Once again, here is another “Youtube Videos of Interest” segment. This time we will focus on Spring time snacks in Japan, techy graveyards, samurai’s and coffee, and Tommy Lee Jones and coffee.

First up, we have Spring time snacks in Japan.

Snacks shown in the video include Banana Milk/Cereal Crunky, Strawberry Cake Toppo, Kinako and Brown Sugar Kinoko no Yama, Matcha Milk Takenoko no Sato, Sakura Matcha Kit Kat, Fuwamaki Milk Cake made to look like a cow, and Milk Tea Cakes.

Japan is big on seasonal stuff, especially food. You can find all kinds of “themed” food, as you can see in the video it’s “refreshing” tastes like strawberry and banana, as Spring time means a fresh start to the year. Currently it’s Cherry Blossom season where everyone goes out to Japanese parks and have parties/get together while viewing Cherry Blossom(Sakura) trees and seeing the flowers fall of the trees. Restaurants have “Sakura” types of food that involve light, refreshing, and sometimes pink foods to reflect the season, some using the actual Sakura flower. I have tasted Sakura tea and I enjoy it ^^. In my opinion, the most well known seasonal food is Kit Kat’s. In the US, Kit Kat’s come in only 3-4 flavors, which are quite boring for me lol. So whenever I go to Japan I’m always on the look out for Kit Kat’s that come in a variety of flavors. I’ve had mango, chestnut, roasted sweet potato, ramune, strawberry, and other flavors that I can’t quite remember lol. The Kit Kat’s are mostly white chocolate with flavor infused with them. Although on my recent trip where I bought omiyage (souvenirs), one of them was the strawberry Kit Kat but it was infused with milk chocolate instead of white chocolate. There was also wasabi flavored Kit Kat’s at the airport but I was out of money by then so I couldn’t buy it lol. What other Kit Kat flavors have you seen/tried? So when you visit Japan, take note of the season and see if you can find any seasonal foods while you’re there.

Techy graveyards are next.

Japan is a small country, even if you put all the islands of Japan together. Though there are a couple of places in all of Japan that most people live, work, and play. One of them is in Tokyo where over 12 million people live ^^;;. For that reason, land is not only limited but expensive as well. This goes for grave plots as well that could exceed more than 100,000 US. For this reason, Tokyo is a vertical city where building go up rather than horizontal and company the Nichiryoku knows this all to well, which is why they made a vertical building but instead of going up it goes down. When I say “down” I mean they made a underground vault where they keep the remains of someone deceased inside a box and comes with a grave stone. When a person scans a RFID (Radio-frequency identification) card the deceased “plot” comes up to a prayer area in the building so that prayers can be done, then the box is stored and another will take its place in the prayer area when called. This is a pretty interesting use of technology that is being used. I knew they did this for cars but I never would have imagined it used for “burial plots.” I’m sure many people will use this service as it is not only cheaper but pretty convenient. It’s also in a locked vault so only authorized people can enter it so security is good and less likely to get damaged from natural and unnatural causes (unnatural as in someone destroys it). Though I wonder if its creepy to go down into the vault where thousands of people could be resting ^^;;;.

If you watch anime, drama, history shows or read some of Japan’s history, you know about samurai. If you watch anime and know about Akihabara you know about maid cafes. Now put the two together and you have the first samurai themed maid cafe in Akihabara called Mononopu (もののぷ).

As you can see from the video, the cafe has a nice samurai style theme that is based on the Sengoku Era of Japanese history when lords were fighting each other through their personal samurai army throughout Japan to become the ruler of Japan at the time, the shogun. Although there won’t be any killing at this cafe, the “samurais” will serve you drinks and food, typical of maid cafe’s. The “samurais” will talk to you about the Sengoku Era and apparently history buffs who know about that era talk to the “samurais” about it too, so both parties learn. I like the pink samurai armor that you sometimes see in the background lol, don’t know if someone would wear it out onto the battlefield though ^^;;. The maids look cute in their samurai-style outfits. When they say grace with their “swords” it looks like they’re blowing out a recently shot hand gun lol. I like that they give you a signed photo of your waitress when you dine there, though I don’t know if that’s free or not ^^;;. I’ve been to one maid cafe so far (I went to a famous “cat-themed” maid cafe xD) and figured since most are the same I don’t need to really visit them while I’m in Akiba, but I might just stop off at Mononopu the next time I go. So if you want “history and coffee” (says the owner of the cafe), head down to Mononopu.

Information about Mononopu:
To get to Mononopu, go down the main street of Akihabara towards Don Quixote where the building is located next to a am pm convience shop. The building is called Isuzu, the entrance to get inside the building is in the back of the building, and Mononopu is on the fifth floor. The first floor has a soba restaurant that is called Hidaka shop. (中央通りのドンキホーテの先、コンビニampmの隣のいすゞビル5階(1階は中華そば屋「日高屋」さん)※入り口はビルの裏側になります) Across the street from the building is a Mos Burger. It’s about a five minute walk. The exact address is Isuzu Bldg 4-6-2 Soto-Kanda, Chiyoda-ku, 5th Floor (千代田区外神田4-6-2　いすゞビル5階). They are open on weekdays from 2 pm to ll pm, Saturdays from 12 pm to 11 pm, and on Sundays and holidays from 12 pm to 9 pm. The last order they will take is 30 minutes before closing. 【平日】14：00～23：00
【土】 12：00～23：00【日・連休最終日】 12：00～21：00 ※ラストオーダー：営業終了30分前

Last we have Tommy Lee Jones and coffee.

Tommy Lee Jones is a pretty popular actor in the US, I know him best from his role as “K” in the Men in Black movies xD. One of my favorite quotes from the movie is when “K” is in the drivers seat of a car with a Playstation controller instead of a steering wheel and “J” (Will Smith) asks “K” if his mother ever gave him a gameboy and “K” responds in a angry tone “What is a Gameboy?” Tommy is a pretty famous person in Japan and every now and then you will see him promoting Boss Coffee. He is Boss’s “live” mascot lol. He promotes Boss’s coffee drinks, the drink in the commercial is “Rainbow Mountain” and this new commercial has a cherry blossom theme as it is the season xD. I like how he said that he likes to dress up lol. Boss really should replace their can’s current image of a man smoking a pipe with Tommy Lee Jones face with him drinking the Boss Coffee lol.

That’s it for this Youtube Videos of Interest segment, tune in for more in the future.

Videos are from Japan Probe and JapanSugoi.