Saturday, December 14, 2019

Ramen World Cup Part 5: Hedgehogs and Hakas

Will my Japan Rail Shinkansen pass work on your train sir?


Wider than the All Black's game plan against the Irish.


Hey, welcome to the I Should Have Brought a Second Stroller club.


That's not the sushi roll you're looking for.



No asking for Paw Patrol vehicles on the prayer boards, that's for Santa not the Big Guy.


Daddy, Mommy, I'm not an Instragram prop.



Hey at least the seaweed is vegan.



Speaking of seaweed, here we have a girl of discerning taste. Only the crispiest nori will do.


Oh, you mean you don't eat the hedgehogs in a hedge hog café? Sorry Pip, back to the seaweed.



Hang on, here's a spot where you actually do eat what you catch. Which given the lack of success off the dock back home could be a pretty cheap meal. At least there's the worms on the hooks if things really get dire.


Let's be honest, this guy must have found a trawler net in the corner because there's no way he actually caught that thing.


These days Brooklyn is the go-to destination for counter-only omakase.


Pre-gaming on some classic Whittaker's hand-delivered direct from New Zealand.


Grandpa, is this a bullet train? No, it just seems like that because you're used to the 4/5/6 line.


For a country with just about the lowest birthrate in the world they sure do know how to look after the kids. Starting with a gigantic indoor playground.



Ok kids, remember, if your train is one minute early you must bow in apology and if it happens again, well, you probably should borrow a samurai sword from the Tokyo Museum...


Game time! Team Palmy is ready to pack down the scrum. Now where's the halfback when you need him? Roll in a couple of Sapporo bottles before the ref blows another arbitrary penalty and we have to reset this thing.



Don't worry folks, if Savea pulls a hammy the replacements are ready to roll. I mean look at those silky skills as they pass the Heinekens down the line.



Party like it's the Woolshed.



Victory is sweet. Let's drag race down Fitzherbert Avenue.


There's one game the Irish will definitely win: the post-match drink-off in Shinjuku.


The calm before the storm.


The storm.


Grandpa, is that a tui?


So HP, did you hear the one about the parents who dragged their kids to the opposite time-zone on a 15 hour flight?


Quarterfinal number two pits the plucky hosts Japan against the mighty Boks. It also pits Team Palmy against bags of steaming karaage chicken en route to the stadium. Talk about a rout.



Go Brave Blossoms! Nothing strikes fear in the heart of the enemy scrum like a flurry of Instagram-worthy cherry blossoms.


The after party leads Team Palmy deep into the Golden Gai, a warren of ancient alleys lined with tiny, six-seat bars. Whisky sours into the early hours is the right way to see in the Rising Sun.



No, don't believe the Fake News, that's not Rock.


Daddy, can we ride the R2-D2 plane? Sorry young Padawan, you're relegated to the BB-8 jet.


Fifteen hours of Paw Patrol coming right up.


Mommy, I thought you said United was the place where dreams go to the back of Group 5 to whither away at number 32 on the upgrade list? This isn't so bad, I my seat is turning into a crib.


Thursday, December 05, 2019

Ramen World Cup Part 4: Come On Sun, Rise Already!

Konnichiwa, welcome to the Land of the Rising at 3am Son.


It takes a pre-sunrise pour over to really tease out the subtle notes of abject exhaustion. At least we're in the country that actually has a name for death by exhaustion. Will save some typing later in the blog.



Daddy, now you're talkin' my language.


The Pipster Hipster is in da house.


Don't knock on the ōtoro boys.



Daddy, are you a salaryman? If I say yes can I go to the pachinko parlor?



I assume you'll be transforming into a giant Gundam shortly?



Is this the Sailor Moon cosplay?


A museum for noodles. Cup noodles. Yes you heard that right. You know a nation takes their instant noodles seriously when there's a five story waterfront museum dedicated to the humble cup noodle.


Hey, as far as installations go it's better than Duchamp's urinal.



The formaldehyde shark has got nothing on this carefully preserved archive of every variant of cup noodle ever released.



Pip we may have some leftovers.



Apparently this is an exact replica of the humble hut where the cup noodle was invented. Is anyone else starting to think the Met needs to lift its game?


Because who needs Tutankhamun when you can climb on a real tuk tuk at a fully operational replica of an Asian night market?


You can even make your own personalized cup noodle. For five bucks! I mean Disney charges 200 bucks to build a custom lightsaber at their park and you can't even eat it when you're done.



After you customized your cup it goes onto the real assembly line where a robot fills it with noodles and seals it up.


Daddy, we can heat these up at 3am while we wait for the breakfast buffet to open.



Unfortunately this was taken at 3pm.


Tokyo, one of the world's great cities. Way over yonder you can see the Lost in Translation bar. This is as close as Rock will get. To the bar and/or Scarlett Johansson.


The Professor has arrived! Grandpa, did you bring that long bedtime story about integrated reporting?



Team Two Phat is back! Has it really been 13 years?


Grandpa, should we tell Grandma the ramen has a pork bone broth?


Oh there's another sport that saw plenty of semifinal failures back in the day.



In Japan there's an exactitude in even the simplest acts, like pulling a soft serve.



Ka mate! Ka mate! Roughly translated: Don't choke in the semifinals mate.


The mighty Metropolitan Government building is the kind of austere edifice that would make any salaryman want to pull an all-nighter. Speaking of all-nighters, it must be just about 3am...