We're Turning Japanese

I really think so!

Yeah yeah, I know it is a bit of a cliché, but Lyani and I really are taking serious steps toward resolving the nature versus nurture debate, in the favour of the latter.

To wit:

I am currently in the throes of eating an お弁当 (o-bento, or Japanese boxed lunch), pictured above. This particular one (if you clicky clicky, you might just be able to make out the details) contains the following items:

• チャーハン (chaahan, the Japanese word for Chinese fried rice)


• 唐揚げ (karaage, Japanese-style fried chicken)


• 焼きそば (yakisoba, fried ramen noodles)


• Hushpuppies--I have no idea what they are called in Japanese, and in Japan they integrate vegetables into the batter (for shame!)--but these things are definitely at least a genus of the hushpuppy species!


• Some glass noodles--they get their name from their translucent quality--and vegetables


• Some pickled 大根: (daikon), a Japanese radish and also the vegetable that Mario and friends use as a weapon in Super Mario Brothers II (US only) and Doki-Doki Panic (the original Japanese game that was Mario-ised for the US market)
  

And Lyani? Well, she has been bitten by the Gaspard and Lisa bug, big time! In Japan, Land of the Rising Cute, as soon as the "Hello Kitty" craze showed signs of slowing down, Japanese girls quickly turned Gaspard and Lisa into a huge fad. So now you can find Gaspard and Lisa merchandise of every description. Lyani, whose consumer sense is pretty sharp, has been able to get off with just a keitai strap (pictured at left) and a couple of postcards.

Are we the Japanesiest? (Apologies to Ota!) Maybe not, but we are getting there! ;)

And this has little to do with the entry, but it is a genuine Christmas miracle: a seat on this evening's Tokaido Line train from Tokyo to Yokohama. Gaze upon it in all of its glory (those are Amazon's coding conventions saving the seat for me, BTW--they were also a bit of a Christmas present to me, as they filled my heart with joy--let's just say that Amazonians know how to hack code and leave it at that, shall we?).