Yes, in China, rice isn't very common except in the far south - Vietnam too. In Northern China, the noodles are the main starch. In Japan, though, rice is #1 with noodles a distant second. In fact, Japanese consider their famous noodle dish "ramen" to be Chinese food, though you'd have a very hard time finding anything resembling ramen in China. They do have noodle soups, but not like the Japanese versions.
The word for bread in Japan is "pan" from the Portuguese (same as in Spanish.) They'd never even seen bread before the Portuguese traders showed up. Now Japanese bakeries, though are excellent. In China though, especially in the north, the sesame bread and onion pies (kind of like a tortilla with onion pieces in the dough) are both popular and delicious.
