Yurakucho: The wrong side of the tracks (actually, underneath them)

Hey guys,

Great, great night last night.  Remember my discussion in my Teishoku post of the restaurants underneath the train tracks, with promise of a follow-up?  Hopefully I can adequately deliver

Yurakucho station is just one stop away from Tokyo station, one of the centers of commerce in the city.  At a right angle in another direction is Ginza, "the 5th Avenue of Tokyo" with Tiffany's and Burberry's and exquisite but overpriced dining.  But tucked away in between is a neighborhood filled with places for the working man to go eat.  Not only am I usually the whitest person in the room when I come here, but I'm also frequently the only person not wearing a white shirt and dark suit.  This is my kind of neighborhood

Walk down the dimly-lit tunnel, listening to the thundering of the train directly above your head.  Do not despair, I promise there is good food waiting at the end . . .

This picture deserved to be posted again, just so you can get the feel

Your reward?  Well.  Japanese love specialization in their cuisine, and pretty much every culture that respects food understand the importance of knowing exactly where your food was grown.  Sanshoku Ishokugai combines both of those points a brilliant conceit, a conglomeration of restaurants featuring a different protein from a different region in Japan:  A restaurant featuring wagyu beef raised in Hokkaido, another with chicken from Nagano prefecture, another with seafood from the island of Shizuoka, another with horsemeat from Kumamoto . . . it's brilliant, and it's perfect, and it just doesn't get any more Japanese than that

Pick a place, order a drink and a few dishes to share among your friends, then move on to the next place.  It's amazing.  At this point, the post is probably going to devolve into a series of pictures of food.  Sorrynotsorry

Chawan-mushi, steamed savory egg custard, topped with ikura salmon eggs and sea urchin.  I can almost never resist ordering chawan-mushi in a restaurant, it's so wonderful to see top kitchens' approaches to this simple home-style dish

The centerpiece of the evening, raw horsemeat.  Most people's surprise favorite?  That light-pink meat in the lower-left of the photo, which is actually horsefat--chewy and subtly sweet, absolutely delicious

Daily assortment of shellfish, grilled in-shell.  My favorite, predictably, was the scallop, which was as sweet as *candy*

Beef nigiri-zushi, seared beef on a ball of sushi rice, garnished with green onion and sea urchin (!!).  Rich and fatty beef topped with richer and fattier sea urchin, cut with just a touch of vinegar in the rice.  Amazing

Kani-miso, crab brains with leg meat, grilled over charcoal right at the table.  Tasted like the sea, with just a touch of smoke

Possibly my favorite meal I've had so far on this trip.  Come visit me, all of you.  I promise that I'm not letting you leave without taking you here

And hey, if you still feel like a drink after you've eaten your fill, some of my favorite yakitori bars in the city are just around the corner . . . ;)

Noah out

On Translation, the Importance of

Hi guys,

Quick story time.  My Japanese, while not great, is not that terrible.  However, every so often I manage to mess things up because I don't even bother trying to use my Japanese.  I am not a clever man.  Let me illustrate:

I'll start the story off by explaining that I try to avoid literal translation whenever possible.  A while ago, I came across the theory that translation is the enemy of true fluency; the idea being that you shouldn't translate a Japanese word into an English word and then think about the concept expressed, you should simply jump straight from the Japanese to the concept.  For instance, when I learn the word れいぞく(reizoku) I try to teach myself that it means "the magic silver box in which we put food after dinner and then immediately take it out in a few hours for a midnight snack"--instead of teaching myself that れいぞく means "refrigerator" which in turn means "the magic silver etc. etc."

(This approach is even more meritorious when dealing with things like names.  It's not particularly helpful to think of my friend as "Mr. Bamboo Field", I think I'll be served just as well by remembering his name as "Mr. Takeda")

This concept of translation is further complicated by the fact that, for the purposes of this discussion, Japanese uses two different written languages
[Editor's note: This entire paragraph is grossly inaccurate, leaves a lot of things out, and is such an oversimplification that it has more or less crossed over into falsehood; those of you that actually know Japanese, we appreciate your bearing with us for the purposes of the story.  Actually, if you do know Japanese you can skip right to making fun of the author because you'll figure out the punchline pretty quickly]
The first language, Hiragana, is phonetic--each character represents a syllable.  The second language, Kanji, is used to convey meaning--each character represents a word, thought, or concept.  Thus, each kanji has a "reading" that you sound out using hiragana characters.  This is further complicated by the fact that kanji has a number of homophones.  In essence, the mapping is not one-to-one: While each kanji has a single reading in hiragana [Ed: *cringe*], a given string of hiragana characters could have multiple representations in kanji, meaning a given string of hiragana characters could have multiple meanings



Thus, when I saw that I would have to take the "Denkigai Exit" at Akihabara Station in order to make my lunch date, I didn't bother translating this word because a) translating is not my habit, especially not for proper nouns and b) unless you already know the word it's difficult to translate without seeing the word's kanji representation

The problem was that when I got to the station and didn't see a single sign for a "Denkigai Exit".  There's the Central Exit, the South Exit, no not those . . . the only one left was the "Akihabara Electric Town Exit", that's not it either . . . what the hell is going on here?  Where is "Denkigai Exit"???

Up stairs, down stairs, turn left, turn right, I know I've already been this way . . . at this point I'd been wandering around the station for a good five-ten minutes trying to find this elusive Denkigai Exit.  I say five-ten because I'm estimating downward from the fifty minutes it felt like as I moved from amused to annoyed to confused to bewildered to truly frustrated to seriously stressed because I didn't want to be late for lunch.  Finally, my eyes just happened to glance over the Japanese writing on an exit sign . .

Photo courtesy of--oh wait, you guys can read it yourself

See, they gave me the English translation, so silly ol' me didn't even bother looking at the Japanese.  It was merely by chance that I noticed the character 電, which is pronounced den, at which point the following train of thought went through my head in about a half a second:

"Gee, the word 'Denkigai', whose meaning I never actually bothered to translate because I am lazy
". . . could probably be written as 電気街
". . . which would mean something along the lines of 'Electricity District'
"And hey, there are those same three kanji right there on one of the dozen of signs I've walked past in the last few minutes . . .
". . . plus the 口 character which of course just an abbreviation for "exit"
"So that means that the dozens of signs for for "電気街口 Electric Town Exit" . . .
". . . past which I have breezed in an increasingly angry manner while looking for "Denkigai Exit" . . .
". . . probably mean . . .
". . . huh
". . . yup
". . . well
". . . now I feel like an idiot"

Moral of the story:  Dude, Noah, at least make an attempt not to wander back and forth around the train station like a dumb tourist.  Just try, yeah?  Can you do that for us?  Just try?

Made it to lunch with just barely a minute to spare :P

Noah out

Yakuzen Curry Jinenjo, it will change your life

Hey guys,

Alluded to once or twice, I'd like to tell you all a story about Yakuzen Curry Jinenjo, the greatest Japanese curry I have ever eaten

Located in the middle of Yanaka, one of my favorite old neighborhoods.  Old doesn't mean very much in Tokyo, because the city is only a few hundred years old regardless--until the Tokugawa Shogunate moved the center of government to here, Edo was just a sleeping little fishing village.  Add that to the fact that the city was entirely leveled twice in the 20th century (first with the great Kanto earthquake in the 20s and then again during the War in the 40s) and it means that there are very few truly old neighborhood in Tokyo

Yanaka is one of them, though, and although it's been slightly tourist-icized it's still more honest compared to places like Sensoji temple which is just a giant tourist trap (not that it's not an awesome tourist trap, but that's a story for another day).  You can still find shops in this area that make traditional Japanese candy by hand, or that roast tea out on the sidewalk in front of the shop.  Other shops in the area specialize in traditional woodblock printing or handmade textiles or handwoven bamboo baskets.  There's a gorgeous museum, really just the perfectly preserved atelier of scholar/philosopher/architect/sculptor/overacheiver Asakura Choso.  What I'm trying to say is that this place is awesome

But the capstone of all of this?  Yakuzen Curry.  11 Indian spices, 8 Japanese vegetables, and 6 Chinese herbs--almost all hand-grown on the premises.  Add on toppings like squash, green beans, fresh grated ginger, mountain yams, fresh ground pepper, Chinese kikuan nuts, and and and . . .

It will make you believe in the divine

This curry is fantastic, unapologetically punch-you-in-the-mouth bold.  Not a chili pepper spice, but a black pepper spice that lingers on your palette for an hour afterwards.  The sauce is thick and rich, the texture of the beef is spoon-tender, and the toppings mean that every bite is different and all are equally delicious

All of this plus the fact that the curry is cooked by possibly the coolest dude in existence, Tanaka Kazuhiro-san:

He's cooler than you, and he makes tastier curry than you.  Just accept it

Go to Yakuzen.  All of you.  Do it.  Order the curry.  Talk to Tanaka-san about baseball (his favorite player is Hisashi Iwakuma, meaning he's a Mariner's fan.  This is awesome).  If you're lucky enough, he'll draw you a picture of his facebook profile picture so you can find him online (there are like 50 Kazuhiro Tanakas in Tokyo alone)

I think he did a pretty good job, actually

The only bad thing about the experience?  Last time I was there, I was so excited to eat the handmade banana pudding with azuki beans that I forgot to take a picture.  Sorry guys.  Guess I'll just have to go back . . .

Noah out

So manly

Hey guys,

Those of you that followed my old Budapest blog recall that I'm a sucker for any city that decides to put up random statues.  Real easy way to my heart, for sure

 So manly

I don't know who this guy is, I don't know what he did to deserve this statue.  All I know is that he is everything that I have ever wanted to be in my life

So, so manly

Noah out

Yanaka Matsuri; or: Japanese people know how to treat their gods; or: In which Our Hero was better lucky than good

Hey everybody,

Ooh, good day yesterday.  Very good day yesterday.  Started out with a nice but unambitious plan of going to visit my favorite curry place (and believe you me, that will get its own post very soon), maybe take the long way home, nothing fancy.  But as I got to the neighborhood, checking out a nice senbei shop, I hear from around the corner rhymthic clapping and chanting.  Could it be??

It could, and it is!

Sure enough, I just happened to come to one of my favorite little neighborhoods in Tokyo right in time for their annual matsuri (festival)!!!

Allow me to explain.  See that golden shrine up there?  Well, that is the house of the local temple's resident kami (god, more or less).  Usually it hangs out in the back of the temple, being approached by supplicants and suchlike.  But once a year, kami-sama gets to come out of the temple, gets paraded around the neighborhood, and gets treated to sweets and sake.  Because really, as cool as it would be to have people swinging by your house every day, every once in a while you'd like to get out, see some sunshine, and have a drink and a bite to eat.  Like I said in the the title, Japanese people know how to treat their gods

Also, she has it pretty good too.  No, I don't know what you have to do to get that seat.  Super jealous

Bearers step in and step out, the procession moves forward and backwards, and the whole thing is accompanied by chanting and celebration.  No one is in a hurry.  Guest appearances are even welcome--if I'd had a travelling companion to act as my photographer you'd see a picture of me taking a turn on the poles!

Last year, Alix and I had the absolute pleasure of being able to visit during Sanja Matsuri, the biggest and most important temple in Tokyo's version of this festival.  And that was amazing, don't get me wrong.  But that was filled to the brim with people from all around Tokyo and all around the world.  This one?  Just a neighborhood festival, with an absolutely wonderful feeling.  It was a warm, sunny Saturday, everyone was taking god for a walk around the streets, and everyone was ready to have a lot of fun



Of course, it just wouldn't be a festival without food.  And oh yes, Japanese do fair food right.  Not only is the food awesome, but guess where they set it up?  Right in the middle of temple grounds.  Because it is a matsuri, and like I said Japanese do this whole thing right

Meat+skewer+fire.  An amazing recipe around the world

Not to mention grilled squid

Desserts too.  Yes, that is a banana on a stick dipped in chocolate with a funny hat.  Matsuri!!!

Giant flattop of yakisoba?  Giant flattop of yakisoba

Gorgeous temple, hundreds of years old.  I sat on the steps and ate gyoza

I feel so amazingly lucky to have stumbled upon this.  Matsuri like this perfectly encapsulate one of the most wonderful, uniquely Japanese things I've ever experienced:  Three hundred sixty-four days out of the year, this temple is a place of reverence and respect, a place of hushed voices and thoughtful contemplation; on the three hundred and sixth-fifth, we flip it around into an expression of noise and color and celebration.  And that's not a contradiction at all, just two expressions of the exact same respect for their god--and I say that with the understanding that, as my mother the priest will tell you, "god" is just a code word for community and tradition and all of the intangible things that tie us together.  What a great thing to be a part of

The delicious, delicious food doesn't hurt either :D

The building in the background houses the temple's sacred spring, at which you purify yourself before making offerings to the temple god.  One day out of the year, you can also come here to get a chocolate-dipped banana

Noah out

"What is that beautiful house?"

Hi everyone,

One of the most wonderful things about moving to a foreign country is the opportunity truly not to know what's going on.  While this certainly happens occasionally Stateside (I am not . . .), the language difference means that not only do I not know what's going on but I really have no easy way of finding out.  While my Japanese skills are somewhat conversational, my reading is terrible and it's not just possible but likely that I am just completely unable to understand all of the very nice explanatory signs

And that's ok.  In fact, it's more than ok, it's fantastic.  There is so much in the world, and 99.999% of it is things that we have never seen before.  Don't fight it the mystery, enjoy it.  I found this temple in the middle of Akasaka, not two blocks away from the main drag of restaurants and bars, half a mile (8.3gigaliters) away from a major highway

I hope that I never lose my appreciation for the luxury of being able to say "I wonder where that stairway goes" . . .

At the top of the staircase was a stunning temple, pleasantly uncrowded on a weekday afternoon.  As I've said before, I will never tire of Tokyo's capacity to tuck these pockets of beauty into the middle of one of the most densely populated cities in the world

Chinese influences, I imagine

Oh, is that a monkey god?  Awesome.  Chinese influences indeed

This statue in particular made me smile.  The image of mother and child, crossing cultural boundaries.  And species boundaries as well, I suppose

I threw in some money, rang the gong, bowed my head, and expressed my full appreciation for their allowing me to enjoy the temple.  Good day to be in Tokyo

Noah out

Hayashi

Hey all,

Great day in Akasaka today, one of my favorite neighborhoods in Tokyo. I might look at apartments there if I ever have waaaay more money than I knew what to do with.  But instead, I must content myself with visiting and writing up blog posts.  In fact, I think I'm gonna get at least three or four posts out of today--but Hayashi deserves a post of its own

So, everybody remember a few posts ago where I taught you all the word "teishoku" (lunch set)?  Well, nobody does it better than Hayashi. Let's begin:

This place is not easy to find.  All of these hole-in-the-wall places are awesome, but they take some patience.  I'm glad I'm alone on this trip, because I think that any traveling companion of mine would get mighty frustrated at my thirty-minute wander of "ok so, I was here 1-4 year agos, I think it might be over here.  Nope, don't recognize anything, let's try over there . . ."

In this case, the wander took the form of meandering up and down looking for the tiny "Farm House Restaurant Hayashi" sign that is the only street-level indication of the restaurant's existence

Even once you find it and get in, things look pretty sketchy for a bit

Pretty much just an apartment lobby, with a tiny elevator you ride up to the fourth floor

This is the hallway outside the restaurant

And at the end of the fourth-story hallway, a small door

But once you get to that door, things get pretty awesome pretty quickly . . .

The entryway, because why not?

And the inside??  Gorgeous.  Like you stepped into a farmhouse 100 years ago

Now, this is a very nice restaurant.  A half-dozen tables only, and set course dinners start at $63/person and go up to $110 (before drinks).  So what was Our Hero (the daring and dashing Tanabe-san), what with his lack of monetary influx, doing here?

See, this is where that word teishoku comes in.  Dinner?  6300Y-11500Y.  Lunch?  950Y.  No I did not misplace a decimal point

The lunch menu has a single item on it:  Oyakodonburi, chicken and egg on rice

[side note:  This is a Japanese food joke.  "Donburi", often abbreviated to "-don", just means over rice.  And "okayo" doesn't mean chicken and egg, it literally translates to "mother and child".  Oh, and if you swap out the chicken for pork, it becomes "tanin-don", where "tanin" means "strangers".  Japanese food joke!]

Oyako-don is a simple, home dish.  My mother used to make it for me; after fried rice, I think it was the second dish she ever taught me how to cook.  But at Hayashi, it becomes something else. Top-quality chicken, a sweet-but-not-too-sweet broth, and eggs cooked perfectly soft.  Finished off with fresh herbs and a raw egg yolk (they asked if I was ok with a raw egg, I'm ok with pretty much anything), it's everything I love about simple, comforting Japanese food.  Most Americans think of sushi, maybe teriyaki, when they think of Japanese food--but to me, this is Japanese food.  The kind of food that makes you smile

Served with a side of Japanese pickles and a cup of soup, it's enough to fill up even growing boy--but of a quality befitting a kitchen that charges three figures per person.  For less than ten dollars

Oh, and that's a pitcher of mugi-cha (cold barley tea), the most refreshing drink created by man, in the middle of the table.  I almost didn't leave

Noah out

Kawaguchi shrine

Hey guys,

I wanted to post a few pictures of a little shrine on the walk between the station and the hostel

No big deal, just a quick stop :)

The first time I walked past this shrine I was carrying more than 150lbs (~55kilohertz, I believe) of luggage, so I didn't have time to stop.  But I made my way back next chance I got, to throw some money in.  That's something I always like to do when travelling--pay respect to the local gods, say thanks for letting me come by.  Really that should probably go double when I am actually moving here, huh?

A bell, to let the spirits know you're here

I always like seeing stone lanterns.  No doubt you've all seen them in pictures of temples or graveyards.  See, as I understand it, Japanese believe that although these lanterns are empty to our eyes, they are illuminated for dead spirits.  You guys know I'm not religious, but I've always loved a good story.  To me, this speaks of dead spirits left behind on Earth, trapped in a world that is dark and lifeless and grey.  It speaks to me of loneliness.  And so, we put up lights, lights only these lonely spirits can see, in place like temples and shrines and graveyards--signs to let them know that here they are welcome :)

Noah out

In which Our Hero went camping!

Hooray!!!

Hey everybody,

So I got invited along by my mother's friend, Dan, to go camping with his wife (who teaches English) and her class.  My thought process was something along the lines of "nah, I . . . wait a minute, why would I not do this??"

We drove for about two hours up near Mt. Fuji to this absolutely gorgeous lake, pitched our tents like thirty feet from the water, and hung out for a day with the sun (intermittent with rain and wind, but hey I'm not complaining)

Not a lot to write about, just an excuse to post these two pictures!

So how'd you spend *your* weekend???

Noah out

Teishoku

Hey guys,

Ok gather 'round, I'ma teach you all a very important word in Japanese:  Teishoku

Now, this is not quite on the level of the most important word in the Japanese language, okawari (literally means "change", in practice it means "refill" . . . as in, you hold up an empty glass or bowl and say okawari and a new one shows up.  It's amazing).  And probably not quite up there with the next tier of words like sumimasen, arigatou, and nama biiru ("excuse me", "thank you", and "draft beer").  But still pretty important

First, of all, let's back up.  See, there is this one part of town with a bunch of restaurants organized by a particularly excellent conceit:  Each one specialize in a different kind of meat.  There's the beef restaurant, the pork restaurant, the chicken restaurant, etc. etc.  Needless to say, this is an awesome idea, and the setting makes it even more awesome

Perhaps "restaurant" is not the best word, because these are not fancy places.  No host to seat you, no fancy trappings, just simple places where you can get delicious food and nama biiru (told you that word was useful).  In fact, these places are all located underneath some of the train tracks right outside Tokyo Station.  The easiest way to get to them?  Cut through the section of all the yakitori places (and believe you me I will be writing about those soon) to the unmarked alley at the back, and then down the corridor that is just barely nicer than the Caltech steam tunnels:

You thought likening them to the steam tunnels was an exaggeration, didn't you?

Starts to get a little nicer as you near the end . . .

Patience is a virtue, and after a few hundred feet you get to paradise.  Sadly, the horsemeat restaurant, my absolute favorite in this complex, was closed when I went by--but don't worry that place will get a full write-up just as soon as possible.  What was open, however, was the shellfish restaurant, which brings us to that magical word:  Teishoku

See, dining out in Japan can be expensive.  Mostly because wherever you go you are getting the best quality food they can get--these people do not mess about with their foods.  The inexplicable exception to this rule seems to be the ubiquitous lunch set, or teishoku.  A teishoku usually contains a main dish, a few sides, rice and soup . . . and usually costs like two-thirds of the price of that main dish during dinner service.  I have no idea why it is, but for whatever reason it means that you can get a meal like this . . .

. . . consisting of four large fried oysters (at least 3 or 4 inches, which is I believe is 7.3kilowatts or whatever  metric conversion), three small steamed conchs, a sashimi platter with scallops and two kinds of clams, rice, and miso soup filled with delicious tiny clams . . . for 900yen ($9).  Because Teishoku

Learn that word, learn to love it

Feeling pretty good today

Noah out

Japanese people like things that are cute, #1

Hi all,

I know what you've all been thinking.  "Noah, yes you brought your own pans, but what if you want to cook something on cookware featuring a picture of an adorable animal on the bottom, possibly with an equally cute slogan?"

Don't worry, guys.  Japan has me covered

Noah out

Tokyo is a really, really big city, it's--whoa wait, what was that??

Hi everyone,

So, Tokyo is a really big city.  Like, really big.  Let me try to explain.  Take a look at these pictures:

Busy street

Tall buildings

More tall buildings

Any other city, this would be essentially downtown.  I know in Seattle you don't see buildings that big outside of downtown, except for maybe the giant condo overlords in Ballard and we won't talk about those.  But here in Tokyo?  That's not downtown.  That's a suburb.  And not even a major suburb, this is Kawaguchi, twenty minute train ride from anywhere major.  The train station here has only a single line stop at it; express lines just zip right by

That's how big Tokyo is.  That an area like this isn't even on the radar.  This isn't even Ballard or West Seattle; it's Wedgewood, it's Mt. Baker.  Here, look at a few more pictures:

That's a straight-up skyscraper

Another busy street

Another tall buil--wait a minute, go back

Go back one picture.  What was that???

IT IS A GIANT LION.  AWESOME

That thing is like two stories tall!!!

My god . . .

So, I want everyone to be clear what happened here.  Some guy, some hero of truly monumental proportions, was at the building committee meeting and said, "You know what this building could use?  A giant lion on top of it."  And then everyone else at the meeting said, "You know what?  You're right.  Let's do it"

I don't even remember what this post was originally about.  Now, this post is about how awesome this giant lion statue is.  It is so awesome

So awesome

So awesome

Noah out