SF Cherry Blossom Festival

On Saturday, in between the museum and the Rainforest Cafe, we stumbled upon the San Francisco Cherry Blossom Festival in Japantown. I had heard about it before, but had forgotten it was this weekend. Since William served his mission in Japan, he was very excited at the prospect of going.

Near the center of town, they have this neat tower where there were they had the major performances.

The most interesting part about the festival is that there are no actual cherry blossoms- just a bunch of these artificial ones. I guess it just has to do with the tradition of welcoming spring.

At the main stage, they had performances by different Japanese performing groups. William wasn't quite sure what they were doing with the sticks

Then, there was a group of teenage girls from Japan who performed Taiko where they beat the large drums. William said that this is fairly unusual since it is mainly men who perform. I think its just a great example of gender equality.

They had a bunch of traditional Japanese festival foods like fried octopus (takoyaki) and this pancake filled with bean curd. The lines were very long for these, as well as bbq ribs. They also had things like hamburgers and popcorn. And, then they had the Safeway booths where they had random free samples of Oreos, pickles, and chips. We chose to get the free stuff.

They also had vendors selling different Japanese and non-Japanese wears. They also had people doing free chiropractic back consultations. I thought that their advertisement or enticement to come and check it out was interesting- a big plastic spine.

Besides the vendors specially there for the festival, there are also a bunch of permanent specialty shops inside a little mall. I liked the bridge that they have as a decorative staircase

They also have the special sushi restaurants where you sit at a bar and choose which entree you want as it comes by you on a conveyor belt. William says that in Japan, they also have more elaborate ones, like a water stream.

But, William's favorite part of the trip was going to the Japanese grocery store. They have a few Japanese items at Safeway, but not nearly as many as he would like. He got his favorite drink- Strawberry Calpico, the wrappers to make inari sushi, Cha Han- a special seasoning to make fried rice, Panko- Japanese style bread crumbs, and a couple other items. William does a great job of making these items- I just think it is funny that he really doesn't like sushi all that much. We made Tonkatsu (or chicken katsu) for the Elders and they actually really liked it, mainly because it is a lightly breaded chicken breast with a special bbq sauce.

All in all, it was a successful day at the cherry blossom festival even though we didn't see any real cherry blossoms. And heard a performing group singing American songs. I would love to go and see the cherry blossoms in DC and also in Japan someday.