Summer Staycation 2010

Currently: replying back to all my birthday wishes on Facebook.

If I could describe my summer in one word, it would be busy. But other words come to mind: friends, Whistler, family, fun, food, oatmeal, parties, clarity, realization.

I was involved with so many things that when I was listing them off, I could tell my friends were already waiting me for me to stop, but yet I would go on. My activities kept me very busy during summer, but I learned a lot, gained valuable experience and met some amazing and dedicated people.

Friends were a big help to my busy schedule. Work and fun should balance out and I had a lot of fun, such as various house parties and most notably a weekend at Whistler. It was great reliving my May long weekend last year and I had a lot of fun even though I was still 18. My friends were also very accommodating to my schedule: props to you guys

I also spent more time with my family. During finals, I would often not see any of them for days at a time, but I’ve been making up for it this summer. One of my goals this year is to not stay at UBC for so long and have dinner with my parents more often.

Japadog – The Least Bang for Your Buck at UBC

Picture this: hot dog (included with bun) at IKEA: $0.65 + bits of seaweed: $0.05 or free if you  find it from the ocean and dry them under the sun + squirt of “special sauce” aka sweetened soy sauce: $0.02 + squirt of mayonnaise: $0.03 + chopped onions: $0.20 =

$5.75 Terimayo JapaDog.

If you’re scratching your head on how the math adds up, I am wondering the same thing. How does this seaweed-chopped-onions-”special soy-sauced” hot dog amount to $5.75 when the ingredients, at most, comes up to a grand total of  $0.95?

In the Japadog’s situation, “uniqueness” of the special sauce costs $4.80 which is unreasonable if you ask me. Oops, I forgot the seaweed on top. My bad. Correction: the special sauce AND the seaweed costs $4.80.

But apparently, people will actually pay to eat this and has become really popular in Downtown, Vancouver. Operating out of a sidewalk cart, Japadog has huge lineups just to pay (excessively) for a Japanese hot dog and has a lot of publicity.

A Japadog stand is outside Abdul Ladha Science Student Centre for Science Week and my buddy and I decided to buy one (in support of the Science Faculty, yup, that’s my rational for buying a $6 hot dog) after a few friends told/deceived us that they were really good. There were a few choices, the Terimayo and something else were the cheapest, with the most expensive Japadog being a $9.50 Kobe Beef Japadog. You read that right: $9.50 for a hot dog. What, is the hot dog with gold leaves, caviars, andor truffle? NOPE. Hot dog in a bun, with the meat being from a very expensive kind of Japanese beef, but it still doesn’t make sense that it costs $9.50.

5 minutes later after eating the Japadog, we came to a conclusion: we wanted our money back. This has to be the least bang-for-my-buck out of everything you pay at UBC I’ve seen yet. Tuition at UBC isn’t 6 times as much as any college or university in Canada and food at the SUB isn’t even 3 times as much as they would be if you bought it at a mall (I’m taking an educated guess).

I feel pretty stupid for buying the Japadog, even though I saw the price and was convinced the on-the-top-of-the-world-good taste would account for the cost, but was disappointed in the end. Of course, this is just my opinion. You can try it yourself, though I think the stand will be closed before this post gets posted, but you can visit the Japadog stand Downtown, just google for the location.