{"id":609,"date":"2007-01-28T18:14:40","date_gmt":"2007-01-28T18:14:40","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/walking-ixus.net\/blog\/?p=609"},"modified":"2022-08-15T09:10:26","modified_gmt":"2022-08-15T17:10:26","slug":"tourist_traps_waikiki_and_rame","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/walking-ixus.net\/blog\/tourist_traps_waikiki_and_rame\/","title":{"rendered":"Tourist Traps, Waikiki and ramen"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

My brief visit to Waikiki Beach (5 hours total) over 5 days in O’ahu demonstrates my aversion to known tourist traps. But first, some clarification…

There IS a difference between a tourist trap<\/em> and a tourist attraction<\/em>.

A tourist trap can be an attraction that has allowed the area surrounding it to get all whored out with businesses whose sole purpose is to relieve dumb tourists from their money, regardless of taste or cost, because they are there.
Examples: Waikiki Beach, Great Wall of China (Mutanyu Section), Fisherman’s Wharf (San Francisco), Times Square (NYC).

A tourist attraction is an place or item of interest where the “whoring out” that a tourist trap has is either non existent or unnecessary for the place or item of interest to exist as an attraction.
Examples: USS Arizona Memorial, USS Missouri, Diamond Head, North Shore.
I don’t think you can accuse the above Hawaiian attractions of being “whored out” or “tourist traps”.

Sometimes there are reasons to brave tourist traps. In some cases, it’s the only way to visit an ancient wonder (Great Wall) and in other cases, it’s the businesses that are part of the tourist trap area. In San Francisco, the only reason to go down there (if you live here) is that the Wharf has The City’s only (ONLY) In & Out Burger<\/a> and Hooters<\/a> as well as the old school seafood restaurants. In Waikiki Beach, there’s a firing range (yep) and several good ramen shops. And like the idiot that I am, I went to Waikiki Beach to eat ramen…

The first shop I hit was on my second night in O’ahu. Ezogiku Ramen<\/a> is a chain of ramen shops that are scattered all over O’ahu along with the original shops in Tokyo and Sapporo.
Yes, I got the addresses to the shops in Japan and they’re on my “to eat” list now. <\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"IMG<\/a>
As you walk in, it ain’t glam, it ain’t frou frou, it’s good ramen and beer!<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

After reading about the history of Ezogiku and its Japanese roots, I asked the waitress (who was bringing me a beer, yeay!) what the specialty of the house was.

Waitress: “Miso Ramen”
Me: “One please!” <\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"IMG<\/a>
I’m very easy to please!<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

The miso had that “zing” that we all love in our miso ramen. Or maybe that was a touch too much MSG. But in either case, it was very well done. The noodles were snappy and the scallions were good too. The slice of cha siu was cold, like it was taken out of an icebox and put onto the bowl and the broth could have been a bit warmer.

Many of the customers inside the shop were Japanese and if I closed my eyes while slurping down the noodles in my bowl, I could imagine I was in Tokyo in some unknown ramen shop. Bliss. Until a squad of PRC tourists came in, excessively loud (in both dress AND volume) and hungry. Then when they all got their food, the slurping began. A great sound! Guess they love ramen too.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"IMG<\/a>
Enter here for hearty, unpretentious ramen<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Ramen Ezogiku Waikiki
2146 Kalakaua Avenue
Waikiki HI 96815
808-926-8616<\/em>

Warning: There ARE differences between shops that share the same name. There’s an Ezogiku Ramen on University Avenue down the hill from UH. Other than sharing the name, the ramen here was mediocre. I won’t go on further because it was a big disappointment as this was to be my last meal before I caught the red-eye back to the mainland. A word of advice: If you go to a ramen shop and you see the bowls coming out of the kitchen with heaps of bean sprouts on top, think carefully before you order. Too much bean sprouts on bowls of ramen is like maki (sushi rolls) that’s all rice and not enough fish. It’s FILLER!
Run away!!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

My brief visit to Waikiki Beach (5 hours total) over 5 days in O’ahu demonstrates my aversion to known tourist traps. But first, some clarification… There IS a difference between a tourist trap and a tourist attraction. A tourist trap can be an attraction that has allowed the area surrounding it to get all whored … <\/p>\n

Continue reading “Tourist Traps, Waikiki and ramen”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"advanced_seo_description":"","jetpack_seo_html_title":"","jetpack_seo_noindex":false,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[5,15],"tags":[29],"class_list":["post-609","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-domestic-travel","category-steamy-ramen-goodness","tag-ramen"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p2mgIi-9P","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/walking-ixus.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/609","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/walking-ixus.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/walking-ixus.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/walking-ixus.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/walking-ixus.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=609"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/walking-ixus.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/609\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2011,"href":"https:\/\/walking-ixus.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/609\/revisions\/2011"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/walking-ixus.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=609"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/walking-ixus.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=609"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/walking-ixus.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=609"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}