10 days.

Hi, readers!  WR here.

We're 10 days into "Veganuary" and I have some huge news to report!  After 10 whole days of eating a (relatively) strictly vegan diet, DW AND I ARE STILL ALIVE!  Shocking, I know.  But, before we go into the pre-challenge prep and sexy-delicious food porn photos (mmmm, food porn), let me define "(relatively) strictly vegan diet."  Here's the Merriam-Webster definition:

veg·an

noun\ˈvē-gən also ˈvā- also ˈve-jən or -ˌjan\

: a person who does not eat any food that comes from animals and who often also does not use animal products (such as leather).

For the most part, DW and I are following vegan principles this month, save for a select few:

1.)  First, we're not making any adjustments in terms of leather clothes.  It's winter in Minnesota.  I'm not not going to wear my only pair of winter boots because they have leather on them.  That's f%#ing insane.  I like my toes attached to my feet, thank you very much.

2.)  Second, we're not being strict about third-tier animal-synthesized products.  For example, for serious vegans, any cereal that is fortified with Vitamin D(3) is bad, while Vitamin D(2) is okay.  (The latter is synthesized from a plant material, while the former is synthesized from a cholesterol product.)  We, as not-so-serious vegans, are not being as strict with this.

3.)  Third, we aren't checking the manufacturing origins of any of our pre-existing chemicals or toiletry products (i.e, animal testing).  I'm certainly not saying that that kind of research isn't a valuable endeavor, if the vegan lifestyle is your thing; It's just that that particular facet of veganism is not why we are doing "Veganuary."

We, DW and I, are specifically doing this challenge to broaden our culinary horizons.  Anyone who knows us knows that nary a meal goes by without a generous serving of meat (DW especially) and cheese (WR especially).  So "Veganuary" is a way to push ourselves to try new things (new veggies, new beans, new grains, and whole new recipes), while still preserving that idiotic-challenge-atmosphere that makes us feel like f%#ing food champions.

So, mission and purpose clarified: Let's talk prep.  Preparation is super important when tackling a difficult food challenge.  The only food challenge that I ever failed (a no-dairy challenge), I failed because I did not prepare for the transition.  This time, I was ready.

In December (a well-known, widely practiced challenge known as, "Survive the Holidays!"), I bookmarked 55 delicious-sounding vegan recipes.  I researched popular vegan alternatives for non-vegans, like the best non-dairy creamers, the best fake cheese, the best brand of tofu, the best guacamole, etc.  I made a "Veganuary Calendar" and a list of "Quick Meal & Snack Ideas" and put it on the fridge.  As you can see in the picture above, our freezer is on full challenge mode.

We also prepared our first week's menu and went grocery shopping the day before "Veganuary" began. That gave us all the materials we needed to start first thing the next morning and not put ourselves in a position of being hungry right away with nothing to eat.  Note: Shopping as a new-Vegan takes a LOT longer because you have to carefully examine the ingredients of every single thing you're going to buy.  DW and I started this process early in December by checking the ingredients of everything we bought in advance (vegan or not). Then we kept a mental tally of things that were: A,) Hooray! ____ is A.O.K. for Veganuary! and, B.) Damn. We're sure gonna miss you, ____.

Lastly, we banished all non-vegan food and drink to the farthest, darkest corners of our pantry, fridge, and freezer.  BEGONE, THOU DELICIOUS PESTS!  COMETH NOT INTO MY SIGHT UNTIL NEXT FORTNIGHT!

Dramatic outbursts aside, we were ready.  And it's really worked out too.  The challenge hasn't been too difficult to maintain, so far, and the food we've made has been really tasty.

You wanna see it, don't you?  Our tasty, tasty vegan food.  Oh, I know you do, you bad boys and naughty girls, you.  Well, I'm nothing if not accommodating.  On to the food porn!

Vegan Hoppin' John (a January 1st tradition!) with
DW's made-from-scratch ciabatta.

Veggie & tofu don-buri with a spicy peanut sauce.
(Those are store-bought vegan rolls and they were gross.)

Falafel sandwich with baby greens, hummus, and roasted onions & peppers.

Mushroom & veggie red sauce pasta, with
DW-made garlic crustini.

Vegan masala burger with sauteed onions and french fries.

Baked potatoes with a spicy black bean chili and side salad.

DW-made wheat sourdough Pullman loaf,
the source of many vegan toasts.

Vegan donuts from "Glamdoll Donuts" in Minneapolis!

Balsamic marinated mushroom and tofu kabobs, steamed
green beans in an herb "butter," and black truffle tater tots.

And last, but not at all least, DW's veggie tikki masala curry:
Potato, red lentil, peppers & onions in a "creamy," spicy tomato curry.

Yeeeeeah.  Oh, yeeeeeeeeeah.  Just look at that sexy-deliciousness.  It's not hard at ALL to be vegan when you've got a cook like DW around.

10 days in to "Veganuary"... and we're still food f%#ing champions.

That's it for this week!  If you'd like any of the recipes from the pictures above, feel free to post that request in the comments below!  We'll include them in future posts.

Thanks for reading, everyone!  And don't forget to feed the fish!
WR

Back to the Blog + Veganuary!

Hello, Rowstein readers (if there are any still out there)!  WR here.

'Sup!

It's been a long time.  Like, a really long time.  Sorry about that.  I could make excuses about being busy, but... the truth is, I didn't feel like writing.  The transition from Japan back to the US was very difficult for me.  I kept telling myself that I had to write about it on the blog, talk about my feelings, post a lot of pictures, etc, etc... but each time I geared up to do that, I was struck by such a crippling sense of depression (followed closely by inexplicable guilt) that I just couldn't do it.

I don't want you to think that I'm not happy to be here.  I'm thrilled to be back with my husband, my family, my kitties, my ole' stomping grounds, and delicious Americany-homey foods.  I'm very, very happy to be home.  But I miss Japan.  A whole heck of a lot.

I miss my friends there.  I miss Fukuoka.  I miss the food.  I miss the clatter of trains rumbling off in the distance.  I miss the challenges presented by daily life.  I miss walking everywhere.  I miss the feeling of tatami under my feet.  I miss the sound of Japanese language all around.  I miss the smell of Hakata ramen, even the gross "sweaty feet" kind.

But, mostly, I think I miss my job.  I was a really good ALT.  I mean, I know I wasn't perfect.  But I put in a lot of time and effort into all my lessons and activities, and those efforts were recognized.  I felt truly valued by my school, my students, and my co-teachers.

Since coming home, I made the choice not to seek employment until the new year (2015, aka tomorrow). That's because I'm applying to a slew of really-super-hard-to-get-into-dream-school graduate programs (fingers crossed, fingers crossed!!!!).  My thought process went like this: "Well, I've worked reeeeeally hard these last two years and put aside a chunk of money, so I'll take this available time... these next six months... and spend it writing new plays, traveling, and making my applications as damned strong as possible."  DW heartily agreed.

For the most part, I've done just that.  But what I didn't account for was the absence that work would leave within myself.  I knew I'd miss Japan.  I knew I'd miss my friends.  But I didn't really think I'd miss the work.  So, when I came home (and inevitably gained 15 lbs of "Welcome back to the US!" weight), I felt really worthless.  Valueless.  Like my work, my personal work, meant nothing.  Like I meant nothing.

Hey, okay.  Calm down.  Obviously, now, I know that's not true.  I may be a chubbier WR, but I am a super awesome WR.  (Cheesy smile and two thumbs up!)  I remember that now.  So, no worries.  But that's the real reason why I couldn't write the blog.  Writing my "Farewell to Japan!" post was just going to bring up a lot of feelings that I didn't (and maybe still don't) want to face.

I'm hoping that someday soon, I'll be ready to post my final pictures from Japan (because, damn, some of them are really beautiful) and reflect on my two wonderful years living and working there (because, damn, it was pretty wonderful), but for now you'll just have to wait a little longer.

But!  Hey!  That doesn't mean no Rowland-Weinstein Adventures!  Heeeeellz no.

In the Rowstein tradition of doing idiotic, self-flagellating monthly challenges, I bring you....

>>>> VEGANUARY! <<<<

That's right, your meatiest-and-cheesiest loving friends are going vegan for the month of January.  We might actually die.  But, if we don't, we will certainly learn some new recipes and food tricks that we'll be happy to share with you.  And we'll be posting the highlights (and photos!) here every week!  I promise, we'll be back on the blogging wagon.

Until next week's post, I wish you all the happiest of New Years!  May 2015 bring all the love, adventure, happiness, health, and fulfillment that you could ever hope for!

Thanks for reading!
WR

P.S.  And seriously, you should probably feed those fish.  It's been, like, six months!

Return from off the face of the earth.

Hello all, DW here.  When last you heard from us Japan was in the fullness of Spring and Minnesota was just plain full of snow.  Needless to say much has happened in the intervening months.  The semester came to a close with much grading, writing, and gnashing of teeth on my part, which means I have but one semester of coursework and a boatload of clinical experience to gain before graduating in a year.  I had an amazing time visiting WR in Japan. And now we are only 31 days away from WR arriving back on the ground in Minnesota for good!

I'm hoping to share some of the stories and pictures from all that time over the coming weeks, but to keep from falling even further behind I want to jump ahead to the present and give you all a quick run-down of what is new here in the northern midwest.

Since getting back from the East I hit the ground running.  After four days of prep (read: get over jetlag) I got to be a student clinician for the University of Minnesota Kids Who Stutter Camp.  The name is not misleading, it's exactly what it sounds like, and it was a wonderful experience.  Not only did it give me the opportunity to work with a new population of kiddos, it was amazing to see how the campers supported and shared with one another.  Many of them probably feel isolated by their speech in their normal school environments, but around peers who share the same struggles they really opened up.

A picture from one of my bike rides to campus.  The weather was a bit on the rainy
side (as those of you in the midwest know), and the Mississippi is nearing record highs.

Apart from my clinical work I had to start getting back up to speed in a literal sense as well.  My good friend Drew and I are tackling the Buzz Ryan Sprint Triathlon two weeks from today, and the time I haven't spent on clinic work has been dominated by my attempt to get back in shape.  I've gone back to cursing my existence five days a week (the same regimen which preceded WR and I's last Tri), and I'm finally starting to feel good about it.

Me attempting to not look sweaty as I took a pic for WR after
my first substantial bike ride of the year.

Since the camp ended two weeks ago, I have started at my second practicum placement working at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester.  Saving me from excessive commuting, my benevolent supervisor generously offered me her and her fiance's finished basement which has made it a much less exhausting endeavor.

This is the building I'm working in over the summer.  It's as swanky on the inside
as it looks on the outside. (image borrowed from the mayo clinic)

Like my second placement last semester, I am working with indivdiual's with voice disorders.  So far it's been fabulous.  I have had the opportunity to see a fair spectrum of patients, and I'm getting some great experience with learning Nasoendoscopy (which feels a bit like video games . . . but with more noses, mucous, and larynges).  When I'm not filling people's nares with video equipment or learning/administering therapy I've been putzing around the neighborhood in Rochester, and for once the weather has been behaving itself.

A creek which runs near the house in Rochester.  I will run there.

A lake just a little distance from the house in Rochester.  I will swim there.

A park along the creek and before the lake near the house in Rochester.
I will vainly attempt to study there.

In any event I should skeedattle for now.  Later this week I'll be visiting Madison Wisconsin for a conference, and I have some ducks to coax into rows before I'm ready for the journey.


Thanks for reading!  We'll be back with an update from the other side of the world, and some flashbacks on our recent travels sooner rather than later. Oh, and don't forget to feed the fish.

DW

Pictures for Funsies

Back home with these lazy bums.

Grilling is part of training right?

Dairy Queen is part of grilling right?

My first time making my own rice cakes for Tteokbokki.

The finished product complete with kimchi I made a few months back.

Taiwanese Pepper Pork buns take 3!

A beautiful evening in the Powderhorn neighborhood.

Art's getting fishy in Fukuoka....

Hello, Compendium readers!

WR here, writing from warm and lovely Kyushu.  I hope all you northern-hemispherites are enjoying the spring as much as I am.  For anyone living in Japan, it's especially important for us to embrace the mild beauty of this season.  Because we know what's coming.  1.)  Rainy season; a soppy, wet, mold-spawning realm of hell.  And then, 2.)  Japanese summer; Hell.  Just plain hell.

But for now, the morning breezes still hold a chill and the sunshine is warm on my all-too-pale winterized skin.  It's a pleasant time to get out in the world and see some sights...

... like an art museum or two!

Recently, I've been trying to visit more of the local cultural attractions here in Fukuoka.  I started with the Fukuoka Asian Art Museum, located in central Fukuoka City.  It's a lovely, if small, museum at the top of the swanky Riverain shopping complex in the Nakasu-Kawabata area.  It focuses mainly on modern art from artists in China, Taiwan, the Philippines, Thailand, Vietnam, etc.

They generously allow visitors to take non-flash photography, so here are a few photos of some my favorite pieces from my leisurely stroll through the galleries.

This next one (below) needs a little explanation, I think.  There were two pieces in one corner of a gallery which were displayed as "found art."  They're retired molds for Buddhist sculptures, elevated on pikes so that visitors can duck inside and look up.  In the picture directly below, if you look closely, you can see the rough shape of a full-body, seated Buddha.  The other mold (not shown from the outside) is of a very large Buddha head.  That's the second picture below, taken from inside.

It was a strangely serene experience, standing inside the mold.  There was a faint herbal smell to it, and sounds from the outside took on an distant, echoey tone.

All in all, I highly recommend the Fukuoka Asian Art museum to local tourists.  And with a ticket price of only 200 yen (at the time of my visit, at least), it really can't be beat for a few hour's pleasant distraction.

In keeping with the art theme, let's flash-forward to today's visit: the Art Aquarium.  This installation, currently being shown at Hakata Station, is a combination of goldfish, aquarium design, and art.  While I think arguments could definitely be made that the fish are not being kept in the best of situations, what with the high stress environment (lights and music and a constant stream of people), I will say that the tanks were all meticulously clean and well-kept, and the fish seemed pretty healthy to me; a not-at-all-an-expert-in-fish outside observer.

So.  That aside, I thought the exhibition was gorgeous.  Stunningly so.  There was a shocking simplicity and organic beauty to it all, like watching a canvas paint itself before your eyes.  Here are a few of my favorite photos from my tour.

The triangle piece is a kaleidoscope, one of dozens installed into the tank.
Pretty darn magical, really.

A still from a short film, projected onto a screen
behind a long and flat tank.  Also magical.

That guy has my same camera!

Since pictures can't really capture the feeling of the place, I thought I'd upload a short video of the signature piece (the over-sized goldfish bowl from above). 

As you can tell, I'm really, reeeeeeally enjoying my new camera.  (Thanks, DW!  Hugs!  Kisses!)  I hope you enjoyed the the blog post this week and maybe it'll inspire you to go out and find some art in your own town, wherever that may be.

Thanks for reading and don't forget to feed the fish!
(The digital ones that live at the top of the blog page, not the ones in the photos.)

WR.

On Earthquakes and Barrel Openings.

Welcome back, readers!

That's right!  It's WR, again.  Things have been pretty good in Japan!  The weather has finally started to warm a bit, allowing for the much-awaited explosion of sakura (cherry blossom) celebrations everywhere. But, for this week's RowStein installment, I won't be writing about that.  For this post, I'll be looking back to a fantastic "Barrel Opening Festival" I went to a couple weeks ago.

Oh, right.  And that earthquake thing.  Let's get that out of the way first.

There it is.  The earthquake.  I'm one of the pale yellowy dots, in the upper middle-ish part of the southern island, SW of the red "X."  It was a 6.3 on the Richter scale, happening at 2:06 in the morning on March 14th.  And it scared the absolute CRAP out of me.  Though, to be honest, I'm not sure which scared me most; the actual shaking of my house or the banshee wail of my cell phone's emergency alarm.  There was a squealing siren sound, then a Japanese voice shouting, "Jishin desu, jishin desu!"  (It's an earthquake, it's an earthquake!)  Seriously.  That's a g#%@mn terrifying way to wake up.

It is pretty cool, though, that the P-wave triggered seismic alarm system gave me a few seconds warning, so that I could scramble to my "safe spot" just as the larger S-wave earthquake actually struck.  That's some impressive technology.  We're living in the future!  (O_o)

The earthquake wasn't a bad one, though, even if it creeped me out quite a bit. (I mean, I'm from the upper and middle Midwest.  Aside from the typically quiet "New Madrid" fault, we're about as far from any seismic activity as you can get.)  There were only a handful of injuries, minor damages, and no tsunami.  Whew.

Anyway.  Back to the topic at hand: The Oga Shozu Barrel Opening Festival!

So, as I've mentioned before, there's a sake brewery in my town.  It's called Oga Shozu.  Twice a year, they open their doors to the public and hold a sake festival inside the brewery grounds.  It's a great big party and and an excuse to try a variety of delicious, locally-crafted alcohol.

Approaching the brewery complex proper, I found that the typically drab alley had been decorated for the event with dozens and dozens of old Futsukaichi-area photographs.  It was cool to see the brewery (which has been in operation since the flippin' 1600's) take such pride in their community.

One of three photography displays.

One of my favorites: A very old Nishitetsu bus photo.

Here's the back-entrance to the brewery, which became the front-entrance for the festival.  The blue banner shows the name of the company, in stylized kanji.

Step right up for sake! 

Once inside, I paid an absurdly small fee (about $1.00, American) and got a commemorative sake cup (seen below).  Patrons walked between stalls, sampling dozens of different products made by the brewery.  Some were shochu (a harder liquor, popular in Kyushu) and some were Nihon-shu (what we Americans typically call sake).  My favorites were 1.) a yuzu-flavored Nihon-shu, an Asian citrus which has a tartness similar to a grapefruit, and 2.) this green, almost sludgy liquid which had a flavor that I can only describe as a sake bomb which exploded in an apple fritter.  Surprisingly delicious.

Here are some photo highlights from my walk around the festival.

I'll put you to good use, friend. 

Crowded, but friendly.

Inside the brewery building.

Other festival-goers
getting their sake on.

A brewery banner, with a
tank in the background.

A lovely day for drinking with strangers.
A lot of strangers.

Yeah.  Did I mention it was crowded?

Mochi-making display!
SPOILER ALERT: I ate some
and it was delicious.

Below, you'll see one of the more... interesting sake I tasted.  The bottle seems pretty cool, right?  The hornet on the label and all.  I figured, "Oh, okay.  It's strong.  It's got sting.  Like a hornet."  I reached out with my empty cup in both hands, the Japanese gesture for, "More alcohol please!"

The cool looking bottle, in all it's glory.

The vendor started to pour, then paused.  He asked me a question.  I said I didn't understand.  He asked me again, a little slower.  This time, I caught the words "allergy" and "danger."  I tilted my head in confusion, so he held up the bottle and shook it gently.

Five giant Asian hornet corpses swirled about in the liquor.  "Ah," I thought,  "So. The label is a bit more literal than I'd previously imagined."  But, with my cup already extended and my whole "I'm in another country, just go with it" attitude already engaged, I figured I might as well.  I raised my cup and downed my shochu, receiving approving grins from the row of vendors.

YOLO, as the kids say.

All in all, it was a great event.  It's always fun to get out and enjoy the nice spring weather in my lovely little Chikushino.  And, hey, if happens to align with the chance to take a bunch of shots with friendly, tipsy neighbors... all the better.

Thanks for reading, everyone!  Hope you have a wonderful week, wherever you are in the world.  And don't forget to feed the fish!

WR