Sick

It was only a matter of time before I got sick.  I did think I'd make it passed the two month mark (today, by the way) before that happened, but what can you do?  So I woke up on Monday morning feeling like death.  This was particularly  unfortunate since I don't get paid sick leave for 3 years.  Definitely not in DC anymore- I miss you, federal government benefits!

I tried to fight it with lots of sleep and Advil.  By 3:00, I knew I wasn't going to make it to work that evening.  So I called out.  Unfortunately, my supervisor was already making the schedule for the next day, so I had to tell him about then as well.  It didn't seem like death was ever going away, so I said to count me out for then too.  The problem is, two consecutive sick days requires a receipt from a doctor.  What the heck?  Everyone knows I hate going to the doctor.  But, it had to be done.  Lucky for me, there were two English-speaking doctors within walking distance.  Plus, my personal translator/interpreter was home for Winter break.

Despite the scary bowl of red liquid that he washed his hands in and the cold metal tongue depressor, it was fine.  He was a jolly little Japanese man who had funny English.  He asked me to lay in the "supine position."  I don't know why I find little old Asian men so cute, but I do.

Can I just say this?  National Health Insurance is amazing.  President Obama, if you are reading this- please take note.  It's the bomb.  I walked out of there paying only $15.  I had gone to the ATM beforehand and taken out $100, worrying it wouldn't be enough.  That $15 not only covered my visit but five, count them- FIVE kinds of medicine!

Four kinds of tablets and a strange powdered substance

Now, I'm not crazy enough to take all those drugs, but it was pretty cool to get them all!  Luckily I came with my own personal medical cabinet, so I just stuck to good ol' Costco-supplied drugs.  But still- 15 bucks!  What a bargain.

So with my receipt in hand, it was back to work tonight.  Thank goodness I have the next 5 days off for New Year's.  Hopefully, I'm back to normal tomorrow. 

 

Christmas FAQ

I've been getting a lot of questions about Christmas in Japan.  They are all very good questions with interesting answers, so I decided to do a FAQ post to address some of them. 

What is Christmas like over there?

Japanese people are very into Christmas.  I'm not sure any of them really know what the holiday is actually about, but they love the commercial aspects of the holiday.  Department stores play Christmas music, Starbucks has their red cups (of course when I finally got my first cup of Starbucks last week, they were out and I got a regular white cup), and illuminations are everywhere.  Illuminations are what Japanese people call their Christmas light displays around town.  Some are very simple- a few strings of lights in some of the trees along the streets.  Others are much more elaborate.  They go up around the end of November and you see them everywhere.  Here are a few we've stumbled across:

Pretty blue trees in Toyosu

A floating tree in Roppongi Hills

Christmas tree made of recycled bottles in Shinjuku

Are the Santas in Japan Japanese?

This is a harder question.  I never saw a Santa in the mall or anything, but I did stumble across this article about a real authorized Santa who is Japanese.  So there you have it.  Plus, on Christmas day I came across these guys on the sidewalk:

Japanese kids handing out candy on the street

As they passed by me taking a picture of them, the smallest kid said "Melly Chreestmas," and gave me three pieces of candy!  It was so cute.  I think they were part of some charity organization. 

What do Japanese people eat on Christmas?

My favorite questions, of course.  It turns out there is a Christmas dinner tradition in Japan.  It doesn't involve turkey. ham, or goose.  Although if you are searching for that kind of meal, many restaurants offer traditional western Christmas dinners.  If you want to do like the Japanese do, then you eat fried chicken.

When I first heard that it was customary to eat fried chicken on Christmas, I thought my coworkers were pulling my leg.  Most of them have lived in Japan for much longer than me, so I'm a pretty easy target when it comes to these things.  But it's true.  Do you know how I know it's true?  CNN.  If CNN says it, it must be true.  I managed to catch that link just a few days before Christmas.  I wanted in on this!  Now everyone knows, Popeyes is far superior to KFC.  But since Popeyes is about two hours away, we decided to hop on the McDonalds bandwagon.  After calling ahead to ensure they wouldn't sell out, we walked the ten minute walk to get our iCon box.  Don't ask me why it's called iCon.

Behold- our 2010 Christmas feast awaits

Mega fries, 2 shaka shaka chickens, 2 boxes of strips, 2 boxes of nuggets, sauces and seasonings

It was quite tasty.  I couldn't eat my chicken strips, so I brought them home to eat later (cold of course).  In case you are unfamiliar with shaka shaka chicken, it's basically a piece of flattened chicken breast that is fried and placed in a small paper bag.  You open the top of your shaka shaka chicken bag, and add in some seasoning.  We had the choice of pizza, black pepper, and cheese seasonings.  You then close the bag, and shake to your heart's delight.  The end result is a coated piece of chicken.  I opted to eat mine plain, but i did dip a bite or two into the pizza seasoning to see what it was like.  Not my cup of tea.  McDonalds here tastes exactly like back home.  But I did miss my sweet and sour sauce.  Much to my dismay, the green sauce packet was actually sour cream and onion.  Oh well.

So in the end, we had a very authentic Japanese Christmas meal.  It was interesting, but maybe next year we'll start a new tradition.  Christmas sushi?  Christmas burgers?  Who knows? 

I hope everyone had a very Merry Christmas back home!  What did YOU eat? 

Internship

To state the obvious, internships are kind of a big deal in DC.  There are many famous stories about interns that I don't need to mention here.  Internships are a big reason why people come to DC in the first place.  Walk around any of the Georgetown bars in the summertime and you're bound to run into a bubbly west-coaster bragging about their UC-DC experience.  In fact, one of the reasons I hate DC in the summertime is because of all those darned interns.  They fill up all the nice restaurants and stand on the wrong side of the escalator.  Plus summer is way hot.  But that's not the point.  The point is, internships are a big part of DC life.

Internships are important here too.  Especially recently!  I'm very proud to announce that my baby is an intern!  All jokes aside, this is great news.  The company is Flutterscape, and I think the concept is fabulous.  Check it out when you have a minute.  Basically, people in Japan can sell cute and strange things to people all over the world.  You can pretty much sell anything you want.  He's already trying to sell sneakers, of course.

Congratulations!  I hope this is just the beginning of your amazing Japanese business career.

Good things come in small packages

Restaurants in Tokyo are tiny.  For dinner my first night here, we ate at a neighborhood ramen shop that probably only had 8-10 stools around the counter.  Space is hard to come by around here, so people make do with what they have.  This is fine with me- as long as they food is good.  Some of my favorite restaurants back in DC are small as well.  A few weeks back, we went to Yarakucho in search of food stalls.  We had read that there were tiny restaurants underneath the subway.  That visit was unsuccessful.  We found a food hall under the station, but the restaurants were sort of fancy.  We tried again the other night and found it!  Just under the overpass for the JR line are several small restaurants.  You can tell the area is very popular, and we could smell the charcoal-grilled meats as we rounded the corner.

A few restaurant stalls under Yarakucho Station

You have to hand it to these guys.  They really make use of all their space.  Some of the cooking is done outside the actual restaurant.  You can see a guy making soup in the photograph above.  All that separates you from the cold is a thin piece of plastic, kind of like a shower curtain.  We made two or three loops around before we settled on a yakitori place.  I was slightly intimidated by the large table of business men with red faces, but we decided that was a good sign.  As usual, I can't read the menu.  But luckily, I can read the prices (numbers are the same in Chinese)- and they are cheap!

Each skewer of meat is about 150 or 160 yen.  Drinks are about 390 yen.

  We order a good variety of mostly chicken skewers and two big beers.  Most of you know, I've never been a huge beer drinker.  But there is something about Japanese beer I really like.  To me, it kind of tastes like carbonated rice.  Beer-y rice.  Anyway, I love getting a draft beer here.  There is rarely more than one kind available, so you just order a draft beer and you get what they have.  One thing I can't get into is the foam.  Japanese people love extra foam on the top of their beer.  Bartenders back home would never dream of giving you these.

Extra foamy beers

I usually wait a few minutes to let the foam settle before I drink mine.  If no one is looking, I sometimes take a chopstick and push the foam out of the way!  There is something really refreshing about a nice cold beer while sitting under the subway station, partially in the cold.  I can't explain it, but it works.  You know what else works with beer?  Skewered meats.

Our first round off the grill

The chicken wings and meatballs were juicy and savory.  My personal favorite is the skewer with the cartilage-y pieces of chicken.  I know some of you think this is bizarre, but if you've ever seen me eat wings, you know I always clean those bones dry.  The cartilage is the best part!  I live for that combination of soft meat and tough crunch.  Yum.  The skewered leeks are a nice balance to all the chicken.  That was someone's idea of ordering a vegetable.
 

Tiny fish from a tiny restaurant

The little fish- we love the little fish!  The skin gets nice and charred from the grill.  You eat them head first, and they have such a simple flavor.  Sitting here eating these fish reminded me of being at Solomon's with my family.  We always hope for crabs, but sometimes these little fish hop into the crab traps.  Of course we don't throw them back!  They are so yummy, I sometimes enjoy them more than the crabs.

All in all, it was a very fun and tasty dinner.  It's such an interesting experience to sit in this tiny space and watch the food getting cooked.  I admire the families who run these stalls.  If you can make all this good food in such a tiny space, what can't you do?  Here is a picture of the chefs in action:

Tiny kitchen big enough for two

There isn't any meat on it, but that is the grill in the bottom of the picture.  You can see the wood and charcoal burning in between two pieces of metal.  Can you smell the deliciousness wafting off the screen?

Expensive

A few months back, I started telling people that I was moving to Tokyo.  I almost always got the same response:

"But Tokyo is so expensive!"

I wasn't too worried.  I had been here before!  Sure there were some outrageously priced things, but I would find the cheap stuff.  I have always prided myself in finding good bargains.  A good friend of mine once joked that she could give me only $5, and I'd be able to buy the world.  This was an exaggeration of course, but I did find some good deals.  Black Friday outlet shopping at midnight?  Check.  Yard sales, flea markets, and craigslist?  Definitely.  Day after Christmas sales at 3 or more Targets?  Absolutely.

These bargain opportunities are not available here.  Sure, I found a 100 yen shop that has decent snacks, nail polish remover, and other home goods.  But it's quite hard to be CHEAP.  And I like to be cheap.  I'm sure as time goes on, I'll stumble across more ways to be frugal, but so far it's hard.  I have gotten to the point where yesterday I nearly giggled with joy as I found a bunch of bananas on sale for a little over a dollar.  Oh, how I miss Trader Joes and their 19 cent bananas!

To help you understand a little of what I'm dealing with, I'd like to share something that you can find almost anywhere here.

A beautiful gift cantaloupe

  This gorgeous melon is available for around $105 (much more b/c of the bad exchange rate).  Isn't it cute with it's attached piece of stem and accompanying gift packaging?  These bad boys are for sale in almost every department store and supermarket.  I have not seen anyone buy one just yet, but clearly people must be.  This is one of those Japanese things I just won't understand.  If I see someone buy one, I'm going to grab their hand and explain to them about places like H Mart and Grand Mart back home.  What is so special about this cantaloupe?  I love cantaloupe.  Is this one filled with magic?  Maybe.  I'll never find out, because I'll never buy one.

While this is an extreme example, Tokyo really IS quite expensive.  But, I'm considering this all just part of the challenge.  I will continue to search out ways to be frugal!  I will stay true to myself!  I will never pay over $100 for a piece of fruit. 

Spin me right round baby

I've been talking about food a lot.  Tokyo has lots of amazing food that I got to try back in 2003 and couldn't wait to try again.  Takoyaki?  Yes please!  Ramen?  Dinner my first night!  And then there's sushi...  Did you know I used to hate sushi?  I'm embarrassed to admit it.  It's true.  I was here for 10 glorious days 7 years ago, and I didn't eat a lick of sushi.  I couldn't stand it.  Who in their right mind would want to eat raw fish?  I had tasted it many times back home, and I just didn't understand the appeal.  It had no taste.  The texture was weird.  It was just gross.

That was before real sushi.  Some would argue that you can't find real sushi in DC.  The next time someone says this to you, send them here.  The sushi available at that back counter will make them cry.  They will complain about the price, until the boxes come out.  In fact, tell them I sent you.  While Chef Nobu will probably stare at you blankly, I like to pretend we are BFFs.  But, I'm getting off topic.  The point is, I became a sushi addict a few years back.  When I found out we were moving to Tokyo, I got all giddy with the idea of sushi all the time!  But wait- it's expensive.  And sometimes, it's not good.  This is just unacceptable.  I wanted to make sure I got the good stuff.  How do you know where the good stuff is?  Pay attention.

Recently, we were walking around the restaurant floor of a department store.  Yes, you read that correctly, department stores have entire floors devoted to restaurants.  They also have entire floors (sometimes two) devoted to selling food.  More on that later.  Back to the restaurant floor.  It was lunch time and we couldn't decide what to eat.  Divine intervention struck.  What is that giant line for?  Why is there a man with a sign?

A very blurry picture of a restaurant bouncer

That man with a sign was telling you where to stand if you wanted to wait in line.  What were these people waiting for?  Everyone knows if people are standing in line, it must be worth it (unless of course you are anywhere near Georgetown Cupcake, in which case- don't bother.  The cupcakes are delicious but no cupcake is worth a two hour wait in the rain.).  We decided to investigate.  I could feel the excitement brewing.  Wait- do those tables have ipads?!?!

A very happy Japanese family at their ipad-clad table

Good googly-moogly, they are ordering SUSHI from an ipad!  Yes, that was my exact reaction.  As starving as I was, I demanded we wait in the line.  So we did.  I was so distracted by the ipads, I didn't even notice the sushi itself was moving on a conveyor belt.  This concept isn't foreign to me.  I have eaten at all TWO of DC's conveyor belt sushi restaurants.  Both leave much to be desired in terms of quality.  But we're not in DC anymore.  This is Tokyo.  And there was a line bouncer!  It had to be good.

As we slowly approached the front of the line, I could see the sign with the prices.  In true Japanese restaurant style, there were excellent pictures to guide you.  How could this be?  The prices seemed too good to be true.  Could you really get good sushi for 100 yen?

So many possibilities!

My friends, it was glorious.  Sadly, you had to have 3 or more people to sit at a table with an ipad.  I almost threw a fit, but I decided sitting at the counter and watching the chefs up close was more important.  If any of you come to visit, we'll take you and get another chance at those ipad tables.  Back to the sushi.  It was amazing.  The portions were generous.  Those chefs were masters with their knives!  We ate, and ate, and ate, and then we ate some more.  It's hard not to be gluttonous when you're grabbing small plates right in front of you.  Some eye candy for you:

Perfect salmon.  There were 2 here, but someone ate theirs before the picture was taken.

Super duper toro.  This fatty tuna was so fatty, it was like tuna flavored butter on rice.  Yum!

Beautifully butterflied scallops- a new favorite of mine.

Last but not least, the uni (sea urchin)!

 Of course, none of these were actually only 100 yen, but I swear the cheap ones were yummy too!  We could have sat there and ate all day.  But, our wallets and our stomachs stopped us.  We still did pretty good for ourselves though:

Huge stack of plates = good meal

One of the coolest parts of the meal was when we were ready to pay.  I thought they would come by and sort our plates by color to add them up and figure out our total damage.  Leave it to the Japanese and their crazy technology.  The dude came over with a scanner gun and just ran it down the side of our stack.  Boom- here's your total.  I still don't know how that worked, but we went with it.  We managed to get out of there only 3800 yen poorer.  Not bad at all.  We'll be back soon for another spin soon.  

Shinjuku Gyoen National Garden

What I am about to say may come as a shock.

Tokyo is not very pretty.  There- I said it.  There's no taking it back.  The city is a whole bunch of large skyscrapers.  Some cities of the world sweep you off your feet with their good looks (I'm looking at you Paris).  Don't get me wrong- Tokyo is an amazing city.  It's clean, modern, and extremely unique.  But pretty?  Not so much.  Tokyo looks best at night, when you can't see all the gray of the dull concrete.  The bright lights of all the ads give everything a festive look.  Like most people in Adams Morgan bars, Tokyo looks best in the dark.  

But yesterday, I found a whole lot of pretty- right in Shinjuku.  Shinjuku is famous for its red light district.  The station is probably the craziest one I've been to, and the amount of people passing out ads for new cosmetics or cat cafes are endless.  I've been several times and never seen much that took my breath away.

Thank goodness for the Filipinos!  The Filipinos planned a potluck picnic for Friday's lunch.  We headed to Shinjuku Gyoen National Garden to feast on tinola, adobo, and a whole lotta rice (with spoons of course).  The food was obviously delicious, but I was taken aback by the natural beauty of the park.   

Here is some of what I saw:

Looking up at the sky through the trees

An unusual plant in the French Rose Garden

Gorgeous fall leaves just over the pond

A walkway towards the traditional Japanese garden

There was so much beauty all around me.  I took 71 pictures just on my phone!  It was such an amazing day.  That morning, we woke up to pouring rain beating down on the balcony.  After a few hours, the sun came out and it ended up being 72 degrees.  In December!  I know you are jealous back at home.  It was December 3rd, and I was outside with no coat, smelling the roses.  Literally.

It turns out Shinjuku is quite beautiful, if you can just manage to walk a bit past the crazy.  Don't worry- it's worth the 200 yen entrance fee.  Now you KNOW you're not in DC anymore when you pay to go into a National park.

Thanks for a wonderful lunch and a beautiful day!  I'll be back in the spring for the cherry blossoms.    

A taste of home

I will never get tired of trying new foods.  I could probably eat something different everyday here.  That's the beauty of Japanese food.  There is so much variety- sushi, tempura, ramen, udon, soba, yakitori, katsu- it goes on and on and on.  I have loved every bit of it.  But sometimes, you just want a taste of home.  This is especially important when you are feeling lost.  Maybe that day you got overconfident.  You attempted to make small talk with someone in Japanese.  What were you thinking, you can only say two things!  That ended well.  Or maybe you overreacted to a very small earthquake that everyone else thought was nothing.  On days like these, you need something familiar- some comfort food.  Thank goodness that isn't too hard to find here, if you know where to look.  Luckily, I am pretty good at my food research.

Case 1:

One smell of this took me right back to the Book It program

In case the pan crust didn't make it obvious

Pizza Hut.  Now, I'm not a huge fan of this back at home.  I much prefer Papa John's.  But that's not really an option here, so I'll take what I can get.  It was a little difficult to not get distracted by all the toppings.  Octopus balls in your crust?  Mayonnaise drizzled over your pizza?  Seaweed sprinkles?  No, thank you.  Today I will have the American version.  I even want pepperoni, and I NEVER want pepperoni.  Delicious.

Case 2:

Ba, da, ba, ba, ba- I'm lovin' it!

Give me back that filet-o-fish!  Give me that fish.  Golden delicious french fries.  Enough said.  This one is everywhere.

Case 3:

This is not what you think

Rice, beef, salsa- must be Chipotle!

Burritos.  Fajita Burritos.  I know someone back home who can't go very long without Chipotle (you know who you are!).  Alas, there is no Chipotle here in Tokyo.  But this place was pretty darn close.  It's called Frijoles.  They don't give you quite as much rice, and your burrito doesn't feel stuffed to the maximum.  These are both fine with me.  It definitely satisfies the craving!

I don't have to have these things every day or even every week.  In fact, I've begun to crave some new foods as though I've been eating them my whole life (see more on onigiri later).  But on some days, when you're feeling a little misplaced, it's nice to know a taste of home isn't that far out of reach.