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hey guys
good morning today i'm in yamagata
prefecture
in shonai town which is pretty close to
the coast on the
japan seaside of northern japan this has
actually become one of my favorite spots
in northern japan this year i've been
out here a couple times to
visit my friend natsuki who is from this
area and i just fell in love with it
it's so
gorgeous today i'm actually joining a
cycling tour
of the area we're going to cycle through
the countryside and make some stops
at different sightseeing spots along the
way and basically just get to know
the area a little more we're starting
off somewhere where i'm going to make a
present for my grandma actually so let's
go do that
after the meiji restoration in the late
1800s the samurai of the shonai area had
to give up their sword fighting days and
find a new way to live
the two major exports at the time were
raw silk and
tea so they decided to transform the
shonai area into what has now become one
of the most famous silk producers in all
of japan
so i have to choose a color now and it's
really hard if you
only use the natural sakura color
this is what you will end up with golden
yellowy color but if you add some other
dyes to it
you can kind of make it more slightly on
the pink side which i
think my grandma would like
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we're all finished i really hope my
grandma likes it it's a pretty pink
color
which she wears a lot so i think it's
perfect all right now for the best part
we're picking up our bikes
these are electric bikes that we're
using today i absolutely love these
if you get kind of tired riding
throughout the day you just turn the
electric boost on
and it's super easy
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honestly joining a cycling trip for the
day is not only the perfect way to
experience the japanese countryside
it's also a really great way to meet new
people and make some new friends
our next stop is hanabusa soy sauce
brewery which was founded in 1823 and
has been passed down for 15
generations what makes this brewery so
special is how committed they are to
continuing the traditional
manufacturing methods ramen restaurants
in the area proudly display
made with hanabusa soy sauce on their
shop signs as it's known for being
especially delicious
it's over a hundred years old it's
really cool it's so different than the
other
soy sauce factories i've been to so yeah
we're gonna get a little tour of the
place and then we're gonna do some
tasting and i can't wait because it
smells amazing in here
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okay so the first thing we're going to
try
is this konyaku that's been stewed in
soy sauce
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we're about to eat the famous
they're dried and this is my favorite
way to eat them because they become so
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sweet
that was delicious everything was so
good and
i'm definitely going to come back here
and buy a bottle of soy sauce because
i don't want to go back to using my
usual soy sauce this is so much better
ah she's going to give me some hoshigaki
to hang up on
my porch and dry them myself in morioka
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all right next stop is lunch i'm getting
hungry
after all this bike riding
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it looks so good i love hummus and it
doesn't really exist in japan except for
when you go to like specialty cafes
we're gonna eat this super quick
that was one of the best meals i've had
in japan actually that was amazing
the vegetables tasted so fresh i'm
really excited about that i feel good
and healthy now
and we're about to cycle for seven
kilometers so
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checkout
so this is so koji temple it's so nice
it feels so refreshing because it's in
the shade and it's just surrounded by
streams
little fountains it's beautiful here
i've never been here before
we're gonna have a little tea break here
have some matcha
and uh we're going to do a buddhist
meditation activity
called shakyo you guys will see a little
bit more about that when we do it
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the mindful tracing of the buddhist
sutras using a calligraphy pen
originally started as a way of spreading
the teachings of buddha nowadays shakyo
is practiced as a way of relaxing
and purifying oneself both mentally and
physically regardless of your beliefs
many buddhist temples in japan offer
this experience for their visitors
all right it's much a time i've been
looking forward to this i love matcha
so much and the view of this garden is
just perfect
i couldn't ask for anything else and
they've given us these cute little
sweets
to eat along with the teeth i've never
had these before i think they're like a
powdered sugar
yeah they're like a powdered sugar candy
that balances out the bitterness
of the green tea and a really good
combination
that was so nice and relaxing i really
recommend dropping into a buddhist
temple if there's one in the area that
you're visiting
you can just pop in have some matcha
enjoy the beautiful views
in their gardens it's really common for
them to have little activities
like that that you can enjoy here we're
off to watch a maiko performance now
which i've actually never seen before
so back during the edo period sakata
city this area here was a famous
shipping port
so because of that they had a really
thriving entertainment industry
including geisha and maiko performances
and some of those establishments are
still around today and that's where
we're going now we're going to a place
called somaro
and we're going to see a maiko
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performance
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foreign
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and that concludes our tour for the day
that was so cool to see the
microperformance i'd never seen one
before
and i expected it to be more subtle but
apparently
the style of dance that they use up here
in sakata is a little more lively
and yeah it was amazing it was really
beautiful to watch their singing was
just like
i was blown away by that if you guys are
interested in doing a similar bike tour
to what i did today i'll have the
information down below in the
description box so please do check it
out thanks so much for watching guys i
hope you enjoyed and i'll see you again
very soon
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you