks festival as much.
On that day, lots of girls wear "YUKATA" which is kind of KIMONO for summer. Girls think YUKATA is good to look us cute and sexy. It's effective in hunting boys. That is true.

Short trip

I went to Nasu in Tochigi prefecture where is about 2 or 3 hours from Tokyo by car. Nasu is countryside highland area so a bit cooler and drier than Tokyo. The first day was quite hard because there was a big typhoon. But the next day was incredibly fine and sunny. When I visited to "Seshouseki", I saw loads of Jizo which is a stone statue of Budda (see image). There are one thousand of Jizo apparently. The surprising thing is their faces are different one by one. I'm not Buddhist but whenever I see Jizo, I relax. Their faces are not only calm and gentle but also grave.
There are lots of Jizo in Japan especially in Kyoto I guess. It's worth to see when you come to Japan.

The first day

I'm not sure what to write but...well, I'm gonna write my recent life this time.

I lived in Manchester until 2 weeks ago, it was 10 months English and photography cource. I've extremely enjoyed staying in the UK so of cource I'm missing everything in the UK. Now I'm back to my home in Chiba where is next to Tokyo. And I have no job at the moment :-p But I have a dream, I wanna be a travel writer. Because I love traveling and I love to meet people and I love photo shooting and I love writting!

I'll write about my travel and my life in Japan as much as I can.