Calgary Chinatown 2022 Mid-Autumn Festival, Summer Fun, and Japanese Snack Haul

September 12, 2022

Calgary Chinatown 2022 Mid-Autumn Festival, Summer Fun, and Japanese Snack Haul

The summer was a bit of a bust for me. I broke a foot in June and it basically didn't recover to walk around until the last week of August. Still working on building the strength back up and I'll make a full recovery. Due to my mobility issues, I missed out on a lot of summer hiking, going to festivals and such, so when I was able to walk around again, I went a did a bunch of fun things.

Cute little pink paw pads on a resident at the cat cafe.

In August I went for some walks in Whitemud Ravine Park / Natural Area. Hadn't been down there for months as it is dirt trail. Really missed the great outddors. I saw three beavers on my second trip down there working on some dams. We've had a hot summer with less rain in August so the hydro engineering the beavers did kept the water level higher than it would be otherwise.

Whitemud Ravine Park

One of three beavers working on one of the many dams down there.

Then I also did Pokemon Go Fest Part 2 down at West Edmonton Mall which is loaded with pokestops. My foot was still bothering me so I walked but stayed around the Pirate Ship and Sea Lion Pool. The event was pretty well attended and I had a nice bubble tea for a light lunch / snack with another trainer. This event had plenty of ultra wormhole raids and it was one of the better ones with many raiding and pokemon catching activities. I've been playing since the game came out and am level 46 now, but I've slowed down rising in level as I don't work downtown anymore.

Pokemon stuffies at the mall.

Lots of gyms and Pokestops at West Edmonton Mall.

Ultra Raid with Buzzwole.

Sea lion show.

I also went to the originally named Cat Cafe on Whyte in Edmonton down on Whyte Avenue. I really miss my cat who passed away last year. The younger cats were active and were all after one little springy toy, but being there in the afternoon had a lot of the cats napping. There were plenty of people and good coffee to drink. Most of the cats were up for adoption.

Nice cafe side and a cat area side. This is the cafe side, but you can bring your coffee to the cat side.

Soooooo sleepy.

This cat was wary of me or the camera. Rules at the cafe mean you can approach the cat, but no picking up, chasing, or holding. You can pet if they approach and it is okay if they curl up in your lap. These cats were used to lots of human attention.

One of the kittens and the elusive springy toy.

Ruffles came out with a limited time promotional potato chip that was Kentucky Fried Chicken flavour with the 11 secret herbs and spices. I wanted to try them and snagged a few bags to try. They were tasty, but only KFC-like. I tried another variety years ago for KFC Japan and it was about the similar in comparison.

KFC Ruffles Canada

Calbee Japan KFC chips from 2015.

McDonald's also ran a nifty little Pokemon Card Happy Meal tie-in and while there were shortages for a bit, when I finally went to see what the special game was, they had them in stock. No riots over scarce Pokemon cards this time. The little game that was included was interesting, utilizing a spinner and some of the card stats. Very simple game design. The creature stats are in pretty small print on these new cards - must be for children's eyes.

You get a small burger, milk, fries, Pokemon Pack, and a little book.

The simple little Pokemon game with spinner and 4 random cards.

The Mid-Autumn Festival or Moon Festival was quite early this September. This is a traditional harvest festival celebrated in China and other Asian countries such as Japan where it is called Tsukimi. I love the mooncakes that come out at this time of year, especially the white lotus paste ones with an egg yolk. It is pretty rich food though. There was a lantern festival in Calgary's Chinatown this year and I popped in to have a look around. The festival was pretty small and very crowded. Originally we were going to eat there, but there wasn't much variety in the food trucks (most of which were not Asian themes strangely enough). We ended up going up Centre Street to the nearby Tokyo Street Market restaurant and eating on the patio out back under some vines and strings of light. It was pretty nice and the ramen and chicken wings or pork cutlets were quite tasty and cheaper than eating from food trucks.

Crowded Lantern Festival street.

There is a good menu at Tokyo Street Market

Tasty Tonkotsu / Shoyu Ramen

Curried Chicken Wings

Looking down Centre Street. One of the buildings was lit up in the Union Jack in solidarity over the queen's death. I'm going to miss her myself as she was such a good monarch.

We also managed to visit the new Farmers Market down in Calgary and went down to 17th Avenue for some really good Spanish Tapas for dinner. It was a good weekend for the Moon Festival. There was this cool little block of shops nearby too on 11 Street downtown. Very old fashioned in appearance with a nice selection of stores including the cool little Kalamata corner store which has a nice selection of Greek products. I miss Greece too as I haven't been there for six years now. I lived there for six months decades ago.

Cool Kalamata Grocery in Calgary. I love the vintage Coke sign.

I want to try this diner on the block too.

Cool playground equipment.

When I was down in Calgary, I also hit True World Foods, the Japanese food store down there that only sells Japanese items. The supply chains are messed up these days and there are no really good ways to get imported Japanese snacks and instant noodles. I managed to pick up some new noodles to review and also found some stuff at T&T and H-Mart.