Over the past few years, I’ve taken photos, planning to turn them into posts–but I got busy and the posts never happened!

These pictures are several years old. Maybe 2016? My husband, son and I all went to Koriyama City (population-wise, the largest city in Fukushima Prefecture) for its Ramen Festival. It was raining heavily that day! It was a lot of fun, despite the inclement weather.

We took a bus to the park where the ramen festival was held.

Okay, Japan, you’ve rightfully earned your reputation as a Very Cute Country. Even your city busses are adorable.

This is the place!!!!!!!!! Is the weather going to show leniency upon us noodle slurpers?

Nope. No clemency from the Rain Devils.

(image used for free if recognition of site is given: https://www.irasutoya.com/ )

The flying carp tells us what time of the year it was. This would have been late April or very early May. (The carp are only flown at that time—like jack o`lanterns in October, and so on.)

“Men” means noodles in Japanese. (Any kind of noodle)

I’m guessing it means the same thing in the Chinese language because ramen (and noodles) originated in China. (In olden times, Japan borrowed A LOT–food, culture, language, etc.-from China.)