thirty six views

I spent last night in a 27-room ninja village in Akasaka, otherwise known as Ninja Restaurant.  When we finally found the entrance (it doesn’t stand out, unless you’re looking right at it) we were pulled in by the hostess and asked to wait for ninja training…because that’s obviously what you do before you enter a ninja village. The hostess clapped twice, a ninja appeared to lead us through some small, dark passageways and across a drawstring bridge. After we passed our ‘ninja training’ we were led through the ‘village’ to our private dining room. The room was small and only fit two people, but it had a stream running through it and a button under the table to call for service - that’s all I need to be impressed.

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We have Sushi Fridays in the office, but this week was extra special: giant tuna cutting day! It started at 11:30am, and there was a line that went from the sushi station all the way to the entrance of the cafe. I’ve never seen that before!

Warning: if you don’t like seeing raw fish being sliced, don’t expand this post.

The first cut.

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Kyoto is an amazing mix of modern Japan and traditional Japan. You can see a geisha walking down the street in Gion, and the next minute you can be in a high end department store buying some gadget you don’t need. My Dad is in town, so we spent this past weekend exploring the restaurants, temples, gardens and sights Kyoto has to offer. In the spirit of my favorite travel column from the NYT, here is the 36 Views take on 36 Hours in Kyoto.

DAY 1 - Saturday 

6:30am We took the Shinkansen bullet train from Shinagawa Station in Tokyo first thing Saturday morning because we wanted to spend our Friday night in Tokyo. Although the 5am wake up time was brutal, arriving in Kyoto before most of the stores had even opened (9am) was definitely worth it and made our trip feel longer than it actually was.

9am Upon arriving in Kyoto Station, we took a cab to our hotel to drop off our bags in the lobby. When we arrived, we were met by the very friendly family that runs Kikokuso Inn, a traditional ryokan. The hotel is situated in Central Kyoto, away from the hustle and bustle, but very close to everything you need. There’s a beautiful Japanese garden across the street and it’s a 10 minute walk to Goju subway station.

(Lobby of Kikokuso Inn)

10am Once we dropped off our bags, we walked to the subway station and headed north to the Imperial Palace. Although we couldn’t get inside for a tour (it’s closed Sat & Sun), we did get to walk the beautiful grounds and visit the various gardens and temples that surround the palace. Kyoto is amazingly hot in the summer, and there’s no wind because it’s surrounded by mountains. Be sure to stay hydrated and wear sunscreen. Or, better yet, go in the springtime or fall.

12noon After our walk, we hopped the subway and went to the Higashiyama stop, close to the National Museum of Modern Art. We decided to continue our walking tour instead of go into the museum, but the area has a lot of cute shops and art galleries. After looking at some art and grabbing lunch, we caught the Raku sightseeing bus (only 100 yen!) back to Kyoto station. There’s a Raku stop directly across from the museum, and it runs very regularly. The Raku bus is for tourists, so it plays English commentary as you drive through the city’s top sights. I learned more on that bus ride than I did the entire morning!

(The Raku bus stop is straight ahead on the right, before the large red gate. National Museum of Modern Art is on the left, out of view)

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Yesterday, I took my Dad to Eat More Greens for his first dinner in Tokyo. We wanted something healthy and quick because he was really jetlagged and it’s difficult to find healthy food where he lives.

Eat More Greens is a self-proclaimed ‘vegetable cafe and bakery’ located one street off the main market street of Azabu juban. When you walk in, you feel like you’re in the West Village, except no one speaks English. All of the food is incredibly delicious, and they have an amazing selection of vegan desserts. If you don’t mind smoking, I recommend you sit on the wrap around patio, which faces a sleepy plaza area in Azabu juban. I’m always slightly amused by the fact that everyone on the patio is chain smoking while eating vegan food…

For food, I highly recommend their summer salad specials, the taco salad and the falafel plate. For dessert, get the vegan apple pie - it’s the best apple pie I’ve had in my life. If you don’t like apples, get the pumpkin pie. They also import vegan donuts from New York if you’re having a donut craving. Just keep in mind that if you’re going for the pie, be sure to go early - they usually run out by dinner time!

I’ve been taking note of the eating habits in Japan because as we all know, Japanese people are very thin, fairly disease free and live long lives relative to Americans. This is obviously a generalization, but I think most would agree that Americans are more overweight and suffer from more diet-related diseases (diabetes, heart disease, etc) than the Japanese.

Obviously two benefits of eating healthy are that you’ll maintain a healthy weight and hopefully prevent diseases. But eating better also makes you look younger! Honestly I am always shocked when I find out how old people are in Japan. The 30 year old women here all look 21 and have the bodies of teenagers. I have a really hard time guessing anyone’s age. My basic rule of thumb is that people are 10 years older than they look. With a few exceptions, that’s universally true in Japan. For women, this in part due to diet and in part because they stay away from the sun like it’s their job. They carry umbrellas on sunny days and generally avoid tanning at all costs. The men seem less concerned about tanning, but they also eat a very healthy diet.

Here are the lessons I’ve learned so far about Japanese diet. It’s an ongoing study and these are just my personal observations.

Eat a variety of food - At lunch, when I look at people’s plates, they usually have between 10-15 items on their tray. They’ll have a variety of vegetables, soups, rice, noodles, meat/fish and cold salads. In the US, even someone who is being really healthy will usually only have about 5 things on their plate (salad, meat, starch, a few veggies, etc). I mentioned in a previous post that my co-worker was told as a child that variety was one of the most important rules of nutrition. He wasn’t joking! Variety doesn’t equal more food, though, which brings me to…

Eat small portions - When my co-workers are moving through the lunch line, they get a lot of different dishes, but they get very small portions. We’re talking SMALL. It’s normal to take 2-3 pieces of a dish with tongs and move along (ie. a few mushrooms from the ratatouille, a few cubes of tofu from a stir fry, one small sliver of salmon, etc). Sometimes I feel like a pig when I take more than 3 vegetable slices from a veggie dish. That’s how small the portions are! The only portions that seem larger are lettuce (for salads) and noodle dishes (which are served in separate bowls usually).

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Things I love about the Japan office: every Monday there are so many treats because it’s customary to bring back food gifts from weekend trips. Last week there were a ton of treats from China (lots of them panda themed!!). Today there were treats from all over Japan and some from Dublin. I’ve been munching on this one cookie that my co-worker brought back from home. I liked them so much I went to the website…and I was shocked to find this:

‘It is the famous confection produced by fresh butter and selected ingredients in combination with seasonings such as eel extract and garlic.’

Say what?! Is this a typo? They literally taste like buttery caramel.

UPDATE: It is not a typo. Eel extract is, in fact, a real baking ingredient in Japan and it’s apparently very good for you (obviously, we’re in Japan.)

I just spent the better part of my Sunday evening figuring out how to use the rice cooker that came in my kitchen. It’s the one appliance they didn’t have English instructions for in my handy apartment guidebook. I think most people can figure out the microwave and TV given we all use those and the buttons are similar, but seriously, they had to leave out instructions for the rice cooker?

After some searching on goog, I was able to find an instruction manual for my Japanese rice cooker that someone had kindly translated in a random rice cooker forum (who uses rice cooker forums?! oh wait…), so I matched the Japanese characters for ‘brown rice’  to the ones on my cooker. Then I watched a few YT videos to show me how to wash my rice correctly and how to measure the water level. It’s absolutely astonishing to see how many videos there are on YT. I could spend the next 10 years of my life watching rice cooker YT videos if I wanted to.

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I had an incredible weekend in Tokyo town! The highlight was purchasing yukata (summer kimono) in Asakusa, an older part of town, with my co-workers. They were nice enough to take me shopping so that I’m prepared for our boat dinner tomorrow. We’ll all dress up, take a boat into Tokyo bay and watch the summer festival fireworks from the water. It seems like fireworks (hanabi) are happening every night in the summer. On Saturday night, I was just about the only person not wearing yukata in Harajuku, and everyone was gathered on the overpasses to get a view of the fireworks. It was beautiful.

Back to Asakusa…I managed to only get scolded twice on my shopping trip for yukata, so that was a success! Once for letting the yukata touch the floor, and the other for taking a picture inside a geta (wooden flip flop) store. I’m basically a walking offense waiting to happen.

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This Japanese iPhone case with a human hand attached to it. This picture says it all. Only in Japan…

“These iPhone cases come with a very realistic hand attached to the back that you can—according to the ad—use to hold your own hand while speaking on the phone, act as a candleholder, or even marry.”

(via Refinery 29)