East Meets Old West

One of my buddies (and also fellow coworker), started his own clothing company called Yancha Digs. It’s philosophy is the mixture of samurai culture and skateboarding culture. They have all kinds of cool designs mixing the two together in interesting ways. Recently I got a shirt from them which throws together two of my favourite things.

Clint Eastwood and samurai swords. How perfect is this combination! Especially since the “Man with no name” character was based on some Kurosawa samurai movies to begin with. Currently this shirt is classified as a prototype, and not for sale, but there are lots of other cool designs on the site and more being created all the time. So check out they’re site and buy something if you like it. They have all kinds of stuff, T-shirts, hoodies, even skate decks. It’s all available at Yancha Digs.

Damage

I’m finally back on the internet again after almost a week. Things are starting to get semi-normal. We have power, internet, and telephone (land line and cell). We still don’t have water yet (so I’m probably pretty stinky now), and most of the stores are still closed, so getting food can be a bit difficult sometimes. We still have enough to eat though. We also can’t get any gasoline, and the trains are not even close to running any time soon. It’s not so bad though, considering how some people are having a much worse time right now.

Anyways here’s some photos of the damage around my neighborhood. It’s nowhere near as bad as some of the stuff you’ve probably seen on TV. In fact it’s kind of trivial compared to the tsunami damage.The first three are at our house. The earthquake almost toppled the wall behind our house.

It’s actually very lucky that it fell away from the house. Below is a stone ornament thing in our garden. The earthquake just shattered it to pieces.

During the earthquake I was standing near it, and didn’t even notice it falling down (or the wall for that matter). Everything was shaking so much and for so long, I thought it was never going to end. I could barely even stand up. I had to hold onto a post, but I still had problems keeping my feet on the ground. It was easily the most terrifying thing I’ve ever experienced.

Below is several photos of my immediate neighborhood.

Most of the worst damage was to older buildings. Below a temple gate fell right over.

Some of the streets just cracked right open. When I was driving the other day I saw a crack in the road almost half a foot wide. Also I saw a section where the road sank over a foot! These are smaller ones just down the street from my house.

Since the earthquake we’ve experienced almost constant aftershocks.  Some quite substantial too. In fact some of the aftershocks have been stronger than earthquakes we’ve had before. Thankfully it’s starting to settle down to one or two every couple of hours. So that’s the current up date as it stands so far.

Oh by the way I forgot to mention that the inside of our house was completely trashed. Stuff was everywhere, and a lot of it was broken. One thing that surprised me was one of our heavy shelves actually had moved a foot and a half sideways! Also our fridge toppled over and hit a shelf . I found it sitting diagonal with the doors wide open and the food all over the ground.

Sendai at Night

Here’s some photos I took downtown in Sendai with my new camera. Enjoy!

Rakuten Eagles

A couple of weeks ago the wife and I went to see a Rakuten Eagles game. They’re the pro baseball team for Sendai. Usually I don’t go to sporting events, but I was interested to experience what a Japanese baseball game was like. The perfect opportunity came up when my wife won free tickets to a game at her work.

Having been to some baseball games back in Canada I can tell you it was a different experience. It seemed like it was faster paced. Maybe it was the fact that something was always going on during the game. Almost to the point of distraction. Especially when it came time for everyone to send up these whistling balloons. I couldn’t even see the game! I took a shot video where you can hear some of the songs the fans sing during the game. It’s almost like a soccer match.

For some reason my camera didn’t like the bright stadium lights in the video.

What was strange was after the sixth inning the had dancers come out and then there was fireworks. I guess they have a sixth inning stretch and not a seventh. You can see in the photo below we were quite a distance away, but what can you expect when the tickets are free.

One of the best parts was that you can bring two drinks into the game with you (unfortunately I didn’t know about this until we got to the stadium). Including beer!! Oh, if only I had known!

Kebabs in Sendai!!!

Thanks to a tip from one of my students, and a through search of the internet by my wife, I have found what I consider to be the “Holy Grail” in Sendai. An actual kebab restaurant!!

As you can see in my hastily taken, extremely poor quality photo (I accidentally took it at ISO 1600. That’s what happens when you last took star photos, and you’re in too much of a hurry to check the setting dial) its name is テラトルコ which is “Tera Toruko”.  “Toruko” is the Japanese name for Turkey by the way, hence the crescent moons in the windows. The shop apparently just opened up in March. Well, the day after I found out about it, I rushed post haste to sample their wares. I had two different sandwiches, a chicken with yogurt sauce and a beef with chili sauce. They were both super  good. I recommend that anyone living in Sendai area, and is in the mood for some Middle Eastern food check it out!  A couple of websites that have some info on the shop are right here (TeraToruko Blog, Sendai blog info) it’s all in Japanese by the way.

The Viking

Yesterday I went to my father-in-laws place of work, Sendai Hotel, for an excellent and expensive buffet. It was fantastic to say the least. All of the food was really high quality, and plus there was unlimited beer to drink. I drank almost 4 litres!

They also had some carnival like games. I found out that I’m a crack shot with a cork gun in the target shooting game. Even after ingesting large amounts of beer. Now you might be wondering why I called this post “The Viking”. Well Japanese people don’t usually say buffet, they call it a viking. No doubt due to it’s links to the Swedish tradition of smorgasbord.

Mandai Shoten

Last night after dinner we stopped by “Mandai Shoten”. It’s kind of a used item shop or as the Japanese call it, a “recycle” shop. They sell all kinds of cool things. The store is a little bit hip, and also has loud music playing in every corner of the store.

Some of the different sections that they have are: video games, manga, DVD, CD, clothes, shoes, toys and figures, musical instruments, fishing gear, and even airsoft and paintball guns. It’s quite an interesting shop. For those interested, and that live in Sendai, it can be found on the Sendai by-pass  just south of Minami Sendai station.

Mc Hot Dog And A Quarter Pound

There are two new things at McDonalds recently. The first being the “Mc Hot Dog”, which is basically just a normal hot dog. I haven’t tried it yet, because it is on the breakfast menu. Yes, the breakfast menu.

In my opinion hot dogs are more a lunch or dinner type food. Maybe someday if I wake up early enough I might get to have one. The other new thing is really not new at all. Well, it’s new for Sendai that is. It’s the old classic the “Quarter Pounder”.

Until just a little while ago Japan did not have the Quarter Pounder. Now it’s slowly spreading around Japan. Currently you can only buy it at two stores in Sendai. I have inside information that it will be available at all of the stores later this month. Also the “Cheese Katsu” burger is back from it’s year long slumber. I wrote about it before here.

Showa Restaurant

On Friday the wife and I went to a “Showa” themed restaurant in Nagamachi. The traditional Japanese way of measuring years is not the same as the rest of the world. It’s measured by the the time the emperor is in power. So the “Showa” period was from 1926-1989. The numbering starts over with every period. So I was born in Showa year 50. Right now is the Heisei period. Anyways, it’s a complicated system, but that’s not the point of this post. Basically the restaurant is nostalgia themed.

As you can tell from the old fashion exterior. They also have old movie posters on the outside of the restaurant.

The inside is made to look like an old style neighborhood. You feel like you’re walk the back alleys of some old area.

The atmosphere was cool and the food was really good. It was basically your usual Japanese pub food. They also had huge beers, and special rates for all you can drink. I think we’ll definitely go back sometime.

Vindaloo

Today I went to Yamaya in Minami Sendai and found the holy grail of Indian curries in Japan. Packages of spice paste to make Vindaloo! It’s the first time I’ve seen it at a store since I came to Japan.

I think the reason it’s hard to find is Japanese people usually can’t handle spicy food. What they say is really spicy over here is actually not that spicy at all. Vindaloo being very spicy would generally make it very unpopular dish for delicate Japanese tongues. Somebody was adventurous at Yamaya though, throwing caution at the wind when ordering it. Well, I say thank you to that man. Don’t worry, I will buy all of your stock!