Soba and Udon noodles

What food do you imagine when you hear “fast food”?  You may think of hamburgers, hot dogs or French fries. Japanese people, of course, eat them as fast foods, but they are originally from other countries. In Japan, we have our own fast foods. Do you have any idea what they are? They are soba (buckwheat) noodles and udon noodles. Udon noodles are made of flour.

There are different ways to eat soba and udon noodles. One way is to eat cold, with a dipping sauce. Wasabi and finely chopped Welsh onions are often served as condiments. Another way is to eat warm. Usually, it is served in soup made of mixing broth with the rich dipping sauce, which is also used for cold noodles. Variation of toppings opens up many possibilities, for example, deep-fried tofu (soybean curd), deep fried tempura batter or egg York.

Then, why those noodles can be called “fast food”?  That is because there are many soba/udon noodles restaurants which serve those orders to us very quickly. Most of them stand in train stations or close to the stations. When we use train for traveling or business transportation, we use these restaurants for quick breakfast or lunch, using the short time of train change. The chefs of those restaurants serve an order within a minute, so we can have it within 5 minutes in most cases. I think this is truly the fast food!

A feature of those restaurants is to eat standing up. The restaurants do not have chairs and tables, but only counters. This is a reason why the system can shorten the serving and eating time.

By the way, there is a kind of etiquette when you eat those noodles. That is, you should slurp them up noisily. This should be regarded as bad manner or unfamiliar to foreign people, but in Japan, it is regarded as the authentic manner. Looking closely at soba/udon noodles, we can find various cultural differences.

Written by Yabuuchi

O-bon ceremony in Japan

Hello, I’m Tatsuya, one of the internship members of Focus Japan. In Japan, it is now the season of “Obon” or a Buddhism ceremony to pray for the ancestors of each family. I live in Kobe alone, but now, I am back in my hometown, Nara. I visited my grandparents’ grave with my family today.

Let me introduce the Obon ceremony. This ceremony is to pray for our family’s ancestors around July 15^th. However, today’s Obon ceremony is held in around July in some areas, an in August 15^th in some other areas. Why?

 That’s because, now, we use the solar calendar here, but we used to use the lunar calendar until about 140 years ago. (Of course, August 15^th in the solar calendar may not exactly be the equivalent of July 15^th in the lunar calendar, though.) That’s why Obon ceremony is held either in July or August. The areas follow the traditional lunar calendar hold the ceremony in July, and the others in August follow the solar calendar.

Well, what do we do on Obon? It, again, depends on region, but at my hometown, we have mainly two ceremonies. One is to offer prayers to our ancestors in front of my family’s Buddhist altar. It is believed the souls of our ancestors come back to this world on the Obon day, so we offer foods to welcome the souls. The other is to go to family’s grave and also offer flowers and prayers.

This is the temple which my ancestors are enshrined.

Although, I was totally indifferent in these events, I’ve got interested in them as I grew older. Throughout this internship, I have much opportunity to review our daily lives.

Japanese family crest

In Japan, most of houses have their own "Family crest". This is my house's. In ancient times in Japan, when some clans were very strong, some clans who move to local region created their own family name from their lands to distinguish the same clans in other areas. This is the origin of surname in Japan. Family crest was created as the symbol of house. Family crest usually shows the family name.

Alcove and scroll paintings

This is an alcove of a house. This is a section of Japanese room, functioning as an ornament. While almost all areas of Japanese room is filled with tatami mats, the alcove has a wooden floor and some scroll paintings. Many people enjoy the arts on the alcove. Though this is a typical Japanese traditional interior style, there are less and less houses without alcove.

Rice Paddy Field

Rainy season passed away. There are many paddy fields in Japan, and the rice is gradually growing! We usually plant the rice on the end of April or May. Rice gain much nutrition from paddy and rain, especially in rainy season. They are usually cut 
in September, and we can store the rice in whole year.

Japanese Summer Festival

Hakata Gion Yamakasa festival has started today. This festival has 770 years history in Kyushu. It is two-week-long festival! So you can see this festival yourself if you make your mind up to get the ticket to Japan right now! Haha!

 

Seven teams of 26 bearers each carry huge , one-ton floats called Yama and compete with a passion to be the fastest round the 5-km route in the festival.
So I should train hard!!

 

Written by Kihara

 

Hagi-ware’s color changing

Hagi-ware has a specific feature that other potteries don’t have. That is what is called “Hagi-ware’s color changing”. 

That means, if you continue using Hagi-ware, the color changes gradually. The reason is as follows; the clay used for Hgi-ware is not so fine and has low pyrometric cone equivalent that firing only once is not enough to make Hagi-ware stiff. Because of this fact, sometimes glaze is covered with the wares. 

With the use of glaze, the difference of shrinkage ratio between glaze and clay makes chaps when firing completes. Clay has some water absorbability and water get through from the chaps. When you pour alcohol or tea, the components bond to the ware. This gradual change makes Hagi-ware’s color change. This is called “Hagi-no-Nanabake (literally, the seven change of Hagi-ware)” in Japan. Although those color-changed ware comes in handy because they are pleasant, even some users in Japan misunderstand that the wares became filthy.

Before

After

Do you notice something like cracks?

When I met some craftsmen making Hagi-ware, many of them said “some users complain because they don’t know Hagi-ware’s color changing”. They also mentioned “although the color changing is the very feature of Hagi-ware, most of the users don’t know the fact”. What was worse, some of them even said “foreigners can’t tell this authenticity”.

Through these experiences, I decided to write the article about Hagi-ware’s color changing. I know that I can’t tell the authenticity by only these sentences and some photos, but after you read this article. I’d like you to ask something.

“Hagi-ware’s color changing”. Which do you think, the wares are mere filthy, or beautiful ?


Written by Yabuuchi