of fireflies and cha han

First up - a birthday shoutout to Nick who's celebrating his 30th birthday in Mongolia. His MSN mesg reads - Life begins at 30! May God's grace and love fill your days throughout the rest of this year, and have a blast in Ulaanbaator ya :)



It's getting a li'l busier here. More homework, assignments, reports and presentations. But in between, I try to find the time to enjoy life here in Niigata. Like last Sunday we went on an impromptu trip to Maki, 30 minutes drive from Ikarashi to catch hotaru (fireflies).

We heard it was off peak season, but I thought we should still give it a try. Even though the winds were blowing fiercely, I managed to convince them to just go for a road trip, if nothing comes out of it in the end. Heh.

As we were driving there after church, we started getting excited and talked about where to have our dinner. Hiro-san called some friends and managed to get some info about a particularly good ramen restaurant in the area.

After parking at an onsen resort, we alighted and walked towards the hills where the fireflies were supposed to be seen. It was about 8pm and still very windy, we were half expecting to see the blinking insects. Seeing some people standing near the bridge kinda raised our hopes a little.

Boy, were we delighted to find not more than 10 fireflies flying about in the dark. True enough, it was off peak, but our efforts were rewarded when we saw the last few of the fireflies blinking away sporadically in the river banks.

As the fireflies diminished into the night, we went off for dinner. But alas, the restaurant that we wanted to go to closed early. So we went around searching for an alternative. Being a small town, Maki did not have much to offer, especially at that hour. We finally decided on the next available restaurant along the road because we were quite hungry already.

To my joy, it was a little Japanese shop serving Chinese food. Even the pictures in the menu looked tantalising. I was a little suspicious at first, but later found out that the Japanese loved certain Chinese dishes, and "cha han" (fried rice) is apparently a firm favourite!

This was definitely better than any of the upscale Western restaurants I've been to in Niigata, and most likely because it was unpretentious and cosy. You didn't have to dress up to come here and you can chat with the waitress while she takes your order. I'd definitely recommend this place, if only I knew how to get here in the first place!

We all agreed that even though the trip didn't turn out as expected, it was a blessing in disguise. The fireflies could have disappeared by now even as I write this, and the restaurant that we initially wanted to go might have paled in comparison with the one we ate at. It was definitely a little treat for us on a Sunday evening. Sometimes we get more than we ask for when we do not expect anything in return.