Saturday Bustling
I tried to wake up early this morning to go with my relatives to pay a visit to my grandmother's grave -- but it turned out to be too late in the morning so they decided to postpone it to some other time instead. Argh..wish I slept in more. But I did meet up with many different friends today though.
1. First, I met up with Anna and Yuko for lunch at Cafe Papas in Hiroo. It was fun talking to them about various things in life. Yuko also mentioned about the pain she was feeling in her stomach last night -- which is a sign that the baby is coming soon! I was a bit concerned (and worried) hearing her story... but thankfully everything seems to be in order. I think the baby is due sometime next week -- can't wait! Maybe if I'm lucky, she'll have the baby when I'm in Tokyo :) I want to wish Anna a fun and safe trip in Turkey! Also want to wish her all the best with "Mr. S" ^_^
Lunch at Cafe Papas in Hiroo with Yuko and Anna:
2. After lunch, I quickly located myself halfway across town to Odaiba to meet up with Elaine, my old college friend from Berkeley. I promised that I would go to Edo hot spring with her since she's never been there before and I highly recommended it. I remember the last time I was there was with Yuko, A-chan, Kinyoshi, and Koji after one drunken late night on my birthday last year. Ahh.. good times :)
I really like this place because it is super old school Japanesey inside (but with all the modern ammenities of course). Did I mention this place is HUGE? It's almost like an indoor amusement park except everybody is dressed in Japanese Yukata and the main attraction is taking a bath in the various natural hot springs. Funny eh? They have about 6 or 7 different kinds of hot springs, some with different herbal ingredients in the water and at different temperatures. I like to jump into the freezing cold tub right after the scorching hot one...not sure how, but suppose to be good for you. They also had an outdoor patio area with the traditional Japanese garden. Even outside, there were couple pond like places where you can take bath in. I would have taken pictures inside but I doubt people taking baths would appreciate it.
Afterwards, we grabbed a quick bite to eat from one of the many food stands they have inside. The inside of this place is similar to a carnival in that they have various game and food stands. It was very festive inside.
Once you enter the "amusement park", you get to choose your own Yukata to wear. They had so many different designs! You can't see in the picture, but I chose Yukata #1 with this picture of a big sumo wrestler on the back.
Elaine and I after we chose our Yukatas.
Inside of this "amusement park" was decorated with traditional Japanese stuff. There were also tons of tradtional Japanese carnival food and game stands.
Mechanical good luck statue.
3. Although I was suppose to have dinner with my relatives, I found out that the dinner was moved to tomorrow instead. So after feeling all squeeky clean, I took the train back across town to Akasaka to have dinner with my ex co-workers (Moto, Kato-san, Tsubouchi-san, and Tokura-san) from KPMG instead. It was good to see everybody again, especially Moto since we have been trying to stay in touch ever since I left Japan, got him into Goldman + I use to go out drinking with him :) I forgot the name of the restaurant but it was this ultra cool place with very good kushiyaki (Japanese skewers -- yakitori and such). The interior of the restaurant was REALLY cool although its probably just normal standard for Tokyo. The food was excellent and we managed to drink and eat ALOT. I was stuffed ^_^
My ex co-workers from KPMG (Left to Right: Moto, Tsubouchi-san, me, Kato-san, and Tokura-san)
4. Afterwards, all of them were planning to go to another bar to continue drinking, but I excused myself again...this time to meet up with another friend Tad and David. We went to a dining joint to have some casual dessert and drinks. I had the tradtional Japanese dessert ("anmitsu") which was pretty good. Again, I was stuffed. We talked until we caught the the last train back home.
Ack! I forgot to take pictures! Oh well, next time. ..
Overall, it was a long but fun day for me catching up with various friends around town...but its now 3 am and I'm tired. I'll post more later. Hope ya'll had a very good weekend as well!
1. First, I met up with Anna and Yuko for lunch at Cafe Papas in Hiroo. It was fun talking to them about various things in life. Yuko also mentioned about the pain she was feeling in her stomach last night -- which is a sign that the baby is coming soon! I was a bit concerned (and worried) hearing her story... but thankfully everything seems to be in order. I think the baby is due sometime next week -- can't wait! Maybe if I'm lucky, she'll have the baby when I'm in Tokyo :) I want to wish Anna a fun and safe trip in Turkey! Also want to wish her all the best with "Mr. S" ^_^
Lunch at Cafe Papas in Hiroo with Yuko and Anna:
2. After lunch, I quickly located myself halfway across town to Odaiba to meet up with Elaine, my old college friend from Berkeley. I promised that I would go to Edo hot spring with her since she's never been there before and I highly recommended it. I remember the last time I was there was with Yuko, A-chan, Kinyoshi, and Koji after one drunken late night on my birthday last year. Ahh.. good times :)
I really like this place because it is super old school Japanesey inside (but with all the modern ammenities of course). Did I mention this place is HUGE? It's almost like an indoor amusement park except everybody is dressed in Japanese Yukata and the main attraction is taking a bath in the various natural hot springs. Funny eh? They have about 6 or 7 different kinds of hot springs, some with different herbal ingredients in the water and at different temperatures. I like to jump into the freezing cold tub right after the scorching hot one...not sure how, but suppose to be good for you. They also had an outdoor patio area with the traditional Japanese garden. Even outside, there were couple pond like places where you can take bath in. I would have taken pictures inside but I doubt people taking baths would appreciate it.
Afterwards, we grabbed a quick bite to eat from one of the many food stands they have inside. The inside of this place is similar to a carnival in that they have various game and food stands. It was very festive inside.
Once you enter the "amusement park", you get to choose your own Yukata to wear. They had so many different designs! You can't see in the picture, but I chose Yukata #1 with this picture of a big sumo wrestler on the back.
Elaine and I after we chose our Yukatas.
Inside of this "amusement park" was decorated with traditional Japanese stuff. There were also tons of tradtional Japanese carnival food and game stands.
Mechanical good luck statue.
3. Although I was suppose to have dinner with my relatives, I found out that the dinner was moved to tomorrow instead. So after feeling all squeeky clean, I took the train back across town to Akasaka to have dinner with my ex co-workers (Moto, Kato-san, Tsubouchi-san, and Tokura-san) from KPMG instead. It was good to see everybody again, especially Moto since we have been trying to stay in touch ever since I left Japan, got him into Goldman + I use to go out drinking with him :) I forgot the name of the restaurant but it was this ultra cool place with very good kushiyaki (Japanese skewers -- yakitori and such). The interior of the restaurant was REALLY cool although its probably just normal standard for Tokyo. The food was excellent and we managed to drink and eat ALOT. I was stuffed ^_^
My ex co-workers from KPMG (Left to Right: Moto, Tsubouchi-san, me, Kato-san, and Tokura-san)
4. Afterwards, all of them were planning to go to another bar to continue drinking, but I excused myself again...this time to meet up with another friend Tad and David. We went to a dining joint to have some casual dessert and drinks. I had the tradtional Japanese dessert ("anmitsu") which was pretty good. Again, I was stuffed. We talked until we caught the the last train back home.
Ack! I forgot to take pictures! Oh well, next time. ..
Overall, it was a long but fun day for me catching up with various friends around town...but its now 3 am and I'm tired. I'll post more later. Hope ya'll had a very good weekend as well!
posted by Jack at 12:19 PM
3 Comments:
Jack, you did so many things yesterday!! I love your pics of odaiba hot spring:) It's the one of the awesome places!!! I LOVE IT! Hope you playing throwing star swords of ninja there..
I want to go to the Edo onsen too!
i miss tokyo so much just looking at your pictures! i envy you...
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