Food, Travelling & Living: Food And Fun Of Okinawa -- Day 4

Coffee, fried potato with beef, club sandwich and oden
Image from Locky's English Playground

Day 4 morning started off with a convenient store breakfast on the car as we wanted to maximise time for shopping.

Coffee, fried potato with beef
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Didn't really like the coffee that much, coffee in Japan tends to be a bit bland, but I have stressed that I don't know how to appreciate good coffee as I am more of a Starbucks person, so you can take this comment with a pinch of salt.

Turnip Oden
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Daikon oden (turnip in bonito soup) though needs no expert to you that they are truly delectable. My wife likes it so much that she can even have it as breakfast in the morning! That being said, this daikon oden is the one that gets sold out the earliest in any store!

fried potato with beef
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But this fried potato with beef, to my dismay, had a hard, rock-like exterior and zero beef content.

Sign of private housing opposite the entrance of the castle
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We were supposed to meet up with the rest of the dozens of the couple's family group and friends at the Shuri Castle for some sight-seeing, but since we arrived first, we proceeded with our plan first.

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It was a time for students' school holidays, so there were many enjoying their moments of "jumpiness" in the air for their photo-taking.

Entrance
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3D models of the history of Shurijo castle
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3D models of the surroundings of Shurijo castle
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There were quite a lot of 3D models of the Shuri Castle, but the real thing was what we were interested.

First gate from central path
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Most of the gates of the castle are free of charge,

Panoramic view
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and the panoramic view looking over the city was great,

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except the central palace, which requires an entrance free of JPY820.

Tiles making up a image of the central palace
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3D model reconstruction of a scenario
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Image from Locky's English Playground

Of course, we didn't spend time trying to understand the history. It would have taken a whole day to do so.

Another 3D model reconstruction of a scenario
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Beam constructed palace
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Most parts of the paid areas do not permit photo-taking, thus the lack of photos here, but if you ask me, I think the walk was worth paying, since simply by looking at the amount of maintenance of the place you'll have to agree with me.

Never skip a chance for ice cream in Okinawa
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Two things I did find really interesting that day. One was the limited edition tri-colour ice cream sold only in Shuri Castle.

Solar-powered lamp post
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Two is the solar-powered lamp post around the park. This is something that every one should go for.

Uokura sushi
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After we left the castle, we found a decent sushi restaurant called Uokura 魚蔵 バークレーズコートwhere everyone can finally meet up.

Entrance of the sushi restaurant
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There weren't too many customers at that time but you can never go wrong with sushi in Japan.

Steamed egg
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Various types of sushi
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All I know is, it was lovely to stack up many rows of 20 plates in the process.

View from my table
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Seach eel
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Talking about freshness and taste of Japanese sushi would be redundant. Photos of them should be enough to do a great job.

Ramen work ham
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Salmon galore
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Flounder
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Crab legs
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Zoom in
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But one thing is for sure, there was no tuna on my plate.

Mobile bakery
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Nintendo lookalike
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Electronic shops in Naha are huge but did not have the latest models in stock. If you do want something very new, you need to call a week earlier and place order.

Panoramice view of the shop
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Water filter at anight excellent price
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But when they do have, say, water filters, the price was excellent. I myself have bought 4 back home. 

Cameraso and lenses
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As for camera lenses, they were quite a bit cheaper but I had not got a need for an upgrade. 

Talking projection
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Solar-powered garden lamps
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Route to Nishimatsuya Nahashintoshin
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After the group shopping was done we drove to Nishimatsuya Nahashintoshin to get baby stuff. 

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My wife bought dozens of packet instant food for baby Muse, while I bought this car seat mat to protect the bank row seats. Again, crazy bargains.

Baby car seat mat for cars
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I got this seat mat for JPY1299, which was around HK$90.

Packet instant food at half price
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And each one of these is JPY87, around HK$6 as compared to HK$12 in Hong Kong.

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After that, what's for dinner could not match what we had on day 1. So I don't think I'll even bother taking about it.

We had the entire restaurant
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But we sort of had the entire restaurant for ourselves.

Restaurant from the front door
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Maybe because it was already pretty late, or that we were too noisy and drove everyone out.



Vocabulary:
take sb with a pich of salt -- UK ( US take sth with a grain of salt) to not completely believe something that you are told, because you think it is unlikely to be true:
delectable -- (adj) beautiful; giving great pleasure
dismay -- (n)[U] a feeling of unhappiness and disappointment


Resources:
Shuri Castle @ Wikipedia
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shuri_Castle

魚蔵 バークレーズコート @ tabelog
http://tabelog.com/okinawa/A4703/A470404/47000808/


http://dictionary.cambridge.org/dictionary/british/take-sth-with-a-pinch-of-salt
dictionary.cambridge.org/dictionary/english-chinese-traditional/delectable?q=delectable+
http://dictionary.cambridge.org/dictionary/english-chinese-traditional/dismay?q=dismay+

Food, Travelling & Living: Food And Fun Of Okinawa -- Day 3 @ Locky's English Playground
http://lockyep.blogspot.hk/2014/12/food-travelling-living-food-and-fun-of_22.html

Food, Travelling & Living: Food And Fun Of Okinawa -- Day 2 @ Locky's English Playground
http://lockyep.blogspot.hk/2014/12/food-travelling-living-food-and-fun-of_15.html

Food, Travelling & Living: Food And Fun Of Okinawa -- Day 1 @ Locky's English Playground
http://lockyep.blogspot.hk/2014/12/food-travelling-living-food-and-fun-of.html