Matthew's Food Festival

Watanabe during the festival in September 2021

The **Matthew's Food Festival** (or **MFF**) is an annual festival held in Perak, Ipoh, Malaysia, during the summer to fall in which festival goers eat Matthew's favorite food that includes Chinese and Japanese cuisine , Western cuisine as well as Malaysian food. The festival began in 2019 and spans about ten days during which thousands of dishes were consumed and sold each hour.

## Background

The festival was first celebrated in Malaysia in September 17, 2019, founded by a now-deceased Matthew Leong, who travelled to Manchuria to buy food products and return to Japan to create a festival.

The festival is celebrated annually in 2 countries, Ipoh, Malaysia and Hiroshima, Japan, during the festival in September, by eating Japanese, Western food and Asian cuisine. Early on, it was reported that roughly 10,000 dishes had been consumed for each annual occurrence of the festival. This budget is estimated to be about 6,500 US dollars (938,775.50 Japanese Yen)

In this festival, you can find a urn that contains Matthew's ashes due to his disappearance, he is presumed deceased.

## Music Video

On September 17, 2022, the first day of the MFF, Watanabe, Kenji and Shigeru Yamazaki performed a music video in a construction site to teach how to find the location of the festival which is located in Matthew's country Malaysia

This is a spin-off of "Dog Festival Directions" same audio with different lyrics

### Lyrics

If you want to eat Matthew's favorite food, I have good news

There's an annual food festival where you can eat all Matthew's dishes he cooked for you

And it's located in Ipoh, Perak, Malaysia

And the festival spans about ten days With 5,000 dishes consumed And it goes from the 17th to the 27th of September

I just wanna let you know, I'm just trying to be a bro

So, you first take a flight to Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia

Once you get off at that airport You wanna ask around for the KL bus And it costs 4 US dollars And it's a 2-and-a-half-hour ride

And you get off at Sungkai West Just remember, Sungkai West

Now, you might have to stay there a full night Depending on the time you arrive

Because the next bus that goes to Ipoh Only runs like once a day And you have to buy another ticket It's about another 4 bucks

But from there, it goes straight to Ipoh Soon enough, you'll be eating Matthew's cuisine Now, there are about 14 available hotels in Ipoh I'm checking online, now

I suggest the Sunway Lost World Hotel Offering a water park and a room Wow, it's not too bad at all

Never mind, it's 44 bucks a night But with free complimentary breakfast And a free cancelation fee So, it's not as bad as I thought

When you're ready the concierge will know Exactly which festival you're talking about And he or she will give you directions So, take a cab

But don't get ripped off If you behave mischievously, they'll charge you double I ---- you not I ---- you not

But anyways, enjoy your flight Goodbye Enjoy Matt's Food Festival.

Listen to the full song

## Trivia

* The original song from YouTube was set to private by Joji, it was possibly it's intention to not upset his 88rising team and the song lyrics refrenced to China. It was the 23rd track of Pink Season, it was also removed from Spotify, ITunes but was preserved on Soundcloud
* The word "摩周" [Mashū] is a Japanese pronunciation of his Western name Matthew