Sakura Soba

Looking out the window at the grey, rainy/snowy day, it is hard to imagine that sakura (cherry blossom) season is right around the corner. But within three weeks or so they should be in full bloom. Predictions for their peak dates (they vary in accordance with location) are probably already in the media someplace. Like everyone else, I await their arrival eagerly and hope that I will not miss them entirely while on spring break back in chilly North America.

In anticipation, I had sakura soba for the first time the other day while out for lunch with a dear friend. Truth be told, I had never seen these unusual noodles before. When they appeared as a special offering at that rather good sobayasan atop the department store Mitsukoshi Ginza, I could not resist. Though the same thickness and texture as garden variety buckwheat noodles, they were pink! Yes, pink! The taste was essentially unchanged. But my nose did detect an essence of cherry blossom as I daintily slurped the tsuyu soaked strands. An all natural product, the pink color may be attributed to the flower petals added to the basic buckwheat flour mix.

The Top and Bottom of the Swatch Building

I recently re-visited the Nicolas G. Hayek Center (aka the Swatch Building) in Ginza. Created by that Japanese architectural wizard, Shigeru Ban, it is a fantastic solution to the nearly impossible problem of showcasing seven of the company's best-selling brands on a prominent but narrow parcel amid Ginza, Tokyo's high end shopping district. Ban's competition-winning building begins with a four-story void connecting the streets at the front and back of the property. It is also the staging area for seven elevators, each one a tiny, satellite showroom leading directly to the brand's boutique above or below grade. If you would like to read more about the building, here is the link to the piece I wrote for Architectural Record shortly after the building's completion (http://archrecord.construction.com/projects/portfolio/archives/0805nicolas-1.asp).









The top of the building is crowned with a grand party room overlooking the city. A precursor to Ban's unique building for The Centre Pompidou Metz that opened earlier this year, the room is covered with a wavy roof supported by woven steel strips that morph into organic, tree-shaped, see-through columns doubling as conduits for drain pipes etc.







Accessed via stairs or an elevator cab lined with bands of the colorful clocks all buckled together, the Swatch shop anchors the bottom of the building. The basement-level boutique was not designed by Ban but by Swatch's worldwide space planner. Sorry Swatch people, this was a missed opportunity. Just think what Ban could have and would have done.

Umbrella Bag Rant

Today's rant is about disposable umbrella covers, those long, skinny, single use, vinyl bags whose dispensers (pictured above) come trotting out at the slightest drizzle. While I appreciate Japanese fastidiousness when it comes to unwanted water, I can not applaud the overuse of vinyl bags or the accompanying tsukai suteru (use and lose) mentality. Reader, this wasteful and environmentally unfriendly situation warrants attention.

To Japan's credit, the eco-bag trend seems to be taking root. At least at the stores I frequent. And I sense an increase in public bathrooms equipped with those supersonic hand dryers that practically suck the water right off the skin. Surely this is better than paper towels, yes? Best of all are the washrooms that provide no hand drying mechanisms whatsoever. Though it is a bit of a bother to whip out a hankie or pocket towel with wet hands, one gets used to it (or in this case re-use to it since this practice has been around a long time). But when it comes to wet umbrellas and their bags, change is slow.

Let's backtrack for a moment. As I may have mentioned in a previous post, people in Japan love umbrellas. Myself included. I am certain that I carry an umbrella far more frequently here than I do in the US. This is partly because it rains more in Japan (I think). And when it does rain, I simply take an umbrella cover from the discard pile and re-use it, if I need to go inside a store, office or other public facility. Not ideal, but better than the alternatives. I am waiting for someone to design an appealing and reusable umbrella cover. The old lady version already exists but it is not a big seller. Why doesn't someone do for the umbrella bag what was done for the shopping bag?



Given my strong feelings on the subject, you can imagine my elation when a friend and I encountered this umbrella drying device at the entrance to a Ginza eat-and-drink building. It consists of felt panels arranged radially to wipe the umbrella's outer surface and a plastic box to catch the runoff. All it takes is one quick twist of the wrist ... no bags or electricity needed. Please note the conventional umbrella bag dispenser hovering in the background. Was this relative positioning intentional? We stood and watched for a few minutes -- almost no one chose the bag over the dryer.