We're not suffering...too much.

In the fast food department we've pretty much got it made. I'm sure I can't remember everything but here are the majority of places found in the exchanges (or, as Jenna calls them AX...changes) and the shoppettes. Burger King seems to be popular. There are 3 of them on one base here. Then there's Chili's and Chili's Too. The interesting thing about Chili's is that this restaurant is the one (or one of the ones) where they do all of the "experimentation". It's where they try out new food to test its popularity and determine whether or not it makes the menu you'll be looking at back in the states. Interesting!

Continuing on...there's Subway, Taco Bell, Manchu Wok, Popeye's, Captain D's, O'Charley's, Anthony's Pizza, Baskin Robbins, Dunkin' Donuts, Pizza Hut, Starbuck's (off base), a club on Kadena serves The Cheesecake Factory cheesecake. It's not the full menu and each piece is $4.50. It's cheaper here! Right outside the club there's a little coffee shop that sells the cheesecake by the slice or the whole thing. We avoid this place AT ALL COST! That is a dangerous place for two people that love cheesecake so much. There is one Wendy's here that we haven't seen yet. Something big here is A&W. Do you remember that? They're everywhere here! They have sit-down restaurants with a drive-in. It's all the rage...no kidding.

Now, out on the economy there's McDonald's. These are not the kind that you go to over there. The male employees are dressed in pants with a BELT, their shirt is a button-up that's TUCKED IN and they wear a TIE. The female employees have a button-up shirt with a short kind of ascot tie, a jumper with nylons and PUMPS! Are you hearing this? Everyone wears those paper hats you never see anymore and they all smile and talk to you politely like it's their first day on the job. When you're finished there's a girl that will carry your trash to the dustbox (that's what they're called here). We think there was an inspection of some kind going on that day but, you know, the thing about it is they're always that polite even on a normal day. When we left there were about 8 employees outside having their pictures taken. Everyone stopped what they were doing and smiled, bowed and said arigato, arigato, domo arigato gonzaimasu! I told Lonnie that felt so bizarre! It's like they were really glad we were there.

Here is what a McDonald's menu looks like:

This obviously doesn't show everything. The prices are in Yen and one of those is still almost equal to $1. They keep a laminated one on the counter that looks like this...all in Kanji. On the backside is the same thing with Kanji and Yen but there's an English description. To order you point (which is considered rude in Japan) to what you want. Oh yeah! Everything does taste almost exactly the same here. Sizes are a little different. If you get a large drink it comes in the medium-sized cup. If you get a medium it comes in the small-sized cup. Naturally, here you can get a Teriyaki burger and a McPork. Lonnie got something that must've been a McShrimp or something. It was like fried shrimp on a bun.

I at least have to tell you about the apples here. Jenna LOVES apples so when we were in the commissary last week I picked up two. When we were doing the self-checkout and I weighed them I almost passed out. Two apples were $4.95. They're good but for heaven's sake they don't have gold seeds or stems that I could see!