Six Gaijin

We're home!

Flight back was two hours shorter and uneventful.  More details of the trip to come later.  Right now we just want to sleeeeeep.

Soba!

As I mentioned in the previous post, we saw a man making fresh soba at a restaurant just outside of the main gate of Zenkoji Temple.  It was very cool to watch him work.  We stopped there for soba lunch afterward and it was dee-lish!  Teresa said it was her favorite meal of the trip. 

We're in Nagano.

It’s Thursday afternoon, April 3rd.  We’ve been in Nagano since yesterday afternoon.  A much quieter change of pace!  We took the Shinkansen (also known as “The Bullet Train”) from Tokyo.  The trip only took about 90 minutes (even though it was scheduled for longer) and was very smooth sailing.  The trip to the Shinkansen was anything but.  Our travel agent had hired a service to take us by private van from our hotel to the Tokyo train station, and when the women got to the lobby to pick us up she immediately started tut-tutting about our luggage.

“What’s wrong?” we asked her. 

“Your luggage,” she said.  “It’s too much.  No place for it on the train.” 

“What?” we asked, not understanding. 

“Those smaller ones, fine” she said, pointing to our carry-on bags.  “Big ones…no place for them.”

We all looked at each other worriedly. 

“Well, let’s just go,” she said.  “We’ll go.”

We spent the entire trip in the car trying to get her to explain what we should do.

“You should mail them to Nagano yesterday.”

“Uh…we can’t do that.  It’s now today.”

“Yes, but that’s what you should do.”  Clearly, we were hitting some sort of language barrier here.  Either that, or the Japanese have a much better way of managing time than we do. 

“Can you make overnight bags for Nagano, and send your luggage to the airport [for your return trip to the United States] now?” she asked.

“No!”

“Tsk, tsk.  Your travel agent should have told you this.  Japanese people don’t carry big bags when they travel.  Only Europeans and Americans.  I have heard of trains in Europe where they have places for the big bags.  And the train you’ll take to the airport on Friday has a space for bags.  But this one?  The Shinkansen?  No space.  I don’t know what yoer’ going to do.”

“Will you be able to stay with us when we get to the Shinkansen to help us ask questions?”

“No.”

So, by the time we reached the train station, we were all quite concerned what would happen. 
Cutting to the chase:  Nothing happened.  The Shinkansen was nearly empty, and there were plenty of places to tuck our luggage away for the short trip.  She worked us all up for nothing.
Nagano is nice.  Cooler, fresher air (at least as compared to Tokyo).  It’s at the foothills of the “Japanese Alps”, and was the home of the 1998 Winter Olympics. 

Of course, the main reason we came here was so that the kids could go to see the GazettE in concert.  Kate and Sandra had already purchased tickets through a service back home,  and fortunately, the show was not sold out and Zach was able to buy a ticket as well.  The venue was a small one nearby the theater, and we were quite comfortable letting the kids go by themselves (we walked them to and from the theater).  They had a GREAT time!

Today we went to the Zenkoji temple, which is a very large and very important Buddhist temple in Nagano.  It was really lovely.  It’s up on a hill overlooking Nagano City, and there are many gates to walk through to get there.  After you walk through the main gate, there is a road of vendors along the path selling all sorts of little trinkets.  There were also noodle shops.  We saw a man making fresh soba noodles from scratch.  We hit that restaurant on the way back and all enjoyed our very fresh soba.  (I had mine cold style, the others had theirs in hot broth.) 

We’re all just kind of laying low right now, relaxing after our whirlwind week before we head out for our big journey home tomorrow:  Bullet train from Nagano to Tokyo (approx 2 hours), Express Train from Tokyo to the Airport (approx 1.5 hours), Flight from Tokyo to Seattle (approx 9.5 hours), customs and immigration at Sea-Tac (about 1 hour), then our limo ride from SeaTac to Sammamish (about 40 minutes).  Gah!  I’m getting exhausted just thinking about it!

Japanese Toilets

As I said in one of my first posts, about the only phrase I've memorized in Japanese is "Where is the toilet?".  I've used it, too!  But here is something I know now that I didn't know then.

Japanese toilets are amazing. 

They wash your bum for you.  

Not all of them do this, but a lot do.  I'm still seeing a few traditional Japanese toilets around, but mostly they've been Western style.  But, no, that terms not right, because the Japanese have made them their own.  The toilet has a little arm that comes out when you push a button.  There are usually two choices:  The first is spray, which washes your ... um... rear.  (With pinpoint accuracy, I might add.)  The other is bidet, which washes your ... um... lady parts.  Some of them also will play a noise (usually the sound of a toilet flushing) to cover up any embarrassing noises you might make.  I've heard tell of ones that also gently blow-dry the area.  Seriously. But I haven't seen them. 

Our group's thoughts?  Well, I'm not naming names.  Let's just say some of us need to loosen up and others of us have never been so clean in our entire lives. 

Chris: More pictures - from Tsukiji Fish Market

Here are some of my shots from this morning at the fish market.

Tuesday AM: Tsukiji Fish Market

This morning Chris and I went to the Tsukiji Fish Market. This is something we'd both heard about, and Chris has always wanted to do.  But here's the main reason he hasn't in the past:

You gotta get up at 5am to do it. This is why Chris and I were the only ones who went.  

Tsukiji is the largest fish market of its kind in the whole world.  Basically how it works is this:  the fish boats (including the boats for tuna) come in with their fresh catches.  Tuna is a premium product here in Japan, and first thing they do in the morning is lay out their prize catches and put them up for auction.  This morning we saw a tuna sell for 1.2 million yen.  That's $12,000 for one (big) fish.  Once they're sold, they're marked with a number then carted off (literally) to the wholesalers, who carve them up with band saws and giant (four-foot long) knives.  Once that happens, they're ready to sell them to their clients, who ship them all over the world!  That sashimi you're ordering in Manhattan tonight?  I saw it here in Tokyo this morning. 

The auction is over by about 6:15am.  Then everyone races around getting their shops set up.  It's quite astonishing that they allow tourists to wander around this place, as it's incredibly chaotic and dangerous.  Guys in little bitty flatbed carts powered by propane tanks whiz around like mad, every which way, shuttling styrofoam boxes filled with fish.  Wet floors due to fish and the cleaning of fish.  Actually, it turns out that this touristy activity might be on its way out.  The Japan Times reports that due to concerns about sanitation and safety, tourists will no longer be allowed back in this area starting in April.

So, once you've watched the auction and snapped your pictures, the traditional thing to do is go find a sushi place nearby for the freshest sushi breakfast you'll ever eat!  We did.  We sat with a nice university student from Bangkok who was in town with his buddies for a rock concert.  (He seemed very surprised that we not only knew and had met a few J-Rockers, but that we enjoyed listening to some of them.)  The tuna was to die for.  Sweet and buttery and melted in our mouths. 

Second half of the day was Tokyo Tower and back to Harajuku.  More later. 

Monday - Happy Birthday, Sandra!

Monday was a relatively quiet day.  It started out quite rainy and cold, but we girls ventured out to Harajuku to get some more shopping done.  Since they missed the chance yesterday, Kate, Sandra and Teresa (and I) had the traditional crepes there.  I was quite pleased that the Japanese have a way of preparing the crepes and fillings so that they're not messy and you can walk around while eating them.  Mine had strawberries, chocolate, whipped cream and mille feuille cookies in it.  It was very tasty but I couldn't finish it all.   Chris and Zach decided to stay back at the hotel and rest a bit (they then took a trip to Shinjuku for a bit, I think...they'll have to tell you more about what they did.)  Today was Sandra's birthday...she's seventeen!

Tonight we went to dinner at a nearby Chinese restaurant.  The food was very good, but the portions ... though served "family style"...were clearly meant for small, thin Japanese families.  These six Americans were still hungry afterward! 

Anybody Out There?

Please leave us comments!  We want to know who's reading.

Sunday: Harajuku, Shibuya, and the Roppongi Death March

If you're a fan of Japanese youth fashion, then I don't need to tell you that Sunday in the Harajuku district is the place to see and bee seen.  Kate and Sandra have been planning for the better part of a year on the what, where and hows of this day.  They decided to dress in Sweet Lolita style, and they were an absolute hit.  Many many people stopped and asked to have their picture taken with them.  It was quite a scene, and Kate and Sandra were delighted. 

Kate, Sandra, and Teresa headed off for a day of shopping.  Chris, Zach and I decided that a day of women's fashion and maddening crowds was not for us, so we left for the Shibuya district.  We visited the Mandarake Manga/Anime store, which was very big and thorough, but since the kids have mostly given up on Anime and Manga, and the materials were all written in Japanese (they read the English translations) our time there was short.  But, fortuitously, in the same building was a really cool guitar/music store that Chris and Zach had a lot of fun playing in.  We got a picture of Zach next to one of Stevie Ray Vaughan's old guitars.  Then it was off to lunch.  We popped into a noodle shop where NO English was spoken or written.  With the help of a friendly table-neighbor, we pointed at the pictures and got some very good food.  My noodle dish had a dark, strange broth that was pretty funky tasting...but I liked it!  Not at all sure what the herb/flavoring was that made the broth so dark.  If anyone reading this recognizes the dish, let me know!  The closest I could guess was that it was filé powder.  Am I right?

The guys and I headed back to the hotel early, rested, and waited for the girls to return.  Shortly after they did, we headed out (feet aching and now it was dark and raining) to Roppongi to go to Gonpachi. Chris' post explains what happened.  We got lost!  We walked and walked and walked on very sore and tired feet.  It was The Roppongi Death March!  Eventually we got there and the folks at the restaurant were nice enough to still honor our reservation.  The yakitori was excellent.  Gonpachi was the inspiration for the restaurant set in Quentin Tarantino's Kill Bill.  It's really a unique looking place!  Chris got some good pics with his iPhone camera.  We'll try to get them posted later.   

CHRIS: Getting to Gonpachi

Each time I've come to Tokyo, I've gone to Gonpachi for dinner.  Really fantastic food and a beef dish that is absolutely to die for!

Now each time I've come in the past, I've had someone else actually leading the charge through the subways and along Roppongi-Dori to get there but the directions were simple enough.  Leave the subway station and walk down hill. When you think you've gone too far, it is right there.  The key is leaving from the right exit.  Josh thought it was exit 3.  The directions said exit 2, but there was no exit 2 as far as we could tell so we left from exit 3.

Today, I learned that Roppongi-Dori goes down hill in both directions from the Roppongi station.  And everything looks pretty much the same whichever direction you walk, except that only one direction has Gonpachi.  Once we reached the bottom of the hill, I was pretty sure that it wasn't right so I asked someone at a Wolfgang Puck restaurant and sure enough, we had gone the wrong way and were now 15 minutes from the train station which is 15 minutes from Gonpachi. 

We trudged back up the hill, with everyone's feet already throbbing from a day or two of walking around Tokyo and eventually made it to Gonpachi.  The food was fantastic, as usual.  We didn't get to eat sushi since we were in the main dining area but we got a prix fixe meal that was great!

Oh, and the proper exit is 4b.