Minor correction to the previous post. Ahem, the highest grade out of ten hasn't been ten (otherwise they'd all be doing pretty good). It's been something lower. I think there was one eight, one seven, and a bunch... lower.
I worked through a bunch more tonight after dinner. Originally, I was going to make pasta or something cheap at home but then decided that nah, it was too cold and I was too tired. So I decided to have ramen. But the ramen place I wanted to go to - of course - was CLOSED. I've never, in all the Tuesdays and Fridays I've walked by it, seen it closed! AND THE ONE TIME I HAVE THE TIME TO GO TO IT, it's not open. Sigh. I was kinda annoyed. But I got on the train and came back to Takahashi instead, and revisited my pasta idea. But I was still feeling lazy, and now I had a craving for ramen. And gyoza. I friggin love that stuff.
So as I was cycling home, I decided to try the chinese restaurant's ramen Since this is Japan, and pretty much all Chinese restaurants have A) chanhan, or fried rice and B) ramen. Ramen because the noodles came from China some time ago, and despite the Japanese having made this their own dish, many many many people still consider it to be a CHinese dish. Oh, and most of the Chinese restaurants also have C) gyoza (or potstickers... but they have a thinner skin than Chinese potstickers) and also D) mabodofu which is this spicy tofu and (usually) pork dish that's reddish brown in color. I really enjoy eating it.
After thorough ethnographic participant-observation, and taking many many field notes on the topic, I have come to the general conclusion that ramen from Chinese restaurants is inferior in most ways to ramen from dedicated Japanese ramen restaurants. It's funny, because the ramen places... pretty much serve ramen. Sometimes they'll also have stuff like gyoza or maybe udon... but they never call themselves a Chinese restaurant, or a Japanese restaurant. They're simply a ramen restaurant.
And man are they good. If you ever come to Japan, I'd definitely recommend the ramen. But that's almost a given.
Anyways, after I ate dinner, I was like "hm, it is cold outside and it will probably be cold in my house, so why don't I grade papers here?" So grade I did. I actually managed to get through the whole stack that I had, and as a reward about halfway through I ordered this tasty kiwi chuhai (chuhais are almost like fruit cocktaily drinks... like if you mixed a fruit mixer and vodka, but it uses uhhh sochu, which is the asian version of vodka) and ordered (more) gyoza (since I mean, naturally I had already ordered some gyoza with my meal).
I feel much more alive after all of that. I had been starting to slip into the grips of "culture shock wave two" also known as "oh god winter and cold weather." My body reacts to winter the same way a bear does: it puts on weight and gets very very sleepy. So I have less time to actually do things during the day because of a tendency to pass out sometime around 10 or 11 (which is probably better that I sleep around then, but it's just so... early...). This, combined with the general crankiness and the insanity that November brings (I don't understand why it's always so busy)... well, not being a hermit and not just sleeping all day under covers and not curling up in a ball until everything passes takes effort.
Can't really help that I suppose though. I guess I need to get kerosene sometime soon, and bust out the kotatsu blanket. I'm excited for that... but I'm also kind of dreading it because I know that getting up will be fifty times harder.
*
In other, slightly more depressing news, I think I've finally managed to kill my basil. My one regret is that I didn't pick the basil before the plant died. -_-; I had managed to grow so much too! I'm really proud of that... even though now all the leaves are turning yellow because I think I'm not watering it enough or it's not getting enough sunlight or something like that. The basil I made was really tasty though (even if it was a little too salty).
I never thought I would have made my own basil. I mean, costco was only a 15 minute drive away. I'm glad I have though~
*
Also in other news, I think I'm getting sick. D: My head has been kinda warm lately and I can't find my thermometer. I think this morning I had a mild case of food poisoning too. That was probably because I ate something from my fridge after discovering it had been broken. Of course, I had forgotten the cardinal rule of when your power goes out aka your fridge has no power: don't open the door otherwise the cold won't stay in and all your stuff will go bad. Opening the door to check and see if the freezer and fridge were REALLY broken was probably an unwise idea.
No comments:
Post a Comment