A Personal Note on Bourdain in Japan, or How I Learned to Stop Worrying And Love the Fusebox Festival

Weeks before the devastating March 11th earthquake and tsunami and all-around destruction, Anthony Bourdain and his No Reservation crew set out to discover Japan's northern country called Hokkaido. Cold as Hell, and looking more like Cleveland than the Japan we have seen in past episodes of No Reservations, Bourdain finds an explosion in curried soup houses. This area once had only one such establishment, but now features over 200. Catch this clip and just try to tell me that soup would be fantastic on cold day.

Bourdain’s return to Japan is dropping right out of the sky exactly when I’m thinking of the country. More and more we see China as a foreign threat to the American way of life as they have now overtaken the Japanese economy as the second largest in the world. But when I was young Japan was the land America was talking of, a place that is isolated and deliberate in an alien-like culture. I was just thinking that Japan is a place where it is way of life when cities are gone in a blink of eye from bombs or natural disasters. When visiting Japan, maybe more than any place, you are stranger in strange land, and now that after the earthquake I’m even ore attracted to visit and observe as the islands try to move forward. And, most certainly, get some fine soup in the process. I must admit I’ve started looking for residencies there in my free time. Anthony Bourdain’s No reservations: Japan airs tonight at 9pm, Texas time, only on The Travel Channel.

Timothy Braun
Austin, TX
April 24, 2011

Five Easy Pieces (a quintet of other matters on my mind).
1.) With the NFL Draft this Thursday I will be live tweeting the first round @tab42. I expect buckets of trades.
2.) If I were an NFL executive I would watch every minute of the Jon Gruden’s quarterback special on ESPN. Brilliant.
3.) I would love people’s opinions on this. Are war photographers rock stars? Are they glorified?
4.) F.O.T. Dennis O’Leary, the Executive Director of the Djerassi Residency Program, is retiring. Dennis is a fine guy. He was always keeping Djerassi classy.
5.) Playing with a new lens on my camera. This picture s inside an art instillation at the Seaholm Power Plant.
Coda
As the Fusebox Festival has now kicked off, we are moving headlong into “Digestible Feats” the unique program where artists are paired with chefs. Tonight I will be joining Fusebox and FINO for a 3-course tasting of music, cocktails, and tapas. This late-night feast pairs original compositions by Graham Reynolds with brand new cocktails by Josh Loving and specially created tapas by Jason Donaho, both of FINO. This one-time event at Fino begins at 9pm, but there are still a few seats left.

Tomorrow, Foley artist Buzz Moran and composer/musician Ben Webster (aka Butcher Bear), transform the sounds of a meal prepared by East Side Show Room’s chef Sonya Coté into a feast for the senses at Springdale Farm. This entire series can be found here.

I love Fusebox.