via gelato.

most of you know, my favorite part of eating is dessert.  it's definitely a curse, but my health depends on it, but frick.  i LOVE it.

recently, there's been talk about this "gelato truck".  to be honest, i've actually never been a lover of food trucks - i cannot manage my life and follow all the trucks and hunt them down.. i don't have time for that.  but this gelato truck, called VIA gelato seemed very cute and fresh.  she's definitely a believer of supporting local - i love that.

my friend lindsey (who also writes for the honolulu pulse) and i finally got a chance to go last week.  the pastel yellow truck sitting right in front of kahala mall.  

what flavors do you want to try??

isn't her truck so cute??

this is lindsey - doing an impromptu interview with melissa bow, the owner and creator of via GELATO.

i asked for something different - i asked for the makaha mangoes sorbetto and brown butter vanilla together.  melissa wasn't sure if it was going to work because of the consistency of the sorbetto, but i handled the home made waffle cone and scoops fairly well.  no drip, no mess!  all sweet goodness!

(p.s. her home made waffle cone is divine - it has the texture of those japanese cookies, light but firm, full of flavor!)

(side note: yes, my shoulder is peeling and yes, it's ugly.  yes, i should use sunscreen.)

i even bought a pint of makaha mangoes sorbetto for home.  it's mine and i'm going to eat it slowly so i can have it forever!

for flavors and location on where she's going to be, follow melissa on twitter @viagelato or on instagram @viagelatohawaii

thanks melissa for fulfilling my love for dessert with your home made deliciousness!!

japan 2012

i took some time off in march and last minute, decided to go to japan with my parents.  it was nice, it's been six years since the last time i was there.  10 days with my parents... love them to death, but that was long.  haha.

jeez, produce in japan is awesome.  the color, the taste, the packaging - all immaculate!

i mean look...  they package celery by each leaf and lettuce by a couple leaves instead of the entire head!  what?!

even the sandwiches are packaged individually, with the crust off, of course!

it's a total different lifestyle - walking and training every where.  if my mom wasn't there, i'd be lost in a tokyo minute and would probably taken forever to get around!

this restaurant has been here for awhile - it's a restaurant with my name!  cute huh??  eek, but we never ate there!

omg.  my ultimate favorite thing in the entire world.  tarako.

tarako is cod roe.  tarako & hot white rice - perfection!

my parents and i at this one restaurant where you dip your food in a public, for all to share dipping sauce.  they do have a sign that says "do not double dip" - but common!  that's weird and slightly gross!

selling cigarettes on the street.  cool?

oh man...  smokers... don't they know it's bad for them?  let alone have a special box room for them to smoke in.  great, you're not smoking outside to have the rest of us get second hand smoke, but what about when the smoker sits next to us on the train?!  gag, they are reeking of smoke!  nasty!

onsen.

we went to couple hot spring resorts.  i love taking baths so that was nice.  most of the time, i was bathing solo so wasn't too awkward!

our first room - so nice.  but damn it, the beds were too hard!

our second room - we had our own onsen in our backyard.

sakura.  love.

i'm born in april and that's spring time which means sakura is blooming.  i've never had a chance to see the sakura bloom in japan either so i was definitely looking forward to it.  unfortunately, this year, it's been very cold that the flowers haven't been blooming yet.  luckily, at one of the hot spring resorts, we found some!

mmmm.. this ramen place my friend took me was SO good.  the end.

Hello Kitty has her own store.  i could spend all day there!

close to my dad's friend's house is an actual street called "NISHIHARA STREET".

cool!

my friend nao-chan doing my nails!  she's my inspiration!

yes, this is me eating sushi at 8am at one of the sushi restaurants at tsukiji fish market.

i love sushi, but i can't eat so much sushi at 8am!

fish-galore~

knives every where!

this is an apartment/condo few houses down from my dad's mom's place.

has anyone seen a skinner house ever?!

in the rain - every japanese person owns a clear umbrella.

japan was fun, but it was also nice to come back to hawaii.  

lucky live hawaii.

living in hawaii, you get to enjoy some delicious things!

lychee & hawaiian flag plumeria.  this plumeria is different than the rest - see how the petals are curling in?  and they are a lot more fragrant than the other ones.  mmmm... 

these are makaha mangoes - locally grown on the west side.  so vibrant in color and sweet!

this is a homegrown coconut, freshly picked from the backyard.

so i learned something - see how the inside coconut meat is thick?  that means that the coconut is "older" which means the coconut water is not as sweet.  the thinner the meat, the sweeter the water.

this was my perfect coconut.

i feel very lucky to live in hawaii with all these fresh & delicious goods. nom nom nom.

happi 4th of july

trying to be a bit more patriotic via-my nails.

it didn't come out good as i hoped, but it was my first time using tape and stuff.

dah, this took forevs.

new friends.

i think the older you get, the harder it is to find "real" friends.  this has been absolutely evident in my move to hawaii thus far, but i have been lucky enough to find a couple new friends.

let me introduce to you...  aja & mallorie.

i met mallorie through roy's.

and aja through mallorie.

the coolest part about our friendship... the three of us all swam AND played water polo!  even crazier, mal and i both swam BUTTERFLY!  you NEVER meet people like that!  we have so much fun, we get each other and have no shame.  

yay for new friends!