southern all stars: the yatai of tenjin and nakasu, hakata

by rameniac | 03 Mar 2008

It should come as no surprise, to any close reader of this site, that I am completely enamored with not just Japan, but more specifically, southern Japan. Yes, the rameniac does play favorites, but it’d be pretty hard not to, not when historically speaking, the world’s best tonkotsu ramen is served at literally thousands of yatai food carts scattered across Fukuoka city’s Hakata district. What the taco truck is to Los Angeles, the yatai is to Hakata, and I wear my heart proudly on my sleeve when I say that I root for the Softbank Hawks and count among my favorite people on earth my tomodachi in Northern Kyushu, whose residents are often friendly to a fault and exude the warmth of oden simmering past two am on a wintry morning. 

I’d been meaning to make this post for a while, but life (and countless bowls of mediocre Los Angeles ramen) intervenes, and so to kick off my recent trip to my preferred corner of the world, I’ve elected to finally give you Southern All Stars: The Yatai of Tenjin and Nakasu, Hakata.

I took these pictures one cold night in late 2006, out for a stroll and inadvertently homeless when a sumo tournament pretty much maxed out every single hotel room and mangakisa in the city. (Apparently, I still haven’t learned my lesson to book ahead, but more on that another time). Amazingly, I wasn’t the only one, as the streets of Fukuoka quickly filled up with drunken businessmen, bosozoku, and club kids with no desire to go home. I wound up shooting the shit in front of a Family Mart until six in the morning with some fast friends, not literally shooting the shit in a Skid Row or Hollywood Boulevard sort of way, but rather debating the finer points of Rick Rubin’s music production philosophy with a trio of dudes with an uncanny affinity for western pop cultural minutiae.

And as for the girl I played table tennis with at the Tenjin Sega fun center that weekend, this one’s most definitely for you.