Our first weekend in Japan, we took to the car and headed south to the surf town of Shishikui. We stopped briefly to grab a drink and a nibbly at a convenience store, where I spied these boxes of collectables in the same aisle as the candy and chips.
For 100 yen, a box from the Sushi Strap Collection can be selected, whose contents remain unknown till you open it up.
I got this cute piece of hamachi, which followed us through-out Japan attached to our keitai.
This first excursion into a convenience store also happened to be where we picked up the ominous Bacon Caesar Salad Pringles…
shudder.
It was also a first for someone gawking at me in all my gaijin-ness. A man wearing a Britney Spears t-shirt gave me a speechless jaw dropped look when he spotted me in the store… and heavens I don’t resemble the pop star at all! But it did seem like he was going to start chasing after me any second…
Maybe he was wondering if I could pass on a fan note to Britney. 
Taking in all the drink types in the coolers, it was also noted that one can purchase plastic cups filled with ice (because there is no soda fountain self-serve culture). I tend to believe that most sodas and juice taste better over ice, so these ice cups with a box of grapefruit juice quickly became a favorite way to beat the Japanese heat. Mmmm… I can practically taste the grapefruit juice as I think of it!
3 Comments
Visitng Japan is such
After reading this I want go to Japain as well!LOL
i lived in japan for 2 years. my first year i home-stayed in a small town of about 3,000 people (mostly farming) in fukushima-ken, soma-gun called kashima-machi. my first week there, i was walking to the train station from my shuuji (calligraphy) lesson when three kids on bikes stopped dead in their tracks, pointed, and shouted, “amerika-jin!” … well, they were my welcoming party, i suppose. (i was the only american in town.) after 2 years, i got used to the stares of old people on trains and the silly flirtatious giggles of high school kids on trains.
japan is a very interesting place, but i loved it. i’d go back any time. thanks for reminding me of all the interesting … culture. (^_^)
