Eating Out In Japan: Plastic Food

I love going out to eat.  Rich and I usually eat at home during the week but when the weekend comes, I'm all about going out to eat.  When I found out we were definitely moving to Japan, I was really excited by the thought of all the new restaurants I would be able to try and all the yummy food I was going to enjoy (so far, I have not been disappointed).  At first I was nervous about eating in local restaurants: how would I know how/when to order, would I be able to communicate, how would I know what to order.  Thinking about the first time Rich and I ate at a local restaurant makes me laugh because we were so serious about it.  After we were seated, and not wanting to look like idiots, we spent at least 10 minutes in silence, carefully observing what everyone else was doing and how they were ordering.  This is how we first learned about the buzzer system I referenced in the post "Things About Living In Japan That Make Me Happy". Thankfully everything went smoothly and we're now old pros at eating out (well, for the most part anyway). :) 

Many restaurants that get a lot of foreigners tend to have English menus (or at least parts will be in English). But if not, don't worry, all you have to do is look for the plastic food display case to determine what type of food the restaurant serves and what to order.  When I really started exploring and searching for new restaurants to try, one of the first things I noticed was the display cases with plastic/model food that a large majority of restaurants seemed to have (keep in mind that I'm referring to the more casual restaurants; I don't think you'll find a plastic food display at Gordon Ramsay's at the Conrad Hilton in Tokyo).

Besides having a tendency to make a person hungry, these plastic food displays can also be incredibly helpful. For example, if you happen to be in a shopping complex or at a food court (where there are several restaurants in a row) and you don't know what you want to eat, taking a quick glance at the plastic food displays each restaurant has definitely helps those that are more visually inclined decide what/where they want to eat.  Also, if the menu is not in English, the handy dandy plastic food display can help you decide what you should order.  In theory, it also helps speed up the ordering process once inside the restaurant, because presumably the customer has looked at the display and has already made a decision as to what he/she wants to eat (unless of course you're my husband who changes his mind at least 5 times before we actually order).

Since I'm a curious person, I did some research into the origin and evolution of Japanese plastic food  The first Japanese fake food models were made in 1917 and were first used by restaurants starting in approximately 1926.  The original models were made out of wax and were intended to be used as a marketing tool because Japanese like to see the end product.  In fact, someone wrote a book which is devoted entirely to the subject of plastic food - in particular, it explores the psychological structure unique to the Japanese and which brought about the plastic food culture.

Apparently, over time, the plastic food business has become a billion dollar industry in Japan and the making of the plastic food has actually become an art form (there are even regular competitions that are held).  Each restaurant's items are custom made for that particular restaurant with an emphasis on making the model look as authentic as possible. I learned that the fake ingredients are often chopped up in a manner similar to how the real dishes are prepared in order to make the model more authetic. I'm here to tell you that the models really DO look like the dish you are served. There's one particular display that I pass a lot and I often wondered if the real salad actually looked like the display because the display just looked so perfect (see the chef salad on the left side of the pictue).  One day I was in the mood for a salad so I decided to order the display salad.  Lo and behold, the salad I was served looked EXACTLY like the display - all the ingredients were perfectly lined up in exactly the order shown in the display.  That taught me to never doubt a plastic food display again!

Time To Take Out The Trash

One of the most difficult things we had to adjust to when we moved to Japan was the sorting of our trash.  I know what you're thinking - how hard can it really be?  Well, move to Japan and you will find out firsthand.  Rich moved into our house a few days before I arrived in Japan, so he was the one that got all the paperwork and explanation(s) from our rental agent on everything, including the garbage system. The thoughtful husband that he is, he also made a trip to Homes (our version of Home Depot + Target) and got Japanese trash cans and trash bags - although I later got an earful about how it took him forever to decide which trash cans and what size bags to buy.  In his defense, shopping for garbage bags is overwhelming the first time because there are so many choices -  i.e., what size and with or without handle (not really sure why anyone would get ones without handles though, they make it so much easier).

Anyway, I had barely walked through the door to our new home when Rich handed me a stack of papers explaining the trash system and said, "Enjoy!"  You can't really tell from the pictures, but the colored pamphlet is 6 pages long and is quite user friendly since it's in color and has pictures.  The other one, which is 5 pages long (front and back), is more comprehensive in listing items and identifying which category they belong to.  I studied both of them very carefully and thought to myself, this is going to be interesting!

Taking the trash out in Japan is a 4 sometimes 5 day a week chore, as our city has established five general categories which our trash must be sorted into and put out on the appropriate day (only a few of which overlap days).  Here is the schedule that we follow:

1. Burnables (food scraps, some paper products) - picked up on Mondays and Thursdays
2. Group resources (cardboard, clothes, magazines, toilet paper rolls) - picked up the 2nd and 4th Monday of every month
3. Plastics - picked up on Tuesdays
4. Nonburnables - picked upon the 2nd and 4th Wednesday of the month
5. Cans, bottles and PET bottles - picked up on Fridays

After living in The Bay Area, I am BIG on recycling and I get why Japan has this system.  But having just moved from a state where they only started curbside recycling in 2007, sorting the trash into 5 bins takes getting used to.  Also, since different trash gets picked up on different days and you place your trash either under a mesh net or in a steel cage, you can only put it out the morning of pickup.  That's right, there's no putting your smelly trash in your own bin; you have to wait till the right day to put it out.  You also can't throw away large items (you have to call the city to pick it up) and you can't throw batteries away, you have to take them to a store and put it in a collection box.  As I type this, I realize that at least you don't see old couches, dirty mattresses or other junk furniture lying on the sidewalk like you do in some neighborhoods in the U.S. (I won't name names, but you know who you are). 

You're probably wondering why you should care about sorting your trash properly. You don't have to, but if you don't, the trash collectors will leave your trash there with a preprinted Yellow Note identifying your trash violation.  How do they know if you've gotten it right or not?  Everyone is required to use clear (or opaque) trash bags which clearly show what's in the bag - talk about no privacy.  Having heard of how strict the Japanese are about trash and living in constant fear of the shame of getting a Yellow Note,  I probably checked the pamphlets any time I had to throw something away for the entire first month we lived here.

As the months passed with no incident, I think we got a little complacent with our trash sorting habits.  Well, after living here for 7 months without any issues, we got our first Yellow Notice the other day. And apparently they knew the violators were not Japanese because as you can see, the Yellow Note is in English not in Japanese like the others we have seen.  It seems we have been incorrectly putting non-PET water bottles in the plastics when they should be going in the cans, bottles and PET group.  Luckily this wasn't such a hard violation to correct (I say this, but Rich is the one that had to go through the bag and re-sort it) but the crappy thing is that we had to keep it for another week.  With the exception of this incident, I'm pleased to say that we've pretty much gotten the hang of the sorting and hey, I may even miss it when we leave here.