The Way The Nori Rolls

An update

amy_palfreyman — Wed, 11 Aug 2010 18:50:00 GMT

Hey all. Just a very quick update to let you know I've started up a new website called These Roads. Setting up this little baby has been a fantastic learning experience and I'm really enjoying getting my stuff out there for people to enjoy.

Aside from embracing my inner geek with my website, I've been busy setting up some work with a big-name guidebook you might know and am super excited for a big research project I'll be embarking on in a few months time... but more on that later when everything is settled.

Anyway, pop on over to my site and have a read - I'd love to see you there!

Until next time...

The End

amy_palfreyman — Wed, 31 Mar 2010 13:43:00 GMT

Well, that’s about it from me and my adventures in Japan for the World Nomads travel writing scholarship... for now at least. I intend to continue posting at this address with updates on what I’m up to in the world of travel writing… which, if all goes to plan, will be a lot of things!

Since returning from Japan, my life has taken on quite a different shape – I’ve been discussing future assignments with the Rough Guide, have been interviewed by local media and am generally still trying to get my head around how to earn a crust as freelance writer. It’s all very new to me and the learning curve has been steep, but I’m really enjoying myself and am excited for what the future holds.

One of the main things I’ve gleaned from this experience is that the life of a guide book writer isn’t as easy or leisurely as one may imagine. The days are looooooong and invariably draining – both physically and mentally. You have to be incredibly motivated, energetic and flexible, switched on 24/7 and unafraid to throw yourself into the unknown at any given second… but this also makes the job really exciting, a lot of fun and definitely something I’m pursuing wholeheartedly.

As a newbie to this game, the thing I’ve had to work hardest at is training myself to produce quality writing to a deadline over and over again – I’ve still got a long way to go (the fact that I’m still blogging a month after my return is testament to this), but I’m getting faster at it and finding it easier every day… practice, practice, practice.

I would like to say a massive thank you to World Nomads for giving me this insanely cool opportunity – people plug away for years to get even just a taste of what you’ve handed to me on a sushi covered silver platter. This scholarship has been life changing in the best way possible and for that my gratitude has no bounds.

To my travel-writing sensei/mentor/guru, Simon Richmond; it was a privilege to meet you and learn from you. It was also a whole lot of fun. Thank you, from the bottom of my Anpanman-loving heart for all you have done for me – your patience, encouragement and guidance ensured that I got more out of this experience than I could have ever hoped for… when I grow up, I want to be just like you.

Thanks also to everyone who has been following my blog and for all your comments (even if most of them came from my friends posing as random strangers)… the idea that anyone other than my mother would read what I write is really quite cool.

Oh, and I hope for world peace.

Watch this space…

'Smoking Manners' ... funny stuff.

amy_palfreyman — Wed, 31 Mar 2010 13:24:00 GMT

Under a thick cloud of smoke on many a Tokyo street corner you’re likely to find dozens of people huddled around designated smoking areas, frantically puffing away on cigarettes and, sadly, seemingly unaware of the immense humour that lays before them on the ashtrays… in sticker form.

Allow me to elaborate. Concerned with the image of it’s 30million or so smokers, Japan Tobacco has, over the years, released a series of public service announcements pertaining to ‘smoking manners’ in a bid to educate the nation’s smokers on the preferred smoking etiquette. These announcements prevail as large stickers displayed on the giant ashtrays around the streets. They can be seen from a mile away, which is a good thing as it means everyone gets to share in the fun, because, intentionally or not, these signs are truly hilarious.

While in Japan, I managed to photograph a lot of these signs (which you can view here), but with over 70 in the official collection, it wasn’t possible for me to get them all … the rest I’ve tracked down online and you can view them here.

Enjoy!

Photos: 'Smoking Manners' ... funny stuff

amy_palfreyman — Wed, 31 Mar 2010 13:10:00 GMT

Japan Tobacco's 'Smoking Manners' campaign has produced some seriously funny stickers around town. Love it.

Asakusa By Night

amy_palfreyman — Wed, 31 Mar 2010 09:58:00 GMT

By day it’s a bustling tourist centre of sightseeing and shopping, but when the sun goes down and the bulk of the tourists take their weary feet elsewhere, the shops on Nakamise Dori close their shutters for the night and a very different looking Asakusa comes into view.

After dark, the shutters of the Asakusa shops are an attraction unto themselves – covered in brightly painted murals that are the work of local artists from the Tokyo National Uiversity of Fine Arts and Music, the Asakusa Emaki (Asakusa Scrolls) on the 89 shop fronts along Nakamise Dori depict traditional and seasonal events connected to Nakamise and Senso-ji temple.

For me, the real treat is in the laneways that run off the Nakamise Dori, where some of the most colourful and interesting murals can be found – many of them painted by local artist Katori Senko whose brilliant work depicts scenes from popular Kabuki plays. I ran into Katori Senko one morning while he was working on his latest mural and could have happily watched him paint for hours. His artwork is an Asakusa institution, the memory of which will be long lasting from this trip to Japan.

Between sunset and 11pm, the artwork around the Nakamise Dori is lit up for viewing, or you can check it out before the shops open around 10am. Either way, the art around Asakusa is well worth an after-hours visit.

Photos

Photos: Asakusa By Night

amy_palfreyman — Wed, 31 Mar 2010 09:19:00 GMT

Asakusa in different light. When shop shutters in and around Nakamise Dori showcase the work of local artists.

One Crazy Night in Shinjuku

amy_palfreyman — Tue, 30 Mar 2010 13:34:00 GMT

For my last weekend in Tokyo, Simon organised a mystery dinner and drinks adventure in Shinjuku that I think showcases both the diversity of activities a travel writer like Simon engages in, and the randomness of Tokyo quite well (Simon aptly called it ‘an offbeat gourmet safari’ in his blog post about our adventures that night). In just one night across a few city blocks, we got a taste of the old school pre-war days, the modern and ultra kitsch and the très suave and cool of Tokyo.

We began the night at the Asadachi restaurant in Shinjuku’s Piss Alley. Apparently ‘Asadachi’ means something along the lines of ‘morning wood’, which is appropriate given the restaurant’s claims that it’s dishes improve virility. And, as I alluded to in an earlier post, these dishes also improve my gag reflex and desire to become a vegetarian… eating whole grilled lizards on a stick and a bowl of codfish sperm will do that to a person. A crazy Tokyo adventure in gastronomy, yes. A place to discover my new favourite dish, no. I’m just glad that one of Asadachi’s signature dishes wasn’t available that night given that it was the reason Simon took me there… I think eating a still beating frog’s heart may have tipped me over the edge.

After this hilarious and slightly traumatising meal, we headed around the corner for part two of our dinner extravaganza. Alice in Fantasy Book is an Alice in Wonderland themed restaurant in Shinjuku that is certainly up there in the weird stakes, however, as Simon and I discovered, it left a lot to be desired in the food deliciousness ratings and really could have used the Alice theme a lot better than it has. So instead of being wowed by the restaurant we nibbled on our too sweet Cheshire cat pizza and sipped on theme named cocktails while we amused ourselves watching horrified men who’d obviously been dragged to Alice on a date and were stunned into silence by love-heart shaped portions of meat and pink pasta dishes… now that was funny.

The final instalment of the night saw us in La Jetée bar in Shinjuku’s Golden Gai district – a few laneway blocks packed with some 200 bars, each so tiny they would struggle to hold my immediate family. The Frenchy La Jetée bar is one of few bars in the Golden Gai that is tourist friendly and it boasts a rather famous clientele with big film industry names like Francis Ford Coppola and Quentin Tarantino keeping a bottle of behind the bar there. Kicking back with a few Japanese whiskeys and some French movie talk with the owner and her French clientele was a perfect way to wrap up the night.

Photos

Photos: One crazy night in Shinjuku

amy_palfreyman — Tue, 30 Mar 2010 13:08:00 GMT

It's all in the broth; Otafuku Oden Restaurant, Tokyo

amy_palfreyman — Tue, 30 Mar 2010 11:24:00 GMT

In an earlier post I wrote about some of the more questionable things I’ve eaten in Tokyo and promised to write another post about one meal in particular… a meal that was cooked in a broth that literally has not been changed for over 6 decades. Sounds gross? Tastes amazing!

Oden is a Japanese dish similar to the Chinese ‘hot pot’. It’s soup/stew-like quality makes for excellent winter food and can be enjoyed by vegetable and meat lovers alike. Anything from eggs, tofu and vegetables to shark meat, beef, fish balls and whale tongue can be found bubbling away in a vat of broth from which you continue to order away, dish by dish, until you’re sufficiently full and need to be wheeled home – well, that’s how full I was when Simon, Tatsuya and I visited Otafuku, an oden restaurant in Taito, Tokyo.

Sitting at the old wooden counter in Otafuku, the neon and bustle of modern Tokyo was left behind and we were transported back 80 years to the time when this restaurant was first opened. Sipping on delicious pine-scented sake, we got talking to the oden chef behind the counter who mentioned that the reason the broth our food was cooking in was so tasty (and thus why this restaurant is so popular) is that it had not been changed since the end of the Second World War…

“The recipe hasn’t been changed, you mean?” was my obvious query to this statement… “No, the broth is the same. They don’t make a new broth, they just add a to this one each day”, Tatsuya said, “As the broth evaporates, they add more water… it’s the different things that are always cooking that give the flavour”. He went on to explain that each evening the broth is removed from the copper pot to be drained (and the pot cleaned – phew!). It’s then put back into the pot and covered (not refrigerated) over night and heated again the next afternoon until the end of dinner service. The chef also explained that oden restaurants should always have wooden window and door fittings as they allow a little air in to circulate which is better for the broth.

“Well, that’s fairly gross” was all I kept thinking at the time, but then I figured that although this kind of thing certainly wouldn’t fly back home, it’s a tried and tested practice here – and I have to admit, the food was delicious AND I didn’t die from freakishly old broth induced food poisoning, so, yeah, now I’m all for eating food that is older than my parents! Woo hoo!

Photos: Tokyo - San

amy_palfreyman — Tue, 30 Mar 2010 10:47:00 GMT

English is joyful with foreign countries

amy_palfreyman — Mon, 29 Mar 2010 13:00:00 GMT

Spend any amount of time in Asia and you’re bound to stumble across some fine examples of misused English that, to the proficient English speaker, can be pretty amusing.

Over the years some lovely signs have told me to “glide with care” in a Chinese hostel shower, warned me against “striding” and “stampeding” at Indian train stations and told not to “litre” in a national park in Laos. I’ve been enticed into a “surprise meat” restaurant in Korea, drank “lame juice” in Vietnam and was welcomed to a “defecation free” town in Nepal.

Japlish / Janglish (Japanese-English), Konglish (Korean-English), Chinglish (Chinese-English), Khmerlish (Khmer-English), Laolish (Lao-English), Vietlish (Vietnamese-English), Hindlish (Hindi-Enlish) – call it what you will, it all falls under the greater banner of what is widely referred to as ‘EngRish’ – and, in my humble opinion, it’s awesome.

The term ‘Engrish’ can denote hybrid English loanwords adapted into the local vernacular, but generally it refers to (usually hilarious) grammatical and spelling errors or mistranslations of English found mostly on signs, menus, t-shirts and other miscellaneous products in non-English environments (usually in Asia, but not exclusively). The term comes from a common mispronunciation of the word ‘English’ by native speakers of some East Asian languages that do not have distinctive ‘R’ and ‘L’ sounds (for example, Japanese and Korean) resulting in ‘r’s and ‘l’s being swapped or sounding much the same as each other… English becomes Engrish, Lunch becomes Runch.

Capturing examples of Engrish on camera is a little hobby of mine, and over the last 2 years I’ve built up a collection of some 300 photos of pure Engrish gold. But I’m not the only one who welcomes an oddly translated sign here and there, Engrish has gained a large, international following with countless appreciation societies and websites dedicated solely to the wonderful world of Engrish (see, for example, Engrish.com – the mecca for all things Engrish).

You can make your own Engrish by simply translating an English sentence to another language on web-based translation sites such as babelfish.yahoo.com and then translating it back into English again (I find Japanese, Korean and Chinese work best). Another fun Engrish related site is translation party... give it a go.

Reverse Engrish (the misuse of other languages in English speaking environments) is equally as fun… particularly when found in tattoo form. See Hanzi Smatter for a wonderful showcase of botched Chinese characters in Western society.

Click here for Engrish photos from my recent trip to Japan... a few of my old favourites.

I including sincerity, desire the fact that you obtain the joy from the gallery of the photograph of my Engrish! (I hope you enjoy my Engrish photo galleries!)

Photos: English is joyful with foreign countries

amy_palfreyman — Mon, 29 Mar 2010 11:20:00 GMT

A collection of some of my favourite Engrish.

The Way of Tea (Japanese Tea Ceremony), Andon Ryokan

amy_palfreyman — Sat, 27 Mar 2010 12:39:00 GMT

Given the ritualised and formal nature of Japanese culture, it’s little wonder that in Japan, even the simple cup of tea has an entire ceremony in its honour.

Through the influences of Zen Buddhism, the commonplace practice of tea drinking has been moulded into a spiritual custom emphasising calmness, contemplation, mental discipline and respect for others. Chanoyu (tea ceremony or ‘Way of Tea’ as it is often known) follows a series of aesthetically crafted steps, each laden with deeper meaning and significance - far more complex than dumping some tea powder in a cup with hot water. Every movement of the hand, flick of the wrist, turn of the fingers is beautifully designed to represent tranquillity, respect, harmony and purity. It is a stunningly complex procedure reflecting the values of this ancient culture… and it is fascinating to watch.

While in Tokyo, Simon and I attended a tea ceremony at the Andon Ryokan - an award winning architectural masterpiece and hotel in Taiko-ku near Ueno and Asakusa. The Andon Ryokan holds a small tea ceremony three times a month instructed by Mr. Soyu Maruyama, master of the Soan tea style for 40 years, where participants first observe the correct process of preparing matcha (green powdered tea) before trying their own hand at the art.

In addition to a tricky method of preparation, drinking the tea is not a straightforward matter – guests in a tea ceremony must follow a series of actions prior to, during and after their tea drinking. Resting the Chawan (tea cup) on the palm of their left hand while supporting it with the right, the guest turns the cup twice in a clockwise direction before placing it to their left and asking their neighbour permission to drink. Once permission is granted, the guest takes one sip and compliments the host on the tea’s fine taste. The guest then takes another sip and then finishes the cup with a further noisy slurp to indicate satisfaction, before wiping the rim of the cup, rotating it back two turns anticlockwise and placing it down with their right hand.

As Mr. Maruyama prepared the super-strength bitter green tea for the 6 foreigners in our gathering, we clumsily bumbled our way through the formalities of the occasion; accidentally using the wrong hand to pick up the cup, turning it more or fewer times than is required and stifling giggles at each others slurps, whisking incorrectly, adding too much water and so on, we quickly realised the mental discipline and attention to process that is required of this ceremony. The lovely Mr. Maruyama was as patient as ever with us – his philosophy is that anyone, anywhere at anytime can learn the Way of Tea and he is happy to teach those who wish to learn.

At the end of the ceremony Mr. Maruyama made a beeline for the coffee machine and gulped down two cups in rapid succession, “Ah. I like coffee”, said the tea master with a smile.

Photos

Photos: The Way of Tea (Japanese Tea Ceremony)

amy_palfreyman — Sat, 27 Mar 2010 12:14:00 GMT

Hadaka Matsuri - The Naked Festival : Coming this winter to a Shinto shrine near you!

amy_palfreyman — Wed, 24 Mar 2010 01:11:00 GMT

I recently spent a day surrounded by a few dozen semi-naked, mud-smeared Japanese men… oh, and one semi-naked, mud-smeared American. Yep, it was loincloths, bums and mud as far as the eye could see and it was all done in the name of good fortune in crop harvest, health and makin’ babies.

Welcome to the Hadaka Matsuri (naked festival), a fun-filled ancient Japanese ceremony, that takes place at Shinto shrines around Japan each winter. This incredibly bizarre festival basically involves local men stripping down to a loincloth to run up and down a hill a few times while flinging a lot of mud at spectators and each other… oh, and there are a few bouts of human pyramid wrestling (where one small slip of the cloth could spell disaster) thrown in for good measure.

It might sound a little weird, but this is not the only time I’ve witnessed something like this… If you take the words ‘Japanese men’ and ‘one semi-naked… American’ and replace them with ‘Korean men and women’ and ‘hundreds of semi-naked… Americans’ then you’d have a fairly good description of my first super muddy Asian experience – the Boreyong Mud Festival at Daecheon Beach, South Korea (that is, if you forget the bits about good fortune and crop harvest and baby making … well, maybe not the baby making part – wink wink, nudge nudge).

Both Korea’s mud festival and Japan’s naked festival involve scantily clad participants with a penchant for slinging mud. Both are annual events and both are a hell of a lot of fun to be in town for, but this is more or less where the similarities end.

Korea’s Boreyong mud festival is a 9-day social extravaganza open to anyone who cares to mud-up (and many unsuspecting bystanders who don’t). There are mud slides, obstacle courses, games and even a ‘mud prison’ where those who feel they are not grubby enough can enter to be sprayed with the dirty stuff. Basically it’s just an excuse for Koreans and waegukin (foreigners) to hit the beach during the unbearably hot month of July to enjoy some impressive fireworks, some less impressive musical acts and a whole lot of drinking. Aside from promoting the healing properties of the local mud (and, let’s be serious, no one remembers this through their soju hangovers anyway), there’s no greater purpose or significance to this mud festival… it’s just really, really, really fun.

While also a lot of fun, the Hadaka Matsuri, is a religious rite celebrated to bring good fortune for the forthcoming harvest season and good health to the new babies in the community (even if, at first glance, it does look a bit like a college fraternity party gone wild). Although it is open for public viewing, only local male residents may participate in the festival and, as I understand it, they must have fathered a child in the last year or be hoping to have a child in the next year (this seemed to be the case at the Mimasubi Shrine in Yotsukaido, Chiba-ken anyway). Between throwing a Shinto priest in the air a few times and a lot of running around and muscle-flexing, the men mark the faces of their children and of people in the crowd with mud, giving the recipient good luck. By the end of the festival, Simon and I looked like two pretty lucky people... but not quite as lucky as this kid.

Photos

Photos: Warabi Hadaka Matsuri - The Naked Festival

amy_palfreyman — Wed, 24 Mar 2010 01:02:00 GMT

A Shinto ritual that sees semi-naked men get muddy in the name of good fortune.

Origami Kaikan, Tokyo

amy_palfreyman — Mon, 22 Mar 2010 16:44:00 GMT

For a real origami treat in Tokyo, look no further than the Origami Kaikan in Ochanomizu. Established in 1859, the Origami kaikan houses an impressive display of origami creations in addition to an origami school, a workshop that manufactures of washi (a fibrous paper made from pulped tree bark) and a shop selling a whole manner of washi and origami related products.

Simon and I popped into the Origami Kaikan with the intention of staying just a few minutes... and emerged over an hour later after forcing ourselves to keep moving to avoid obliterating our schedule.

Between stunning origami displays and watching the making and decorating of washi paper, we were thoroughly entertained and when one of the kaikan staff invited us to join an instructional origami class, well, we could hardly refuse… nor could we refuse the offer for a second class! After making paper cranes (that can also double up as sweet-holders for dinner parties) and a pair of ‘hot lips’, we were introduced to Mr. Kobayashi Kazuo – chairman of the kaikan, origami master and, as we soon discovered, author of a fantastic origami book that both Simon and I had both purchased in Matsumoto the previous week!

Mr. Kazuo has been practicing origami for over 30 years, displaying all this experience when, with only so much as the occasional quick glance down to his hands, he expertly made a pair of intricately folded, 5-paper kimono dolls (and very kindly gave them to us as a gift as we left the centre!)

The Origami kaikan is free to enter and often offers impromptu origami classes like the ones Simon and I took part in. Ongoing and more complex classes are also offered for a fee. It’s something a little different to break up a day of sightseeing and what’s more is that the cute origami kits and stunning handmade washi paper on sale make for great presents when you get home.

photos

Photos: Origami Kaikan, Tokyo

amy_palfreyman — Mon, 22 Mar 2010 16:40:00 GMT

Popopure Maid Café, Akihabara

amy_palfreyman — Mon, 22 Mar 2010 14:48:00 GMT

If Tokyo is the world capital for weirdness, then Akihabara would have to be its pulsating heart. In this district, famous of its electronics and anime, you can find everything from computer parts and popcorn machines to gaming outlets, manga galore and even entire department stores dedicated exclusively to X-rated adult entertainment, making a trip to Akihabara a real adventure into some of the more bewildering and baffling elements of Japan.

It is therefore unsurprising that Akihabara is also home to Tokyo’s highest concentration of maid cafés – cafés where young female waitresses, dressed in cutesy French-maid outfits, act as servants waiting on their masters and mistresses. This involves highly formalised speech and subservient behaviour such as kneeling before a customer while stirring sugar in their coffee. It all sounds much kinkier than it actually is – in reality, it’s just a fairly tame way to spend some time in a fictional world.

Interested to see what all the hype was about first hand, my Intrepid Travel guide, Tatsuya and I visited the Popopure Animation studio and Maid Café for an afternoon coffee and snack. Entering the café, we were greeted with a chorus of “Welcome home, Mistress. Welcome home, Master”, which was slightly unnerving and started off a wave of giggles that would continue to shake Tatsuya and I for the duration of our maid café visit. Our maid came and took our order in English before singing a little song to welcome us to the café… it was supposed to make us feel relaxed and comfortable, but really it made me want to crawl into a little hole and hide for a while. When our order arrived, our maid asked us to join her in singing another song. This time, to our coffee and cake… yep, apparently serenading your food with a little love ditty makes it happier and therefore it tastes better. Riiiight.

Overwhelmingly, the clientele at Popopure consisted of geeky male otaku (manga, anime and video game fanatics), but there were enough women, couples and tourists present to convince me it wasn’t a seedy establishment (and how could it be when it The Backstreet Boys had visited the café last year to record part of their new music video!? … watch it – it’s unintentionally hilarious). Around us, customers were singing and playing games of rock, paper, scissors with the maids and we watched on in amusement as one particularly awkward chap energetically rehearsed then recorded a voice-over for a short anime film created by the café to be taken home as a special souvenir… *cool*

The maid café is another wacky Japanese experience to add to the ever-growing collection, but it’s worth keeping in mind that the popularisation of maid cafés seems to have diluted their authenticity and charm (see, for example, this article and one can only imagine what the original maid cafés would have been like). Despite this, the average maid café is still a bit of fun and quite easily accessible to non-Japanese speaking tourists who are keen on exploring the quirkier side of modern life in Japan.

Intrepid photo album

The Soba Enthusiast

amy_palfreyman — Fri, 19 Mar 2010 18:34:00 GMT

en·thu·si·ast (ĕn-thū'zē-ăst')

noun.

1. one who is filled with enthusiasm; one who is ardently absorbed in an interest or pursuit: a baseball enthusiast.

2. a zealot; a fanatic.

Enthusiasts - they exist for just about anything; wine, football, motorbikes, Startrek, bands, collectables - you name it and there's someone out there who follows it with gusto… some more so than others.

Enter, Mr. Ito, charismatic soba noodle enthusiast and founder of the Edo Sobauchi Kyoushitsu (Edo Soba School). Before Mr. Ito, I’d never met a noodle enthusiast and if I’m honest, I’ve met very few enthusiasts of anything who follow their interest with the fervor and passion that Mr. Ito exhibits for the humble soba (buckwheat) noodle. This soon-to-be octogenarian eats, breathes, talks and teaches soba on a daily basis (I’m pretty sure he counts soba noodles as a separate, and perhaps the only, food group). His love for soba transcends all language barriers and extends across decades during which he worked as a very successful soba chef until opening a soba school in his house some years ago.

I came into contact with Mr. Ito on the second day of my Intrepid Travel “Flavours of Tokyo” tour, when I visited his soba school in the residential area of Koiwa. I instantly warmed to him (he reminded me of my own wonderful grandpa) and in the 2 hours that followed, found myself in constant stitches of laughter brought on by Mr. Ito, who is undoubtedly one of the funniest characters I’ve met in my travels to date.

Armed with a whiteboard and a marker, a jovial Mr. Ito began the class with a 45-minute lesson on the history of soba noodles… in Japanese. My guide, Tatsuya, raced to keep up the translation of this in-depth lesson that was laced with anecdotes, jokes and information on the all-important buckwheat to wheat ratio in the noodles (8:2 in favour of buckwheat, I’ll have you know). The lesson also included specifics on the different types of soba noodles (primarily differentiated by the aforementioned ratio, the season in which the wheat harvest takes place and the thickness of noodle cuts) which culminated in an incredibly amusing audio demonstration by Mr. Ito of the sound these different noodles make when being slurped down your throat.

Following the theory component of the class, Mr. Ito demonstrated his well-honed skill of noodle making. His hands danced around the bowl as they artfully mixed the perfect amount of water with the perfect amount of buckwheat flour before removing air-bubbles from the mix by carefully kneading the dough into the shape of a flower and then into a cone-like shape, the end of which closely resembled the appearance of… well, as Mr. Ito kindly demonstrated, the appearance of a belly-button.

Through tears of laughter, I watched as Mr. Ito completed the process by flattening the dough with a range of complex rolling techniques and cutting perfectly uniform noodles with a soba kiri – a very scary looking cleaver blade designed specifically for this purpose.

The noodles that I subsequently created, of course, looked like chicken scratchings compared to the mastery produced by Mr. Ito, but when Tatsuya and I sat down for lunch I was slightly chuffed to hear Mr. Ito loudly slurping away on my noodles in the adjoining kitchen. This means he liked them… or at least he pretended to.

Before this class, I’d never given a second thought to soba noodles, but now I know that I will think of these buckwheat creations every time I think of Mr. Ito… which, strangely enough, will be every time I think of belly buttons.

Intrepid Photo Album