Daikon makes the news!

And in further proof as to Japan's obsession with food, a radish was in the news today. These giant radishes are known as daikon in Japanese, and this one looks like a giant foot. I remember hearing a while back about them talking about a daikon that was growing up through a sidewalk somewhere in the south and how it represented the Japanese fighting spirit that never dies, haha. What I thought was funny about this was that the headlines read 大根足("daikon ashi", radish foot/leg), which is also one of the worst insults you can give a Japanese girl.

You see, there is a genetic disposition for Japanese to have short and stumpy legs, which resemble this daikon. They're stout, like a good Guinness beer (without the goodness). For some reason though, they don't like people to point this out. There are also a bunch of girls here that are too thin for their own good though, and have the legs to prove it. On a semi-related note, the term for a flat-chested woman is a manaita, which comes from the word for a washboard. They don't like being called this either.

Oh, and I'm watching a food show right now - they talked about making peking duck stuffed with avocado and shrimp fried rice, and just now were talking about a way to serve maguro (tuna steak basically) with yakiniku (Japanese-style Korean BBQ) sauce and rice. Yum.