Department Store Opening and Visiting Friends

We had lovely weather today, cool and sunny. Brad and I went to the Nihombashi area to drop in on two of Tokyo's grand old department stores. We were there when they opened the doors at Takashimaya and were greeted with deep bows and choruses of "irrashaimase" (welcome) as we passed from one department to another. This department store tradition gives one a chance to feel what it must be like to be royalty. After visiting the housewares and stationery (our fave depts) we headed down to Mitsukoshi and paid our respects to the goddess of shopping and visited housewares, stationery, an exhibit of traditional crafts and the rooftop garden.

Around noon I left to visit with another DigitalEve friend. Misa is an architect and has been membership coordinator for DEJ for many years. She is quite dedicated to the organization and I'm certain the group would have folded if not for her dedication. I met Misa at Roppongi Hills in the lobby of the Hyatt Hotel. Roppongi Hills is a huge glitzy complex of shops and restaurants that opened just before we moved from Tokyo. It sits on the street that led from our apt. to Brad's office so it still seems kinda strange to me to have this huge complex in the middle of our former neighborhood. Chiharu also met us at the Hyatt but could not join us for lunch. She brought me another DEJ t-shirt; very cool, since my other one is just about worn out. Misa and I walked about a block to a new Chinese restaurant on TV Asahi Dori. For 900 yen we got one of several set menus: stir fried chicken, potatoes and peppers, rice, soup, pickles, shumai appetizer, and almond jelly for dessert. The portions were generous and everything was delish, once again proving that Tokyo's best deals are to be had at lunchtime.

After lunch Misa invited me to her office for dessert. It was a chance to walk through familiar old neighborhoods. I passed by Brad's former office, Hardy Barracks (where we spent our very first days in Tokyo) and even saw the cat man (a harmless but eccentric homeless man who lives with stray cats. He used to be seen wearing a cat draped around his neck but today he had a cat on a leash with him.) We walked past Tokyo's newest museum, a striking structure of curved glass and popped into Cafe TeTe's to pick up a selection of cakes. Misa shares an office with her husband Yutaka and has one employee, a quiet fellow named Kodama. Yutaka is such a nice fellow and I enjoyed seeing him. We spent a little bit of time on google earth and I showed them our home in Linthicum and our former home in Harrogate.

It was after 4 p.m. when I left Misa's office and headed back to our apt. I took the long way home and walked down Gaien Nishi Dori to Hiroo Bashi. I stopped in at National Azabu (the grocery store where i used to do most of my shopping), walked through Arisugawa Koen (the park where I used to walk Taffy) and passed by Homat August (our former apt. bldg). Everything looked exactly the same. My feet were really aching as I made my way to the Juban. Brad had plans to go out for dinner with former coworkers and I had planned to go out again after stopping home but my feet screamed NO! I picked up another Lawson's convenience store dinner (salad and a roll) and stayed in for the evening. I did a load of laundry and organized our recent purchases and gifts. I caught the end of a strange movie with Cate Blanchett and Giovanni Ribisi called Heaven. It was in Italian and English. The subtitles were in Japanese so I had to guess a bit at the Italian dialogue.

Brad is still out carousing with his friends and I'm going to hit the hay.