The List: The Oddball Things on My Souvenir List

Souvenirs, Snacks, and Not-Available-in-US Items That I Need or Just Yearn For:

[This List Will Be Added On To Over Time]

1) Facial Masks- Actually come in handy, and such a variety...
2) Kairo for warming of hands. Wonder if there is an opposite...a cool pack.冷却シート or 冷やし
3) Pens, highlighter, thumbtacks, stamp/tape - Also Brush and marker style. Sekaido or Itoya Ginza
4) Eye drops (Santen Fx Neo, Ro-to Dry Aid, Ro-to Lycee, Ro-to Gold 40, Ro-to Cool 40, Soft SanTear (good with contacts in), Sante PC)
5) Stapless stapler?
6) Senbei from everywhere
7) Cat toy if there's anything unusual...
8) Blank kanji grid notebooks
9) Kanji workbooks for kids/simplified
10) I'm well stocked with Japanese socks...but there is room for more.
11) 3DS games in Akihabara (used)
12) Amazake
13) Dried Yuba 湯葉(kanji for dried might be 干)
14) Big Bean Choco with Black Kuromitsu- dried sweet snack
15) Facial cleanser like Rosetto green cleanser, Shiseido Perfect Whip, or Kanebo Suisai Beauty Clean Powde, and or the Soy Milk Isofurabon cleanser.
16) earrings- satellite shop?
17) BB cream dr jart, radiance, premium, silver
18) soft/silicone keychain (small)

19) Nivea Sun Protect Super Water Gel SPF 50/PA+++ (Face & Body)

Traveling Solo in Japan

I had spent more than a year putting my experience of planning and getting to Japan in a webcomic form [here]. And it's still not done. But I wanted to put the main points in a post to sum it up for any parallel universe me's to read and consider.

It's Scary

Well, yes, and being the anxious type doesn't help. But Tokyo is such a breeze. You don't need anything but the yen in your pocket and the English in your head, and you're solid. There's so many signs and info kiosks and hand-holders in Japan that it would be pretty difficult to get into trouble

English is so often added to everything in Tokyo, so you can't get that lost. If you're heading towards the countryside, into the mountains, or off to find the source of your favorite Earth Porn picture [Yakushima Forest], maybe be a little more careful about writing down Google's advice on how to get there. Write out the kanji. Or stick to Tokyo and Kyoto and Osaka and be free of any fear.

The Woman Alone

Nope, you'll be fine. Crime in Japan is ridiculously rare. People leave their purse behind when they go to the bathroom to show that they'll be back. In Tokyo. At night. I walked around Akihabara at night to go play arcade games, and I didn't sense anything scary or suspicious. If you're around late enough in Tokyo, the main hazard is avoiding drunk barf.

I think the main thing I've heard is to avoid the red district type places at night, but I think that much is obvious.
But I've heard people talk about the cheap deals on love hotels as an accommodation type. But I'll be over there, in safe town, in my boring little Airbnb with no red hot tub, and that's okay.

That Awkward Restaurant Feeling

Okay, you got me there. It's not quite the same eating at a restaurant with a phone to keep you company, but you're not the only one. In fact, if you look at noodle shops in the morning, there's tons of business guys slurping down their food like there's no tomorrow. All alone. And there's even a ramen restaurant that emphasizes the solo experience by offering cubby booths for one instead of tables. You can find a place. You can do it.

Selfies

And it's not the same when every picture with you in it is a selfie or as a result of asking a stranger to hold your phone. I found it harder to break out of "alone face" when I wanted to take a picture. A small price to pay for Ultimate Freedom.

Ultimate Freedom

Here's the thing: You can do anything you want, for as long as you want, and totally change plans with no arguments. If you need 10 minutes to look at a window display of crepes just because, nobody will stop you. No listening to complaints or conversations about disappointment or making compromises. It's your headspace, uncluttered and ready to explore.

Got Myself a URL

I still Try Japan, but now I do it on my own URL: www.itryjapan.com Right now, it's a bit focused on my upcoming trip. And instead of blog posts, I'm dividing it up into webcomic form and videos. I'd like to think it's even more edutainmenty than ever.

Japanese Kit Kats Review

The fact is you like Japanese Kit Kats. A million flavors are possible, and they change from season to season. A rainbow of awesomeness. Here's my treasure trove I squirreled away in 2013:

So here is:
* Matcha with Sakura
* Matcha
* Strawberry
* Yatsuhashi (those cinnamony cookie things in Kyoto)
* Roasted Green Tea
* Dark Chocolate/Adult
* Blueberry Cheesecake
* Passionfruit (also adult line).
Some of these came from a former coworker who went in early Summer, some from when I went in the Fall.

There's actually only a few that are really milk or dark chocolate. It's mostly white chocolate so you can get the subtler fruity/desserty/beverage flavor.

Kit Kat Review:

Roasted Green Tea: A creamy, distinctly tea flavor. Like black tea, which shouldn't be surprising, because black tea is roasted, I think. Novel in that it tastes right, but not my favorite.

Blueberry Cheesecake. Kinda a bit on the fake side, and just okayish. Fake cheesecake is never all that great a facsimile. Blueberry is subtle and meh.

Yatsuhashi: One of my favs. Tiny crunchy yatsuhashi cookie pieces, nice balance of cinnamon. Excellent flavor and texture.

Strawberry. After you try the first one and say, oh yes! Strawberry! Then it's a little plain. Just okay for me. Maybe they should have called it "Strawberries and Cream".

I think this one is the Matcha and Sakura one. Slighly lighter in color, and the matcha might be toned down just a little bit so the slightly sweet/fruity sakura can play. I can't say, "Wow, this is so sakura here," because I never had the real deal. Is it suppose to be cherry-y? Pretty subtle, whatever it is.

One of the Otona/Adult flavors. It's a little darker and has a fine sandy texture, which sounds bad, but I really love it.One of my favs. After all that sweet white chocolate, it's a nice change of pace back to the heart of chocolate.

Passion Fruit: Like the other Otona/Adult one, it has a sort of sandy finish, which I still love. And the flavor is awesome. I love passion fruit flavor. Tangy like a sophisticated pineapple. This is great.

Matcha: It's one of the best sellers, and the reason is that it's good. Matcha has a definite green tea flavor that you don't have to replicate. It's there, and you know who's boss. Mossy musky bitter green tea meets creamy, sweet, crispy Kit Kat. It's all good.

I can't help but continue to look for more and more flavors. Another one of my favorites, not shown, is the dark honey/molasses flavor. I hear apple is really good, and that always makes an appearance, I think. I always wanted to try pumpkin, too. I regretted trying Wasabi, but I wouldn't mind some of the weirder ones, corn or soy sauce or ginger ale.
Oh yeah, and I really want to try this one!:

Yaki Kitto Katto!? Baked Kit Kats?? Yeah!
Check out more stuff in the official Breaktown.

Japanese Low Table Part III: Joining the Tabletop Boards

Since I spend a good bit of money on these mahogany boards, I want this done right.

So I was a little wary of putting my own hands to work. But I have Dad! And Dad has Wood Wizard Neighbor! If you want to look at my plans and dimensions, check out my earlier post. Here we go.

Step 1: Join the table top.
Three boards must become one. Flip them around, decide which layout and wood color variation pattern you like. Pinch them together with clamps. Dad dragged the pencil across a few time to make line that can be lined up later if need be.

He sanded some of the rougher inside edges so the board-to-board connection was a little more tight. Once clamped, he and the Wizard also banged these board in place with a mallet for maximum perfect smooth awesomeness. The point here is that you get it the way you want it so you can make the pencil lines at the places you want to put biscuits...

You can wedge these suckers in wide-side-in and the wood will become pretty well stuck together. When I say "wedge" them in, you have to make a biscuit-sized hole to do that. So you need a biscuit-cutter tool. The bottom has a clear plate that you can line up with your biscuit-purposed pencil marks. Like so:

You could start the gluing at this point, but wait: The Wood Wizard had an addition method of making these boards joined together like...like...

...like something really joined. Anyway, that method uses a little silver L-shaped thing that, once clamped on, allows one to drill holes at a diagonal into the wood to that you can actually use screws without the danger of breaking through the top.

You can sand off the rough bit there. Now you have a perfect little tunnel for your screw. Time to glue.

The glue- Gorilla Wood Glue- goes in a line over/down into the biscuit hole. Then apply the biscuits as shown. Then the oozing beads of glue can be spread out and maybe a thin line of glue goes across the whole edge of that board, spread down like jam a little bit. I think once the other biscuit holes on the other board are glued, you don't need an addition line on that side. Speaking of glue, the work surface was covered in wax paper. Good idea, huh?

Note: If you're using quick-set glue, make sure you have a wet rag handy to wipe up the oozey bits. NOW!

Yay! Now all that's left is to clamp it, maybe mallet-whack a little if you're trying to even things out, then screw in the screws after that. The Wizard reminded us that once the biscuits are in, the mallet-whacking will only do so much.  Don't forget to screw in the screws. Dad used a hand screwdriver. You can see below the 6 screw holes along the middle board.

It needs to be clamped for however long your glue tells you- 20 minutes or whatever. Then unclamp and voila!

Once it gets 24 hours of setting, then it's ready for more action. Like sanding. Hope that blue end there goes away.

Japanese Low Table Part II: Picking out the Wood

Ah, wood, the stuff of trees! If you look at any of your furniture, you'll notice it's actually pretty crappy. That's because everything is particle board these days.
Ikea's stock of particles outside factory:

Maybe you have something nice that says it is made of hardwood. That means it has a thin layer of nice hardwood over top your crap fake wood. What I'm saying here is that I wanted to use some decent wood to make my table.

I went with mahogany because it's a great hardwood for furniture, has a bit of a pretty reddish color. You don't really need to stain it...leave as is and after twenty years of chipping the crap out of it with your
ninja stars, just sand it down, maybe reseal it. Try that on your BORGSJÖ. 

Home Depot and Lowe's don't have mahogany. The lumber yard is the way to go. (No shame in harboring Home Depot love for you oak and pine fans.) The lumber yard has some precut planed stuff, but this stuff was unplaned, 14 feet long. For a small fee, they'll plane and cut it for you. That way it has a consistent width and 90 degree angles all over the place. We look the entire 14' 1-inch thick board and 18 inches from a 2-inch thick board (for the legs. We wanted 12 inches, but 18 was the minimum.). Plane time.

 From all that effort (and the discovery that they gave away their planed scraps so we nabbed a long bit of cedar wood to play with), we have this:

You can almost picture the table top here. Our next step is to glue and biscuit (like jamming a wood cookie into both edges) the 3 pieces together for the table top. Then we can treat it as 1 big table top piece and sand it down all together. Stay tuned.