"...while visions of mochi balls danced in their heads."

[merimask]

BWAAAHAAAHAA! I win. :-) A Japanese outlet store just opened up in a plaza near our house...color me ecstatic!


Charlotte and I went hog-wild, buying weird Japanese candy and other crap we don't need (but really want). She just about burst into tears when she saw the Pocky display. I had to try a box of green tea pocky because Res says it's her favorite, but of course Char grabbed an armload of strawberry...she's addicted to it and has actually saved the empty box from her last batch of Pocky (purchased the day Media Play closed forever...sniffle)for months.

I bought mochi too, just to try. We've both been wondering what the heck mochi is really like. Now we know. Char loves it. I think it's awfully strange stuff (the texture is SO gooey and odd, like a blob of half-dried jelly but twice as sweet).

Right now I'm chewing some yummy Marukawa bubble gum. It's teeny tiny and comes in cute itty bitty boxes. The Japanese excel in their clever packaging skills. Me love.

The place was FULL of badly-translated cute stuff... I LOVE badly translated things from Asia, they crack me up. I bought a mechanical pencil that features "Cheer rabbits! We are cheer rabbits! Oh happy day!". Too freaking cute.

So we get home, and my sister has sent a large box of belated birthday stuff for Char.
Nancy loves the funny translations as much as I do, if not more (we regularly mail things we find to each other, like "faffoos" (tattoos) from Hong Kong or pencil boxes that are shaped like "Happy bus!! I have come to here to give your good luck!"). Nancy knows I've passed this quirky obsession on to my daughter, so she sent Char a whole box of badly translated love from Japan (via Daytona Beach FLA).

Char got a really fun lunch box covered with colorful Hindu goddesses, which Nancy instructed her to use as a purse. Nance has an Astro Boy lunchbox from the 1950's that she guards with her life. It's the only purse she's used for the last 15 years (it's so cool!).

Inside where a number of cute funny things...but the best is a change purse that's part of a series of items merchandised in China as "Parasite Pals". It is never going to be as popular as "Hello Kitty" but it's a hundred times funnier. "Parasite Pals" features a little girl who has "friends" that are parasites (a louse, a bedbug, a cootie of some sort, and a tapeworm). Nance gave Char the bedbug change purse...a cute blue and green bugface, snoozing, with the following tag attached. (Nance didn't make the tag, I swear this is the actual merchandise tag that comes with the purse).

PARASITE PALS! Here is the girl with small friends of life present for always. Some irritation she finds with them, but much fun and love is to be shared!

Zzeezz BED BUG! Zzeezz is happy for to be living inside the bed. He is always tired from many biting.

...

It doesn't get much better than that.

Edit: LOL!! OMG you must click on this...I actually found a web site for Parasite Pals and it's absolutely hilarious. "Dig Dig", the head louse, is the funniest one. Apparently, Dig Dig is happy in scalp home. Digging in hair forest day and night.

Comments

[zipis1.livejournal.com]

Parasite Pals? That has got to be the weirdest idea 've ever heard of. I'm strangely compelled to want one XD

[merimask.livejournal.com]

OMG I did a search...can you believe there is a website for "Parasite Pals"?? Too freaking funny, you must click.

[golden-meliades.livejournal.com]

Lucky. We have many huge box stores up here but no specialty stuff. Boring.

As soon as I an type normally I'm going to have to post that little article on signs translated into english..."Let me write sign, I speak English good"...it's funny. Maids pressing pants with pleasure and no sex in the elevators and things like that. I love bad translations. "I spank you without pants!" Sometimes you just wonder what they were actually trying to say.

[merimask.livejournal.com]

It's unintentionally funny. :-) I'm sure that our really cool kanji tattoos and tee shirts are just as funny to Asians, I've heard that most of the stuff is pure gibberish (or really really nasty and wrong).

[lotus-faerie.livejournal.com]

Oh, show me a picture of the lunch box, as I bought one many years ago, saying that as a Hindu, I should own it, because at least I knew what the goddesses are. :) I would die if it's the same one! *grin*

[merimask.livejournal.com]

I'll have to get a pic of it, it's very colorful and simply lovely. On one side is Ganesha and (I think) Durga and a couple of elephants. The other side is Matangi, I'm pretty sure (lots of pretty moon symbolism in her headdress, and she's blue). Char's just crazy about it and has been carrying it around ever since she got it. Plus it sparked her interest in learning about the Hindu pantheon of gods and goddesses, and I think that's a good thing. :-)

[rumdiculous.livejournal.com]

"Is happy for to be living"?? Fabulous. XD

I'm so envious, we have no fun stores like that down here. We have some really cheap dollar trees though. Where they sell W-Tips instead of Q-Tips.

And I've never tried Pocky. *pout* Must fine some...

[merimask.livejournal.com]

I was going to send you some for X-mas...it must have slipped my mind. The green tea is pretty good, but I'm with Char...the strawberry is absolutely the best. :-) I'll have to send some your way soon.

[rumdiculous.livejournal.com]

^__^

[pzb.livejournal.com]

Gah I can't remember for the life of me, but I saw Parasite Pals in a REGULAR store at some point, though it oculd have been when we were still in CA in which case, no store is "regular" XD

You must try the Ramune candies. Both the larger hard candies and the little tiny soda bottle candies are YUMMAH.

[chickenpantz.livejournal.com]

Hee hee hee!!! I'm sitting here looking at my Tickles Tapeworm Lunchbox... "Great friends we are to the extremity. LOVE ME! TAPEWORM!" :D