Hillary's Last Stand

Hillary left Japan for the good ol' U.S of A at the very beginning of August. Since she needed to fly out of Tokyo, we spent her last night in Japan together. I got a room at the New Sanno Hotel and we got snazzied up, got some yummy drinks and had a romantic dinner together. :)

Thanks for a fun date night, Hil! I miss you!

We went to a fun restaurant in Ebisu that a friend had been to and it had a giant aquarium/shark tank!

Corsu-menu arimasu-ka? Hai. Futatsu onegaishimasu!

I loved having Hil in Japan while I was here. It was wonderful to get away from base for a short time and reminisce about Iowa State and college days. I can't wait to see where she ends up next so that I can go visit her there as well. Love you, friend!

Lock Up!

Last week was my farewell. Well, it was scheduled as my farewell and then we got extended 2 months so it wasn't really my farewell...a pre-farewell party instead! We headed to Shibuya in Tokyo to the Lock Up restaurant.

It is a haunted prison hospital themed restaurant. Lots of fun drinks that came in laboratory ware!

 These colored "pills" were on the menu and for 100 yen each, we couldn't resist. Turns out they are grain alcohol in capsules. That's one way to get the party started. :)

 Mix and match test tube drinks. Delicious and colorful.

 This was the Blood Alcohol test drink. It was a syringe full of yummy strawberry flavored goo of some sort.

I don't want to ruin all the fun of the "show" in case you attend the restaurant as well, but it was pretty scary!

As Lauren is showing!

After Lock Up, Mike, Kristy and myself headed down the street to a yummy English pub. They had us as soon as we saw the sign that said 20 beers on tap. What a fun night! I can't wait, well really I can, for my real farewell!

GNO Tokyo!

When the boys are gone, the girls will play! I headed to Tokyo a few weekend ago with some very fun girlfriends to Gonpachi restaurant. We got there a little early so we stopped for some drinks at the Mexican restaurant across the street.

Sadly, no one ordered the Appli Pie.

Dericious.

We ordered the course menu and it didn't disappoint. Yummy food course after course!

An hour long train ride didn't deter us. We were off to Karaoke once we got back close to base!

I'm excited to get back to America, but nights like this are going to make me miss this place SO much. Good friends, no jobs, a fabulous city out our back door. It can't be beat!

Tokyo Food Tour 2011

Ok, so it wasn't so much a tour, but it could have been. I should copyright it now. Glenn and I headed to Tokyo on Thursday night after he got done flying. Being the sweet husband he is, he was even able to rearrange a few things so that we could leave a few hours early. Thanks, Mr. We had dinner on Thursday at a restaurant near the hotel- Cicada- Spanish tapas with sangria....thankyouverymuch.

The next morning we slept in- wow...hotel blackout curtains really work. Perhaps I should have invested in some when we moved here...then we headed to Tsukiji fish market. I had been there before, but Glenn never had. Last time I was there, we didn't eat at any of the restaurants because it was 5 am, but I knew I had to eat at the largest, freshest fish market in the world before leaving Japan.

I was doing research on Tokyo and came across this article that recommend Sushi Dai for breakfast. I really know what we were looking for, but when we saw this line, we figured it was it. No other shop at any line whatsoever and after about an hour in line, Glenn begrudgingly said, "This better be the best sushi of my life." Another 30 minutes later, we got seats in the tiny 13 seat shop. OMG.It.Was.

Since it was no longer breakfast like I had intended, but in fact, lunchtime, we ordered a beer which came as a set with octopus and baby squid with ginger.  An excellent start to our tour.

We decided to order the 10-piece chef's choice set and share it because at around $50, it was a pretty expensive. The set included one roll, soup, tea and one piece each of the best sushi I've ever tasted. The piece of tuna on the far left in the picture below was one of the greatest things I've ever put in my mouth. It melted like no piece of fish ever as. I'd wait again, just to eat that piece of sushi again. Luckily, the 10th piece of sushi was our choice so we ordered another one. I can't remember all the sushi we had, but in included: fatty tuna, no so fatty tuna, baby shrimp, sea bass, soft crab (that was still alive when they served it) and a few others. 

The chefs were very friendly, thanked us for waiting and even gave us a free egg sushi. Maybe because we were the only gaijin (foreigners).

It was a wonderful experience. I highly recommend the wait even if it seems to be taking forever. After "brunch" we headed to Yasukuni shrine near the Imperial Palace. We enjoyed the beautiful weather and took a walk through the palace gardens on our way towards our subway stop.

 

Our next stop on our TFT2011 was a Indian restaurant near Hiroo station called Priya for a late lunch. I love Indian food, but always say that I go for the naan bread. For me, curry is a condiment for my naan. That was not the case at Priya. Amazing curry! I had the chicken spinach curry and it didn't disappoint!

After lunch we headed back to the hotel to rest and clean up. Tonight we were celebrating our anniversary a little late at the Park Hyatt's New York Grill. This is where much of the movie, Lost in Translation was filmed.

Here are a few pictures from the Internet. I say we were celebrating our anniversary, but the real other reason was so that Glenn could order the Kobe prime cut steak. I'll let Glenn tell you all about it some day, but here are a few quotes of the evening.

"I don't want to swallow"
"I just want to crawl inside my mouth and be with it"
"This is the single greatest thing I've ever eaten"

Of course he let me try a bite, and he was right. I ordered the 5 course set and the awesome steak that came with mine didn't even compare.

 Last bite. So sad.

The Park Hyatt is an amazing experience. We were greeted at the entrance by no less than 4 staff members and were treated like royalty. An amazing way to wrap up our tour in Japan and Glenn and I's last few months in Japan. And with the prices you pay, it gave us time to save up!

The restaurant is on the 52nd floor and there are several bars as well. We headed down to the 41st floor for a night cap and to enjoy the never ending skyline of Tokyo before walking back to Shinjuku station to catch one of the last trains back to our hotel.

TFT2011 did not disappoint. We might have to have a part II before Glenn leaves. What an amazing city!

Hachiko!

Hachikō (ハチ公, November 10, 1923–March 8, 1935), known in Japanese as chūken Hachikō (忠犬ハチ公, "faithful dog Hachikō" ('hachi' meaning 'eight', a number referring to the dog's birth order in the litter, and 'kō,' meaning prince or duke)), was an Akita dog born on a farm near the city of Ōdate, Akita Prefecture, remembered for his loyalty to his owner, even many years after his owner's death.

In 1924, Hidesaburō Ueno, a professor in the agriculture department at the University of Tokyo took in Hachikō as a pet. During his owner's life Hachikō greeted him at the end of the day at the nearby Shibuya Station. The pair continued their daily routine until May 1925, when Professor Ueno did not return. The professor had suffered from a cerebral hemorrhage and died, never returning to the train station where Hachikō was waiting. Every day for the next nine years the golden brown Akita waited at Shibuya station.

Hachikō was given away after his master's death, but he routinely escaped, returning again and again to his old home. Eventually, Hachikō apparently realized that Professor Ueno no longer lived at the house. So he went to look for his master at the train station where he had accompanied him so many times before. Each day, Hachikō waited for the return of his owner.

The permanent fixture at the train station that was Hachikō attracted the attention of other commuters. Many of the people who frequented the Shibuya train station had seen Hachikō and Professor Ueno together each day. They brought Hachikō treats and food to nourish him during his wait.
This continued for nine years with Hachikō appearing precisely when the train was due at the station.

Richard Gere also starred in a movie recently about the story of Hachiko! The above article is from Wikipedia.

Race for the Cure

 On Saturday morning, a few of the spouses from our squadron headed to Tokyo to run in the Race for the Cure. It was a beautiful day and it actually made the running really fun! We ran around the Imperial Palace following the moat for the most part. The air was cool and the leaves were beautiful. If running was always like that, I would probably do it more often. Three of us ran the 5K race and two people in our group ran the 10K race.

 I finished the 5K with a time of 32 minutes. I was pretty happy with that for it being my first race! In all there were about 1500 runners between the two races so it was a good turn out especially in a country that doesn't have as much awareness for Breast Cancer like the US.

 There were some other Atsugi-basers there too!

  What a great day though! It actually makes me want to go running again. That's new!