the wacky wombat weblog

Went to try Okinawa cuisine for dinner yesterday on our friend Yuri’s recommendation. It’s really a fantastic place.

The restaurant is a little place right next to Ogikubo train station. Everything in there is Okinawan - the food, drinks, music, and even sand. haha. Ok, I doubt they actually brought the sand over, but I thought it was a cute setting, putting the tables on sand like we’re eating at the beach. :p

Okinawa food is supposed to be very healthy (people on that island live very long), and different from the usual japanese food. I thought this is definitely the most interesting thing of all:

It’s our salad. When I opened the box, there was like dry ice floating out, and the green little itty bitty things on top looked like fish roes to me. Turns out, they’re actually a type of vegetable/plant. Seaweed, that is. O_o Definitely one of the coolest thing I’ve seen so far. haha.

It looks like mini fish roe (on a stem), and when you eat it, it feels a bit like the tiny fish roe texture, but tastes totally different, un-fish-like, but also un-seaweed-like. But definitely tastes gooooood. yum.

woot! Exciting news: Not only is F1 going to Singapore next year, it will also be the first ever night-time race!

Just read about it here.

I am so gonna go for the race! hahaha. IF the tickets won’t rob my entire bank account lah. :p

Have never gone for a live F1 race before even though Sepang isn’t that far away. But seriously, Sepang is too hot (track temperature went up to an insane 50 degrees). I really don’t wanna travel 1 hour there from PJ (plus I don’t really know how to drive there), and I really don’t wanna bake under the 30-40 degrees sun. Sepang race is more fun to watch on TV. And I’m not really in PJ most of the time anyway.

But the Singapore race, hmm, I can definitely think about that. Quite near from where I stay, not hot (no sun!), novelty (night-race!), street circuit will be interesting, and it’s new.

Then hopefully the free-to-air channels will pick up the itv race broadcast so we can all watch for free. Right now the only option is cable TV with sucky Star Sports commentary.

Whee. exciting. I guess if I’ve got no money, there’s still TV. So it ain’t that bad. :p Plus 1 more new race at Valencia, so that means more races to watch next year!

Many months ago, Au Yong told me that Krispy Kreme had opened up an outlet in Tokyo. And so, I was determined to have some yummylicious doughnuts before this trip is over. Especially since it’s been over 2 years since I last had their doughnuts (which had caused massive crazy food craving in me then: refer old raving mad blog entries here.)

So I was bumming around yesterday without much to do (gotta give that Wii a rest and stop playing for a day haha). Thus I decided to take the train down to Shinjuku and perhaps buy a dozen doughnuts. Of course, Au Yong talked sense into me and so yes, 6 doughnuts instead of 12. haha.

Being a weekday and all, I thought the queue wouldn’t be so bad. I mean, the shop’s been here for months, surely the fad’s gone down. But when I got there, omg…

There was a long queue snaking right outside the shop, with 4 blue-uniformed-men guarding/facilitating the queues (explanation of the low unemployment rate here: jobs created for every single imaginable task). And worst, the queue doesn’t end there.

It continues behind the store, right up onto the bridge that connects to Takashimaya!! >.< ack. And a very helpful little board at the front of the shop clearly indicates that: you are just TWO hours away from being served. X_x

Fantastic. buek. As crazy as I am about their doughnuts, I don’t think I’m mentally ready to go queue up for 2 hours (and buy only 6). Might end up losing my brains halfway thru the queue.

And I thought the queue at the (not-krispy-kreme)-doughnut kiosk in Raffles City Shopping Centre basement was bad. :s

Move over wombat. The position of ‘my favourite animal’ has just been usurped.  By…

The Anteater.

Yup. Saw a documentary a while back on Animal Planet when they were doing a feature on animals in the South America continent. The Anteater was huge, furry, and snoring under a tree. hahaha. It tried to run away from the camera but I think he was more like lumbering away than really running away. Anyway, that piqued my interest in the animal and started reading about it on wikipedia. Like, it eats 30,000 ants a day. BIG healthy protein diet.

Then, I was shopping around Ikebukuro the other day, and amidst the pile of tiny elephants and lions soft toys, there was one solitary anteater! Seriously, who sells anteater soft toys anyway? Except the zoo of course. Usually it’s just bears, dogs, cat, and bunnies. So I bought it.

Here it is in its new habitat. Foraging for ants (and found none in Japan!)