Sakura Matsuri + Sunday Date

I love festivals!

 

The food, the nature, the culture, the food, and THE FOOD!

 

Japanese festival food is probably everybody's favorite part and the main reason that people even go in the first place, haha! I am very picky, duh, and since yakisoba is my favorite food EVER, I must admit--Kanto area's yakisoba sucks. Give me my saucy, wild yakisoba from Kansai area ANYDAY.

 

My town's cherry blossom festival holds a very special place in my heart, it's was thanks to this festival last year that Ryosuke and I were able to realize our mutual feelings for each other and started dating a fews day later! Ever since then, I have vowed that I will without a doubt go and make sure that I can enjoy the cherry blossoms with him.

 

 

I just happened to get a sweet selfie stick for less than ten bucks the day before and was just getting used to how to use it with the crowding.

 

So Ryosuke lives about twenty minutes away from the park, which is up on the main part of the town..up a huge steep hill! Considering everyone in Gunma drives, it would only be obvious that we should walk instead of using one of our cars to attempt to find a parking and drive around in circles. I am trying to get into some sort of shape since I do absolutely nothing active apart from going up and down stairs at work--at the very least a hike-like walk is completely necessary. On the brightest side, it was a beautiful day and breezy enough to not be super hot. It really only takes from 15-20 minutes and with a bottle of water, I survied!

 

We arrived at the festival about an hour after it had begun, and typical Japanese style it was already getting quite crowded and fully underway. The first thing that I was super craving more than anything was grilled steak on a stick! ハラミ/harami (tender meat from the middle)!! I used to think that カルビ/karubi(short rib) meat was the best, but the amount of fat makes it a bit--not as appetizing for me but the ハラミ is were the thick, delicious meat is at. Ryosuke got it last year and I followed in my drunk suit, for it to soon become my favorite and most looked forward to snack.

 

UNFORTUNATELY, for Ryosuke, his カルビ was...under cooked and we were a bit too far and scared of the man who served it to really say anything. Fortunately for me, mine was perfect, perfect, but I didn't want to go back to get more since I felt bad Ryosuke had such a bad experience. :(

 

 

 

After that sad bit, we passed through the other side of the park and I bought the most delicious chocolate filled--pastry and attempted to buy yakisoba from a stand which I thought would give me saucy noodles... Only to be disappointed some more by a simple mistake on my part. I decided to get in line too late, I turned around and another woman with her kids got right in front of me--and swiped the last noodles... The woman behind the counter proceeded to very rudely tell us to go somewhere else and that there were plenty of other yakisoba stands... I rarely deal with rude people in Japan, and Ryosuke made a good point of telling her how patiently we waited as we walked away. I finished eating my chocolate filled delicacy and stared at the trees to calm down from a possible blow up on the rude lady...

 

 

 

We made our way back to the main festival side of the park and made our way to a booth that was selling Grilled Chicken, Herb Sausage and claimed DELICIOUS Yakisoba. The booth next to it was selling 小籠包(Chinese soup buns) and pretty flower ice cream. The grilled chicken, was--a bit on the simple side with a good spicy sauce, but the sausage was a bit TOO herb filled and the yakisoba was--not so great. I really wish that I can go back to Kansai area during a festival and get my hands on that saucy deliciousness I have been craving soon...

 

 

Either way, it was a really nice time, and for a festival in my little town the food was pretty good. As with the way to the festival, the way from the festival was also involving the hill. But I feel like the way down was not only a hellova lot easier, but we took a nice long break on some stairs to take pictures of the beautiful view with my selfie stick!

 



Since it only took a few hours out of the day, Ryosuke wanted to help me and make my shelf that I want for underneath my desk to put stuff and leave at school instead of crowd up my tiny apartment. I had no idea that in the main home store in the area you could actually build whatever it was you needed using the supplies you just bought and renting the equiptment. So long as you bring your own materials, just fill out a form and it's free to use as you please.

 

I tend to forget that Japan doesn't have big houses with garages, and that a place like this would be most definitely necessary for those who need/want to build something of your own but don't have the space. We are both pretty new to the build-it-yourself world and were a bit sheepish to the whole experience. Funnily enough, I bought the wrong size of screw and the available driver was crap. But thankfully for us, an experienced builder was in the room as well and lent us his driver as well as gave us better screws (so we gave him our too big ones).



 

Like I said we aren't the handiest pair...so it came out a bit lopsided...woops. I'll take a picture once I've figured out how to fix that problem. Either way we enjoyed the experience and like with the other shelf, we did it together and had fun, so the outcome can be a bit--not perfect.

 

After an hour of hard labor, we were starving and luckily for us only about ten minutes away was the delicious hamburg restaurent 'びっくりドンキー', it's a 'Western' style restaurant, probably supposed to be modeled after hamburger places--with a Japanese twist as per hamburg. A great place for just meat and rice at a fairly reasonable price. Then to my happy suprise, the current campaign menu included Hokkaido ice cream! I chose for the fanciest plate including rare cheesecake and A SUPER DELICIOUS waffle! I'm not a fan of cheesecake so Ryosuke ate that for me and I enjoyed the strawberrys and waffle.

 

 

 

Another lovely date weekend!

 

Thanks for reading!

Hanami + Walmart + New Furniture

I finally got a Costco card!

So the plan for Wednesday was to go to Costco!!!! I really wanted to go to the Youtube Hanami Meet thing, but I really hate going to Tokyo by myself--the anxiety alone convinces me to not go. I hate travelling--period. Plus the three hours (due to being cheap and going on normal trains) on a train always kills my phone battery which is no fun and I can't ever manage to sleep on trains...yada yada yada I gave up on going.

So instead! I decided to put that money I would have used to something I've been wanting for along while now--A COSTCO CARD!

Ryosuke's mom used to have one, but realized they didn't go enough for the expenditure, and I would never ask her to ree-up on that when I could just get it as I was missing my home massive amounts of foods and THAT PIZZA THO.

Anyway, so thankfully Ryosuke's schedule was open on Wednesday, and thanks to my moms genius week plan (lazy monday, make a list tuesday, go to costco wednesday), we made the hour and a half trek to the Amerika-land! We are quite lucky in Gunma actually because there even IS a Costco within the prefecture. Nagano and Saitama people usually have to come here to get Amerika goods so in that aspect we're good. :D

Ryosuke is usually a very late starter in the mornings, were I am awake (for example, now at 7am on a day off) super early, and he likes to sleep...till midday.
(>_>)

So thankfully his switch for 'I MUST GET UP' was on and he got up early enough for us to leave a couple hours prior to Costco opening. Both of us had yet to eat breakfast, so obviously a quick conbi trip was needed so none other than--Family Mart! Fried Chicken and Monster for breakfast--greasy food and energy drinks, what more could this girl ask for. (^_^)

We started our journey with tummy's just full enough and trees dead like it was still Autumn. The weather was cloudy but enough sun to not kill my eyes which turned out to be better and better the closer we got to Maebashi! The closer we got the more we started seeing the cherry trees! 



The cherry blossoms were just starting to bloom and some trees were already crying petals. I, like everyone in the world, must take pictures of this once a year event. We passed a couple parks and I mumbled how nice it would be to take pictures--and finally we decided to just stop in the main, big park and walk around for a bit and take some pictures. Since it was mid-morning on a weekday, luckily there were very few people.

I've always wanted to see the cherry blossom festival in this park, but it get super crowded and my anxiety flares up a bit, so I enjoyed the time to ourselves. The sun even came out to say hello!!! I'm not sure how much time we spent there, but we took a whole bunch of photos, many of which look really similar to any other picture--so I'll post the nice ones and a little collage.

credit:Ryosuke

After I felt I had walked enough for the day, and didn't want to be too late to my Costco festivities--we headed back out and made it there shortly after they'd opened. One thing I must say for the Japanese that I could never say for Miami people is how early and on-time they are (for the most part). I always liked to go to the mall or a store early, early because virtually nobody was ever there. In Japan, there are ALWAYS people waiting for places to open and bum-rush the store!! We got there literally half an hour after it opened and there were already enough people to make Ryosuke's anxiety flare up. (I consider Cc I was used to that much.)

 I was so-so-so happy to find massive fruits in big bags/bunches and be finally reunited with my precious bagels. Those simple things we take advantage of in the states--I am drinking a smoothie full of my America fruits now and will be gorging on a bagel shortly. I spent the most money I have in a long time shopping for just food, but good lord did it feel good. I've only ever gone with my parents or friends who had a card, so for me to finally have one of my own--I felt so adult!

There are obviously two reasons to go to Costco, the food--to buy and the food--to eat. I love pizza, and although in Japan the selection is quite poor, (also living in the mountains, all we have is a damn Pizza-la..and it's not my favorite) so when I can have a normal sized, sauce-loaded, cheesey pizza--I realized later I SHOULD have bought the second slice for Thursday morning--but it's ok I had bagels. I am very used to the obscene size and taste, Ryosuke on the other-hand barely finished his slice, I would've tried to finish his--but thankfully I didn't.

I felt to happy to share this moment with him. I am sure we will do this many, many more times--and at the very least, once a month. :)

On our way home, I started to think--there's no way in hell my purchase will fit in my house. I barely have space to fit anything as it is (tiny LeoPalace), how the f___. So I did some quick thinking, I would need to but a shelf! Problem was that I didn't know the measurements and first I had to drop off my food because I had a massive bag of frozen strawberry's that needed to see my freezer ASAP. So we hit up a nicely sized Daiso (100yen store) and got  mini screwdriver set and a measuring tape thing and we were back on track to go home.

Long story short, I got a wooden shelf as opposed to a metal one due to price and the aesthetic being much nicer, and good thing I bought that screwdriver set because even though the box says it was included--it was not.

It really was a team effort, Ryosuke got it started half way and I helped with my little hands in my tight hallway space and quick thinking skills from watching my dad put stuff together all my life. We succeeded and my new shelf proudly houses my purchases beautifully.

As if a great day would just not want to end, as a bit of a break from the usual--Ryosuke and I decided to get a bit expensive on dinner and had yakiniku! We both love-love meat and eating out of something we do often, but eating on this side of the pricier end is not done much and we both decided we worked hard enough today that it was well deserved.

I swear that was such an amazing day, spent with the most amazing man, doing my favorite things!

Have a great rest of the week, thanks for reading!