MazÄzu Crepe マザーズクレープ
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At Tasty Treats (Suntec City near Carrefour).... anyone tried before?
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yes... i dunch like it...
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why? :(
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got wat?
crepes ah?
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ps have japan feast event .. selling this mazau crepe
try once find it too creamy for my liking (i hate cream)
i prefer Saybons mushroom cheese crepe at ps basement taste better :lol: -
Originally posted by meltz:
ps have japan feast event .. selling this mazau crepe
try once find it too creamy for my liking (i hate cream)
i prefer Saybons mushroom cheese crepe at ps basement taste better :lol:
okies... yes tried it at the jap fair at PS L1 atrium. always pass by their suntec outlet but first time trying.... maybe i'll try saybons next! -
The origins of the Japanese people is not entirely clear yet. It is common for Japanese people to think that Japan is not part of Asia since it is an island, cut off from the continent. This tells a lot about how they see themselves in relation to their neighbours. But in spite of what the Japanese may think of themselves, they do not have extraterrestrial origins, and are indeed related to several peoples in Asia.
We shall have to go back a long way through history and analyse in depth the culture and language of the archipelago and try to find out whether the Japanese are indeed unique, and in what way.
During the last Ice Age, which ended approximately 15,000 years ago, Japan was connected to the continent through several land bridges, notably one linking the Ryukyu Islands to Taiwan and Kyushu, one linking Kyushu to the Korean peninsula, and another one connecting Hokkaido to Sakhalin and the Siberian mainland. In fact, the Philippines and Indonesia were also connected to the Asian mainland. This allowed migrations from China and Austronesia towards Japan, about 35,000 years ago. These were the ancestors of the modern Ryukyuans (Okinawans), and the first inhabitants of all Japan.
The Ainu came from Siberia and settled in Hokkaido and Honshu some 15,000 years ago, just before the water levels started rising again. Nowadays the Ryukuyans, the Ainus and the Japanese are considered three ethnically separate groups. We will see why.
Genetic evidence
It is now believed that the modern Japanese descend mostly from the interbreeding of the Jomon Era people (15,000-300 BCE), composed of the above Ice Age settlers, and a later arrival from China and/or Korea. Around 300 BCE, the Yayoi people crossed the see from Korea to Kyushu, bringing with them a brand new culture, based on wet rice cultivation and horses.
DNA tests have confirmed the likelihood of this hypothesis. The Y-DNA (paternal line) of the modern Japanese is composed at 50% of haplogroup O, of Sino-Korean origin. The rest is made of three haplogroups C, D and N. The 15% of haplogroups C and N, or Siberian origin, might have come through the Ainus, but more probably through the Yayoi invaders.
The 35% of haplogroup D (or DE) is the most interesting for this study. It is only found in very specific regions : the Andaman Islands (between India and Myanmar), Indonesia (only a small minority), Mongolia (also a small minority) and Tibet. It is thought to have originated in East Africa some 50,000 years before present. Those people would have migrated along the coasts of the Indian Ocean, through Indonesia, and gone up to Japan, South-East Siberia, then moved inland to Mongolia to end up in Tibet.
It likely that haplogroup D represents the settlers of Austronesian and Ainu origin. The presence of this haplogroup in a minority of Indonesian people confirms the link between the two countries. As for the Ainu, we know from the last surviving tribes of "pure" Ainu (most of whom live in Sakhalin rather than Japan) that almost all of them belong to haplogroup D. It would mean that the aboriginal people of Japan, the Ryukyuans and the Ainus, are ultimately related.
The Austronesian connection
The Indonesians, Malaysians and Philipinos originated from Southern China. They migrated on boats via Taiwan and displaced the original inhabitants that might have been related to Dravidians of Southern India. We will see below that it is possible that some of these early Austronesians may have been the ancestors of the Ice Age settlers of Japan.
From a linguistic point of view, Bahasa Indonesia/Malaysia and Japanese language share only a few similarities, but nonetheless striking ones. Apart from the very similar pronunciation in both languages, there is the same hierarchical differences in personal pronouns. For example "you" is either anda or kamu with the same meaning and usage as anata and kimi in Japanese. Likewise, the Japanese verb suki ("to like") translates suka in Bahasa. Such similarities are probably more than mere coincidences, and may reveal a common origin. Furthermore, in both languages the plural can be formed by simply doubling the word. For instance, in Japanese hito means "person", while hitobito means "people". Likewise ware means "I" or "you", whereas wareware means "we". Doubling of words in Japanese is so common that there is a special character used only to mean the word is doubled (々) in written Japanese. In Bahasa, this way of forming the plural is almost systematical (person is orang, while people is orang-orang). Expressions like ittekimasu, itteirashai, tadaima and okaeri, used to greet someone who leaves or enter a place, and which have no equivalent in Indo-European languages, have exact equivalents in Indonesian (selamat jalan, selamat tinggal...).
Another evidence of the migration of haplogroup D from the Indian Ocean to Japan is that Tamil language (from Tamil Nadu in South India) also bears some uncanny similarities with Japanese language. Naturally, these languages having evolved separately for maybe 40,000 years, only a tiny fraction of the common roots have subsisted, but enough to confirm that such a common origin might indeed have existed, in a very distant past.
Japanese matsuri (festivals) resemble so much Balinese ones that one could wonder if one was not copied from the other. During cremations in Bali, the dead body is carried on a portable shrine, very much in the way that the Japanese carry their mikoshi. Balinese funerals are joyful and people swinging the portable shrine in the streets and making loud noise to scare the evil spirits. Basically, Balinese religion is a form of Hinduism that has incorporated the aborigenal animist religion. Japanese Shintoism is also a variety of animism, and is practised side-by-side with Buddhism, a religion derived from Hinduism (Buddha himslef was born a Hindu). There are lots of other cultural similarities between ancient cultures of Indonesia and Japan. For example, both Balinese temples and Japanese shrines, as well as traditional Japanese and Balinese houses have a wall surrounding them, originally meant tp prevent evil spririts from penetrating the property. Despite the radical changes that Indonesian culture underwent after the introduction of Islam and Christianity, and the changes that Buddhism brought to Japan, it is still possible to observe clear similarities between the supposed original prehistoric cultures of the two archipelagoes.
The Korean connection
Japanese and Korean languages are both classified by linguists as Altaic languages, along with Mongolic, Tungusic and Turkic, among others. Nevertheless, Japanese is so distant from Mongolic and Turkic than the common points are hardly more evident than those with Indonesian or even Tamil.
Korean language, however, is much closer to Japanese. The grammar is very similar, and both have imported about half of their vocabulary from Chinese, which makes these three languages almost mutually understable in the written form, thanks to Chinese characters (rarely used in Korea nowadays, except in place names). Native Korean and Japanese words are often related when comparing Old Korean and Old Japanese, but few of them are really obvious to modern speakers.
Mindset and values in Japan and South Korea are deeply intertwined, thanks to the strong influence of Confucianism, Taoism and Buddhism in both countries. This is obvious from the corporate culture (e.g. discipline, seniority system), the strict politeness system, or the Taoist/Buddhist value of simplicity and humility.
The Japanese colonisation of Korea (1895-1945) has left of a lot of resentment on the Korean side and a sense of superiority mixed with repressed shame and denial on the Japanese side. This is why both Koreans and Japanese are often reluctant to admit their similitudes. However, thanks to natural affinities in sensitivities and tastes, South Korea and Japan appear to be culturally closer as ever nowadays.
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is it like the crepe at Tampines Mall Basement? If some sort, no i dun like it..
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Originally posted by meltz:
ps have japan feast event .. selling this mazau crepe
try once find it too creamy for my liking (i hate cream)
i prefer Saybons mushroom cheese crepe at ps basement taste better :lol:
i find saybon too crispy.... :(