Kelly Azuma

Yesterday we had great plans.

We had heard from a friend of ours that has just moved here from Mauritius that there was a fish market up the road from us that opens at 6am on Saturday mornings. This is one of the places where the Japanese restaurants in Perth get their fresh fish from and the good part is that they sell to the public as well.

We never buy fresh fish here because Yasu deems it “not-so-fresh”, or not still-jumping-just-been-killed fresh.

So anyway, yesterday at 5:30am Yasu woke me up and I quickly got dressed, brushed teeth and had a quick cup of tea and then we left. We got to the place and there were 2 Chinese people who quickly disappeared inside one of the doors. That was weird. Hmm…so we waited in the car and then another bunch of Chinese people came, and promptly disappeared. The outside of the place wasn’t marked, and even when we looked at the site of the supposed fish market, the lights weren’t on and no-one was inside.

Anyway we decide to check out where all the Chinese people were disappearing into. Turns out it was a fresh vegetable market and butcher. At 6am in the morning! What are all these people doing up so early and shopping? I had never guessed.

Anyway, to kill time, we went across the road to a massive Asian shop (that also opened at 6am!) and stocked up on a few Japanese essentials, Kewpie-wannabe mayo (can’t get real kewpie anymore due to it having more than 10% egg inside), dashi, udon, nori, wasabi, and calpis.

We then went back to the fish market but it was nearly 7am and still not open, and it didn’t look like anyone was in there getting ready to open so we decided to just go home. Bummer indeed as I know Yasu was looking forward to having sashimi, but oh well. We surmised that maybe the Aussie fisherman didn’t go out fishing because it was New Year’s. Maybe they all had a hangover or something, who knows. So we will try another time I guess.

Anyway we came home and basically had a leisurely day. We watched a bit of Japanese University rugby on nhk. I don’t get that game, I so don’t. It’s like the majority of the time they are in the scrum or being tackled. The time they get with the ball is little to none. What I did think was cute though was that the Japanese guys playing were short and squat, pretty much what we used to think Japanese guys looked like. I guess they have the perfect body for rugby.

Another friend told us they also have a Japanese Cricket team in Tokyo. Now that would be interesting to see them play our game. Not that I’m so much into Cricket but it’s interesting to see other nationalities play a game that is foreign to them, how they interpret it.

Anyways, I made miso toriyaki for dinner and despite Yasu hating miso, we both liked the toriyaki. I’m not really a fan of miso either but the last couple of weeks I have had such a craving for it (?) and so I bought some white miso at the Japanese supermarket.

I’ve been making alot more Japanese food lately because I think it’s healthier for us. I noticed when I have a Japanese meal my weight is less in the morning by about 500g, so I’m hoping to just cook mainly Japanese food to help us along with our health and weight. Also our Japanese friend N only cooks Japanese meals for her and her Aussie husband and she has a lovely figure, so it can’t hurt hey!

Yasu and I are taking up jogging from the end of this week. It’s been something the angels have been telling me would be good for me for a while so we decided to jog together in the evening. Yasu tends to jog in the off-season to get ready for the baseball season, so while he does 5 or so laps, I will probably do 1 or 2 until I get as fit as he is.

Who watched wonderxwonder last night, behind the scenes on kouhaku? I was disappointed they didn’t say anything about the MJ tribute. I bet the people behind the scenes were sick of moving stairs after all that moving between acts! And that huge doll of Kobayashi Sachiko that they discovered was “boring” because it didn’t move, only after a year of planning! I had abit of a chuckle, spend millions of dollars on a doll and only realise at the last minute… not very good planners are they?