Japanese Homecoming

Last Saturday I took a trip to Fukuoka, the land of ramen, the friendly rich, and of course, the loveable Softbank Hawks baseball team. Monday was a holiday, so I took Tuesday off as well to make it an even four days. And an excellent four days they were.

I took a 5-something AM train to Kaga Onsen station, hopped on the limited express to Osaka, and then switched to the Shinkansen. It was my first time riding the famed bullet train, but all said it wasn’t that much faster than a regular express train. The service and comfort, however, was second to none.

I arrived in Fukuoka at about noon, where I was met by my host parents from two years ago, when I spent 6 weeks studying at Kyushu University. They promptly took me to an American-style diner, with American-size portions, and I had what felt like the biggest burger of my life. The diner really did its best to remain true to the real deal. The food, the music, the drinks—even the magazines were American!

That night I met up with my friend Eiko who was at Queen’s for a year studying English and who ended up subletting my apartment in Kingston for a summer. It was kinda weird—we talked about my room and my house, and she confessed just how much cleaning she had had to do to get it looking the way it did when Josh, Geoff and I got back in the fall. She was joined by her friend, also a graduate of Queen’s U. School of English, and we all went out for ramen, oh sweet sweet ramen, at a yatai (licensed street vendor) near Canal City. Yatai stalls are some of Fukuoka’s more famous dining entities. They litter the streets throughout the summer and into fall and offer local food at good prices. I’m something of a ramen lover, so having street stall-style (say that ten times fast) Hakata ramen after a 2-something year dry spell was a real treat. I won’t lie—most of what follows is simply a description of the awesome food I ate, and I think it’s fair to say that’s what this trip was really about.

The following day my host sister Maki arrived from Tokyo and together with my other host sister, Sayuri, we went out and about in Tenjin, the major shopping/eating/hanging out/karaoke-ing/fun district. It was like old times…made me miss family life. That night we went out for yaki niku (fried meat) with the whole family, including grandma, and then out to karaoke afterwards, this time excluding dad, but…still including grandma. There’s nothing quite like belting out Ne-Yo or Backstreet Boys in front of an 85-year old who you just met.

Anyway, the next couple of days were slow and relaxing. I watched a lot of Full House, some American Idol (from 2 years ago, I discovered later…), went out to Ippudo—a very famous chain of ramen restaurants that boast perhaps the best of Hakata-men, and did a bit of shopping. I bought a winter jacket in Canal City that I better be wearing for at least the next 10 years to get my money’s worth. Ice cream, too, played a prominent role in any activities that were dessert or snack-related. I made two trips to Cold Stone ice cream, if for no other reason than to hear the all-Japanese staff sing a heavily-accented “Zipadeedoodah”. Most of the trip was about quality family time, though. I was treated to almost everything we ate/did, and my host mom took no shortcuts in making me feel at home.

On Tuesday, before leaving, my host sisters and I took a three-minute stroll down the block to a humble-looking ramen establishment that was recently rated as the second best ramen restaurant in all of Japan! As one can imagine, I was more than a little excited to try it out. To my dismay, however, it was closed when we got there! Turns out they’re closed for business every Tuesday. By some miracle, though, one of the employees snuck me and my host sisters in and whipped us up some delicious lunch in his own time and without his boss' knowledge. The guy even offered to let my sis off with no charge! This coming from a place that usually has a line around the block. Since in Japan you don’t tip, we expressed our gratitude by insisting that he let us take a photo with him instead of giving us change.

Shortly afterwards I left Fukuoka to come back to Kaga, but I’ll definitely be back as soon as I can. It’s a great place, with great people, awesome weather, and…amazing food!