(Day 21) Curry with an Old Friend

Another day dawned and there are only a week’s worth left. These are certainly times to be enjoyed so I will. Since I’m an old pro at sleeping on the floor already, the night passed easily and Mayuko’s alarm (playing Tackey & Tsubasa) rang endlessly too soon. She slept through it several times while I got ready for my day out with Haruka in Shinjuku.

Haruka was an exchange student to our small high school in southern Manitoba during my grade 10 year, 1997-1998. We got off to a bit of a rocky start since I was somewhat (ha ha) obnoxious and outspoken. Haruka, on the other hand, was quiet, but doled out biting comments ever so often – as you might guess, this is not a good match. Thankfully, we both matured and when I started getting interested in Japan and learning some phrases of the language, it bridged the gap and now I’ve met up with her several times successfully and had fun. Today we were meeting at Studio Alta in Shinjuku and were at least going for lunch.

I headed to the station in Hino by my lonesome and zoomed off.


Waitin’ for the train.

After arriving, I found Haruka easily and then it was off for lunch. Haruka recommended this restaurant that was very famous for their curry and since I hadn’t had any yet during this trip, I was all for it. The restaurant is named ‘Nakamuraya’ and it was indeed delicious.


Many types of rice and curry.




Haruka, probably wondering why I need to take a picture of every little thing. Ha ha.

She treated me to lunch (so nice!) and after we wandered around Shinjuku. She doesn’t come there often (which is beyond me) so I pretty much took charge as I knew it better than she did.










Hee! You can see the sign for ‘The Lockup’ on the left.

We went into a drugstore where I found more boy-band advertising.


KAT-TUN lip gloss. I almost, almost bought the raspberry one because he’s my favourite. Tee hee!

Look at these cuties!


How ‘Precious Moments’. (Notice the lady is also carrying the token plaid ‘Isetan’ bag.)

After finding and buying a Vivienne Westwood wallet at Ragtag (yoshaa!), we headed to Takashimaya to find a café and have a sit…this was apparently more difficult that it seemed and we ended up on the food court floor.



It was now late afternoon and I was going to meet Mayuko for dinner in Kichijoji, so Haruka and I said our farewells and I was on my way again.



I did a bit of shopping before meeting up with Mayuko in front of Parco. We decided that we would go to an izakaya (pub) as Mayuko wanted some sukiyaki, which I had never tried.




First, you get this bowl of stuff and then put it over a flame.


After it is cooked, you transfer bits into the little bowl on the right and then when you are ready to eat, you dip it in the raw egg on the left and enjoy. ^.^ (Or not enjoy, depending on your fondness for raw egg.)


I ate some yakionigiri along with my sukiyaki.

It was really stank in the izakaya since smoking is still perfectly acceptable in those places. Boo on that. We followed up our meal with a “SPASH”!


This is Mayuko’s attempt at hand modeling. I think it’s great. ‘Spash’ is officially called “Liquid in Gum”.

Next up was purikura!!



Mayuko is a veteran at purikura, so she looked fantastic while I looked awkward.







Since that only took about 10 minutes, we then moved onto do a bit of shopping. Kichijoji is a trendy neighbourhood (and also where ‘Ryuusei no Kizuna’ is flimed’) so finding interesting shops was not difficult. Since no evening is complete without several different activities, we decided before karaoke, we would get some dessert at a café.




So much choice! I will have one of everything. Or not.


This is cheesecake. Looks different right? That’s because it IS different. Tasty.

We wandered the streets on our way to karaoke…


Cool! It’s one of those carts that come out and night and serve hot things like oden to patrons wandering by.



After a rousing session of karaoke, we headed back to Hino on the late train…which was apparently the same idea many others had (it is Saturday night after all.) One creature of particular interest was a fat, slouchy drunken man who kept on whacking us with his briefcase. Not happy! Me, being ever the aggressor when I’m annoyed, used both of my feet (I was sitting which made it easy) and gave his legs a good shove away from us. He seemed very confused by this (of course he did – he was plastered) and figured out that we didn’t want him there (hooray!). He moved to the other side of the train where he nearly fell on many other clearly irritated patrons (some of who were taking pictures of him with their cellphones). I’m just happy we emerged from the train chuck-free.

Tomorrow is another fun day of exploring the intricacies of Japan life and my first visits to Ebisu and Daikanyama. I’m coming Hanazawa Rui!