What we were really there for was a world class sashimi brunch in one of the many tiny restaurants in and around the fish market. Of course there were many other people with the same idea, and a few of these places had huge queues of foreigners (a sure sign of people who religiously obey lonely planet guides). Yet at the risk of sounding simple, how different can a piece of raw fish be between neighbouring restaurants? We decided to go outside of the fish market for slightly cheaper prices, and found a small yet busy place where two spaces just became available. A typically slightly pushy, yet very friendly and helpful lady ensured we didn't leave by forcing menus into our hands and signalled her husband in the kitchen area to give us miso soup.
A small side note, I really enjoyed how many of the restaurants in Japan mimic a bar layout. Sitting literally at a bar being able to watch a chef make food that is very alien to you is firstly very interesting, and also reassuring for those who may be distrustful of foreign foods.
Anyway, a good thing about sashimi is that you don't have to wait very long for it to come out. At the owners suggestion, we ordered the house special that was pictured on the first page. This consisted of a bit of everything; tuna, salmon, fish eggs, prawn, squid, some egg thing, wasabi, and rice. Costing about £9 it was delicious, and looking at the picture makes me want it again now.
After brunch, in our typical fashion, we decided to see where our feet would take us. We headed in a direction unknown to us and 15 minutes later ended up in (another) very posh shopping district. We stood for a moment to take in the sights and were beset upon by a T.V. crew who asked if they could interview us. Why not? Unfortunately for them the interview consisted of questions regarding the culture shock in coming to an Asian capital city such as Tokyo. I then realised how settled I was in Asia, as coming to Japan was only a change in country rather than change in continent (I am used to being the 1% minority now, coming back to England where I will again be in the majority might even be strange at first). We explained that we had travelled around China last year, spending a week in Beijing, as well as currently living in Korea with a good knowledge of Seoul. Now I am in no way grouping all Asian countries or people together, it is rather the mental condition of knowing when you are out of your comfort zone that is familiar. In other words, I cant order food without a picture menu here, and I cant order food without a picture menu there, some things don't change (apologies for the predictable food analogy). Anyway, the T.V. crew were pretty interested in what we had to say about their city, I told them it was too expensive, they apologised. We told them when we had been up to and showed them a few pictures.
Quick picture insert here for old time's sake, our old car (Mitsubishi FTO) on it's home turf, still looking good.
After our chat we decided to get out of the area (Ginza) before being accosted by any more paparazzi, so we hopped onto the subway and went back to Harajuku to go to the oriental bazaar. On our way we even saw a Harajuku girl (they usually come out on Sundays to show off their crazy clothes).
After the bazaar (which turned out to be a big fancy gift shop rather than the traditional market that we were hoping for, I got to hold a samurai sword though so win some lose some) we were determined to get to the elusive restaurant (third time lucky). On the way back we took the opportunity to try to create Tokyo's version of hold-up-the-leaning-tower-of-Piza, drink-the-Asahi-building (it's supposed to look like a glass of beer):
The building gave me a taste for the real thing, so we popped up to the 33rd floor to the sky bar WHICH IS IN THE FOAM! See the line of windows in the foam? That's the sky bar. Now of course the beers were pretty expensive but it had to be done, the view was pretty good too:
We ended our final day in a catch-your-own-fish restaurant. We were a pretty unlucky couple of fishermen/ women, and it took us about 15 minutes, a lot of sympathy, and four different types of "special" bait (eventually I think we were baiting the line with sashimi) to catch a nice pair of sea bream.
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| Had to mess around with the camera settings for a while to take this one |
We then headed back to the hostel bar to take stock of our rather hectic long weekend break before yet another early morning.
