a couple nights ago nick, jenn and i went to hakata ramen in gardena. man oh man, it was the best ramen i've had! that's saying a lot, compared to the excellent places in little tokyo. mmm so tasty...

also i was able to pickup some (very) basic japanese conversations amongst the staff, which was awesome - motivation to keep up the studying. there were some children's drawings and letters on the wall, and i could read them too! but i couldn't understand all the words. cool.