We were in Japantown the other day and walked by one of the many restaurants. Nick reminded me of the time he commented, "Wow, they have to make that food everyday and put it in the window....seems like a waste." To which I replied, "you know it's plastic, right?"
Anyways, this is very common in Japanese restaurants. And apparently we were the cause - and by "we", I mean Americans. After we bombed the heck out of Japan back in WWII, us and the Europeans decided we should probably help them rebuild (how nice....). When "we" arrived there, we couldn't read the menus. So the Japanese restaurant owners had wax models made to show Americans what was on the menu. That way the Americans could pick the food based on what it looked like.
Now, it has become a HUGE industry. Restaurants have been known to custom order an entire window display - upwards of 1 million yen ($10k). I actually had a mini set of sushi when I was little. It was fun to play with. I kinda wish I still had it, it would make for some fun magnets.
3 comments:
does it remind you of big bird in tokyo? because that's what it reminds me of. it also reminds me of you. satsu-maa-gaaaa.
I totally almost added that it reminded me of Big Bird in Japan....but decided against it. I guess I was wrong! But yeah. It totally does. 1-2-3 is ichi ni san, ichi ni what? ichi ni san.
Seattle Pacific University used to have a display as you walked into the cafeteria which showed all the daily entrées, but they were real, not fake. This was great because otherwise you'd have to walk all the way around the perimeter of the cafeteria to see what was available at each station. Unfortunately, it seems some of their students complained about the "huge" waste of food, so they stopped. And now you have to walk all the way around the cafeteria, cutting in front of people waiting in line at each station, just to see what's cooking. Naturally, this causes a lot of chaos, confusion and unnecessary crowding.
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