Cass Isele

The fascination all started when senior Cass Isele’s older brother gave them a sip of classic-flavored Ramune. Ramune is a Japanese carbonated drink that comes in various flavors, including banana, strawberry and lychee.

“The first feeling I had was almost confusion at first because it was not a taste that I’ve ever tasted before. It was really interesting because [I felt] confusion, then [I had] take a second to taste it, then [I] had to take another taste of it. [Finally,] I was like, ‘Oh, I like this [sense of] that happiness,’” Isele said.

Isele’s favorite flavor is either lychee or banana. They find Ramune bottles interesting because of the ornamentalism of the bottle and the signature marble in each bottle. They can be purchased at World Market for under three dollars. Isele has collected roughly 21 Ramunes so far.

“I started drinking and collecting them at the start of the pandemic because I would go and bike to Pan Asia with one of my friends to just hang out [and] get a soda. I ended up collecting them,” Isele said.

Now, Isele drinks about 3 Ramunes a year, but during the pandemic, Isele estimates that they drunk around 3 Ramunes a week. They have multiple flavors in the collection, including multiple Original bottles.

“It was a curiosity to me at first because of how it’s sealed with a marble and the marble stays in there while you drink it. [Collection] was [also] kind of a like chronicling of my experience drinking them. And it was also really fun, if you picked it up and shaked it in a certain way the marble would clink around and make a funny noise,” Isele said.