2015-05-13: Vegetables for the brain or something

The Spell of the Turtle has hit again! Turtle Ramen 

Prawns are Ebi. Train Stations are Eki. We have not had Eki Ebi yet but this will now be something I look for.

This time we attempted to ask for Gyoza (fried dumplings) with the sauce that the fried shrimp come with. Ewa loves the shrimp but mostly because of the sauce. This was far beyond our linguistic skills. We are creative people however and the mayonnaise that we did get we mixed with the standard chilli oil on each table and created something pretty close.

Cultural Observation: Smoking

Smoking is not encouraged but it isn't stupidly banned either.
There are lots of rules around where you can smoke and when. Most of the larger streets, especially in Fancy Suburbs like Sakae are smoke free ($20 fine).  Many other streets smoking is supposed to be done in designated areas, I don't know if this is by custom or by rules.

Ewa planned to mix the sauce and then dunk the gyoza

At Turtle Noodles, as with many other places open at lunchtime, smoking is not allowed during Sararimen lunchtime (about 12:00 to 15:00). Beer is still served of course but if you go back to the office reeking of beer at least it is your own fault. Going back reeking of smoke could just be because you were unfortunately seated next to some gaijin bum (probably me). After 15:00 it is a free for all; the Izakaya we have been to all allow smoking.

Which worked well

I guess if you go home to your wife late Reeking of Smoke is probably low down the list of things she is going to complain about. She'd probably be happy to hear you were sitting with a gaijin bum such as myself as I don't lead people astray... Well not much I don't... look, any Astray Leading that may occur is almost guaranteed to be something the wholesome person wanted to do anyway and I am just enough of a reprobate that they felt free to choose to go astray.
In general Japanese policy seems to be Don't Incovenience Others If You Can Avoid It. But if you choose to go to, say, an Izakaya full of smokers then You Chose So Don't Complain (and definitely don't try to ban the stuff they like doing).

I went for the industrial Do Them All at Once plan. I like shelling a handful of pistachios before starting eating.

A similar thing can be seen with regard to drinking in public. There are times and places where being ludicrously drunk is just normal. The rest of the time no one cares much whether you are having a beer or a coke. On the subway back from Jukendo we usually have a Lemon Highball (6% abv, $1.80, Not full of sugar) the rule seems to be Don't Be A Dick And No One Will Care. I have still seen just the one physical confrontation between drunk people, and they might not have even been drunk.

Making sauces on top of gyoza is harder than shelling pistachios. Not sure where to go from here. Scrap eit off and remove gyoza then mix in chilli?

The majority of people smoking also have personal ashtrays which cost $1 and are in every convenience store.
I like this kind of policy. Bit of personal responsibility, bit of tolerance of others and generally everyone is pretty happy.

Rating: 10/10 (This is not to say that everyone here is an angel)

Fortunately I had backup ramen coming in case I made mistakes in the gyoza saucing process.

We also discovered that the teeny tiny pictures of something we couldn't figure out are salads. And actually not bad salads either.

Almost a Polish Style Salad.