Today I was an honorary Japanese person for the day. I went with Mariko and her mom to the Tofu Festival and the Nissei Week Parade in Little Tokyo. Apparently we had been volunteered to help out the Okinawan group during the parade by walking with them handing out water. It was going to be an interesting day indeed.
A quick side note: I haven't been eating breakfast on a regular basis, partly because I've been waking up close to lunch time. I really should have had breakfast on this day.
We picked up two obaachans at Mariko's mom's work because they were going to ride with us. The first thing we did was go to the Japanese American National Museum and checked out the drum exhibit. I've become inspired to learn how to play the Japanese taiko. It looks like fun. At the museum we got to play a kid's game that is similar to Donkey Konga. I sucked big time. I couldn't get a hang of using the sticks to hit the drum. I'm used to using my hands on the bongos that come with Donkey Conga (A great game by the way. Run out and get it if you don't have it yet!). Mariko beat me, of course. Next we left to hit the Tofu Festival which is what I was really looking forward to since I left New Crapland.
I tried some banana soy milk (good), tofu nuggets (great without the thousand island dressing it came with), deep fried taro (good), green tea soy milk (a little weird, but still good), tofurky sausage (lacked flavor alone, but tasted great with the roasted peppers, looked grey), soy ice cream (very, berry belicious), teriyaki tofu (i liked how it was crispy), tofu chili (not very exciting), tofu dessert with strawberries and almonds (crappy, crappy, crappy-a slab of tofu with syrup), strawberry mochi with peanut butter (fantastic!), and tofu tostadas (this one was the best! i have to try the recipe). We wanted to try the tofu cheesecake, but the company that had it ran out on the first day of the festival. Some things looked interesting, but I couldn't eat them because they either had eggs or cow milk in them. Hopefully next year there will be different things to taste.
After we finished stuffing ourselves with tofu, we went to get ready for the parade. We decided that we wanted to see the parade instead of walking it, so we found a spot with Mariko's mom's Okinawan friends where the parade started. I heard them talking Spanish and flipped out! They are from Peru and now live in L.A. I think they liked me right away because I spoke to them in Spanish and laughed at their jokes. These ladies were hilarious!!! They even told me that I need to go to the events they have at the Okinawa Association where Mariko's mom works.
It had been a really long time since I had been to the Nissei Week Parade. My family used to go when I was little. I think it was more exciting then, with bigger bands and more floats. It seemed really short to me this time. One of the Peruvian ladies ran up to get Mike Shinoda's autograph for her daughter and was pushed away by the guards. We didn't think she was going to be able to, but at least she tried. The highlight of the parade came when all of a sudden a whole bunch of girls all of a sudden got up and started running down the street screaming. We had no idea who was coming and didn't care. Apparently it was an all boy pop group from Japan that must be popular with American girls. They didn't look special to me at all, just some skinny Japanese guys with dyed hair. Big deal! My favorite part of the parade was watching the dancers as they walked by. My eye caught one particular guy that looked very interesting-at least his crotch did!
What's your name honey?