Friday December 12, 1997: 9:30pm
Tonight we made... dum dee dum dum... PUMPKIN PIE!! Finally! This is the day I'd been waiting for! So I bought the nutmeg and cloves - Sariya had brought the pumpkin mush and condensed milk - and set out to make pumpkin pie tarts. Yes, TARTS, beca use my "oven" is way to small to fit a pie.
Anyway, I was expecting difficulties, since pumpkin pie recquires some exact oven temperatures, and my gas oven can only be specified to small flame, medium flame, or big flame... so when it came time to pop those babies in, we were debating how big of a flame 475F was. We figured big flame.
Of course, we were wrong. Sariya went to check on the progresss of the first 2 tarts after 10 minutes and I hear a "Uhhhh.. oh oh" coming from the kitchen. I run in, and what do I see? Two black charred pumpkin tarts. Eukay fine, maybe *not* the big flame! Oh well, on further inspection we found that only the tops were charred (since the flames are actually on teh TOP of the oven) so we turned the flame down to "small", and I even opened the front of the oven for the remaining half hour.
And as it turns out, they were purdy tasty! All we had to do was remove the charred parts (and there were many) and the rest was fine. And this way, when I put in the next 2, they only got half-charred. Cool, so the next batch should be... uh - pe
rfect! Hahahaha...
Saturday December 13, 1997: 8:30am
Today is a *beautiful* day. The sky is incredibly blue, wow. It's a little chilly, but we could see Mt. Fuji so clearly that it almost makes up for the temperature. And besides, no matter how cold I think it is here, I can comfort myself with know ing that it's colder at the summit of Mt. Fuji!
8pm
What a great day it was! And since it was so nice out, we decided to make it the Imperial Palace/Ginza/downtown Tokyo day. I've done this "day" about 4 times now so I know it pretty well. But I like this tour because it's just nice.
So we started off at Yasukuni Jinja, then went through Marunokoen to the National Museum of Modern Art. And lucky for us, today was a free admission day! Now I've also been to this museum 3 times, but surprisingly they change the bulk of their perm anent display so there was still plenty of neat stuff to see.
Next we walked through the East Palace gardens - ate our pb sandwhiches - then we walked around the moat for awhile. Took some pics, then walked on over to Ginza - there, we basically just wandered. Oh, we found the International Arcade - I remembe r when Jon and I were in Ginza, we could just NOT find it - and as it turns out, we had walked right by it, numerous times. Ha ha, typical. Anyway, Ginza being Ginza, we spent the rest of the afternoon in the crowds, passing all the very (very) expensiv e shops... both of us are low on money so we're kind of pathetic shoppers at the moment (although we try!)
I started Margaret Atwood's "Lady Oracle" tonight and so far it's great. But I'm going to have to cut down on the reading because my Japanese has been put on hold and that's not good! So once this one's done I should get back at the Japanese!
Sunday December 14, 1997: 8:15pm
We turned on the TV tonight and found Sesame Street in English! So of course, we watched it. Woah, I never quite realized just how entertaining that show is! And now we're watching a game-show-type show, but they put such Indiana Jones type music in the background that you've just gotta laugh!
'Perfected' the pumpkin tart production.. they're not so bad! And we've still got plenty of pumpkin must left - man, that stuff is NOT pretty! But if it ends up in the form of pumpkin pie...
Monday December 15, 1997: 9:30pm
Sariya and I went on a scavenger hunt tonight. On her walk in the afternoon she'd seen some old sofa-type chairs, apparently abandoned, so she thought we should go back tonight and pick one up. I was all for it, since I have no chair in my apartmen
t, and wouldn't mind having one, especially if it were for free. So we walked down there, in the cover of darkness. To our dismay, there was a van parked beside the sofas, and people standing around talking, so we did a cool, unsuspecting walk-by and de
cided to come back when the people had left. So about 20 minutes later, we come back and... they're gone! (the couches). What disappointment. And they looked real comfy too...
Tuesday December 16, 1997: 9:40pm
Today was my hirukai. Actually, *yesterday* was also my hirukai but I'd forgotten, and so today was mine once again. The topic was "Mt.Fuji experience" and I talked about, duh, the Mt.Fuji climb. And this time I only wrote key words on the white b
oard so as to force myself into ad-libbing it... and it worked! Ah, and I think I even made sense for a good part of it (unless of course, they weren't laughing at my jokes, but at my Japanese.. hm..)
Wednesday December 17, 1997: 10:30pm
Are we ever late coming home today! We took an extra long time at calligraphy tonight because we were "perfecting" (I use the word loosely) our kakizoumes [the calligraphies for the new year]. We? Sariya started one tonight as well, while I contin ued with the same. Sariya did "shogatsu no tako" which means "the kites of the new year". See, here in Japan they do all sorts of traditional things on New Year's Day, one of them being flying big kites. BIG. Anyway, even though it was easier than my calligraphy, it was still pretty difficult for the 2nd lesson, but Sariya did really well, I was impressed. And Sensei showed her how to sign her name in kanji and woah, is it ever difficult! I'm glad I'm not her!!
Anyway, I think tonight was the last night I'm doing my kakizoume, because tonight was the last lesson of the year. Man, already? I can't beleive it!!
Thursday December 18, 1997: 11:20pm
My very first bonenkai [end-of-year party] - what fun! I left work early - at 5 - telling Hirabayashi-san that I had a bonenkai to go to. And although usually he disapproves of me leaving anytime before 8, he was more than understanding today since it was all in the name of drinking and eating yourself silly. Cool.
So I was to meet Sariya, Sensei, and Ai-chan [another student of Sensei's] at the Wako building in Ginza at 7 or so - but actually I ran into Sariya elsewhere (hey, she's a tall blonde - she sticks out!) as we walked for a bit before heading over to Wako.
Right around 7, Sensei and Ai-chan showed up together - and so we started our walk towards the restaurant (called Mumui, btw). Now Sensei used to work in Ginza before she got married, so she is very attached to the place. As a matter of fact, if th ere were such a word as "Ginza buff", Sensei would be THE definition. So it was pretty funny walking with her because at each store we passed she would hit one of us to tell us a bit of history about the store, or about the building, or about where she u sed to work - quite fun!
We made a brief stop at a nice stationary store because Sensei needed some envelopes, and then we made our way to Mumui.
Now, to set the scene, this is December. This is bonenkai season. Mumui is one of the most famous udon [a type of Japanese noodle soup] and sake [rice wine] restaurants (quite the pleasant combo) - and all this adds up to one helluva crowded restau rant! Luckily Keiko-chan (who met us at the restaurant) had made reservations over a month ago - which is necessary in December - so we didn't have to wait long for our table to be ready.
Now unlike most of the Japanese restaurants I've been to, this one is pretty big although it sure didn't give that impression. Our private room (with a table for 6) was on the 3rd floor. When we got to the room, most of the meal was already prepare d.. there were 2 hot plates built into the table, with 2 metal bowl-shaped pots, empty, on top of those. Then at each end of the table were 2 boxes, one with noodles (pre-cooked) and one with all sorts of ditties (carrots, tofu, cabbage, raw chicken, imo , sashimi..) nd then to top off the feast, we each had a bowl of sashimi in front of us, and some sort of tofu in another bowl. Wow, it was a lot of food, but we didn't start eating it, of course, until we'd ordered the beer and done our "kampai!" [CHEE RS!]. *Then* we dug into the sashimi [raw fish].. well, *they* dug into the sashimi, Sariya and I dug into the veggie decorations surrounding the sashimi.
Once we were done with those, it was time to start cookin' the udon. So a couple of waitresses come in and start to fill the metal bowls with soup - and they poured it from these old red clay water jugs, it was cool. And so the soup was left to boi l, oh, and that's when the waitress brought out the shrimp. Now, I would like to note that although I am a vegetarian, I don't mind the sight of meat, I mean, I used to eat it too. But none (NONE) of my meat-eating experiences prepared me for... for LIV E shrimp. LIVE! Like, the waitress opened the box to show us, and they were all wiggling around.. ew, they are oooogleh! They thought it was hilarious - how Sariya and I reacted. We must've looked pretty shocked. So I ask - Um, what are you planning to DO with those... ? And they say - with a laugh - Well, we're going to put them in the soup of course! A statement to which Sariya and I go wide-eyed again... I can just see our faces, with the incredoulous stare of a child, mouthing the words "live?" . Ha, Sensei said that sometimes they put the shrimp in sake beforehand and the shrimp get drunk! hahahahahaha..
Ok, so I'm not finished with this live shrimp yet... because just as I was getting used to the idea of having live shrimp on my table as a centerpiece, they start to throw them into the boiling soup! And to THIS, well, I was squirming. I was also p robably making funny gawking noises. We watched them lash around until the heat got to them.. suckers, BOILED ALIVE!!
Now this little shrimp incident made it a bit difficult to serve myself some soup at first, but once I tried the noodles and soup, there wasn't much of a problem anymore.. it was so good! And there were plenty of veggie things for us to pick at. Oh , serving the noodles with chopsticks was a bit difficult!
Go-san arrived after the first bowl - to complete the table of 6. We ordered another bottle of beer to do another kampai and set right back into the food.
In the meantime, we had ordered some of the infamous sake. It came in a bottle the size of a white zinfandel (Levon's influence), and it was chilled so much that it was actually mostly frozen. BUt, it seems as though that's how it was supposed to b e. We had to wait a few minutes before we could pour it, but when we did, it was slush. And this was chodou ii (just perfect) - how it was meant to be drunk. Yum!
So we were at the restaurant for a good hour and a half - more actually - and we were eating the whole time. Wow, that udon was so GOOD! I completely stuffed myself. And it was just lots of fun - my Japanese seems to be at the point where I can un derstand most things, so I can understand a good portion of the jokes and stuff. And all these guys are so nice! Ha ha, I think Sensei got a bit drunk, and she was just so funny. Oh wow, she even gave us all, including Sariya, Xmas gifts!! So nice.
We stayed until Mumui closed (10pm goro) then all headed home by the Chuo line. They all got off a couple of stations ago, and it's Hino next..
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