japan day 1

Well, friends, we have made it to Tokyo! With the exception of a de-icing delay out of Denver, our travel was perfectly seamless and actually quite delightful.  From Denver we flew to Seattle, had a very brief layover due to the delay, and boarded our plane to Tokyo.  ANA, the Japanese airlines, was AWESOME. The service on the plane was exceptional, the food was pretty amazing, as far as airplane food goes, and we were incredibly comfortable. 

 i mean, really, look at this spread! Pork and rice with japanese curry, soba noodles, miso, fruit, veggies, wine...so much yum!

Funny enough, all of the flight attendants spoke to Yasu in English—we realized, though, that he looked especially American yesterday. The american boy enjoyed his "brewed for good times" beer!

Somehow, Yasu and I lucked out and had a row of just two seats to ourselves. What should have been a seat next to the window and me was actually an empty floor area, so we had lots of room to spread out and make a mess. I’m sure we won’t be so lucky on our flight back, especially since it will be a United Airlines flight, but the comfort definitely decreased my stress for the trip! We spent the 9-hour trip (yes, for whoever I told it would be a 13 hour flight, apparently I’m bad at math) watching movies, knitting, and eating!

Upon arriving at the airport, and getting through customs very quickly, we made our way through rush hour traffic from Narita to our hotel in Kichijoji, which is Yasu’s hometown in the Tokyo prefecture. Let me tell you, our hotel room is SMALL. I’m honestly surprised that the bed fits inside. But, it’ll be a great little home for the next 10 days.

First view of Tokyo from our airport bus

Kichijoji

So, after dropping our stuff off at the hotel, we meandered out for dinner. On our walk around Kichijoji, we discovered that a couple of Yasu’s favorite restaurants no longer exist, but eventually we stumbled upon another favorite—an adorable little hole-in-the-wall one-man operation called Soybean Farm. Inside are a few tables and an open kitchen where the chef is also your server, and man is he a GOOD chef. All of the food somehow incorporates miso, which is a fermented soybean paste—the derived substance is quite different from what you may gather knowing about miso soup. It almost has a bit of a peanut buttery texture, and it can be both savory and sweet. The special thing about this restaurant is that the miso is incorporated in very gourmet ways, using it as a marinade, sauce, or dressed up in a paste—and every single bite of our dinner was delicious. 

Unfortunately I didn’t snap pictures of every course, but we finished our amazing dinner with a tiny piece of miso cheesecake and some hot tea. I may drag Yasu back to Soybean Farm if for nothing else but to get some of the amazing gingery miso that came with our rice—I want that in our fridge at home.

Thankfully, our dinner was the perfect way to settle us into sleep. Because of our schedule—we left Denver at 8am Wednesday and arrived at about 3pm on Thursday—we tried our best to stay awake throughout our travels so that we could get a full night of sleep on Thursday night and adjust to the 16 hour time difference as quickly as possible. I will say, though, that walking around in the dark of 7pm last night, I was wondering why SO many people, especially children, were out and about at the open shops in the middle of the night—my body clock was definitely off. I think we’ll both admit that it was about the worst sleep of our lives, as we were both up every couple hours, allowing me to have a lovely iMessage chat with my mom around midnight Toyko time, but we made it. So, after going to bed at 8:30 last night, we woke up just before 6am this morning and literally cheered knowing that we’d slept enough hours!

My first impressions of Tokyo are very good. All the signage and decorations here are definitely very colorful and cutesy, with smiling animations everywhere. There are also narrow alleyways everywhere, where I could very easily get super lost, especially given the language troubles. Oh yeah, and everyone talks a WHOLE LOT faster than the speakers do on Rosetta Stone, so I’m basically catching zero noticeable words anywhere. Thank goodness I have Yasu—though he’s also feeling very funny speaking more English than he has ever spoken in Japan. And finally, I’m about the only white person around. It probably is in part to us being in a suburban town outside of the main city center, but I am definitely white, and I am definitely getting some funny looks hanging out in this town.  I’m so happy to be here, though, and am looking forward to meeting Yasu’s mom later today, and his dad, sister, and grandparents later this weekend. We have some exciting things planned over the next few days, so I’m savoring this quiet time to ourselves while we have it. Right now, I’m at a donut shop having some tea and a donut while Yasu is next door having his hair cut at the barber. It’s just a quiet day in the life!