(Upbeat music)
- [Micaela] Summer may be over, but that
doesn't mean we have to stop having fun.
With comfortably warm nights continuing in the fall,
there are still plenty of opportunities to go outside and
enjoy public festivals and events in Fukuoka city.
(Upbeat music)
Whether you are just passing through or you've lived here
for years, one of the events you can look forward to is
the yearly night market.
Lighting up the downtown Nakasu district with red
lanterns, starting in August and occurring every
weekend until the end of October.
- Hey guys, how is it going? It's Micaela.
I'm in front of Fukuoka's beautiful downtown shopping center
Canal City, here on the river, on the canal,
they might even say!
And I'm here at the evening Fukuoka Freedom Night Market.
It's a really cool setup and they've only started doing
this in the past few years.
But it has become something that I really look
forward to every summer here in the city.
And I'm really excited to finally have the chance to
show it to you guys today!
I'm meeting Rachel and our friend Sonnie, um, just at
the other side of the market, so let's go find them
and say hi. Let's go!
(Upbeat music)
- [Micaela] Night markets have always been one of
my favorite things about visiting other Asian countries.
And in Japan the night market culture doesn't really exist
but with the summer being as hot as they have been
the past couple of years, I'm really really glad that
there are events like this that happen during the
evening, where you can come out and be so chill after
the sun has gone down and a few degrees have dropped.
(Upbeat music)
- I found my friends!
- (All Together) Hi!
- I'm so excited you guys are here, 'cause then I can
finally get food, too.
- Yes!
- All right so all the friends have arrived and we've
all kind of gathered in this one spot and
we're hungry so we're gonna go check out the food stalls
and get something to eat.
I think Rachel, Rachel is already gone!
She's like I'm on my way!
- Hey!
- [Micaela] Let's go! Let's get some food!
(Upbeat music)
- One thing that I'm really excited about is
this organic vegan Gelato.
You wanna go and have a look at that?
So I had this one last year, the roast brown rice
milk gelato, it was really good!
And then I think the white chocolate and kinako
sounds really good too.
- Hmmm, oh It's like a pretty delicate flavor
that doesn't like hit you very hard.
- [Micaela] Yes!
- Oh I love the texture!
- [Micaela] Really?
- It's really creamy and smooth.
- [Micaela] Yeah.
- Oh I really like it!
- [Micaela] And you are lactose intolerant right?
So normally you can't have gelato.
- Unless I take a bunch of pills!
(Laughs)
- [Micaela] Yeah, yeah, I'm gonna try it.
- [Sonnie] I'll feed you.
(Laughs)
- Hmm, oh It's really good!
- Right?
- It has like that kind of bitter caramel taste,
I like that!
- [Sonnie] Yeah, yeah, yeah.
- I'm gonna get one too, I want the brown rice milk one.
- I was thinking about that one, too, yeah.
- Yeah, good choice!
- Well I wanna try yours now!
- Yeah, when I get it, I'll share mine with you.
- Okay good!
(Laughs)
- [Micaela] So he's got a kebab sandwich. How is it, Joe?
- It's good, but I'm not used to using
chop-sticks to eat it.
- [Micaela] You should really just like
shove it all in your mouth!
I'm sure you could, It's the American way! (Chuckles)
- Yeah, probably! It's really good though, I like it.
- [Micaela] Jun's got hotate!
- Yeah with the Sea Urchin cream on it
- [Micaela] Ohh!
- [Jun] Really good!
- [Micaela] That looks really good!
- [Jun] Yeah it is really good.
- [Micaela] This is literally, I think the first
Japanese food I ate when I came to Japan.
- [Micaela] Look at these noods!
(Laughs)
- So as the night progressed, our lipstick
is getting smudged.
But we're still pressing on for more food!
I'm gonna go grab some gelato finally, I think
Rachel is looking for...
- Kakigori
- Ah, kakigori!
- [Rachel] I've decided on freezing myself from the inside.
- Oh! Wonderful!
(Upbeat music)
- [Micaela] (Speaks Japanese)
Whoa!
(Upbeat music)
- [Micaela] At a normal Japanese, like, summer festival
you might find soft drinks or Chūhai's or Shochu Highball's.
Um, but at the night market they've got like beer
from around the world.
They've got fancy cocktails, Sangría, Mojitos...
It's a little bit more fancy, there's a lot of options
and you get to try a lot of things that you
wouldn't normally see at a summer festival.
And it's a lot of fun.
(Upbeat music)
- So unfortunately, It started to rain so we're
packing it in, we're heading home.
- Heck yeah!
- But It is like 10:30 at night, so I guess It's like
bed time if we're seniors.
- If we're normal!
(Laughs)
- [Rachel] Normal adults!
- (Mocking voice) We're old people!
- [Rachel] With good life schedules!
- Yeah, so we're heading home but the
Fukuoka Freedom Night Market goes on every Friday,
Saturday, Sunday, providing that the weather is not shit.
Um, and It goes on until October I believe.
So if you're interested in checking it out, if
you're visiting Fukuoka for the Rugby World Cup
in September and you're looking for something to do.
Uh, maybe throw it on your itinerary as
something to check out!
(Laughs)
- [Micaela] Yeah, anything to add?
- Um, I know nothing about Fukuoka yet.
I trust Micaela completely, everything she says
is highly accurate.
She's very knowledgeable about this city.
- I'm Rachel and I endorse this method!
(Laughs)
It's basically what you're saying.
Where's Sonnie?
Did you have fun?
- I've been making faces behind you guys, yes!
- [Micaela] Oh good!
(Laughs)
- Yes, I enjoyed it.
- [Micaela] Good!
- [Sonnie] It's chill, you know?
- [Micaela] Yeah, yeah, yeah.
- That's nice.
- There isn't much of like a night market culture
in Japan yet.
- No...
- So I think It's really interesting that
they're trying to do something.
- Yeah.
- And then there's like something like this, when
the sun goes down and like the weather is a bit cooler
that like you can look forward to and go out and do.
- I like that there's so much going on the city and
It's not super over-crowded, you can actually do something.
Like, we were able to get seats for way people, basically.
- [Micaela] Yeah, and like sit down and eat our food, right.
- Right.
- [Micaela] Like eight people and a dog.
- And a child!
- [Rachel] And a child!
(Laughs)
- [Micaela] Yeah. Yeah, no, it's good. I like that
there's so many event happening in
Fukuoka lately, and it keeps things like lively
and interesting.
- Yeah, Fukuoka is a great city.
- [Rachel] And It's not overcrowded, and
the canals everywhere are so pretty!
- [Micaela] Hmm, indeed.
(Upbeat music)
- [Micaela] Hey guys, thanks so much for watching.
Don't forget to click subscribe if you want to see more
videos about life in Japan and
specially, life in Fukuoka City.
Have you ever been to a Japanese festival?
What was the most impressionable experience you had?
Let me know in the comments, and I'll see you again soon!
Bye!
(Upbeat music)