Sunday Morning in Japan

Our second to last day of breakfast at the Green Rich, we took advantage of the hotel provided robes to be comfy as we ate! 

 After breakfast, we quickly changed and struck out for some blended coffee.  During Wifey's walks about town, she had identified exactly one coffee shop that served a "coffee smoothie" which appeared to be similar to the frappes and frappuccinos to which we're accustomed to stateside. 

Pos Cafe did deliver taste and consistency of coffee, although the volume was somewhat lacking.   Also intriguing, this little shop included a charging station for various mobile devices and accepts payment in bitcoin.  Wifey was tempted to return to the hotel, figure out how to buy a part of a bitcoin, and then go pay for her coffee with that bitcoin .... just to say she did.  Cooler heads prevailed. 

After acquiring our blended coffee smoothies ... we walked to a nearby AoG church for Sunday morning services.  We greatly enjoyed visiting RockPoint Church.  The congregation and pastor were friendly and welcoming. 

#Missions

 After church, we drove to a seaside restaurant called Miya for lunch.  The view was spectacular and our food also excellent.  Post lunch we enjoyed a short walk down to the water and explored the seabed that is periodically covered by hightide. 

More culinary adventures!

As the week progressed, Hubby and friends worked quite a bit more and Wifey shopped quite a bit more.  We all got together each day for Breakfast, Lunch, and Dinner though! 

Some highlights of the days-o-work include getting to re-visit Fukoka, wifey's favorite pizza joint ... (and remembering to photograph our food there!). 

Diabla Pizza

Apple and Cabbage Pizza

Four Cheese pizza minus basil plus tomato sauce

Pizza with him, egg, and mushroom.

Full tummies!  

One day, I had the opportunity to enjoy shopping with Ms. M, one of hubby's coworkers.  We got so caught up enjoying our time and a brief coffee outing that the rest of the team had lunch without us ... cell phone coverage is errr ... spotty at best.  Still needing to eat lunch, we ventured down to Fuji Grant mall's food court and ordered the following ... by pointing at mock-ups of the meals.  Our google translate failed us when we attempted to read the menu.  

Meat, shrimp, soup, ,and rice 

Apple custard pie menu

lunch menu

Apple Custard pie

Greed Spice, Pachinko, Karaoke

Friday night we ventured out and about after Hubby finished with work for the day.  We had dinner at a local Mexican-ish restaurant called "Greed Spice".  Here the menu options were pretty simple ... Taco Rice or Taco Noodle.  Within these, we had the option of adding various 'extra' toppings and choosing our spicey level. Perhaps Wifey was just craving some western food, but Greed Spice was amazing! 

After Greed Spice, we went into a local Pachinko Parlor, where Hubby proceeded to lose exactly 100 yen and Wifey proceded to refuse to gamble exactly 100 yen and trade in her ball bearings for a small snack food item.  We don't understand Pachinko.  We had been told is something like an American Pinball game, but appears closer to Plinko from the price is right.  The parlor is loud, smokey, and altogether pleasant IMO.  

After leaving our brief Pachinko adventure we decided to go sing Karaoke.  We saw a bright sign which clearly indicates this was available!  YAY!

Going inside there was no hostess so we kept wandering back until a Japanese lady approached us kind of freaking out about our shoes.  We are pretty accustomed to the cultural norm that you remove your shoes in many places in Japan.  We always look for the pile of shoes right next to a platform and add ours as we go.  Here, there was no such pile.  We followed the attendant back to the entryway and discovered show lockers pictured below:  We began removing ours and storing them in the lockers while discussing needing a room for Karaoke.  This, however, seemed to be impossible.  We're not sure if Karaoke is reservation only here or if they were just full for the night, however, we ended up leaving without wowing everyone with our musical prowess.  Alas .... there's always next trip ... maybe. 

Ladies Shopping Morning

Men don't prefer to spend time shopping.  While I have known a few exceptions to this rule, none were present in Iwakuni this week.  Creating a good-for-everyone solution, us ladies went out and about one morning on our own to get our shop on!  We hit up the mall and grocery store with our google translate apps in hand!  

Soup Spoons

Bowls made in Japan

Smiley face trash cans

Ninja Tabs

Wifey doesn't eat curry ... Hubby does ... apparently its popular enough in Japan to even warrant an instant rice cup version.  

On our way back to the hotel after the mall, we stopped at a coffee shop for some quick caffeine and conversation!  

can you see wifey on the left of this pic?  

We ordered Coffee Jelly from the Japanese language menu based mostly on the picture of ice cream sitting atop coffee.  Can't go wrong with Ice Cream and Coffee right!? 

We ordered Coffee Jelly from the Japanese language menu based mostly on the picture of ice cream sitting atop coffee.  Can't go wrong with Ice Cream and Coffee right!?  Well upon further inspection, the "jelly" part of Coffee Jelly referred to essentially jello.  We'd just assumed it was a weird/bad English translation by Google.  Yeah, it wasn't.

I do recommend Hand Drip to anyone who likes actual coffee flavors.  Since I'm typically looking for something a bit more along the lines of #Ilikealittlecoffeeinmy milk ... it wasn't ideal for me.  The ice cream was great though.