It was the Powell Street Festival, aka. the Japanese Festival a couple of weekends ago. The festival is held in Oppenheimer Park in Vancouver -- the area is of a lower socio-economic bracket and only a few blocks from our infamous Downtown Eastside. I believe that they hold the festival there because historically, the Japanese lived there, just like how the Chinese settled in the area we know as Chinatown.
There were demonstrations, food stalls and independent designers selling merchandise -- and my faveourite, was seeing all the people, males and females, dressed up in yukatas.
Wood grilled salmon -- too bad I was too full to enjoy this, but can't you just taste the smokey flavour? Oh yes.
Was too full for the salmon, but not for everything else! Tried the rice cakes -- this one is the one wrapped in seawood with a sweet sauce.
Another serving of rice cakes, except this one is in soup with udon noodles and deep fried things. Despite it being such a hot day, this was delicious -- like "it's disgustingly hot, but I can't stop drinking this hot soup".
Next was the takoyaki -- OH MY GOODNESS, these were awesome; forget the ones that you eat at the Richmond Night Market, these ones are the bomb! Perfect amount of chewiness, a bit crispy on the outside, but just the perfect softness in the inside. And the octopus and squid fillings were sooo good. Now I have wait another year to have these again :(
After piggy out like I always do, I went for some Japanese shaved ice. I first had Japanese shaved ice when I went to Hawaii last year (how I miss Hawaii) at this famous shaved ice place on the North Shore of Honolulu. I found it disappointing, especially when I compared it to Taiwanese shaved ice. But since it was so hot that day, I decided to try it, especially when I saw their special! The name eludes me, but the toppings were matcha syrup, red bean, mochi and ice cream. And I must admit, it was pretty good, too bad the ice was Taiwanese shaved ice style, or else, it would have eaten 3.
Look at his pink fan!!!!
She was so cute!
I was being such a paparazzo that day.
I spot Super Saiyan Goku!
All handmade and incredibly cute.
A portion of some sort of ceremony...why don't I have the program with me so I can name this properly?!
They went through the park yelling and people were throwing water onto them (I assume to keep them cool); I think the louder the yelling, the more luck that is brought to everyone. And yes, a particular gentleman in this photo is wearing what a sumo wrestler will wear.
And I bought myself a hand-made glass birdie! The person that made this is Minori Takagi and her website is www.mylampwork.com.
That's it for my picture spam! I quite enjoy posting more pictures than actual words, so you might be seeing more of that. Also, I realize that blogger added a caption function when I was done writing this post...why didn't I see it earlier?
looks like a great time!
ReplyDeletejadepurplebrown.blogspot.com
Hello my dearest dearest Miranda,
ReplyDeleteYou are blogging the lady gaga concert or else I will cry. Anyway! This festival looked so yummy O.O I actually don’t think we have a Japanese festival. We have Chinatown, greek, etc. festivals but we don’t have many Japanese people compared to Vancouver. If there ever was one I’d attend it for sure and take my make-belief girlfriend in a kimono. Another reason why Vancouver is awesome hmph -_- The rice cake in soup is mine. The takoyaki is yours (i don’t like octopus :O ) And I have still never had shaved ice yet.... I gotta break this fear and just eat some.
The glass birdie necklace was very cute. I am a boy and even I am impressed. Finally, a quick reply to you: I know where surrey B.C. is! A lot of soompi ppl live in surrey. I still haven’t watched inception and it looks like I’m going to be watching it on dvd heh. Every friend I knew went without me. Sigh.
I hope you are doing super awesome and living happily. : )