Harvest Walk - Movie Theater

Harvest Walk boasts several small shops and restaurants, and it’s not far from our apartment. We’d already been there once with our neighbors. We ate dinner at a tiny restaurant there. I don’t remember the name of it, but it specializes in Udon dishes. Udon noodles are thick and tasty. Most customers there really enjoy the Curry Udon. There is also a large cinema there, with many foreign movies shown in their original languages with Japanese subtitles. We hadn’t seen a movie in theaters since leaving the states, so this last weekend we had a good opportunity.

On Friday night we went with a bunch of my coworkers to see Rise of the Planet of the Apes. Every Friday is couple’s night, so couples get ticket discounts. Traci and Sandy (friends from work and church) wanted to go, and they invited two other ALTs, and then they invited us and our next-door neighbors. Traci said they wanted real couples to help them blend in, since she and Sandy are just friends with the two boys they invited first. And so, eight loud foreigners wandered around Harvest Walk on couple’s night.

Since we’re in October, there are many Halloween decorations. Actually, Halloween isn’t really considered a holiday here so much as it is a theme. It was raining, so I have no pictures, but there were little Halloween goodies and decorations up in various places. Various music I recognized played from the speakers – ‘Nightmare Before Christmas’, various tracks from the ‘Harry Potter’ soundtracks, ‘Thriller’, etc.

We bought the tickets early, unsure how busy it would be that night, so we had an hour before the movie to explore Harvest Walk a little.  First we went to Baskin Robins (yes, they have that here, and by the way, most probably don’t even realize it was originally from another country) and got some of the Halloween flavors. Mine was delicious pumpkin pudding flavored, and Drew’s was called “midnight mint magic" (chocolate-mint with pop-rocks in it). After crowding outside the Baskin Robins to eat our ice cream – and probably scaring away other customers by doing so - we migrated to an arcade full of UFO Catchers, where Drew won me a cute little dog.

At last, it was time to head back up the stairs to the theater. While there’s popcorn and soda, they don’t have many candy snacks like US theaters, though they do have churros (which they called “churitos”) and cool drinks like melon soda. Also, the seats in the theater are assigned, and they’re HUGE! Very comfy movie-viewing experience.