Japan journal.

First night after arriving at the hotel, we head down in the elevator exhausted from the trip, figure we'll just eat in the hotel lobby, sheesh it's expensive with plates starting at 3000 yen.  Nice guy in the elevator starts talking with us, and in a moment we're heading to his favorite sushi bar in the neighborhood.  2000 yen worth of sushi is WAY better than 3000 yen of hotel food.  

Great little sushi place, we're at the end of the bar, chatting away. We are the ONLY english speakers in the place.   Luckily I can order food in a Sushi bar, though that's the extent of my Japanese.  We order "Natto", and the chef looks at us in shock.  He wanders down the bar bringing back a tub of lumpy, stringy goopy stuff, and stretches it out showing it too us, as if to say "Are you SURE this is what you want?  Really? ".  Michael and I nod in agreement - yes, we love the stuff.  Looking dubious, he makes us a roll.  We eat it up, and I manage to pull another Japanese word from the depths of my mind - "Oi-Shi" I say.  I think it means Very Good.  The sushi chef smiles, and we begin to get invited to try other things.  There's a special fish that is only in season for a couple of weeks, and we're lucky on the timing, so we try that.  Yummy, though it is cooked and crunchy.  

As I'm looking down the inside of the bar, watching the chefs as they work, I spy an assistant shredding a big green root.  Then I notice the wasabi in my soy sauce doesn't do what it usually does - blending with the soy sauce to this pasty brownish consistency, but it is floating in the soy sauce -- tiny shreds and chunks floating.  Oh, this is real wasabi, fresh.  I point it out to Michael and the sushi chef notices my interest.  So he goes and picks up the green root, bringing it over to show to us.  Then he says "sushi?" making a motion to put the root on top of a hunk of rice, nigiri style.  Our eyes go wide, but he's teasing us, and laughs.  He then begins slicing in a cylindrical fashion to end up with a very thin, very long sheet of wasabi. Then it is sliced into fine shreds, and mixed with seeds, eggs and sauces for an amazing Oshinko - salad.  It is amazing to watch him work.  Though I'm starting to get full, I order more and more, just to see the artistry.  The chef is having fun teasing us, and makes a gesture offering us the knife -- I decline, explaining in hand motions that I'd only cut my fingers off.  I show him my old trick of "the disconnected thumb".  He laughs, and immediately begins practicing so that he can do the same trick.  Silly tricks you learn in grade school CAN pay off later in life.  I think that was good for a perfectly roasted scallop, and a lot of laughs.

I'm really enjoying travelling.  Japan is a crazy place.  Walked through Asakusa in the rain -- little shopping stalls, and cold.  Ancient little old women selling all kinds of stuff.  Bought an umbrella, a cats face including pop up ears, just the cutest weirdest thing.  Ate little barbecued rice cakes.  Froze.  Then wandered into a tiny, tiny coffee shop. It felt like a tea party in an old doll house.  The coffee & hot chocolate was excellent, homemade, real chocolate whipped into the milk over the stove as we watched.  Served in little mismatched dainty frilly tea cups.  First order of business though, the bathroom -- had to go a while ago, in this shop it's a tiny dingy wooden closet, but still it has a heated toilet seat.  Warmed my buns from the cold, and made me laugh.  A really strange place.

Jet lag is a wonderful thing.  It allows us late sleepers to get to the early morning tourist sites, without a big problem.  Tsukiji fish market - we got there at 4:30am or so.  Bustling and busy, with aisles and aisles of every fish imaginable.  Huge hunks of frozen Tuna sliced on bandsaws, and stacks of sea urchin, and everything in between.  Lobster, and spiny things, and spongy things, and many, many things I couldn't identify. Beautiful fish, and amazing quantities. Afterwards we wandered around for breakfast.  Found a little shop. Food was delicious, but they are so polite.  I desparately tried to remember my sushi-bar japanese to ask for the bill.  Unfortunately, the only phrase I came up with was one learned from my father -- and basically translates to "check please, with the family discount".  No wonder they looked at us so strangely.  I finally recalled the full translation well after we left the restaurant, much to my embarrassment.  

Went to the technology area, all the computer parts and technology you can imagine on a Friday afternoon. Like many places, it is crowded with people.  Getting hungry for lunch, wandering though shops of gadgets.   Let my nose lead the way into this beef shop.  We're the only gaigen in the place, neither of us speak any Japanese, no one speaks English.  Luckily the menu has pictures -- so we point, and get some excellent food.  Mine is sliced beef served on a hot skillet with a paper band around the edge to prevent any spatter from coming off the plate.  It's raw when placed in front of me, but cooks in seconds, a sauce is poured over sizzling, smells great.  I'm famished, and dig in.  It's delicious.  There's american punk rock playing on the radio, which eventually merges into metallica, then strangely to abba.

Visited the place I'll be working for the week, Shinjuku Station.  I got lost several times in the station, it's awful to navigate.  Many shops selling many, many things.  Found the Sanrio store -- my god, they have an entire kitchen set of Hello Kitty -- not miniature or toy, but a real adult kitchen set.  Pots and pans, appliances, papertowel holders, dishtowels, everything.  Yes, you too can wake up to toast imprinted with the Kitty with no mouth.  

Went to the Okeno Gardens and the Zoo.  Nice place to wander and see gardens and animals.  

Another oddity this morning on the subway to work.  There was this whole orchestra of sniffling. Snurk, snif, snork, sloop, sniff, snurkle, snort, snurk.  It took a while for the depth of the strangeness to dawn on me.  I'm sitting in a seat, and hear on both sides of me, sniffling and snuffling -- everyone has a cold.  But in a crowded subway at 9:00 am on the way to a busy station and business area, I can hear all the different sniffling personalities on the train - and that's all.  This place is crowded but quiet -- which is a bit surreal.  I'm so used to very noisy crowds.