This weekend the Orange County Buddhist Church in Anaheim will host its annual Hanamatsuri flower festival–a celebration of the birth of Buddha, with music and of course, food. And like I wrote before, the parking situation might test your patience, but the rest of the afternoon will put you at peace.
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Like every year, it's a two-day event chock full of Japanese culture. There will be demonstrations of aikido, kendo and karate; katana sword, bonsai and koi exhibits; taiko drums performances, and yes, even karaoke.
Food will, of course, be a big part of the festivities (why is why I'm talking about it). There will be grilled squid, teriyaki burgers, chirashi, makisushi, Spam musubis, and Okinawa dango, which are bite-sized fried donut spheres (some encasing hot dogs), and imagawayaki, a sort of hockey-puck-shaped pancake traditionally filled with sweet azuki bean paste.
More details can be read on this website, but here are the essentials::
Saturday, April 11, 2015; 1 p.m. – 8 p.m.
Sunday, April 12, 2015; 1 p.m. – 8 p.m.
Orange County Buddhist Church
909 South Dale Avenue
Anaheim, CA 92804
(714)827-9590
ocbuddhist.org
Admission is free.
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Before becoming an award-winning restaurant critic for OC Weekly in 2007, Edwin Goei went by the alias “elmomonster” on his blog Monster Munching, in which he once wrote a whole review in haiku.