Lika’s Log

I went to Phoenix’s annual Matsuri this weekend, aka the Japanese Festival. Its held in downtown Phoenix, at Heritage Square/ASU downtown campus area (7th & Monroe).

Had plenny food booths, ono kaukau. Arts & crafts, serious shopping. Entertainment, three stages of music, dance and demonstrations. Free admission. People watching is free; food and shopping always cost. But such is life. *L*

I walked down the row of food booths going oooooohhhh & aaahhhhh. Cause you know Japanee style dey have da sample plate so you can see what you going buy. Plus of course have to have da teriyaki sticks on da hibachi; that smell so ono. Dat smell always reminds me of carnival & picnics in Hawaii.

Do you wot dey had dat I could not resist, to die for and I prolly will, but knockonwood simbako; at least I had one. Papa Beards cream puff! Oh yeah. I got one plus a 6-pack gift box. Present for me. One a day, keep da docta away. Eda dat mess up my low iodine diet big time. Its all shot to hell anyway, I’m so bad. Attitude issues, I tell you. All the greens have gone to my head that I got a cream puff. So now my system is going into shock and I get sowa stomach big time. But I’ll live. *L*

They had some great arts and craft. Even greater art and photographs framed. I want one of those framed samurai art prints. Its not in the budge. Ah shucks. But it was nice to look at. One of these days…..*L*

They had some great ikebana and bonsai displays. So simple and elegant. I did not look at prices. I did not need to know. Like I was gonna buy one or two.

There was 3 stages of dance, music and matial arts demos. I was watching one group do bon dancing. I was so shocked that I remembered…..Da Coal Miners dance! LOL

I had to laugh because I remember the motions due to the fact that it was part of PE class and we had to get graded on doing it. Who knew it would be forever be embedded in my memory cells? Dig right twice, dig left tiwce; trow ova da shoulda right, left; wipe da brow right, left; clap twice clap once (we use to yell or laugh HUIHUI hui!); anden push da cart push da cart and repeatt! Too funny I remember dat; have no clue wot da PE teacha’s name dat made us do dat but I rememba Bon Dancing. Don’t rememba wot grade I had eda.

It was neat looking at all the Japanese shopping. Reminded me of da Mom & Pop stores like Arakawas and Kawano’s in Waipahu. Arakawas always had the section with toys and gadgets from Japan. Both stores always had plenny different kinds of material. Stores like that are rare nowadays. I never know how much I miss the stuff like that untill I see it and realize I haven’t seen that stuff for such a long time.

They had a booth that specailizes in Akita dogs, they do rescue and adoption. The people that ran the booth had this Sumo-size Akita, he was huge, brown and fluffy like a BEAR. He was so cute; really macho manly dog. Poor thing there was also a black one up for adoption. He wasn’t as huge but he was big but if he didn’t get adopted he would have to go back to Joe Arpaio’s calaboose house. Prisoners take care of him until he gets adopted.

There was a Japanese man from the Los Angeles area whose specialty is the flute and his troupe does the Lion dance. The flute tones sounded so nice & pure in person. Something that can’t be captured electronically. It sounded so good. Kind of like Makaha Sons in person is way greater then Makaha Sons on CD. I don’t know what it is but to me the live performance is always better then the electronic version.

I was so tempted to buy some material and I haven’t even been sewing. But I wanted the material. Wotsupwit dat? Need or want? Want. The material cost $10.00 a yard, thats steep, I can wait till I go home. Besides; material or cream puffs?

I think you know which one won. I am so paying for it now too. I have serious sowa stomach. Auwe, bachi as why. LOL

This entry was posted on Sunday, February 26th, 2006 at 3:05 pm and is filed under Da Kine. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.