Roaring Trade Of Flu Masks in Japan

As Japan prepares itself for a possible swine flu outbreak, pharmacies in Tokyo do a roaring trade in flu masks.

Foong of My Very First Blog had a post up on How To Avoid Being Infected By The Swine Flu Virus. Check it out too.

Onigiri For A Picnic By The Lake,Eating Rice Drenched In Tea And The Ever Trusty Kicap

I made some onigiri for us to take out and eat at the nearby Botanical Park (Taman Botani). Well if you can call a park 12km away near.

I only used three different furikake flavours for our onigiri this time; tamago (egg), ume (plum) and okaka (finely chopped katsuobushi dressed with soy sauce). For 2 and a half cups of calrose rice, I managed to get 16 small onigiri. I made small balls because I didn't want Raimie to eat half a ball and unable to finish them.

Literally, furikake means "to sprinkle over". Furikake is essentially of a mixture of seaweed, dried and ground fish, sesame seeds, soy sauce, sugar and salt and is used to add some flavour to the rice. Other ingredients can be salmon and egg, to name a few. The seasoning is used on hot rice and in onigiri.

This is how I make onigiri:

I always end up with lots of dirty dishes when making the rice balls. I put the rice already mixed with furikake in the mould (see triangle thingy I was holding in my palm) and press away to get the triangle shape. If I want to put some filling inside the onigiri, I put rice half full in the mould, then the filling and then some more rice and press.

Raimie ate 5 onigiris while I was making them, he was that excited. He would've eaten more but I asked him to wait and eat the rest when we get to the park.

The finished onigiri

Eating onigiri in the park. Zaini lamented on the fact there there wasn't any tsukemono (Japanese pickles) to accompany the onigiri. Something citric/spicy definitely go well with onigiri.

The picnic ended with this for a view, the Putrajaya Lake at dusk. Nice way to spend the evening, don't you agree?

Next week, we'll head to another park for another onigiri picnic, if the weather permits. I think I need to start making my own nukazuke for my two pickle loving boys. (And start making onigiri with fillings and not depend only on my stock of furikakes).

There's another dry Japanese condiment meant to be sprinkled on top of rice and that's instant Ochazuke. This simple Japanese dish is made by pouring green tea, dashi, or hot water over rice that's topped with other condiments.

I like things spicy so I always eat my ochazuke with lots of kimchi (so makes the dish a mix of Japanese and Korean). :)

Well, Korean has their version too; like this packet of instant rice seasoning.

We have one local seasoning for rice too, a very popular and some simply can't without this. What is it?
The always delicious kicap! (That's soy sauce for you - but our soy sauce is completely different from the Japanese one).

I once flew from KL to Tokyo with a bottle of kicap (with transit in Changi, Singapore) stashed away in my hand luggage (and this was when the liquid ban was newly enforced. Thank goodness me and the kicap made it safely to Tokyo and to the hand of a blogger friend there). :)

Of Rice Balls, Breakfast Onigiri, Oshin and a Mother's Love

Onigiri - rice ball in English or Nasi Kepal in Malay, makes me think of a highly popular Japanese Drama of yesteryears; Oshin. I doubt there's anyone growing up in the 1980s who didn't know or never heard of Oshin.

Oshin tells of story of a woman's struggle in Japan, born in a poor family and persevered through all the challenges that came her way and made a success in her life.

Jim of Self Magic wrote about his visit to Kirishima . There were quite a number of comments about his order of onigiri there.

Kak Lela of Awan Okinawa Berlalu poignantly wrote about her "bekal" of 4 onigiri balls for her daughter returning to Singapore after spending her holiday at home in Okinawa. Fly Away Tyme in English and Tatkala Masih Ada Sebelah Kepal in Malay about how the 4 balls were shared and eaten slowly by her two daughters. A mother will never stop worrying after their children and I can feel her love for them (and maybe a bit of loneliness?) just by reading her posts.

Kak Lela, growing up and leaving home from the age of 13, I relish any food I brought from home to my boarding school. I remember when I was 14, my aunt made me a coconut cake and I slowly consumed it at school eating just a few bites each day, so slow that it had started to grow molds but I still wouldn't throw it away because the cake reminds me of home.

Raimie loves onigiri. I always opted for a good dose of furikake sprinkled liberally on rice for my onigiri just because it is easy and I have lots of furikake stocked up in the kitchen.

It is easy to shape the onigiris as I have some onigiri moulds at home that I bought from Japan, but these moulds are available here at Jusco, Isetan and other supermarkets too.

We had plenty of opportunity to enjoy delicious onigiri in Japan, and some free ones too at Toyoko Inn, a hotel chain we stayed in while vacationing in Japan.

Eating onigiri accompanied with tsukemono (Japanese pickles) and a bowl of miso soup on the side is absolutely a divine way to have a meal. Actually, Raimie ate more during breakfast there than back in Malaysia.

More Toy Madness - A New B-Daman For Raimie

We bought this Chrome Levan Cyclone B-Daman ages ago - well, during the J-Card Members' Day but I finally upload the photos of it last week.

I won't bore you guys with all the geeky details but this B-Daman is used by Grey Michael Vincent, Yamato's friend who joined the Shadow Alliance in order to save his sister. A loyal friend to Yamato and will do anything for his fraternal twin, Lienna.

Work in progress

The finished Chrome Levan Cyclone figure, ready to battle with Cobalt Saber Fire

B-da battle!

Who those completely lost, you gotta watch B-Daman anime to understand what I'm talking (or rather, writing about).

Toys Madness

How does your workstation looks like? Is it neat, clean and professional looking or do you put your favorite stuff there and make it feel more like home? After all we do spend more time at work than at home.

Here's what some of my colleagues who are avid toy collectors, put at their workstations. My workstation looks a bit more sedate, I just have a few Ultraman SD figures there (My place gets plenty of visitors so I had to minimise the decorations).

Transformers, Doraemon toys and empty gashapon cases on display

Keroro Gunso figures and yet some more Doraemon toys

Gashapon toys - a whole lot of Dragon Ball figures in a row

And these Kamen Riders figures. It will rather fun buying toys as souvenirs from Japan for these few special colleagues of mine as I know they'll appreciate them. After all, they are all to willing to spend insane amount of $$$ to buy the toys they love, the latest being the Mickey Mouse Transformers figures.

Tokyo For Green 2016 Olympic Games

Inspectors from the International Olympic Committee ended their tour of Tokyo on Sunday. The city is one of several being considered for the 2016 Games. Tokyo is the only one of the candidates to have hosted the Summer Games before. The event in 1964 helped Japan become an economic superpower, but now in a new century, it's not the economy, but the environment which the city is pushing.

Tokyo, competing against Chicago, Madrid and Rio de Janeiro, is the second stop on the Evaluation Commission's schedule after Chicago. The IOC will vote on the host city at Copenhagen on Oct. 2.

Of Cheap Stuff, Glico and Glico Man

Just a little bit of nonsense on a Friday afternoon.

I simply can't resist clearance item on sale. A TopValu soda drink bought at Jusco's clearance stock area. RM2.oo per bottle. Taste a bit like Kickapoo.

Buying this clearance item that is nearing its expiry date reminds me that I need to finish my last packet of Mugi-Cha that I bought at MaxValu supermarket in Osaka last year.

The expiry date is looming! Gotta drink plenty of mugi-cha in the next few days and I'm roping my colleagues to finish them with me.

Pejoy stick (?) from Glico bought in Guangzhou. I was ranting on the fact that I can't eat them with Zaini earlier on. Anyway, looking at this made me think of the Glico Man in Osaka.

Plenty of tourists - Japanese & from overseas alike couldn't resist the photo op here on the bridge.

RM2 Sushi King Bonanza

From Apr 13 - Apr 16, Sushi King is having their RM2 bonanza, so we decided to join the crowd and eat as much as we can for just RM2 per plate.

I was supposed to go with some friends of mine during lunch, but after a bad case of gastric, I had to pass on a sushi lunch. Zaini on the other hand, had his sushi lunch with his colleagues at KLCC. But the three of us (me, Zaini & Raimie) went to Sushi King (second time in a day for Zaini) for dinner together.

The queue for cheap sushi at MidValley yesterday. I always preferred the Sushi King outlet on the 3rd Floor than the one at LG Floor. Don't be intimidated by the long queue. We didn't wait that long to be seated.

Everybody was patiently queuing and nobody tried to jump queue.

A notice to remind customers of the time limit: just 60 minutes per table to enjoy your cheap sushi.

A very efficient and friendly staff showing us customers on how to differrentiate the RM2 promotion plate and the normal priced plates. Only rice based plates (full rimmed-colour plates) are RM2.00

My first round selection. All purple colour (usual: RM6.00) plates. We only aimed for the purple and red plates yesterday.

Sushi chef busy at work

Everyone's busy looking at the revolving belt. While the food may not be anything special, it was rather a fun outing for cheap food. We spent less than RM30.00 for a full stomach yesterday.

Service there was quite good and efficient too. Not to mention, very friendly. Kudos to them.

Loincloth for Lingerie - Japanese Women's Ultimate Liberation?

The latest in "women's liberation" is a product making a comeback in Japan that makers claim allows women to ditch tight-fit underwear -- loincloths. A Japanese lingerie maker calls female loincloth underwear the "ultimate liberation item" for women.

Sakae Sushi, Bangsar Village

Zaini and I had some time to kill while waiting for Raimie to finish his School's Saturday Camp last week and we were not that particularly hungry, so we decided to head to Sakae Sushi in Bangsar Village for a light snack.

Actually Zaini took me there to prove a point. He had earlier told me that Sakae Sushi wasn't that great but I didn't quite believe him. I know, I know. It's a bad habit of mine - I reserve judgement until I experience them myself and I don't usually trust my own husband. So sue me...

First off, some photos of the decor. Nice decor. Good spot to have a date. Cosy and the mostly foreign staff were quite attentive as do the Manager. So, good service from them.

Cool interactive menu at the table too.

But, when it came to food - the selections were quite uninspiring. Starting with the RM2 teabag. Free hot water though.




We ended up just eating three plates of sushi. That was how uninteresting the selection was.

The saving grace about our Sakae Sushi outing was this pickled ginger. This pickled ginger is so much better than the ones at Sushi Zanmai.

Three plates of sushi and 2 cups of tea translated to RM22.70. Actually it was RM22.65, but the Manager omitted to give me back the 5 cents balance. I noticed nowadays there is this trend with some shop owners (in KL) omitting giving back the 5 cents balance. It used to be the 1 cent (because they said they don't have stock of 1 cent) and now shop owners conveniently say that they don't have the 5 cents change. Imagine that!

Tea - Bottled or Brewed or Ordered From Your Favourite Mamak Place?

Zaini and I love our tea, but we have different taste in how to enjoy our tea. Zaini likes his cold and more often than not, he drank bottled or canned tea bought from supermarkets.

I for one, have never liked the bottled variety even though they are so convenient. I like to take my time, brewing and pouring my tea. Nowadays, I use the loose leaf variety instead of the teabags ones.

We even have different taste when enjoying a cup of tea at the Mamak stall! I like my teh tarik (pulled tea?) but Zaini prefers his Teh Ais (iced tea with milk).