Thursday, Tamae and I ventured down to Narita (we were hoping to get some alien registration things done at the airport, but no such luck). So instead we headed to the mall walked around a bit, stopped by starbucks (I even caved and bought the starbucks Christmas cd!). While at the mall we saw a game arcade and decided to take a look at what games they had. We ended up playing Mario cart a few times, which was actually fairly addictive. The best part of it was that it took your picture and then placed the characters head on you, and then these faces bobbed along the racecourse the entire time, quite amusing. It was a nice little end to the boring workweek. After that we decided to treat ourselves to a nice dinner at an Italian restaurant (that I had been to once before ) for our ‘Thanksgiving dinner’. The dinner was great (this place is such a find in japan, real cheese and bread!), and the owner acted like he was a close friend even though I had been there only once before. He even invited us to join him and his friends on Saturday to celebrate a friends birthday (unfortunately I already had plans).
Friday, I did some cleaning in my apartment. And I discovered the nastiness that is the Japanese drain!! I will spare you all the details, but let me just say that there had always been a slightly funky smell in my apartment, that I couldn’t get rid of no matter how much I cleaned, well I found the source! It was the drain in the bathroom!! I will stop here, but trust me I had nightmares the next night!
That afternoon, I drove up to Mito (it was a great fall day, perfect for a nice relaxing drive). Did a little window shopping in Mito, met up with Emma and then headed back down to Itako. Once home, Tamae came over and we made a ‘Japanese style Thanksgiving dinner’. We made Nabe, which is essentially a big pot of boiling stock that you can cook just about anything in. We opted for a vegetarian version, with carrots, cabbage, lotus root, leeks, bean sprouts, pumpkin and tofu. It was pretty amazing. I am fairly certain this is what I will be living off of for the next few winter months, as it is incredibly warming!
Not our Nabe, but a close up of what it looks like
The picture below is of Emma and Tamae sitting at my kotatsu table all ready for dinner.
Saturday, Emma and I headed into Tokyo. We had intended on doing something cultural, like going to a museum. But once we got into the city and the weather was so nice out, we decided to go to Ginza. Ginza is the more upscale shopping district in Tokyo, perhaps equivalent to 5th Avenue in NYC. It turns out that they shut down the main street in Ginza so you are able to walk down this great ‘urban canyon’ created by all of the buildings and surrounded on both sides by fabulous store fronts (currently decked out for Christmas). It was wonderful. We decided that this was actually fairly cultural because window-shopping is quite popular with the Japanese people! Haha It was also a great area to people watch, as people were decked out in such fabulous outfits. I think that ‘fabulous’ is the word that I have decided best describes the style and mode of Tokyo.
Below are Emma and I in the great ‘urban canyon’ (with a million other people)
Ben and another Jet friend, Jay, eventually met up with us in Ginza and we walked around a bit more, before heading to Ben’s apartment for a little bit before we went to dinner. For dinner we decided to go to a ‘Mexican themed’ restaurant, Zest. It was kind of strange because walking in I felt like I could have been anywhere walking into an American Tex-Mex place, except everyone working there was Japanese as were the other patrons and the menu was in Japanese. Can’t really say the food was fantastic, but was able to have some fresh guacamole.
Jay, Emma, Ben and I at Zest
After that we decided to shake it up a little and go out for a little dancing, and so I leave you with this picture.
i love tokyo more and more every time i go in, i think i'm becoming addicted
2 comments:
"Shake it up a little and go out for a little dancing" hahaha. Looks like a fun weekend! Or excuse me, a FABULOUS weekend.
Hola! I'm glad to see you had a nice Thanksgiving. I did teach my students all about the Pilgrims and the Indians - very educational! I actually spent Thanksgiving weekend in London visiting KC... it sounds like you, me, and Sophia all took advantage of our travel time.
Random thing I came across, and since you're my Japan connection I wanted to ask you if this was for real: http://jezebel.com/gossip/notag/faking-it-to-make-it-330707.php/
Is that really a trend?!
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