I thought it was important to post this because for me it’s important for others to understand and appreciate the enormous level of convenience in Japan. On the night I had eaten this feast I was staying at a business hotel in Kanazawa, which was about a 20 minute walk to KenrokuGardens.
Anytime I visit a new prefecture I always sample the local food at the local market first and then the nihonshu because for me it’s central in understanding the people. Kanazawa people, like most Japanese, love seafood and can create almost anything out of it. I love Japanese seafood, but the style and presentation of seafood in Kanagawa and Tokyo do not rival this part of Japan on a convenience store level. It is not like what can be found in Tokyo or Kanagawa where the sushi rolls are typical and uninteresting or no sushi at all in many convenience stores.
In the pictures you can see a famous Ishikawa brand called “kagatsuru.” This sake is like the “Kubota” of Niigata but with subtle differences in aroma and texture. Burikama, the meat around the fish’s gills, is a local favorite of this region. The second food item wrapped in a green leaf is called “sasano hazushii,” which is unique to this part of Japan also. You see, there’s lots of uniqueness in Japan and in its many prefectures. This meal cost me under 3000 yen and I wasn’t even able to finish it all.
I'm a sake and fine foods connoisseur specializing in local and regional rice wines and cuisines in Japan. I am a self published author of two books; one on hot springs and the other on nihonshu. I am also a cultural immersions instructor by trade and a life transitions counselor that oversees and assist people with life overseas.
Self Published Coffee Table Books: One on sake and the other on Japanese onsen: # ISBN:978-4-9904068-0-6/ The Soul of Japan. Japanese Sake# ISBN: 978-4-9904068-1-3. Both books are fully listed.
Kenrokuen Gardens of Ishikawa Prefecture
One of Japan's Three Most Beautiful Gardens
Korakuen Gardens of Okayama Prefecture
One of Japan's Top Three Gardens
Kairakuen of Mito
The Third Most Beautiful Garden in Japan
The Onsen
Snow Cooled Nihonshu
Nihonshu, nihonshu, nihonshu. I can feel the warmth FEEL down my throat as if the warmth is another living organism in itself feeling me as I feel it. I'm being drank.
Welcome Message
This blog is about Japan and its four fundamental charms: sake, onsen, shinto shrines and delicious cuisines. In this blog I have captured some of the everyday pleasures that many Japanese take for granted nowadays. I also want readers to understand that there is a spiritual harmony and beauty in Japan which can be found in its symbols. The Tenno, Mishima Yukio, Jukujo, Sushi, the Hot Spring, and Shrines, are for me the ideal symbols of Japan in my opinion.
On Mishima, a functional schizophrenic who was a five time Nobel Prize nominee, had a vision of a spiritual army that would protect the emperor, which could be symbolic in protecting old traditions and values. That through this army he would prove his love and loyalty to the Son of heaven through self disembowelment . This form of expression which was committed at the very height of Mishima's physical beauty and maturity was considered the most dignified way to die.
"Mishima felt that at the very height of ones beauty it is better to die then than to be remembered being in a state of decrepitude at ones death."
Beauty can come in many forms and can be expressed in many ways. But one must first define a sense of beauty first - mine is this blog. I too, like Mishima, focus on the 'old way' but through another form of expression, I also feel that many things in Japan should never change and should be protected at all cost. One thing that's just as painful as the death of the Soul of a Nation that's spinning out of control, is the impending doom of a culture fast becoming too Westernized for its own good.
On a final note: Jukujo, for me, represent the ultimate beauty that a Japanese woman could aspire to attain, and although Mishima was homosexual, he found beauty in women also.
The term"jukujo" itself could come off a bit negative to some listeners, but it depends. The term literally means ripe and well developed Japanese women in their thirties and forties , and up depending how far you want to take it. Jukujo are very intuitive, intelligent and extremely nurturing.
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