Wednesday, March 30, 2011

Japan Trip

It was a pre-planned business trip to Japan during this Spring season. Flight tickets were all booked ahead in early 2011. Nobody had expected the 311 natural calamity to hit Sendai , North of Japan in March. Luckily for us, the place we were going to is located more than 1000km away down South West which was not affected by radiation or power (electricity) cuts which up until now is still on-going mostly in Northern Japan. My heart goes all out to the people of Japan and hope that the situation will improve soon....... Though Northern Japan was in a state of devastation and sadness still but life elsewhere was pretty much going on as usual....... After completing out business training at our HQ in Wakayama, my staffs and I had time to do some sight seeing. As visiting Tokyo was out of the question at that time, we decided to spent time around Osaka. We visited a tourist spot called Dodonbori (like our own Bukit Bintang area). Here we window-shopped and feasted to our hearts, delights....... This is a good place for tasting raw crab meat. YES! - you heard right....eating raw crab meat.....



Crab Sashimi, Cawanmushi, Grill Crab feet...........The famous ferries wheel located right smack in the heart of Namba (the yellow oval rim with the red cubicles surrounding it)...... At dusk, standing on this bridge and looking straight ahead, you will experience the most amazing sun set scene ever. The sun sets exactly right between the two rows of building flanking the river - it's just amazing......

The night scene is fantastic too. Every where you turn, you will be greeted with numerous 'hot-spot' to satisfy your every whims and fantasies........

One of the numerous Takoyaki outlets. Takoyaki is a flour base ball filled up with a sweet black sauce and a piece of octopus cut....... The sauce some what taste like our cahr-siew-pau.....

All we did and can do was eat and eat and eat (plus some beer here and there)........ 5 meals per day........Raw chicken liver...... Kushiage (Fried Vegetable and Seafood)...... Wanna try some Kagoshima raw chicken drumstick and breast meat??..... Before I left, I went down to meet a friend in Ise for a short fishing trip......


The weather on that day was damn cold (0 degrees C) and the wind was gusting strongly........


But we did tried for a while...... but it was too cold for us Malaysians to continue........ So, only our Japanese friends caught some fish.....

Japanese Mackerel.....

Japanese Amber Jack (Buri)...... We had Matsusakagyu feast for our dinner that nigt.......Look at the snowy texture of the Wagyu beef cut........ Ooohhhh! What a delicacy............ Eat and eat........and eat!

Drink and drink...... and drink........



Again...... eat, eat, eat.......


Thanks to our friends' hospitality......

Back to hotel....... Japanese bath hall......... The last night in Japan......

Went to a decent Teppanyaki restaurant in Osaka........A abalone BBQ..... and Beef BBQ (Yamagatagyu)......... Yummy!

Thanks to the friends and all the delicacy during our stay in JAPAN.......


And I hope and pray that Japan will overcome the crisis very soon.......

Thursday, March 17, 2011

Heavenly Gate - Haruan Game

All these while we usually do land base casting. After being there frequently, the biggies got smart overtime....... So, this time we chose to go out on a boat............ and these are our catches below for the morning session......... Big Haruans.... one after another were caught effortlessly............... Yeah!!
Hoe even caught himself a 6kg Toman............Look at the fella grinning with a smirk on his face...........


What a fearsome predatory fish this is....
Care to put your hand in here???
Smirking again................
Takeshi and Kazu also did well.............

Sunday, March 6, 2011

Where are you - Emperor Snakehead?

Emperor Snakehead also called TOMAN BUNGA locally, is a rare snakehead specie in Malaysia...... Last weekend, a friend of mine brought me for a try......To fish this rare beauty, first you must enter their domain - specifically low land swamp and river......
To enter, you must be equipped with a good 4x4 vehicle........
Look what happens if you don't..........
STUCK!!! Luckily, this time one of the vehicles was equipped with a winch.......
After over coming a few obstacles, we finally reached our destination........
A beautiful swampy river site.............
Every year after Chinese New Year period, the weather of Peninsular Malaysia is getting drier and by this time only, you are able to enter the swampy area of this place for fishing......... Look at the dried up area below......... From this picture, you can imagine that the water level was 2M high during wet season............
To tackle this Emperor Snakehead, you have to wait until the water level is low whereby the fish are concentrated in the remaining deep pool of the swamp.......
Beautiful black water......
It is even inhabited with beautiful aquatic Tiger Barb which is commonly sold in aquarium shops.....
After a day of fishing, out of twelve anglers, only one fella was rewarded with a catch, it turned out to be a young Toman only......... What a poor result it was. We know the fish is there BUT why can't we get it?????.......AAAAARGH!!!
We'll be back for revenge another day.........