Gimmie a Break! Break Me Off a Piece of That KitKat Bar!

Ever since I was very little, KitKat bars have always been my absolute favorite candy, but I never knew until I came to Japan that KitKats could come in so many different flavors. Therefore I, like a good little anthropologist, am collecting the boxes of all the different kinds of KitKats I can find. I'm calling it "material culture" but I'm considering it material culture from Japan and not the United States. There are a few reasons for this. First, despite its American origins, I have only seen two varieties of Kitkat in the United States (milk chocolate and white chocolate), whereas Japan has perfected the Kitkat artform. Second, Americans generally understand Kitkats to function only as a particular type of candy whose value of meaning depends on the individual's personal taste, but in Japan Kitkats can take on another meaning. "Kitkat" sounds like "kitto katsu" which is a phrase used between students wishing each other good luck on their entrance exams and because of this pun Kitkats have adopted the additional recognition of a good luck charm in Japan. Thus with my new mission to collect all the different flavors Japan has to offer, I'm sure to be very lucky. We'll have to wait until the next Japanese lesson exam to test this theory...

For starters, even normal kitkats come wrapped differently in Japan. Two pieces of KitKats are wrapped in traditional plastic wrapper, and two of those wrapped KitKats are placed side by side in a cardboard box, which is then sold in prices ranging from 105 yen to 200 yen (I usually see them for 150 yen). The quality of chocolate (in my humblest of opinions) is much better than their American counterparts, even if they look significantly overwrapped to my American eye. Now let us move on to my rather humble collection of KitKat boxes. I will be adding photos as I find more varieties.

Called "Vanella Beans," this is the Japanese answer to the American "White Chocolate KitKat." There is no difference in taste except possibly for the quality of chocolate used.

The "Strawberry" variety manages to blend my all-time favorite candy with my all-time favorite fruit so naturally, I am a bit biased toward this type of KitKat...

"Cookies and Milk" is another of my favorites because it is an Oreo flavored KitKat bar. Thus, KitKats have now joined the ranks of McFlurries, Sonic Blasts, and Hershey Bars in the Oreo flavor category.

The "Apple" variety is somehow more special compared to the previously mentioned forms of KitKats because it costs more, gives you only two pieces that are only slightly wider and no taller than the original (thus stealthily giving you less chocolate), and says "for a moment of precious indulgence."

The extra-special "Sakura" KitKat. This one apparently only comes out during exam times and is the preferred choice to give to your student who will be taking entrance exams this year (as explained to me by my host mother who found my obvious preference of KitKat to all other forms of chocolate amusing). It tastes pink.

Other forms of KitKats that I am aware exist but have not bought are Orange KitKats and Green Tea KitKats. I have not yet found Orane KitKats anywhere but I have heard about them. The Green Tea variety exists at my local conbini and puts KitKats with the ranks of Green Tea Mochi, Pocky, and ice cream, but I have not bought it yet because I unfortunately am not a fan of green tea. However, for the sake of research...

As I find more varieties, I will be adding them to this post. Consequently, if any fellow Visual Anthro bloggers happen to find an unmentioned type of KitKat and feels so generous to buy me one, I will be most grateful.

EDIT: More KitKat photos...

Green Tea Kitkats. I personally do not like green tea, so fortunately my friend Krissy (who loves green tea) was quite willing to eat them for me so that I could have the box.

White Kitkats are made out of white chocolate. Tastes exactly the same as the vanella bean kitkat.

Neighborhood Hirakata

(Rewritten: May 10, 2008)

I rewrote this post because I’m determined to somehow get photos in here. So, I’ll instead talk about some of the actual people in Makino.

There are two major groups of people in Makino that I am familiar with. Since my host family has two houses, I know of two distinct neighborhoods. The first is the one we actually live in, and I’ll reuse some snow photos to talk about them.

This is taken from the front door of my host family’s house. The two houses directly in front of us that you can’t really see are gone now—all that’s left are their foundations. The one directly next to the non-existent houses across the street has two sons who, when they catch me coming home, take great joy in shouting “herro” to me and get downright disappointed when I don’t say “hello” back. Instead of snow, the balcony now has those carp flags hanging from it in honor of children’s day. They still haven’t taken them down. The next house down has a salary-man who owns a little scooter and enjoys being noisy when he returns home late at night. And the house directly next door to us is owned by an older couple who (gasp) have just recently started saying “Ohayou Gozaimasu” to me when they see me. I do my best not to bother them with my music since their living room is maybe three feet away from my bedroom and I can occasionally hear their TV going.

The other half of Makino that I am familiar with is near the host family’s second house. This second house is where most of their homestay students have stayed, and it is also the location of my host mother’s English school, which I occasionally visit for all the major holidays, where I am asked to discuss how Americans spend the holiday. Because, apparently, I represent Americans as a whole. Right. But it’s also a good experience for me because I learn about Japanese holidays and the typical way they are celebrated. The children who attend this school all live fairly close by and since most of the international students my family has hosted lived in this house, the community there is much more used to seeing blond hair. They don’t stare and they aren’t too scared to talk to me, which I think is awful nice. One of the boys lives on the other side of the block so he can walk without any problems, but he brings his bike every time just to show off. Naturally, I tell him it’s the coolest bike on the face of the planet. The other two live a little further down the street and actually do need to bring a bike, and there’s a little girl who occasionally comes but her mother brings her. And you’d think it was a horrible crime that I know nothing about what to do on Children’s day!

Introduction and First Impressions (sort of) of Japan

Perhaps if someone had asked me last August what were my first impressions of Japan, I might have had an easier time coming up with an answer. But it has now been quite some time since first stepped off the plain at Kansai International Airport (one semester to be exact) and I've slept since then, so when I was told that I was to create a blog for my Visual Anthropology class and that I was to talk about my first impressions, it took me a long time to think back on what I first thought.

I live on this street (and this is also supposidly the most snow that Makino has seen in 11 years) and I remember being very surprised by the nature of the streets in Japan. For starters, streets in Japan are smaller mainly because Japanese cars in general are smaller and don't need the space. There are also a significantly higher proportion of streets in Japan that are one-way (at least compared to my home country) and the street I live on is one of them. There are also several alleyways that are just barely large enough for a small Japanese car but see a great deal of traffic (I ride home on one of them). And most importantly, most streets in Japan either do not have any sidewalk at all or have a sidewalk that is so old and ridden with potholes that it makes it exceedingly difficult for a person in a wheelchair to manuver. As you can see from the picture, my street doesn't even have any noticeable bicycle lane and stairs leading into each of the houses open right into the street. Absolutely no handicap accessiblity. I think about these kinds of things because my older sister has been in a wheelchair for as long as I can remember and things like handicap accessibility have been drilled into my head since day one. I remember thinking "how does the disabled community (of which I'm sure Japan has one) manage in these conditions?" And you know, I haven't found an answer yet because I certainly haven't seen anyone in a wheelchair around Makino. But I'm sure they are there; they must be.

This is Kiyomizu-dera where I had my very first experience with a temple in Japan. I went on the Kyoto Tour during Orientation Week at Kansai Gaidai University and liked it enough that I went back a second time in November. This picture is from the second visit, but I remember what I thought of the first visit very well. I remember wondering if temples tend to be up the mountain or if that was just Kiyomizu. Further investigation during the previous semester has proven this theory to be fairly true not only for temples but also for shrines. Kiyomizu-dera inspired two initial thoughts about Japan. The first was the reinforcement of the lack of handicap accessibility, and the second was that Japan seems to have an awfully large amount of their land devoted to religion in a place where I was told most people don't really follow a religion and was in significant need of space due to overcrowding. I found out later that one of the reasons for the handicap accessibility in what you would think were the most public of places was because Japan has had a long tradition of (mainly shinto) beliefs that said that illness, ailment, and other handicaps were an impurity and thus had to be kept away from ritually pure places (i.e. all shrines and temples and some other public places as well). This would come from the class on Shinto that Dr. Elizabeth Kenney teaches. I also found out through other classes at Kansai Gaidai that in general the Japanese are proud of their history and seek to preserve it. This explains the unusual amount of space still devoted to temples, particularly in Kyoto and Nara, and the huge amount of land devoted to the Hiroshima Peace Park. Perhaps one of the most interesting things about Japan is exactly what history actually gets preserved, but that's another post for another time...

I shall now end with probably my most memorable impression of Japan. I am staying with the same host family as last semester and though I love them dearly, sometimes they worry me in the same way I’m sure I worry them. This photo is of one of those times. Not but maybe two weeks before this photo was taken, I had gone to Hiroshima and Miyajima. At Miyajima, the tide was just right so that if you walked along the shore, you would find all sorts of interesting sea things (hermit crabs, fish, seaweed, shells…). I am from a state that is a good two day’s drive from the ocean. On the very rare occasion that my mother and I do go to the ocean, my mother disappears for a day and I find her at about sunset with buckets upon buckets of seashells that she’s picked up. So, I looked down at my feet, noticed that the seashells at Miyajima were purple, and thought of my mother. I’ve never seen purple seashells before so I picked up a whole bunch, did exactly what I probably should not have and brought them back to the house, washed and dried them, and put them in a container, telling my bewildered host mother and host sisters that it was going to be a Christmas present for my mother and why. So, on this particular day about two weeks later, we’re having our usual dinner of a traditional Japanese dish and miso soup. So my host mother hands me my miso soup, and I hear something clinking around and wonder “what is in my miso soup??” So I looked and… it’s seashells... with purple inside them. No wonder my host mother thought I’d lost my mind, and of course I sat there for a moment and wondered if she lost hers. I did eat what was in my soup though.

So after a semester of living in Japan, those are my most memorable "first" impressions. Japan is a very different and interesting world from my home country and I’m looking forward to another semester of being surprised by this country I currently live in.