Shabu Shabu and Amy's pointing tours

This year, 3rd October fell on a Wednesday so naturally, I did what had to be done and watched Mean Girls but I have to admit, I did forget to wear pink. That aside, I also went out with Amy to get shabu shabu. Now prepare yourselves, because I'm about to drop some knowledge.

Shabu shabu consists of a pot with two halves inside on a heater which is filled with a sauce in each compartment. The sauce is heated so that the meat will cook when you drop it in. It is called shabu shabu because the meat is really thin and when you put it in the pot with your chopsticks, it waves while it cooks and has a fluid motion which shabu shabu is a sound effect for. It was actually really reasonable too, we got all those trays of meat and some sushi for a set price - roughly equivalent to £12-13 with self serve soft drinks and dessert included.

You can see that I went to town on the chocolate sauce and sprinkles on my ice cream. Not pictured was the debacle with the self-serve cotton candy machine. I was set on getting it, even if Amy and I made the waiter laugh at us trying to make heads or tails of the machine. I did in the end get a pitiful wispy mess which tasted pretty good despite it's appearance!

We had made plans to visit a festival in a nearby town called Maibara on Saturday and planned to go with Nam and Shawn. Unfortunately, another typhoon decided to pass through Japan and although the worst of it wouldn't be hitting our area, the festival was cancelled because of the heavy rain which we found out when we arrived. So we all sat in the car outside the temple and brainstormed for something else to do whilst the rain beat down around us.

We settled on visiting a glass and pottery wares square in Nagahama. By the time we drove to it, the rain had stopped and we could meander around at our leisure. The first thing we came across was the figure museum which had a giant dinosaur head outside. Nam put his head in it for a picture just as a group of older Japanese women was passing and he set the trend. No sooner had he moved away, they were all taking pictures - it was quite funny to watch!

I've decided to do a new feature on the blog...you may find it dotted throughout from now on, whenever the mood strikes us! I've affectionately named it Amy's pointing tours in my own head so now here is your first instalment:

This was the street we arrived at with the first pottery and glassware shops. Everything looked so pretty so I had to document it using our new style. The first shop we came to had those buckets outside and turned out to be a veritable treasure trove of Japanese culture - I didn't get many pictures but there were old cabinets, rooms separators and loads of things from temples and shrines.

Here are some pictures that I managed to take:

I bought a cute little soba bowl with cats on and it currently holds all of my odds and ends, like spare keys and batteries.

Walking up the street, we went into many glassware shops where there were Halloween and Christmas decorations, small trinkets and vases, glasses, cocktail stirrers and any glass things you could think of on display.

Upstairs in one of these shops, they had a fascinating and intricate display of Venetian masks from the carnival.

We wandered around the market and artisan shops until they all closed.

 

We decided to go back to Nagahama castle since Shawn had never been; the timing was just right as we arrived just before sunset.

The castle sits right next to the lake, so it also gave us a good excuse to watch the sunset over the lake. Bats played overhead as the sun sank behind the mountains on the other side, I was hellbent on getting a picture with them in but sadly it just looks like a spec!

 {Spot the difference}

By this time, we'd all worked up an appetite. We decided to head for Hikone in search of food. On the way back to the car, I couldn't resist taking one last picture of the castle all lit up.

We were driving back to Hikone when we happened upon a really cute looking place. There were lights all around the deck and it was set in what seemed like the middle of nowhere. Amy and I got the same idea as soon as we saw it and without communicating, both told to Nam to stop the car at the same time. The place turned out to be an American style Diner and it was decorated inside just as well as outside.

We settled in for our meals and I really enjoyed it - the theme and style was brilliant and the music was themed too so it felt really cosy and fun. The waitress got chatting with us and when we left, she asked us to put pins in a map to say which countries we were from.

I'd had such a fun-filled Saturday, that I'd almost forgotten that I was going to Osaka the next day.