A bit ago, my JTE invited me to go with an English Teacher Association she was in to Hokkaido University’s annual culture festival happening the weekend of June 3. Since the group was taking a bus and that would end up being free, it was like a free trip to Sapporo! Plus, the actual event sounded fun, and I think the main goal was to interact with the international students there. I was pretty excited to go and experience my first Japanese-style culture festival, and also get to eat some international food at that.
My JTE picked me up around 8 in the morning, so we could drive over to Yoichi to take a car with the rest of the group that’s going together. We made a pit stop at the Yoichi Michi no Eki, and then browsed the back of the Space Museum, where there was a cool space shuttle weird gravity simulation room. Then a couple ladies from the Furubira International Exchange came to pick us up, and we made a stop in Otaru to pick up one more lady. After that, we went straight to Sapporo to Hokkaido University, and met up with my friend there.
We passed a whole bunch of the more normal Japanese food tents along the way, and then at some point, the more international food tent section appeared. We first stopped by the Hokkaido University International Student Association Tent to say hi and greet the president, who’s from Angola, and another leader who’s from Bangladesh. Since the Bangladesh tent was right next door, he invited us to try some food, and I ended up getting the chicken, since it looked and smelled pretty good.
There were actually a ton of tents and booths selling variations of bbq chicken, but since the Bangladesh one was right there, I just went with that one. The guy told me it wasn’t spicy, but there was some (heat) spice on the chicken apart from the flavor spices. Otherwise, it came out fresh off the grill, and super tender and juicy!
After walking around and browsing the rest of the booths until the end of the street, I wanted to get some stuff from the Thailand, Philippines, and Vietnam booths (because I’m a sucker for Asian food yes). I ended up with a lumpia, and a pho, which was perfect for a somewhat rainy, cold day. The lumpia came out fresh from the frying, and although was super hot, was also super crispy and satisfying with a good amount of filling. It was also on the fatter, but shorter side, which gave a huge amount of hot filling per bite. The pho was a chicken pho, and what they did was scoop a hot ladle of soup into each bowl per order. The soup was light but still flavorful, and really satisfied my pho craving. I really need to try out a Vietnamese restaurant I found in Sapporo sometime…I also swore I saw Thai Tea being sold at some booth, but the Thai stall I knew for sure didn’t have it. The rest of the day I was hunting down the Thai Tea that I hadn’t had in forever…
At this point our group had bought a bunch of food from various stalls and wanted somewhere to eat them, so we headed inside a cafe area and finished up our food there. After eating, we split up around 1 to all go to our own things, my friend had an appointment somewhere, and I went with my JTE to browse the rest of the booths.
We mostly walked around the more typical Japanese area, which had a ton of yakitori and yakisoba stands, among other foods. I guess warabi mochi drinks are also trending at the moment? We watched some stage performances for some time, and as we headed back, we passed the Tea Association’s booth that was selling various matcha products. My JTE offered to treat me to the limited quantity traditional whisked matcha, and it came in a large ceramic bowl with two Japanese sweets. I like matcha, but it was my first time drinking plain and very whisked matcha. The bubbles had an interesting texture to them, and the tea itself wasn’t bitter like I was warned. My JTE told me I had to turn the bowl twice before drinking it, and typically in an indoor setting, while drinking, you eat somewhat sweet treats and then turn the bowl again after you’re done. However, there wasn’t anywhere for me to sit, so I just drank it all in one sitting (there wasn’t too much anyway), and then had one of the sweets they gave. It was basically an entire block of sugar. I think the other one is a youkan jelly?
With the bit of time left before we met up with the rest of the group at 2, my JTE and I went through the stalls one last time to try looking for my Thai Tea. Turns out, it did exist, but it was a separate Thai stall in the back from the main one that was more towards the front. Between the iced and hot options, I got the iced one, though they did fill up most of the cup with ice, 75% of the way with milk, and then the rest with actual tea. I wonder if I would have gotten more drink with the hot option…It was really good to finally have Thai Tea again, though I wish I got more tea as the flavor ration felt slightly off…
After meeting up with the other ladies, one of them treated the rest of us to a free drink from Seicomart (by the way, the Hokkaido University Seicomart is really big and fancy!). I went with a new green grape flavored Calpis. We got in the car, and our first stop on our way back was Otaru, to drop off the one lady we picked up from there.
Apparently, a new Komeda’s Coffee opened up in Otaru recently, and though there are a bunch in Sapporo, none of us had had Komeda’s before, and everyone wanted to try it since the Otaru one is new. I gladly said yes, and since I couldn’t try it before with my friend when I first came. There was a new menu item, which seemed to be a collab between Komeda’s signature Shironoir and an ice cream bar. I got that, but the mini size. Someone else in our group ended up getting a single drink, and the girl who took our order said if we combined it into a set we could get a discount. That was very nice of her. (They also supposedly have a mango jasmine tea shaved ice and a cola one that’s starting soon!)
It was pretty good! The pastry itself is like a danish or croissant, with super flaky, soft layers. It went really well with the soft serve, and the chocolate sauce. The crunchy sugar bits also added a nice textural component too!
We dropped off the one lady in Otaru, made our way back to Yoichi where my JTE’s car was, and the the two of us headed home.
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