All Entries in the "Non-Food" Category
From a Non-Japanese Saying: “私は日本人です”
I am not Japanese but I have the urge to declare that “私は日本人です” to stand in solidarity with the Japanese people.
Ever since last Friday when the Tohoku earthquake struck Japan, the first I did when I woke up to start my day was to check msnbc.com. Yeah, I checked the news even before I checked the comments left on chowtimes which I habitually did. The comments justs did not mean as much to me.
Each morning I was hoping to read the time when the country starts it recovery. Each morning I was confronted with more grave news.
In my whole life, I never had to live through a disaster or war or even famine. I read about many humanitarian disasters but not the scale that befell Japan.
I can’t think of any nation that had to endure what Japan is going through. And I fear that the worst is yet to come.
Out of a whim, I took out the chowtimes.com logo on the banner yesterday. I replaced it with the words “be strong”. I don’t know why I did that. Maybe it is just a way for me to tell the Japanese people that I am with them and my heart goes out to them. It pains me not knowing when it will all end.
As a late baby boomer, I was taught from young to hate the Japanese. I was reminded of their cruel role during the Second World War. However, Japan rose from the ashes of destruction, turn their backs to war and built a nation that gained the respect of the world. Yeah, feelings of the Japanese people turned from distrust and fear to one of admiration and respect.
The Japanese people are resilient and I know that these catastrophic events will make the people even stronger. It gives me much hope in humanity reading about the courage and especially the gracefulness when faced with such challenges.
4SlicesofCheese sent me an email today and I want to share it with you all:
Hi Ben and Suanne,
This is _____ aka 4Slicesofcheese. I just had lunch at Ramen Sanpachi on Robson. I don’t believe you have been there and I am not trying to promote the restaurant, although I do like their food.
The reason why I am writing is because at lunch today I noticed that they have a sign that said 1 dollar of every bowl of ramen they sell will be donated to the RedCross to Japan. I don’t remember the dates exactly but I believe it was until the end of March.
I had a small chat with the owner lady, she thanked me for supporting and I learned that she has cousins in the Sendai area which she has not been able to contact since the Earthquake. You can see the pain in her eyes yet she is still optimistic. She tells me with a smile, this should make you cherish every day in your life and not take it for granted.
I believe this is a good cause and the owners are very nice people. If people do not want to donate in the conventional methods this way you can make a small contribution and also enjoy a bowl of ramen.
I hope you can do a small shout out in one of your post to get the word out.
Thanks a lot,
Yeah, I am curious why there are so little mention of countries coming to Japan to help them in their hour of need. Maybe it is because the country has the resources to deal with the calamities and it is not financial assistance that they need. Instead I can just imagine that Japan will want to pick herself up, on her own … with grace and strength.
But I know that there is one thing that the people of Japan will appreciate … that the world tells them that we all stand with them and pray that the day of rebuilding starts.
So, Japan … BE STRONG.
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Weekend Musings: Of Creative Sofas and Men vs Women’s Brains
I slept like a baby last night. It sure feels great waking up at 7:00 AM for a change instead of 4:00 AM for the past week. LOL!
I am feeling so relaxed right now and what better thing to do than to share with you some pictures of creative sofas that I came across on this site. What I like about the site that I don’t have to use my gray matter … just a bunch of interesting pictures. I added some more that I had found to the collection too.
While talking about brains, Andy from Portland sent me a youtube yesterday. I had seen this before but it is still as funny as ever.
Enjoy a nice relaxing weekend and just imagine you are on one of these sofas!
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Categories Updated: Chinese Cuisine Broken Down To Sub-Cuisines
Hi All:
Jan posted a comment in this post asking if we have a separate category for Cantonese cuisine on chowtimes. Well, we did not but it was an excellent suggestion because the “Chinese” category had been way too big already with over 200 posts. Suanne had spent quite a number of hours recategorizing each of the “Chinese” cuisine posts into its various sub-cuisines. So, instead of a large “Chinese” cuisine, you will see the following sub-cuisine breakdowns on the sidebar:
The numbers in brackets shows the number of posts in the category. Let us know if some of the posts had been wrongly categorized and we will fix it.
So Jan, I hope you find this useful.
Ben
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Happy New Year 2011
May you have …
Enough happiness to keep you happy.
Enough trials to keep you strong.
Enough sorrow to keep you human.
Enough hope to keep you thoughtful.
Enough failure to keep you humble.
Enough success to keep you eager.
Enough friends to give you comfort.
Enough faith and courage in yourself to banish depression.
Enough wealth to meet your daily needs.
Enough determination to make each day a better day than yesterday.
Happy New Year 2011 Everyone!
With love from Nanzaro, Arkensen, Suanne and Ben
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Results of Draw — Vancouver 2010 Olympics Opening Ceremony Dress Rehearsal
The response was simply overwhelming. When Arkensen and Nanzaro donated three of their precious Dress Rehearsal tickets to chowtime’s readers we did not think much about it. After all, we had too many tickets and the event is held on work and school hours.
Credit metronews.ca - stig nielsen/for metro vancouver
It was in the news yesterday that thousands of volunteers were lining around the block in downtown Vancouver to get hold of just one ticket (with the option to buy another one at $50). Between Nanzaro and Arkensen, they were given ten without having to line up for it.
You know …
I want to say a heartfelt thank you for all the unexpected kind words you had for Arkensen and Nanzaro. We even received a long moving email from a reader just thanking the boys for putting the tickets out there. Those words meant a lot to Suanne and I because this allows us to demonstrate to our boys what it means to share and how people out there who truly appreciates such unselfish act. I want to let you know they are pleased and are proud of what they had done even though they did not say it. I can see it in their eyes. :-)
Thanks a lot!
It goes without saying that particular post generated the most number of comments ever. We had recorded a total of 308 comments. As expected, there are some frivolous submissions (i.e. 24 comments coming from one IP within a space of 30 minutes) … sorry to say we removed the entire swath of these emails from the draw.
We ended up with 272 email addresses which we ran through the Randomizer.
Here are the results: More on following page. Click here to continue reading
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Amazing Natural Camouflage
Alright this is not about food … not even remotely related at all. I got these amazing pictures from a friend and thought I want to put it up on the site for a little experiment.
As I was looking at these, I can’t help but to think how much effort one would go through to take even one picture of these creatures.
Enjoy these pictures.
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Happy New Year 2010
Each moment in a day has its own value.
Morning brings HOPE
Afternoon brings FAITH
Evening brings LOVE,
Night brings REST,
Hope you will all of them everyday.
HAPPY NEW YEAR
from Nanzaro, Arkensen, Suanne and Ben
Using Menu Psychology to Entice Diners (by the NYT)
I came across this very interesting article on the New York Times today. The article is a bit longish but it describes how the combination of prices, adjectives, fonts, type sizes, ink colors and placement on the page can coax diners into spending a little more money.
Quoting the article:
Some restaurants use what researchers call decoys. For example, they may place a really expensive item at the top of the menu, so that other dishes look more reasonably priced; research shows that diners tend to order neither the most nor least expensive items, drifting toward the middle. Or restaurants might play up a profitable dish by using more appetizing adjectives and placing it next to a less profitable dish with less description so the contrast entices the diner to order the profitable dish.
In another section of the article it also pointed out:
A study published by researchers at Cornell found that when the prices were given with dollar signs, customers spent less than when no dollar signs appeared. The study also found that customers spent significantly more when the price was … More on following page. Click here to continue reading
