Hi everyone!

I really thought I was caught up with the blogs. But I had completely forgotten about a pretty recent ramen run. As I was scrolling through my Instagram feed today, I came across someone, who happened to have gone on a ramen run with me!

His name is Shawn. Yeah, he’s one of those weird ones that spell their name “Shawn” instead of the traditional and more masculine spelling of “Sean.”

Anyway, I’ve known Shawn since the 7th grade, back in Hawaii at Waipahu Intermediate School. My memories of Shawn were not pleasant ones. He was very mean to me, along with his group of friends. They used to make fun of how scrawny I was and called me String Bean. They also use to pull on my bra strap when I wasn’t looking. But every time they did that, they found themselves on the ground.

This was Shawn in the 7th grade. He had a penis haircut.

Sorry, didn’t mean to do that to you, Shawn. REVENGE!!! 

But Shawn and I grew up, and managed to stay in touch. 

I had not seen Shawn since 2003, when I visited Hawaii after graduating from high school. One day, I was scrolling through my Instagram feed (I know… this sounds familiar) and came across a photo that Shawn posted of himself in Santa Monica. I was shocked to see him in Cali and made a comment on his photo. He then texted me to see where I was. All this time, Shawn didn’t know I lived not too far from his grandparents! I had plans to go out with my friend, Joanna that night anyway, so I decided to swoop Shawn up from Orange County and take him on a little tour of downtown LA. 

We started the evening with some bar hopping, at Bar 107 and La Cita. I think there was another place we stopped by, but I forgot which one it was. None of us have had dinner yet and since we were in downtown LA… You know where this is going…

Shawn no longer has a penis hair cut by the way. (He took his cap off at some point). One thing that impressed me about Shawn was that he knew how to speak Japanese! His mother is Japanese and also teaches the language. He was able translate what the servers were yelling at us.

As for the ramen, it was perfect. Like always. Broth had a great flavor, the noodles had a great flavor and everything was served exactly how I ordered. Joanna, unfortunately, could not experience the wonders of ramen. She can’t eat pork so she just ordered some rice and croquettes. Shawn visits his family in Japan quite often and definitely had ramen there. He thought the ramen here at Shin-Sen-Gumi was great.

It was great seeing Shawn after all these years. He was like a long, lost friend that I actually used to hate but we managed to become friends. We shared stories of our middle school days and got caught up with the past 9 years. Joanna got to learn more about me when I was growing up in Hawaii. All in all, it was a great night of flashbacks, drinks and awesome ramen.

Joan