Hida-Takayama

I don't like people driving inside old town district with tourists wandering around on the streets.  Very dangerous.  Other than that, Hida-Takayama is a cute little town.  Found a great tiny restaurant; if it were back home, it would make into our rotation of restaurants to visit.

Beautiful hotel room key cards

Delicious hotel breakfast

Oshino Hakkai

There are many tourist traps in Japan, and I generally enjoy all of them.  However, I despise Oshino Hakkai to no end.

I've been to Oshino Hakkai twice.  It is especially bad because of over-tourism.  Its over-tourism is because of the villagers' greed.

Hakkai literally translated into "Eight Oceans".  They are ponds, not oceans.  Stop bluffing and upselling it as something they are not.  A couple ponds are so small that, the shadow from three people would cover up the entire pond.  Not all nature needs to be turned into tourist sightseeing spot.  Leave nature be!

There were too many people crowding the too little ponds.  I couldn't see the ponds.  When I finally squeezed through the crowd, the pond was full of tourists' reflection.  I could barely see what was inside the water.  Supposedly there were gold fish, blue fish, and green water plants.  But no.  All I saw was the rainbow-colored clothing from the tourists.  Why would I want photos of strangers' rippling faces?

And who really counted the eight ponds?  Everyone gathered at the main pond.  There was no fence; people might fall into the water.  Nobody cared about the two ponds farther away from the main site.  For all I knew, there might be only four ponds.

The souvenir shops were the accumulation of the villagers' greed.  The entrance to the main pond was located inside the big souvenir shop.  The entire souvenir complex (from the parking lot to Oshino Hakkai, plus all the shops surrounding Hakkai) was larger than the eight ponds combined.

A person is not there to enjoy nature.  The villagers want the tourists to spend money and get out.  Don't look for the clarity and the serenity they advertised.  Everything is fake and superficial.

At other tourist traps, villagers want tourists to at least understand a little about the culture, history, and tradition.  At Oshino Hakkai, the villagers only want tourists to buy their crappy souvenirs; they don't care if the tourists actually see the eight ponds.

Happy Halloween 2022!

Perfect books to read while eating delicious Mister Donuts Halloween 2022 collection 👻

Black Adam (2022)

Not bad, but not great either.  Entertaining for two hours.  I didn't know anything about DC comics; so at first I thought I was watching a Shazam movie.

I liked the small twists here and there.  The good guys weren't completely good, but the bad guys weren't completely bad, either.  Except the ultimate generic baddie, which the audience could see he was the bad guy from a mile away.

Also, because it was a comic book movie, I couldn't help but compare:

DC Cyclone = Marvel Storm

DC Hawkman = Marvel Falcon

DC Smasher = Marvel Hulk

DC Dr. Fate = Marvel Dr. Strange

SPOILER ALERT!

Dr. Fate died at the end.  I am grateful for this plot line.  Pierce Brosnan was wasted in a DC movie.  He should wear a crown sitting on a throne somewhere, maybe in a Marvel movie.  He would have been a great king in a Marvel movie, a good guy or bad guy.  Doesn't matter.

Shaun of the Dead (2004), Hot Fuzz (2007)

Great great movies!  Always finding new jokes upon second view, third viewing.  Even though one was zombie movie and the other one was police movie, I loved the way they referenced each other.  I loved the way the end of the movie referenced the beginning of the movie.

The actors were great.  They played different characters in two different movies, but they fit into the roles. It didn't feel odd.

14 January 2025 Update: I could watch these two movies over and over again and still found new jokes to laugh at. Great acting. Intense dialogues. The movies were perfect!

Lawson Uchi Cafe X Godiva

These were so delicious!  Rich luxurious chocolate but not overly sweet.  Four varieties, sold out everywhere.  Took me a month to find them.  Gotta collect them all!  The dorayaki (#5 and #6 pictures below) was the best in my opinion.  They expired at a ridiculous rate.  The muffin (#7 and #8 pictures below) expired on the day that I bought it, 11 Oct 22.  The thing was already dry and stale.  But it should still be good on the day it expired, right?  Especially sweet dessert could be preserved for awhile past the expiration date.  It just showed how fresh things were in Japan.

Side note:  Lawson is a convenience store in Japan, just like 7-11.  However, 7-11 hasn't had good desserts at all this year.  I wondered what happened.  Last year it was Family Mart (another brand of convenience store) had delicious matcha dessert selection.  I am guessing these three brands take turn selling good desserts?

Burn, Witch, Burn! by Abraham Merritt

This book was too scary.  If not for Math Teacher reading it to me, I wouldn't have read it at all.

It didn't help when I just went to Towada Art Center, there was a giant witch sculpture at the entrance.  The book description of the witch matched exactly to this sculpture.

The witch's hobby was to make dolls.  At the end I warned Math Teacher to never buy me dolls.

It was a short book.  The author could've expanded a little bit on the witch's and her sidekick's motive.  Instead, in the last chapter the author talked about there were already dolls made by witches in the ancient times.  It felt like the author did a lot of research, didn't know where to put it, so he stuck everything at the end.

A fun read for Halloween!

⭐⭐⭐⭐

American Diner at Hamura Station

I don't know the official name, but on the door it said "American Diner".  It is right outside Hamura Station.  I always said there's no bad food in Japan, only mediocre food.  I might be making an exception for this one.

The restaurant opened in July.  Today (October) we walked in, the floor was already sticky.  A good sign of an American diner.  The decor was also good.  Checkered floor tiles, Elvis photos on the wall, and high sitting chairs.

Math Teacher disagreed.  This American Diner did not have a jukebox.  The decor was in the 60s but the music playing in the background was in the 80s; it was incongruent.

It all went downhills from there.

The server slurred and mumbled; I couldn't understand him at all.

The green salad came with bacon bits.  Cold, dumped out of a bag.

The chicken in the chicken burger was thin.  I couldn't tell it was chicken if it wasn't said so on the menu.

The fries were limp, cold, and not crispy.  It was dumped out of the bag and wasn't fried properly.  The portion was ridiculous.  I ordered large fries.  If that was large, then what was small, five fries?

The vanilla milk shake came with huge blocks of the ice cubes in the glass.  Math Teacher said the whipped cream on top was congealed.

The only good thing was the grilled onions in the chicken burger.  It was sweet and juicy.

I wasn't sure if the restaurant was bad, or this was what Japanese thought American food was like.  I felt bad that local Japanese people were exposed to bad American diner-style food.

Americans may not know gourmet food, but Americans know how to make junk food right.

The meat inside the burger needs to be a large, juicy piece.  The fries must be greasy, salty, hot, and crispy.  The ice must be blended into the milkshake.  The whipped cream needs to be fluffy and melts in the mouth.

Before the restaurant opened, we had hoped it was operated by American ex-pats that knew what they were doing.  So disappointed.

Groceries, #3

It happened again.  I asked Math Teacher to buy 2 zucchinis.  I asked over and over if he knew what zucchinis looked like.  He said, "Yes.  The long green cylindrical things?"

He bought 3 cucumbers!  🤦

Towada Art Center

How do I describe Towada Art Center?  It's made up of artists' nightmares.

Don't be fooled by the beautiful flower horse at the entrance of the museum.

There is a house that eats people alive.

There is a two-story high witch looking down at me and following me around with her eyes.

There is an exhibit called "Memory of Water", but the water is made up of red threads.  So it's more of "Memory of Red Arteries".  What happened to this artist that the artist thought water was like blood?

There is a sacrificial goat.

There is a pond of alien pods popping up and down.

There is a large dark shadow looming on the roof between two buildings.  An archer was aiming an arrow at the shadow.  

There is a three-story high robotic ant.

There is a hallowed-out concrete structure that looks like the bones of an ear drum.

There is a three-story high ghost, but the ghost is quite cute.

There is a pumpkin by the famous Yayoi Kusama.  It's a cute pumpkin only if I don't think how Japan treated her like dirt.