A month later: lectures, job and first visitor

Hama-rikyu Garden - spring is almost in the air

I went to an interesting mini symposium at Temple University Japan a couple weeks ago. Good place to meet all kinds of international people: a Hungarian Embassy diplomat, an Irish guy who works at an Italian bank, still haven't figured out what he is permanently doing here, a young Japanese man from the foreign ministry who knew about all sorts of other interesting events and a woman who works with the US-Japan POW association. In the meantime, after numerous interviews, I signed a contract with GABA, teaching one-to-one English. The school is right near our house. The students are supposed to speak at least 70% of the time, which perfect for me. I am here to soak up the Japanese culture and get tips on places to visit and I am getting paid to do so. My schedule is very flexible and the staff and students are really friendly.


Our first visitor, Rich was here for the past whirlwind week. Last Friday we went to Shibuya and Ometosando in the morning, in the evening we went to Kareokee, a bar with lots of foreigners in Roppongi, salsa and ended the night at Masa’s favorite Ramen place at 2:30am. Here is a recent NY Times article on Ramen places in Tokyo:
http://travel.nytimes.com/2010/01/31/travel/31ramen.html?nl=travel&emc=tda1 Thanks Jess! Saturday I had my on my on-the-job training and the guys went to Asukusa. We had dinner at the place where they Quentin Tarantino was inspired for the Kill Bill movies: http://www.gonpachi.jp/en/casual/home/index The guys went out, I unfortunately forgot my key, but didn’t realize until I was almost home so I had to go to the club to pick up when of their keys.









On Tuesday we went to Tsukiji market (the world’s largest fish market) at 6am. To get the full experience, you have to go at that time! Pictures can definitely say more than words. http://www.tsukiji-market.or.jp/tukiji_e.htm

One of the mornings last week we took the train to Shinjuku and were looking for the Tokyo Metropolitan Building http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tokyo_Metropolitan_Government_Building with a free observatory on the 45th floor and the Park Hyatt http://tokyo.park.hyatt.com/hyatt/hotels/index.jsp where Lost in Translation was filmed. Now imagine, two Americans walking around Tokyo, one struggling to learn Japanese, the other looking kind of Japanese. An old man kindly approached us and offered to help, as soon as he realized Rich only looked Japanese and is actually American the old man hurried off.

Yesterday, Rich and I walked down to the Meguro train station to find the Pork cutlet restaurant. We stood in front of four restaurants with a map, which Masa had printed for us. We tried to match the Kanji, but none of them matched, then phone numbers. Finally we asked an elderly woman about 5’1 who was smoking a cigarette in front of what I thought was the most likely restaurant. Q: Sumimasen, dokoni restaurant desuka? (Excuse me where is this restaurant – in very broken Japanese) A: Koko (here) Apparently the Japanese was sufficient for her to understand. The dinner was delicious: pork cutlets, shredded lettuce, rice and some pickled veggies.

Hama-rikyu Garden

Some more discoveries

We went to Masa's favorite Ramen place "Tsukumo" ... oishi!

The weekend before last we went to the former French Embassy in Hiroo. The whole Embassy was transformed by artists in an exhibit called No Man's Land: http://www.ambafrance-jp.org/spip.php?article3720

This weekend we went to Yokohama we discovered a LLBean store GO MAINE, went to the Ramen Museum and a Sumo tournament on Sunday.

I am enjoying my Basic 1 Japanese lessons. The other students in my class come from a wide range of backgrounds: 2 Italians, a 17 year old from LA, 2 approximately 19 year old soccer players from Nairobi, a woman from Hong Kong who lived in LA for 9 year, a female monk from Taiwan, a Canadian English teacher and an Australian woman who is a world champion light weight power lifter and blind. Very mixed and interesting group.There is a cute little used English books store close to our apartment: http://www.gooddaybooks.com. Thank you Brita, for sending me this wonderful show on Japan, I think it may interest some of you: http://www.studio360.org/episodes/2010/01/08 Masa introduced me to Metropolis, an English magazine with events in and outside of Tokyo: http://metropolis.co.jp/

Meguro-ku neighborhood

Earlier this week I discovered the Meguro-ku Citizen's Center and river, which is a beautiful place to run. That is, it promises to be very beautiful in the spring during cherry blossom season because the river is lined with cherry trees.


Every kids dream, an octopus slide and a whole neighborhood named after the park. Unfortunately I think I would get stuck on the slide. Maybe I will take Masa's little cousin there.




For my OSP friends: This week I also explored a community vegetable garden close to the river. The pea plants and pictures of carrots gave away the garden :) There is also a nice Citizen's Center near the river with a gym, including yoga classes, an indoor and outdoor pool and lots of other things to explore. Here's the start of a list of free things to do in Tokyo: lots of free public bathrooms, the Central Library in Hiroo. The Japan Times Community section has a good listing of events: http://www.japantimes.co.jp/life/community_listings.html Every afternoon the bus that talks goes by our apartment, sort of like an ice cream truck, except that it talks instead of playing music. Enjoy the video:

Good night Fuji-san

One morning in Tokyo

I woke up to a beautiful crystal clear blue sky ...

Oishi, oishi, oishi. The New Years brunch was fantastic. The food was exquisitely prepared. We had sea urchin, herring(nichin), octapus (tako) and all sorts of other goodies as you can see on the pictures.