We went looking for a Japanese cola named 'Los Angeles' — and found a story about home

When it comes to snacks, the Japanese do it like no others.

But something I discovered recently took it to another level: A cola sold and manufactured in Japan named "Los Angeles."

Next thing you know, I was out about $20 for a couple cans of the stuff, procured from a website that imported and sold "exotic" snacks in the U.S.

Then came the inevitable rabbit-hole dive into how a cola in Osaka ended up paying tribute to a city thousands of miles away.

Instead of an answer, what I found were the fragments of memories from someone who grew up with the soft drink, long before they immigrated to the United States.

Los Angeles, the idea

The Los Angeles that has loomed large in the global imagination — that of movie stars, palm trees swaying in a sea breeze, and Mickey and Minnie — applies just as well to Japan.

"Los Angeles obviously is associated with the culture industry, with Hollywood. But it's also very much associated with leisure," said E. Taylor Atkins, a Japanese historian at Northern Illinois University.

But the hold is also tangible. Japanese people arrived in Hawaii in 1868 to work on sugarcane plantations. By 1910s, Los Angeles was home to the United States’ largest population of Japanese immigrants. To date, only three historical Japantowns remain in the U.S. — L.A.’s Little Tokyo being the biggest.

"There's some familiarity because there's a large Japanese American community in the Los Angeles area," said Emily Anderson, a curator at the Japanese American National Museum in downtown Los Angeles.

To Anderson, who is conducting research for a future exhibit at JANM focused on Japanese American food, the existence of a Japanese cola named “Los Angeles” isn't so different from the many other ways food straddles continents and cultures — mochi ice cream, the California roll, spam musubi.

 "Food is like, anybody can try to make things; anybody can invent things," Anderson said. "All species require food to survive, but food is also memory and love and comfort and belonging and identity."

Anderson said that although she couldn’t speak specifically to Los Angeles Cola, she might have just the person.

"I'm also simultaneously messaging a friend of mine who's from Osaka to see if she's heard” of it, Anderson said. “It would be amazing though if my friend does because you should talk to her."

Los Angeles, the Japanese cola

Japan started making homegrown cola in 1952 with the debut of Win-Cola, followed by Mission Cola a year later, according to the Japan Soft Drink Inspection Association, which certifies carbonated drinks and fruit drinks in the country.

Coca-Cola had entered Japan in limited quantities at various times, but it wasn't until the early 1960s when the granddaddy of them all became widely available.

But Japan never stopped dabbling in making domestic versions of the carbonated drink — if Los Angeles Cola is any indication.

'Memory and love and comfort and belonging'

"I have tasted Los Angeles Cola," said Hwaji Shin, Anderson’s friend, who is a sociologist at the University of San Francisco.

That was back in her hometown of Osaka in the 1990s. But don't ask her if it's any better than Coke.

" I'm one of those people who can't tell the difference between Pepsi and Coke and Diet Coke and Cherry Coke,” Shin said. “So it was brown, carbonated water to me."

Shin's grandparents were part of a wave of Korean migrants who went to Japan for work during the colonial period — some were forced without pay. After World War II, about 600,000 of them decided to stay in Japan. Subsequent generations are commonly known as Zainichi Koreans, a minority group in Japan.

" So my family had a lot of ad hoc business that's just a survival mode of migrants everywhere," Shin said.

For example, her mom started a string of side gigs, including a laundromat, where she installed a vending machine. It was so popular their neighbors decided to get their own.

 "One of them was a Sangaria vending machine, which produced Los Angeles Cola," Shin said, which locals thought of as a "knockoff, cheaper version of Coca-Cola."

Shin vaguely remembered seeing other domestic cola brands, many of which ended up falling out of favor. Los Angeles Cola itself was discontinued in 2005, and brought back years later by popular demand, according to Sangaria.

Los Angeles Cola.

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Fiona Ng

/

LAist

)

Another Japanese cola named after L.A.

But that cola isn't the only one inspired by our city. Behold Los Angeles Sunshine or LAS Cola from the city of Kobe.

Shin tasted that one too — and it comes with a story. "My dad was a big fan of Coke," she said. The American Coke.

 He was admitted to college, a feat for a Korean kid in Japan back in the day. His father had died of cancer around that time. Unable to afford tuition, his mom asked him to get a job.

At the time, as it is now, Shin said, many doors were closed for migrants in Japan. Eventually her father landed a warehouse gig at the port in Kobe.

After his death, Shin asked her mom about his love for Cola-Cola. She said one of the best parts about the warehouse job for her dad was that every day after work, the president of the company would give each worker a cold bottle of Coke.

"It was very expensive. It was a very, very rare commodity," Shin said her mom told her. "And he never tasted anything that refreshing, like he would never forget that taste."

About a decade ago, Shin and her sister visited Kobe. For old time’s sake, they ordered a Coke at a restaurant in honor of their father.

Shin took a sip of the soft drink.

"I remember [it] tasting a little bit different," she said

Unbeknownst to her, it was Los Angeles Sunshine. That was her first, last and only brush with LAS.

" And then, you know, I was telling my sister, 'It's very refreshing.'"