Reasons I Love Japan - Sweets!! Candy!

There are SO many Japanese treats I love, I need to divide this topic into parts or this post would be ridiculously long. I'll start with candy!

When I first got to Japan I decided I would try all the  candies, no matter how weird! I quickly gave that idea up, because it was expensive and I was eating way too much sugar, and a lot of the candies were weird! So I changed my goal to finding the best candies, trying what was most popular or what looked good to me. These are some of my favorites of what I've found so far!

Haichu! Hi-chew is one of my favorites. They have some flavors here that they don't in the states, cherry, white grape, and cola and Fanta flavors! 

Just some of what I've bought. :)

POCKY! Definitely my favorite! It comes in so many flavors, I've found more than these seven but I wanted to try the fancier ones first!
From left to right: caramel almond, strawberry, caramel, another strawberry kind, chocolate, chocolate almond, and cookies n cream! Caramel almond and the second strawberry kind were gross, but the rest were way good! Apparently there are lots of flavors because I am always finding or hearing about new ones.

I ate all my Pocky and went shopping again :)

So many candies!!!

This candy is awesome. It's kind of a game. There are three gumballs, one is super sour or wasabi flavored, and you try not to pick the sour or spicy one! It's fun to play with other people. I've been lucky so far...

Here is one of those candies, in the colors of a stoplight. I didn't notice the "wasabi" written on the side until after my poor friend Katie got the spicy one! 

This snack is called "happy turn" and it makes you happy!

The package caught my attention first!

This candy has 4 sticks of gum, each divided in four pieces. You take different pieces and combine them to make lots of different flavors! It's fun! That's why the face on the front is so crazy, it's amazed at all the flavors, or something. The flavors are soda, orange, grape, and apple, and they all go together well. I like how some Japanese candies are also a game! 



So those are some of my favorites of the Japanese candies I've tried! :) But there are also some crazy things out there too...

Squid candy, in lots of flavors.

Actual squid.

Reasons I Love Japan - Sweet things!!

These are a few of my favorite Japanese treats!

I LOVE Mister Donut! Their donuts are very chewy! Yummy. 












I also really love their crepes! 

They are made right before your eyes! And they're so big! There are crepe places everywhere.

Me with a crepe and some ramune at a school festival.

This is a taiyaki! A fish-shaped waffle with filling. This one has red bean paste filling. So good!

I'm going to buy some Mister Donut and taiyaki now! 

Noodles and Tempura

Noodles are one of my favorite Japanese foods. It's kind of the fast food of Japan, they sell it in tiny little restaurants on the street. It's made it right in front of you! 

    

There is a little udon place in the Tsukuba Center and it's fab, especially I don't want to cook! ;) 

At this place, you start with the noodles and then tell the person what you want with them. I just get the broth, I haven't explored the noodle options because I always buy the tempura instead. It is my favorite! Tempura is battered, deep-fried vegetables. You're supposed to put it in the bowl of noodles, but I like to eat it crispy!

Udon in Akihabara.

Soba and tempura in Shibuya. 

Ramen in Asakusa.

Noodles are my go-to Japanese food! 

So good! Almost always cheap and very filling too! :) 
I'm sure I'll be ruined for top ramen, it'll probably 
be so gross to me after having the real, 
fresh, Japanese ramen. I'm spoiled now!

Halloween in Japan

I didn't think they did Halloween in Japan, but I was wrong! People love Halloween here! And they don't just celebrate it on the 31st, people dress up all during October too!

People go all out! These people all had great costumes. We asked for a picture with some of them and they all wanted to be in it and then everyone else wanted pictures too! It was so fun! 

Some girls I saw at the store.

I bought some ears at the 100 yen shop, and that was my costume. :)

Me, Teresa, and Katie on Halloween

Robbert and Inna trying to take a scary picture. ;)



I had a fun Halloween in Japan with some fun people!

Reasons I Love Japan - Bicycles!

One of the things I love most about Japan is how people use bicycles so much! I love riding my bike everywhere! I'm so glad the program had a bike for me to use. It's cute and it's... vintage! :)

Me in front of my dorm building.

The basket is the best part! It's really quite handy.

A lot of people use bicycles to get around, but students especially. There are no bike racks on campus, just bike parking places, and they usually can't fit all the students' bikes! 

People usually lock their bikes so no one can walk off with them, but no one ever locks them to anything. Some don't even lock their bikes at all! When asked why people just leave their bikes out unlocked, our Japanese friends said it is because "it's not polite to steal." How cool is that! Japan is so great!!

Some places do have bike racks. There are quite a few around the train station, but that's the only place I remember seeing any. 

This one is the cheapest I've found, it gives you the first 3 hours for free and then it's 100 yen for every 24 hours.




You put your bike in one of the slots, and it will keep it there for you until you come back. When you do, you enter the slot number, put the money in, and then it will let you take your bike. You still have to lock your bike, but the bike rack keeps them all nice and neat so they don't look the bike parking places at the school! :) 

I really like the bike locks they have here! They are smart! They work like this:

Can you see my little key chain of the Rising Sun? :)





Kind of hard to take a picture of because it's right under the seat, but the lock is just a metal circle, about the size of a handcuff. The bottom opens up when it's unlocked. All it does is stop the back wheel from turning. Oh, and it's attached to the bike itself! I think it's really cool, I want get one here to use at home. 

I can't think of just one thing I like most about Japan, but bicycles would definitely make my top five! It is SO fun to ride my bike everywhere! 

Flowers at Hitachi Seaside Park

Today I got on a bus with a bunch of students from Thailand and we went to a place called Hitachi Seaside Park. It;s a big park by the ocean with some rides and carnival games, but most of it is b-e-a-utiful gardens full of flowers! There were so many flower gardens, it was wonderful!! 

First, I saw a big field of pink cosmos flowers. 

It was much bigger than this, there were flowers all around me in every direction!

There were orange flowers next to the pink ones...

... And yellow ones across from the pink ones!

Beautiful flowers as far as I could see!!

A lot of people brought their dogs. SO CUTE!

 

Next, we saw a big hill covered in little pinkish-red bushes and pink cosmos flowers.

They looked like something Dr. Seuss would draw! 

At the top of the hill, on the one side, you could see all the flowers on the hill.

On the other side, there was the ocean!!

It wasn't very much to look at, just a boat dock, but it was so big and blue and the sea breeze felt amazing! It was very relaxing and I probably could have sat there all day long. 

I saw these plants next to the walkway and I thought they were cool.

Next we saw a rose garden. Most of the roses were already gone, but there were a few left.

That was the last beautiful flower garden I saw that day! :) I really enjoyed looking at all the colorful flowers by the ocean! Japan is beautiful!