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Spain’s La Tomatina Festival is Coming to Tokyo This Weekend

Spain’s La Tomatina Festival is Coming to Tokyo This Weekend

Ever wondered what it would be like to be covered from head to toe in tomatoes?

Ever dreamed of smashing a tomato in someone’s face?

Ever wanted to see the streets run red…with tomato juice?

If so, you may think you have to head all the way over to Spain to partake in Valencia’s world famous La Tomatina festival.  However, those of you who live in Japan are in luck.  You only have to go as far as Tokyo.  That’s right, on September 9th, at the Tamagawa river in Tokyo, adventurers and pasta sauce enthusiasts alike can participate in a large-scale tomato fight just like the one in Spain.

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This Tomato Looks Like a Duck

This Tomato Looks Like a Duck

Gather around kiddies, today we’d like to tell you the story of “The Ugly Tomato Duckling.“

One sunny day in the peaceful city of Numazu in Shizuoka prefecture, old lady Chieko Saito was working in her restaurant “Hakuba” when one of her customers presented her with a bag of fresh tomatoes. Among the fruit, all red and plump, was a homely little creature that resembled something of a duckling more than a tomato.

That’s right children, it was the ugly tomato duckling.

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Japanese Shoppers Buying Tomato Juice Like There’s No Tomorrow, Or Like There’s A Fat Tomorrow

Japanese Shoppers Buying Tomato Juice Like There’s No Tomorrow, Or Like There’s A Fat Tomorrow

Supermarkets all across Japan have been struggling to keep up with demand for that barely-tolerated gritty beverage known as tomato juice.  This is the latest in an ongoing series of food fads many in the country believe to be effective in reducing weight like cabbage and bananas.

At the beginning of February one supermarket in Osaka had a well-stocked shelf of tomato juice daily, most likely catering to the odd person avoiding blood clots or making Bloody Marys.  However, on the weekend of February 10, hordes of shoppers descended on their supply of juice like so many locusts on a farm.  By the 14th, the staff was turning desperate dieters away as new shipments could not reach them in time.
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