Broken back pasta, and free pudding

I finally found time to visit a pasta place I like, and which I used to visit once or twice per week. Now it had been over 8 months since last time. It is a very small place, with the owner doing all the work himself.

When I had just moved to Japan, I lived close to this restaurant and the owner would usually talk to me about all kinds of things so I learned a lot of my Japanese by eating there. When I went there now, he said "long time no see", and asked if I had tried to come there recently. I said no, since I have been travelling and been away from Sapporo more than I have been here, lately. He also closes at 20:00, and despite my contract saying I should only work until 17:00 I rarely get away before 20:00.

Anyway, the restaurant had been closed from the middle of January until quite recently, he told me. He had fallen out of a window when removing snow from his house and when he hit the ground he broke his back. He spent one month in a hospital and two months recovering at home.

Now he is back in the restaurant, and his wife has started making vanilla pudding for his restaurant. I gave me a serving of pudding for free, and it was very good. The pasta is also very good.

Pasta in Toyohira and in Susukino

Recently I end up having a lot of pasta. I went to my friends place "Garbanzo" and had pasta carbonara there a few days ago. Garbanzo is always nice, with a great view in the new location they moved to this year.

I also went to a pasta place in the Toyohira ward where I lived the first six months I stayed in Sapporo. After I learned about that place, I went there once or twice per week while I still lived close, and the master there was always willing to speak to me in Japanese so it was great practice for me at the time. I even brought my parents to this very small place when they were in Japan, and my mom and the wife of the master had a long discussion about patch work and embroidery (with me as interpreter). Anyway, you get pasta served in big bowls, and it is cheap and good. The place is called "Yude age spaghetti".