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5.14.2012

Wisteria Floribunda: Ashikaga Park


The first time I ever really appreciated or even seen up close this flowering plant was in Ito City in Shizuoka Prefecture at the famous Rinsenji Temple - there are a few other temples with the same name, so just remember Rinsenji is the one in Ito, and it is the  (りんせんじ temple) - with the  floribunda variety.     Although the actual plant was named after an anglo, the Japanese have been cultivating this flowering plant for centuries before, and was even introduced to North America by a Westerner.    How can one man lay claim to a  name for a flower anyway?   In Japan we call it "Fuji".





As the sun began to wane, and the last vestiges of its great energy shone hues of  gold and orange across the evening sky.   Images of a time long gone, and faded jubilees and sweet kisses.   And sweet nothings.    The naked flower for, example.  It's already beautiful just as it is.  No need to adorn it.  Such as the wisteria with its long and slender vines, and soft pedals lain across trellises.  




                                                                       Ashikaga




Science tells us that the oldest flower never bloomed and evidence of the first flower ever created  is still unknown to us.    The debt to beauty is there.  The proof must be somewhere.   Even science has proven to be utterly clueless.








                                                                                   Purple

We are all indebted to beauty.    We must see it up close and smell it.   This is what I wanted to do on that long train ride through the sun baked backbone of Tochigi Prefecture.   From Oyama to Tomita is a vast and rural plain of golden rice fields and ramshackle barns.   I loved how the setting sun bathed the whole landscape in brilliant hues of orange and gold and the tiny man- made eddies with glistening ripples of light shimmering off the surfaces.   Orbs of sunlight piercing through the train's windows and stinging my semi squinted eyes.  I love how the train rocked with its squeaky carriage as it worked its way through this valley.  I was on my way to Beauty.   Bound for Beauty.  Beauty bound.   Night Beauty.



Purple is a color most associated with royalty in the Western world.   In Japan, it's a symbol of protection.  In Asia it's associated with mourning and suffering.  For the American Negro woman it is associated with sexual  violation and domestic violence as portrayed in the movie Color Purple.    Purple is a color that represents so many different dynamics in the human experience.    For me, it has always been a symbol of beauty and protection.  




                                                 Ashikaga Park had so much beauty to offer for me.  


                                                    The bridge and where it connected me to....


       There is a wonderful site here which explains the different varietals and the history of this park.




It took me about 2 hours and 30 minutes to reach Tomita station, and then another 20 minute walk to the park.  Entrance was about 1400 yen.  The park and souvenir shops stay open until 9pm.   Remember to try the wisteria soft ice cream!   Very delicious.   Wear some good walking shoes because there are plenty of excellent foot paths.   You have until May 20th to enjoy these wisteria.   Daytime offers a completely different view than night.  I recommend trying both.   You don't need buses and taxis to get here.  There are plenty of amenities here, too.   If you bring your own food there is plenty of free seating all round the park which all have gorgeous scenic views of wisteria.    


  





As for accommodation.  Oyama Station is the nearest major station and has an e-hotel and a few other business accommodations at affordable prices.   I did not choose any of them because their facilities were inadequate  for me.  Meaning the baths close down at around midnight.   Other then that, fairly decent accommodation.   I opted for Takasaki Station because they had a Dormy Inn which has a bath and sauna that remain open all night - sauna shuts down at 5am.     Plus they allow for late check-in, like past midnight if you call them.   Takasaki has more convenience stores.   It takes two hours to reach from Tomita Station.  Long rain ride, but well worth it for me.   









5.06.2012

A Rant: Asian Purity

You impregnated a Japanese girl?   Can't believe this is the same fuck head who planted a booger on the back of my jacket without me noticing it.   Man, you've got some real fucking issues going on up there in that head of yours.   I would kick your ass right here in this classroom, but knowing that if I did I could face expulsion.    You are a student from China so we all know how the California UC system favors them, and the other foreign  nationals who can barely speak English and can't write an essay or keep up in the debate classes.    You and I are not friends.     Can't believe you would whisper in my ear that you impregnated a Japanese girl  over the summer when you were visiting Japan, and then disappeared on her leaving her to look after your spawn.   I hope she aborted it, then we could both laugh through crooked teeth of that pure act.    I see now what's really going on.   Like that article in the junk press about Chinese guys outperforming Japanese boys in college romance.   Their real intentions are to steal Japanese women, impregnate them and then extort money out of them and their parents and ultimately get a green card.   Sort of similar to the hordes of Africans who do the same, along with the dregs from white America, especially the ones who use their students as a dating pool to pick and choose potential wives from, and have no shame in doing it, and then having the audacity to  carry on all  artsy like at fancy dinner and sake parties with their newly found anorexic student brides.    What the fuck is going on in Japan?   I am not your friend.    I know who you are!




I didn't think it was charming either when that ashy fingered Kenyan was parading around with his pride and joy  and showing off what they procreated at the Immigration Office.   I don't understand it.  I am not an integrationist at this point.    I do not want to see Japan become another cesspool of foreign indigents like the U.K. and Toronto who think they are actually helping the country through breeding it.   It's disgusting.    That's like that young Japanese boy I banned from my FB account over his stupidity.  I couldn't stand his laughter and his anorexia.    It's disgusting when 90% of the young Japanese men I come across on a daily basis are still single, and many more who are still virgins have the audacity to question my sex life -  I sleep with your mother and probably your sister, too!  That's just like my Jukujo mom's biological son, and my other Jukujo's boy; they were both virgins all the way through college.    In the prime of their lives they put a premium on diet and weight loss, in the end, nothing to show for it but a hard-on and some porn mags and a severe inferiority complex to foreign men.  




The one thing they harp on about is dieting, all of them.   Being fat is no good because Japanese girls are not going to like you.   Or it's not healthy.    But yet, you are a virgin you Japanese geek!  May I question why?   Everybody knows that Japan is one of the most sexually promiscuous  countries in the world.   And Just about every foreigner has their own sexual exploits to tell about how they got and had this Japanese girl and that Japanese girl.    And I can't believe how you can call me the enemy and them friends through your eyes all at the same time.  I am merely helping you realize your ignorance and total lack of responsibility for the mother land you hate to defend so much.   You moron.  




I was dating a Chinese girl in college for about six month.   I met her in my Japanese 101 class.   Thin, huge tits, no ass, fair looking.     She was a product of a school teacher and a land owner from Guangdong, high middle class, yet high browed.    If I had to take one lesson from her, then it was her way of looking at the superficiality of people.   I took her to visit a brother who was living in an expensive part of West Hollywood - Brentwood Colonial.    He had a nice set up with his Japanese wife, a third hand BMW, and a nice flat screen T.V.   After leaving she told me his place was small and dirty and that she was unimpressed.  She had a way of pissing on everything, like the time I was geeking out on sake with a few Japanese interns over in Torrance.    I resented her for her brute honesty, but everything she said was true, even years later about some of my other observations.     Sake is not the holy water of the beer & wine world and acting like it is makes you look and sound like you are full of shit.    Her father made her promise to never marry a black person.   She was supposed to marry white only - not even Chinese.   He had to have curly hair and green eyes...blah...blah...   Never understood how a father could encourage this sort of behavior, that's like a black father trying to encourage his only daughter to marry white in hopes that someday she'll inherit  property and a bunch of half babies who cannot speak their mother's language.





The line between highly skilled and highly paid foreigners and the Japanese is good.   It should remain  that way.  Japan should never become a melting pot.   The homogeneity here is fine tuned and works, believe it or not.   The only discrimination  I have ever experienced, though, in my life occurred from that of a half-breed.   He was a cross between a Mickey Rooney and a Yoko Ono, geek, jerk, and every other name in the book.   How can you discriminate against me in Japan, when you are the bi - product of two races yourself ?  Was your mother a whore student who  married   that nerd teacher white husband?     Was it Marlon Brando's famous 1957 Sayonara quote about marrying his Japanese bride and melding the proud white race with the inferior Japanese race that sold your mother?    Whatever it was, it's absurd.






The Chinese girl faded away after I had taken a Japanese girl I had met at Walmart in Cerritos.   She knew that learning Japanese was important but had to struggle with a lot of resentment about Japan's wartime past, stuff her father and mother shoved down her throat about how horrible the Japan war machine was.     Like she could relate?   It's not like anybody gave a fuck, anyway.    All of her previous boyfriends were stolen by Japanese girls, like I was.     I mean why put up with all the drama and nonsense that comes with being with you, like when I took you up to Irvine to have dinner at a friends house, and you acted a total ass when you tried to tell a Japanese man how best to prepare shabu-shabu,  in his own home!   What the fuck is wrong with you?    Can't you enjoy anything?   Do you ever stop judging other people against your own miserable little life?   What makes feel and act the way you do?  What gives you the moral right to spew your hatred of Japan over what happened 70 years ago, stuff most young Japanese care nothing about.    Are you without stain, are you pure?     Here's a fact of history for you,  Mao killed all of the best that China had to offer.    All of the best academics, engineers, scientist, were all exterminated during the great industrial revolution, some of the worst acts of brutality in human history.   The greatest famine in history, yet Mao is still worshipped today by millions of ignorant little people who look like you  and who have  nothing better to do than accuse Japan for its own part in history that every advanced industrialized nation took part in.       There were no great intellectual gains made in China after Mao, because he destroyed the best of minds.     Your sense of " I can do no wrong" is pure and utter bullshit.      Look in the mirror.



In closing:

Close that Chinese Embassy in Niigata, and send that Chinese Koshihikari rice back to Jilin, China and stop trying to condemn the Japanese, and most of all stop ruining the cultural and spiritual homogeneity here.   Japanese dudes need to fuck their women, and breed more and save  their race and stop harping on about weight gain and all the other unnecessary bullshit that means absolutely nothing in the real world.    Just because you come here doesn't mean you are entitled to anything, and all of this eclecticism is not what it's all cracked up to be.     Japan is already perfect.  















4.29.2012

Sake Tasting 2012.4.29

The significance for me attending this particular sake tasting event was to offer my well wishes in person  to Mr. Daisuke Suzuki of Iwaki Kotobuki, and for him not giving up on sake.   Last year his family brewery was completely destroyed by the earthquake and tsunami which  left him with nothing but the yeast strain sample that had been used to create his family sake.     Struggling over whether it was worth it to continue, he almost gave up  until the local community got behind him and offered him emotional support,  and now he is finally rebuilding and selling again.     I did a write up here a few weeks ago.     On that link is a list of where his sake can be purchased also.     He was incredibly popular so I only had a few words with him and he poured me some of his speciality stash.   Amazing guy and very warm, friendly and approachable.  


Here's the layout:    

The center table had over 2 dozen different sake you could pour freely and as much as you liked.     There were three time slots; morning, afternoon, and evening.   Tickets for the event sold-out for the evening, so I attended the afternoon session.  Spittoons were everywhere like rubber cones on a road.    A lot of the servers were extra generous on the sake, so there was plenty of spillage.   It was phenomenal.


        I sampled every sake  starting from Seiro of Gunma clockwise until I reached Iwao.




For the serious sake drinker this event was a must and was primarily  focused on new up-and-coming breweries from Gunma, Shizuoka, Nagano and Kanagawa.   Yes, Kanagawa Prefecture brews sake and good sake, too.    






The event itself was billed as " Nihonshu Jounetsureto"  which roughly translates as a passionate day for young Japanese.    Somebody must've taken my advice several months ago on this one.  Even the location was great, I mean right in the heart of trendy Shibuya at the Shidax Village Hall.  From Shibuya station it takes only five minutes on foot to reach there.   They should hold this sort of event once a month.



Some of my favorites were all of Kotobuki of course, but I would like to highlight some really interesting sake.   First up, for the warm sake lover, I highly recommend trying Ippakusuisei of Akita Prefecture /
www.fukurokuju.jp/    It was the warm  nutty texture on the nose and tongue that sold me instantly.   I could easily binge on something like that everyday.


Next up was the Kudoki Jouzu a personal write up there with video snippet and all around top sake.



I like what Asama Sakagura of Gunma Prefecture had on offer, too.  I particularly would like to recommend there karakuchi junmai ( dry ) at plus 12 nihonshu-do.    Also, Senkin of Tochigi Prefecture had a very nice Kame no O 50 at minus 5 nihonshu-do.    I was also very happy to see Izumo Fujii again, the president remembered me from last year and offered me sake.   They always make really good sake, like their  Tokubetsu Junmai Muroka at 4 nihonshu-do.  


I was also pleasantly surprised to see Ishizuchi Brewerys there as well.   I did a special write on their sake here.    It's their summer sake I love the most.   They're amazing.  



What took me straight to heaven though, and my all time favorite for this evening was "8000" Hassen meaning eight thousand in English.   Jokingly.  The staff wore shirts with "8000" on the back.   Mutsu Hassen from Aomori Prefecture did it for me.  It was my go-to sake for the whole evening.     The pink label  Ginjo-shu was incredible at minus 1 nihonshu-do.  I could taste ALL of Japan in just one sip from the pink label.     I had a god moment there for a minute.  




In the coming days and weeks I will be ordering and writing up many of the sake on this list in greater detail.   Who knows, perhaps many of these sake will be available in North America.   Not sure if they are there now.  



On a final note, like I mentioned before, tickets for this event had sold-out.    I had purchased my ticket at a convenience store two weeks in advance and almost wasn't able to get it.   Special shout out to Melinda Joe for the tip.    Thank you!   This event had the same energy as the sake no jin, but a quarter of the size.



I'm not sure if I left anything out....  I think I covered everything.    Don't be afraid to tweet this, or me if you need additional information.   Or if I left anything out that's pertinent.  
















4.26.2012

Abekan Sake Brewery Inc.

I would like to express my relief today as I was assured by this beautiful matron Jukujo in the photo that one of my favorite shuzoten ( sake breweries ) was not affected by the 3-11 disaster in Miyagi Prefecture.   








Abekan Shuzoten


The brewery is a corporation, in other words,  it has stockholders and its own legal status. It pays its own taxes.   It's also one of the oldest and most prestigious breweries in Miyagi Prefecture.   




The day I visited, the sugidama (cedar ball) was a beautiful brown color - brown means  the sake has aged  well enough for drinking.   When the cedar ball is green, late fall early winter, means the sake is still fresh and young.






  




The two rice grains you see in the picture are Kame no O and Sasanishiki.    Kame no O is a more robust and flavorsome rice that's more commonly used in sake brewing whereas the Sasanishi is typically a table rice used for sushi.   SOME brewers blend rice to produce certain textures in sake - yes, some sasanishiki is used also, but not commonly!










Off to the left is the actual brewery.  The traditional building is where you can sample, purchase and speak with staff.   Tours are possible if you call in advanced.   Sake here is made in the most traditional of methods.   




Miyagi-ken, Shiogama-shi, Nishimachi, 3−9

Japan




Brands: Omotoka, yashiro, ichinomiya, 

Otokoyama


Details on where it can be purchased can be found on my site ordering sake.
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