それではまた、東京

There was just a tinge of wistfulness when the vacation came to an end and I was airport-bound. That came from knowing that I don't travel as often anymore. Well, it's a choice I've made, and I'm okay with it. This simply means that on every trip I do, I treasure every minute even more, down to the mundane and seemingly insignificant details.  

When people asked if I would be bored with only staying in Tokyo instead of heading out to the suburbs and other towns, I'm like nope. I haven't been to the city for years, so everything is all familiar yet new and strange. There's plenty for me to do in Tokyo without going out of it. I would return to Tokyo again on my own and wander about. I have things that I hadn't done on this trip because I had no time! And also it's very hard to stay at a ceramics shop for half a day with the husband in tow. 

I have my preferred subway lines, and those haven't changed. LOL. What changed is — my Suica card can't be used anymore, oddly. No more PASMO card for tourists and I didn't bother with downloading an app. (I could have just waved the app at the gantries.) So at the airport, I just bought a 'Welcome Suica' tourist card that's valid for 30 days. Along with cab rides, I took many train trips.  

I chose to stay in Toranomon Hills to be close to Hibiya and Ginza train lines. I almost chose to stay at Azabudai Hills area, but since the friends weren't going to be in town, there's no point in staying near them. Toranomon Hills is a lot more convenient for where I wanted to go on this trip. Toggling between the Hibiya and Ginza lines was a breeze. I wouldn't be so affected by weird line closures too. I also prefer quieter spots in the business district compared to staying near or in the 'shopping' areas. 

Toranomon Hills have changed SO MUCH. Wow. I was a bit lost when I got here. New towers popped up. A brand new underground linkway and mall plus food areas offered respite from the weather, especially if a typhoon hits in the day or the rains come in fierce during the day. This round, the rains came in the nights when most of us were asleep and didn't affect many people's schedules unless you do the nights shifts.   

I've eaten very well, and I've eaten all the things that I wanted to eat, avoiding ramen, karaage and not-great tempura. I'M SO PLEASED THAT I GOT TO EAT SO MUCH AWESOME SOBA. Kekekekek. 

Squeezed in one last lunch of soba before we went off to the airport.

The Last Night in Tokyo

For our final night in Tokyo, I ditched a planned dinner at a 'famous' restaurant, and opted for a casual night out in Aoyama. I wasn't quite feeling it to dine out like this. I had already ditched an earlier table at a three-starred Michelin restaurant the other night. I enjoy fine-dining, but mostly, I don't need my food to be done this fancy. 

I can do fancy on another trip to Tokyo. This trip, I want to taste flavors that can come out of a home kitchen, and be reacquainted with everything that I've missed. 

The man was indulgent and didn't mind me ditching our reservations. (Thank goodness I didn't need to pay the cancellation fees because the restaurant waived it.) He did wonder about fresh fruit cocktail bars or one of those rooftop lounges. I'm like, let's go to a basement bar please. Cocktail bars are just wasted on me. I don't care about cocktails (walao the sugar). Just give me whisky. 

I wanted to go to Aoyama, an old haunt, just to see how much it has changed. Had a lovely stroll by the huge Aoyama Cemetery that's open to the public. I like this quiet cemetery loads; I only avoid it in spring since it has cherry blossoms lining the paths, and people crowd it for viewing parties and picnics. The cemetery has been around since 1874. Think of how many ghosts haunt the area. Hehheh. Did you know that Hachiko the Akita's actual grave is here? The loyal dog is buried right next to his loving owner Professor Hidesaburo Ueno.

Once the sun set, we headed to the bar for drinks first. We were still stuffed from dinner, so food would come later. Took a slow stroll and meandered through the streets. Grinned when I saw the almost-iconic Sunnyhills shop at the corner; it's designed by Kengo Kuma and the building was completed in December 2013. 

There're random clothing shops and such, many carrying labels in the designs I love. But they were closed when I walked by. I didn't bother factoring time to shop; I didn't give retail shops a chance. I preferred to spend all that time at the cemetery, watching the shadows lengthen as the sun set.

We hung out at Bar Lasile / バー ラズィール that just celebrated its 18th anniversary last week. I've been coming here for years, and it felt sooo comfortable to just be having two glasses of whisky this trip. The bar makes its little snacks for patrons, and while it has some sort of weird finger food, I wouldn't suggest you order those. Just get the drinks here. It's not a fancy bar. It's just a regular cocktail bar, and it offers a decent selection of whisky. Importantly, it doesn't over-price its drinks. 

Then we hopped across to a little izakaya for dinner. Went to 料理倶楽部. We didn't make a reservation and it was packed out. But they accommodated us. Wheeeee. That was awesome. It was exactly what I hoped to do for dinner on this final night in the city.

I wanted comfort food and familiar flavors. Had to have our last few highballs here too. The man wanted the beef tendon stew / 牛筋煮込み, a few grilled skewers of chicken momo and tsukune. I decided to have two sticks of grilled chicken hearts and a nikujaga /肉じゃが. Took me all of my strength to resist ordering rice to go with this meal.

Made the last connecting trains back to the hotel just past midnight. Heheheh. We didn't stay out too late on this trip and kept the alcohol intake moderate. Tonight was probably the most that we drank. Ooof. Well, we're not driving, so that makes it much easier to have drinks with our meals or randomly spread out through the day. Heh.

Hirosaku :: ひろ作

It has been five years since I stepped into Hirosaku / ひろ作? Wow. I've missed its food. I can never quite find anything like it anywhere else outside of Japan. There's something genuine about the small-ness of the outfit and pride in trotting out the food. 

Hirosaku serves all my favorite things ever at lunch. It's a four-course lunch plus a dessert. We weren't sure what was the dessert. Was it like a zunda-an? Without the mochi? Ooof! Whatever. We all ate it up. Chef Satoshi Watanabe and his wife have aged significantly. How many more years will Hirosaku continue on? 

I highly doubt that Chef Watanabe cares that much about any Michelin stars. He still does the cooking at his own pace, and attends to everything on his own. Chef and his wife. It's hard work, and that is exactly what we appreciate. The effort. It's a professional kitchen, yet it's like the chef's cooking for you in a home, presenting you with all the homecooked flavors that's exquisite and nothing like what commercial kitchens offer.

I think my mistake is in not booking a dinner here and only knowing its lunch offerings. While I like it casual, I'd also love to see the extent of the chef's skills in his dinner menu. Lunch is priced now at ¥6,600 per person and dinner is a whopping ten times more at ¥ 59,290 per person. That is a dinner price I would pay. But I simply refuse to pay that price in Singapore for the meal(s) I get at our sushi restaurants. :P

We began with a sunomono of fish paste noodles and egg. I could just eat this in a bigger portion and skip the rest! The sorta raw fish today was unfortunately a tuna tataki with bonito. I have no liking for maguro, but I ate it anyway. There was tempura with all its beautiful batter, and a fish in there. None of us caught what Mrs Watanabe said about the ingredients and we didn't ask. LOLOL It tasted like anago. 

Then the tempura was served. The batter was still so light. I'm not a big fan of tempura, but I can appreciate the quality of the batter. I ate up my portion. It was too beautiful and I wouldn't waste the chef's effort in frying the tempura for us at this perfect timing. I marveled at how strong the chef is to still be able to carry that heavy copper pot filled with boiling oil up and down. 

The simplest dishes have my heart — tai meshi. At least I assumed the white fish used was tai; the skin indicated so. That small bowl of rice and fish was done sooooo beautifully that I could cry. I really wanted to eat a second portion. Mmmmmm.

THEN IT WAS SOBA TIME! I watched the chef boil up the earlier prepped pot of broth, and dip the soba in it. Freshly boiled. I love watching this part. It's like, I can cook soba too and get the timing right, but even with the top quality ingredients, I'll never be able to produce soba broth of this standard. 

The texture of the restaurant's homemade soba hadn't changed. It's soooo consistent. That beautiful Juwari soba (十割蕎麥麵). I love sipping that soba broth at the end that comes with it. It's thick and flavorful. And well, add more shoyu if you want. I like salty. Heh.

This is a meal that stays with me for a loooong time. It's food cooked from the heart that I can't find anywhere else. ごちそうさまでした!

Hirosaku ひろ作
3 Chome-6-13 Shinbashi, Minato City, Tokyo 105-0004
東京都港区新橋3-6-13
T: +81 3-3591-0901
Hours: Mondays to Fridays, Lunch at noon to 2pm, then dinner from 6pm to 8.30pm.
Online reservations in English here.

Sushi Kuriyagawa :: 鮨くりや川

I actually forgot about booking any sushi restaurants. My mind was completely on organizing logistics for Choya. Then the man said he must have sushi in Tokyo. FINE. Found him one. I have no interest in fancy Ginza sushi restaurants that's just going to give me tuna and more fatty tuna. I've done those rounds and I can skip that. I wanted something simpler, a sushi-ya. 

The friends recommended Sushi Kuriyagawa / 鮨くりや川. I looked at the address and that clinched it for me. This restaurant isn't far from Ebisu station. I like this Ebisu loads. The restaurant is located in the basement of an apartment block, along the modest stretch of restaurants in the residential lanes. Perfect. It's QUIET. It was a lovely little stroll to dinner, meandering through the uncrowded streets. for its little restaurants and bistros. 

Sushi Kuriyagawa welcomed us in right on time at 8pm. We took its omakase set with sake pairing. It turned out to be a great choice because neither the man or I wanted to drink so much. We didn't want to do 720ml of the same bottle, and with this pairing, we got to taste a generous pour of four different expressions of sake from different makers. Yay!

I wasn't very approving of the sharks' fin used in one stewed dish with madai. I ate the madai and left all the sharks' fin behind. I didn't bother to say anything to the chef. Why confront? It's the restaurant's prerogative to use whichever ingredients, and it's my choice to not eat and leave it be. 

The anago was an add-on. The chefs showed us the eel and asked if we wanted it. Sure thing. I opted for it without rice, and the man took the version with rice. Heheheh. Delicious! The tuna wasn't trotted out so often. Just a regular chutoro and then a otoro. Okay can. I passed the otoro to the man. I also gave him all my sakura ebi that topped the chawanmushi. He happily ate them all.

There were about 15 items in our omakase set for the night, including 10 pieces of sushi. The night ended with one last rice thing in the form of an eho-maki (恵方巻き, with seven fillings). NOMS. Against my better judgment, I drank the offered matcha. It was such good matcha! I only realized that the caffeine would keep me awake when I got back to the hotel room. Oops. 

It was hilarious when they handed us a plaque that said 'Happy Anniversary'. I had already explained in my reservation and during dinner that this was just a regular date night — there was nothing special. It isn't our honeymoon, not our birthdays, and definitely not our wedding anniversary. YET. Hahahaha. Okay lah okay lah. We took a photo with it anyway.

This was a great meal. Chef Koichi Kuriyagawa doesn't bother with the extra flourishes. Those are unnecessary to this meal. It's just back-to-basics decent sushi. Not completely traditional, but nothing crazy. It's absolutely dependable and what I would return to eat again and again. I'm glad I opted for this sushi-ya, and the man is really happy with this memorable menu too. 

Yebisu Brewery Tokyo

I normally wouldn't bother to go to Ebisu Garden Place, not even to see the Christmas lights; unless there's an event there. This afternoon, I went to the area to visit the newly reopened Yebisu Brewery. The brewery at this venue was previously known as the Museum of Yebisu Beer that closed in October 2022 to be renovated and rebranded and reopened in April 2024 as Yebisu Brewery Tokyo. 

We ran smack into  an Aloha Tokyo Festival happening this weekend just at the huge atrium outside the Yebisu Brewery. Lots of booths selling odd Hawaiian-themed things, with straw bags and beach wraps and such. I guess it's a prep for summer holidays in Hawaii! So I saw hula performances, and many dogs. Hahahaha. 

The timing is wonderful for us. Yebisu has a smaller market reach in Singapore. It's hard to find Yebisu beer at the restaurants. The expression(s) found at Donki or Meidi-ya is usually just ONE. Damn sad. It would be awesome to taste the beers at their taproom. There're other bars/taprooms in the Ebisu area, but why not visit the brewery since we're in town.

We didn't buy any tickets or make a reservation since I read somewhere that it's an 'open' weekend. This information is in Japanese articles though. I don't know when they require you to pre-book tickets for the brewery since there's a beer fest usually held in September. Anyway, we walked in and nobody said we needed tickets and easily secured seats. LOL 

This is a most impressive space! Gorgeously built, planned and set up. The brewing vats are here too, not just for display. These are working vats. There's a little gallery area where tours are conducted. We didn't need a tour. We simply walked through the display detailing the history of Yebisu and how the bottles and cans and their designs have evolved through the years. There's also a little shop selling Yebisu souvenirs, like socks. Hahahah.

The beer hall is done up so nicely. The lighting. Smart use of it. Bright but subtle — it's perfect for a beer at any time of the day. There's no food served at this taproom except for snacks and finger food. I wasn't hungry but the potato salad was delicious. So I had seconds. HAHAHAH.

The tasting plate of four types of beers included, Infinity (a wheat beer of sorts), Foggy Ale 2024 (a light IPA), Black (self-explanatory), and Elite Hop (something with light hops), There wasn't Black today. So they replaced it with a regular version, which literally read 'Yebisu Beer'. Not exactly helpful. It tasted like a typical lager.

We stayed for a bit and ended up chatting with the couple from Saitama who were seated next to us, and kinda marveled at how much beer we were drinking. Oops. There're many domestic tourists this afternoon. After I was done with my samplers, I ordered a full pint of Foggy Ale. I really liked it! *burrrrrrp

NHK 放送博物館

Shuto-ken told me to visit NHK Museum of Broadcasting / NHK 放送博物館 at Atagoyama. So I did. Shuto-ken is the weather mascot accompanying the weatherman. I'm a huge fan of this little fluffy-stuffy.

It was so coooool that they provided an interactive set-up for visitors to sit in the chairs of the news journalists at the broadcast studios, recreating exactly what you see on the news channel on television. 

The 8K Theatre was a bit of a let-down because of the audio that isn't on par with the screen resolution. It was also playing a very boring version of Swan Lake. At the point of time we sat for 8 minutes or so, we couldn't see the definition of 8K in this dark set. Couldn't they have chosen something brighter or perhaps more action-packed? :P

I wasn't interested in the station's famous broadcasters or actors. I was more keen to see their relics of the 'past' — the older technology used before streaming came in. The piano and the synths. Ahhh... truly old school.

I know some of the giant characters from the cartoons, retired or otherwise. Hahaha. There's Chiko-chan, and Gonta-kun (remember Dekirukana / できるかな?), then there's Little Charo (the dog), and puppets from Hyokkori (ひょっこりひょうたん島). I really liked Ninja Jajamaru-kun! Too bad they didn't make fluffy stuffies of Shuto-ken for sale. (Of course I asked about it.)

蕎麦屋 :: 雷庵

Had to have soba at the traditional yet contemporary Ryan / 雷庵. I love it that for now, it's located at the Kewpie corporate HQ building. Tehehehehe. No, this isn't the Kewpie factory in Goka, Ibaraki, we can't go in for a tour. 

We went for broke and took the omakase set menus at Ryan. J doesn't take beef, so she opted for the short menu without the beef. Her short menu held a lot more anago and fish. We began with appetizers of corn and fish cake with mullet roe, Ayu sweet fish, roasted wagyu beef and chopped vegetable with ponzu jelly.

Then there was more food. Along came dishes of tuna and parboiled hamo (conger pike) and chopped plum, chawanmushi with okra and scallop, deep fried breaded abalone with smoked tartare, and this one I found absolutely unnecessary and does nothing for the meal, the wagyu sirloin shabu-shabu with truffle and egg yolk. Granted, the truffle was properly shaved black truffles, it still didn't impress me that much. I enjoyed the egg yolk though. It was really delicious yolk. LOL

Then it was SOBA TIME! We could choose our style of soba. You could have it hot if you prefer. J has been eating so much that she can't do too fancy — she opted for a chilled plain soba. The man chose his soba chilled with anago and vegetable tempura. Mine was also a chilled version with chirimen, uni and ikura.  

Dessert was weird. I left it alone after one bite. It's a monaka rice wafter with adzuki and pineapple and fermented butter. I like butter, but not the red beans and pineapple. The soba at Ryan is super decent. I'm going to eat all the soba I can on this trip. Totally avoiding ramen shops and trying not to mention it to the man so that he'd thinking about it. LOL

Old School Rakeru :: ラケル 洋食

I wasn't going to eat ramen on this trip if I can help it. I don't like ramen. I do not like the usual kotteri tonkotsu ramen or Sapporo/Tokyo-style shoyu miso. I don't mind shio assari styles but I do, however, not mind tsukemen. If I have to eat ramen, I would have picked Ramen Hosenka /らぁ麺 鳳仙花.

The man likes ramen of all sorts. But he bailed out of the Ichiran queue. He didn't even know what Ichiran is. He simply googled and said "Let's go to this ramen place." My mistake is in not asking which one, and having the shock of my life when I realized that it's Ichiran. Anyway, the man didn't want to queue and found an old-school yoshoku western restaurant Rakeru to lunch at. Okaaaay! The menu is more palatable to me than tonkotsu ramen.

I almost burst out in rude laughter when I stepped into the basement restaurant. OMG. It's so 1990s!!! The checkered red-white plastic tablecloths are such a hoot. Apparently Rakeru has been around since 1963. Wow. It's absolutely fascinating that it has survived, and robustly so till 2024. I bet you their spaghetti Napolitan or Neapolitan will taste the exact yuck that I hate. LOL

The man got what he also wanted to try on this trip — a super old-school Hamburg steak/patty and omurice! He likes this combination, but he doesn't want to go out of his way to hunt it down. Neither are we the type to have to find and eat the 'most popular'/'best of'/'most photogenic omurice'. What luck that this is just round the corner from Ichiran. 

We took a set meal each. My roast beef done medium was surprisingly decent! Egg was great. But I couldn't finish all that rice. No way. That rice can feed three pax. Goodness. My lemonade was serious business. I honestly quite enjoyed lunch. The man totally loved his Hamburg patty and omurice. This restaurant isn't like your Netflix dramatic flair, but just conservative and stuck in 1990s and 2000s. HAHAHAHAHA.

All Them Rice & Eggs!

I am so dead from all the carbs ingested. I'm mostly unable to say no to all the short-grain rice presented and eggs. I know riiiight — I came here to eat rice and eggs like I don't have it back home. I do get equally excellent iterations at home...... just that I see more of them here, and it's too much noms to resist. 

I don't usually bother with breakfast, but I'm in Tokyo, so I work out so as to be able to eat more calories in a day. Breakfast is included with our room. The man is a breakfast person. So I kept away Ms Grouch and followed him to the breakfast table for a nibble. 

DED. SO DED. The hotel's breakfast menu offers rice and eggs. And MISO SOUP. I don't even know why a miso soup at breakfast is so attractive. The cafe uses decent miso, but it's nothing fabulous. Yet I like it. I don't even bother with miso soup for breakfast at home. 

The one form of egg I unfortunately do not eat is, tamago-yaki. I can't deal with the sweet in there. So at breakfast, I take either the poached or ¾ boiled egg, or scrambled eggs to add to my rice. Resistance is futile. The weather isn't cold, but there's something about the combination of hot soup, rice and an egg that's so alluring.

Depending on the meal and activity schedule for the day, we go down for breakfast either at 7.45am or 8am. Before that, it's always an outdoor run or a weights workout first. I can't just eat and eat and eat with no output! I had to row '20kcal per rep X 5 sets' that day to feel suitably less bloated. If brekkie is at 9.30/10am, that means there would be no lunch after. The brain wouldn't mind but the stomach isn't willing. 

Koffee Mameya Kakeru

If I had more capacity in my bloodstream for caffeine, I'd so opt for the tasting menu at Koffee Mameya Kakeru. Sadly, I didn't. So a cup of Guatemala from Tokado Coffee it was. Maki-san made a beautiful brew for all of us.

The coffee stand at Omotesando has been around for ages and it's mad crowded. I wouldn't bother with it. I love it that this spacious venue is blissfully uncrowded. Away from town, not many people will make the trek here, and if they do, they would already have a reservation at Koffee Mameya. They don't take walk-ins.

Unlimited Coffee Roasters is a few streets down. Ahhhh... these few streets have got Seattle vibes. I didn't stop by. No more capacity for caffeine. Totally done for the day. I simply strolled along to soak up the sights and enjoyed the blue skies.

I like this little township of Kiyosumi-Shirakawa. I took a long stroll around the area. There're so many pilates and gyrotonic studios, izakaya, little cafes, wine bars. It's super residential and absolutely charming. Love it! I can come here daily too, if I bother to sign up for Pilates classes each time I'm in town. The man isn't a coffee aficionado, but he enjoys the stroll and hunts for coffee because it's just amazing to walk in this city. 

'Isn't it just coffee? Why make a trek out?' 

Nope. It isn't just coffee. I will make a trek out to anywhere just for a cup of coffee. I drink mine black. Preferably filter. A cold brew properly extracted would be equally awesome. I taste so many layers, flavors and notes. It's EVERYTHING. A cup of coffee is never just a coffee. 

Thanks for taking me to your local, J! No wonder you can come here every day.  

All Them Guitars in Tokyo!

This is as much as the man's vacation as it is mine. I got to chill out in Seoul and did some shopping. In Tokyo, I had better not even begin to shop because I would buy back whole shops. It's too dangerous. I'll come back to Tokyo on my own to shop and ship back things that can't go into my suitcase. On this trip, the man ought to be able to check out what he wants more than what I want. And he got it. I like guitars, but not as keen on them as he is. He can probably spend all day wandering about in these shops.

The man wanted to see if he meets a decent Ibanez dunno-what-model and maybe finally succumb to a custom-shop Fender. LOLOLOL No, no more PRS or Gibson. He doesn't feel anything for those guitars. Not in the sounds or the touch. He's more of a Fender and Suhr player. I'll stick to my trusty Tele. 

We went to Ishibashi at Shinjuku, and the indie guitar stores at Ochanomizu; the 'Guitar Street' is just two streets from the train station, including the not-so-small BigBoss. Of course we had to go pay homage to huge four-storey the Fender flagship store at Harajuku/Omotesando that opened in June 2023.

The Fender flagship store is GORGEOUS lah. The man spent so much time mulling over the Made in Japan pieces that I was almost tempted to just buy a tote bag and a bamboo cutting board in the shape of a Tele or a Strat, just to justify my time spent here. (Our own Swee Lee CQ carries the cutting boards and doesn't overprice them.)

The man was totally stoked. Since we didn't get to catch any gigs we wanted, this wandering in and out of music shops was really satisfying. He managed to find tuning pegs and other stuff at the accessories sections. As for the guitars, they would definitely be over the shopping limits set by our Customs. As a dutiful Singaporean, I had to sternly remind him to declare and pay GST before we get home. 

Dolce Tacubo's Bakes!

J said that Dolce Tacubo's financiers and cream puffs are actually good. I didn't have to make a reservation just to buy (they seem to still do that for the main Ebisu store) at this Toranomon Hills space within T-Market. So that made it super convenient to simply buy loose pieces of confectionery when we pass by.

We taste-tested the financiers, cream puffs and canelé. They are seriously tasty. I like financiers, but it's very difficult to find good ones without too much sweet. The man isn't bothered with canelé. He doesn't mind the financiers. I like the brand's financiers and canelé. I shall take some home.

The one thing that's his Achilles heel — the cream puff. He couldn't resist eating a cream puff every other day. LOLOL. Between this and a dorayaki daily, he’s hitting all his sugar quota for the year. The man ate so many dorayaki from Ogino Wakan / おぎ乃 和甘. He said, 'NO REGRETS'.

We decided that these financiers and savory sablés (think chocolate and cardamon, dukkah, rosemary and sea salt) would make decent gifts. I wasn't going to be in any snack stores and I most certainly do not like shopping at the airport and carrying giant bags of crushable snacks or perishable mochi or whatever up the plane. Mochi and dorayaki have a three-day limit to eat them; they need to be kept cool too. That's too much work. I'd see one person upon landing, and that would be the only one I'd buy the mochi for. I need to check on Choya first before I'm in the right frame of mind to deliver gifts to the friends. These little pastries from Dolce Tacubo could keep for a bit and would do nicely.

A Small Hotel Gym

The hotel gym is so tiny. It's like a small service apartment's penthouse. But it would do. It's super clean and offers bottles of water and towels. 

There's a number of treadmills, a full rack of dumbbells, a TechnoGym bench with resistance ropes, and a rower. There's the loft space for yoga or mat pilates. But no kettlebells, no barbells and no squat rack. Never mind, I can work with these. 

For the first few days of the trip, I still turned up at the gym daily. The rains meant that I can't get an outdoor run in. Anyway I'm so lazy that running outdoors is a big effort. Hahahaha. A tiny gym can't be my excuse not to work out. I don't work out long. 30 - 40 minutes are all that's required. I didn't bother to wear a tracker. I don't usually do. It's not rocket science and I'm not an athlete. Just do 3 sets of 10 reps each or something on the dumbbells for strength. Used the rower for cardio, and finished off with Pilates work on the floor for core. Done.

It's a huge effort trying to control my intake of carbs in the form of rice. That's my biggest weakness. I can't resist all these gorgeous short-grained steamed rice. It's not even about weight loss. It's about not gaining weight or fats from all the starch ingested. I'd also like to keep my stamina, muscles and strength. At least the coach won't raise his eyebrows too much next week when I tell him I can't do 10kg-a-side for dumbbell chest presses, and need to lower it to 8kg. 

Museum of Contemporary Art Tokyo (MoT)

Stopped by the Museum of Contemporary Art (MoT) to look at poop. Hahaha. Yes. There're three current exhibitions going on, till the first week of July. I stopped by the rooms for 'Where My Words Belong', and Ho Tzu Nyen's 'A for Agents', but I didn't linger. I only had eyes for one artist, really — Saeborg.

One is a Singaporean artist (Ho Tzu Nyen) whose works I've seen and understand. It's hilarious when I heard a Singaporean accent explaining to me about the name 'Singapura' and 'Utama'. Okaaaay. That's a hard pass. For 'Where My Words Belong', it's a tad too cerebral. It explores language, words, perceptions and thought languages. That's too close to work things. I have no wish to think about cultural identity today.  I literally walked through it and left. 

The one I was keen to see featured the winners of Tokyo Contemporary Art Award 2022-2024 — Saeborg and Michiko Tsuda. I'm not big on film installations — I only appreciate the concepts and the way it's set up in an exhibition. I walked through quickly. I was more interested in the other room.

Michiko Tsuda's video and film installations in this exhibition explore the roles of family members and others' expectations of them. The notion is rather interesting. Lots of screens and videos of characters, and audiences walking by. 

Saeborg is the creator whom I've been absolutely fascinated by. Her latex creations are ridiculously bright, colorful, cute and poignant. She has painted caricatures of the relationship between animals and humans, the slaughter of livestock, its consumption and intentional reproduction. Too bad that there isn't an artist performance on a week day, otherwise that would have been an excellent experience. 

I saw loads of inflated poop. Yay. Choya's sitters keep me updated about poop and such daily. Her poop is the only clue we all have as to whether her meds are okay, if she's feeling secure enough to toilet properly, or if her GI tract is stressed out. I LOVED THESE POOP INSTALLATIONS. They made me so happy that I was chuckling for ten minutes after leaving the room.

I like to pop by Mori Art Museum (MAM) too since so much of their focus is on commercial art or totally experimental mash-ups. This time, I went and totally didn't get 'Theaster Gates: Afro-Mingei'. MAM's museum shop is fantastic for souvenir shopping. MoT is a nice medium-sized museum that is edgy enough to draw visitors, but not so experimental as to keep away traditional audiences. I enjoy their current curation. Got some postcards from their MoT's museum shop too. 

喫茶ニト :: 雨、コーヒー、ジャズ

J took me to Kissa Nito /  喫茶ニト at Yanesen for a cup of old-school coffee. It's a quiet and very tiny kissaten playing soft jazz music. They open from 11am to 6pm, but not daily. Please check their socials for the week's opening days and hours. 

It's a quaint little street filled with shops selling essentials and crafts. Very residential, very charming. Ignis Coffee is a few doors down, but I'm not in the mood for that today. Kissa Nito is a lovely space for a rainy grey day.

It was hilarious because the moment I scanned the menu, I saw that they offer alcohol in the form of coffee shochu and coffee highballs. J was like, no, they do not serve alcohol. LOLOLOL I waited for her to get to that part of the menu. I can't help it if that part jumps out at me first. No I didn't get any alcohol. I wisely stuck to a comforting cup of hot black coffee.  

I surprised even myself by ordering a snack — five mini castella balls. Nothing caramel-ly or covered with sprinkles or things. I wasn't even hungry. I was quite stuffed, in fact. They arrived looking so adorable!!! They were literally bite-sized balls. Wheeeeee. You know what? They weren't exactly that sweet. They were fluffy and light! What a welcome change from the usual sugared balls.

Sipping my coffee, eating the castella balls, watching the drizzle outside the window and people going about their business at this late hour of the day, I was a bit lost in the contemplative scene. Luckily for me, I don't need to fill silence with J. She knew exactly what I was doing looking around — taking in all the sights and sounds I don't get at cafes in Singapore. It's not just about the quiet we can create in a coffeeshop in terms of decibels or with the right music. It's a sort of peaceful vibe that isn't easy to duplicate...... like I will walk out of here feeling refreshed. And I did.

Brought A Suitcase of Gifts

We brought gifts to Tokyo for the folks we would be meeting. They're mainly for the man's colleagues. I'm not seeing many friends here since it's a short trip; I don't really want to spend all my time meeting people. Caught a few for lunch before they flew out for their work trips/vacations.

I am catching up with J because we are finally in Tokyo together! Hahahaha. We do meet in Singapore, but without her in Tokyo, I'm likely not going to get good coffee with the man. So I'm sticking to her to get to a few coffee spots.  

I wasn't going to lug anything as hand luggage. I didn't even bother to bring a cabin-sized suitcase. Thank goodness I didn't because... REMEMBER I WAS FORCED TO TAKE THE TRAINS INTO TOWN AND TO THE HOTEL. OMG. Anyway, it was a clever move to pack everything securely into the two big suitcases so we could travel slightly lighter. The man had a backpack, and I just had a manageable tote.

On our way out of Changi Airport, we also procured bottles of whisky for those who drink and enjoy a good glass of Scotch. Obviously we weren't going to get them Japanese brands! Although many brands are owned by Beam Suntory now. Ooof. Bengawan Solo provided most of my confectionery needs. Pineapple tarts are friendly, and crispy spicy shrimp rolls give a savory kick. Supermama offered me a selection of the tea towels and sauce plates (mame-zara / 豆皿) that I thought might suit the aesthetics of the recipients. These aren't too fancy gifts, and not utterly useless. So I guess these make for decent enough gift bags. 

Grilled Skewers for All of Us!

On a rainy and super windy night, we popped out to have grilled skewers again, separately. The husband decided to pop by his Tokyo office to say hi and they took him out to dinner at an izakaya (that he can't even remember the name of) in Roppongi. I was taken out to dinner by J and her fam to their local yakitori Mitsu Masa at Shimbashi / 三政 (みつまさ). 

The husband and his colleagues took up a huge space at the izakaya, presumably a favorite of his office peeps. Because of the weather, they shifted the 7pm dinner to an earlier 6pm, so that everyone could get back before the crazy rains rolled in. He could tell me what he ate, but nobody took photos of the food. Whyyyy. The only photo he took was of the lightly seared chicken (toriwasa 鳥わさ), which looked rather raw to me. Eeeeps. I have tried this years ago, and I don't see a need to eat it again. Obviously they had a TON of sake. 

I had nicely-cooked meats at the super casual and very fun Mitsu Masa. Heh! Nothing raw. I couldn't eat more than I wanted to because lunch was huge, so I had no more stomach space. I could, however, eat chicken hearts. Hurhurhur. The shiitake was so big and juicy. Mmmm. I tell you, I had to seriously resist getting a bowl of rice to go along with the meats. 

We all left and went home early, aiming to step into the house before 9.15pm, giving a wide buffer to that threatening red in the night sky. Even the man got back to the hotel by 10.15pm. The gale warning stayed through the afternoon, and the weatherman had issued a 10pm-noon thunderstorm warning. We heeded it.

They weren't kidding. My poor little brolly, expectedly, broke — it was no match against the winds whipping around in all directions. There was rain that wasn't too heavy surprisingly, so honestly, a raincoat would have worked better except that it's 26°C out in the night. TOO HOT. Typhoon weather before the typhoon hits means that it's hot and humid af. A hot shower that night was in order for all of us. 

焼き鳥 :: やきとり

How could I be in Tokyo and not pop by a yakitori restaurant? I'm a tad allergic to chicken too. But I'm in Tokyo! I'll Zyrtec-D it daily so that I can eat everything and all that I want! I'm not fond of having chicken in Singapore because somehow, the chicken simply tastes weird. Most restaurants' prep methods don't work for me, especially not Hainanese chicken rice. Even our yakitori joints can't hold a candle to an average one in Tokyo. 

First dinner in Tokyo had to be at Nonotory / 野乃鳥●焼き鳥. We went for broke and took the premium omakase course. We began with two types of lightly seared chicken. Thankfully they weren't actually raw. They were superbly tasty. Ooof. Then we had seven sticks of yakitori and more sticks of vegetables, chicken soup, rice and dessert. 

Oddly, they didn't seem to serve a variety of innards here. There was no liver tonight. The man does love his liver and gizzards. Ah well. I had to request for hearts — they were delicately seasoned and delicious. 

We had plenty of Kaku-highballs. Absolutely refreshing. I love the prices too because at ¥648 for a glass here even at this pricier joint, it's still tons cheaper than what Singapore restaurants charge. The point was not to even get tipsy. Three glasses of highballs each worked nicely. 

What I didn't expect was the pot of rice. It was gorgeously prepped in an earthenware pot. It was rice served in two ways and gave us a thorough carb punch. First it was served just in its dashi and mushrooms. Ahhhhh. That was divine. Then a second bowl was scooped up. They broke an egg over it and shaved a thick layer of karasumi (dried mullet roe) as a topper. OMG> IT'S TOTALLY A CHOLESTEROL AND FLAVOR BOMB. I went into a merry food coma after that.

I didn't want or need dessert. But since it came with the meal, I ate a bite. It was a dessert platter of four items for each of us. So yes, I took one bite of each. Hahahah. The desserts were pretty standard, nothing mind-blowing, but done well.

こんにちは東京!

This is the first real vacation that husband and I had in years — a full week in Tokyo. Needless to say, I didn't plan any itinerary. We'll figure out when we get there. We're not going anywhere out of Tokyo, so it's super comfortable. For a month before the trip, my entire head space and energy have been spent on sorting on caregiving logistics for the dog, so much so that I was sorting that out even when I was in Seoul. 

No regrets taking the red-eye flight out to Tokyo. I wanted to stay in for as long as possible to settle Choya before flying out. Considering how much I have been kept awake in the nights for weeks (because, Choya), sleeping in this plane seat isn't an issue at all. LOL In fact, it would be friggin comfortable to sleep without any interruptions. Din of engines, clink of cutlery, toilets flushing and human voices et al aren't any issues for my exhausted mind. I'm only tuned to waking up if Choya whines, pants, retches, scratches or digs. 😂

It was only 11.15pm when the plane took off. Had two glasses of red to ease my anxiety about the dog. Then I set the seat back flat and curled up to snooze with three pillows. Solid sleep was had for five hours before breakfast service. The husband even had a small bottle of sake with his breakfast, at 4.45am. (I didn't.) Okaaaaaay. His holiday mode had been turned on!

I clean forgot to fill up the electronic arrival card and customs declaration. Managed to scramble to fill out our particulars and submitted those before the wifi turned patchy. Whewwwww. Then I settled in to eat my breakfast in peace. But thanks to turbulence, I had no chance to get a coffee inflight. That had to wait till I arrived in Tokyo. Luckily there was at least sencha with breakfast. 

The brilliant husband had declined the arranged car to pick us up from Haneda airport, and didn't tell me till we were in the plane. He was like, super enthusiastic, "Let's be adventurous! Let's take the bus." To that, I sighed, "Didn't you realize that the airport limousine bus hasn't stopped at our hotel since March 2023 and the bus company refuses to put a stop there?" We could take the bus and drop off somewhere and cab it. The man mulled it over, and announced, "Let's take the trains!" So who has to navigate? Yours truly. 

Walao, this is peak hour downtown office traffic. Well, we had a seat from the Keikyu line at the airport, but the office crowd was packing in. Then we were the only tourists with big suitcases braving the Ginza line. Champions. But we made it to the hotel just fine before 9am. Hahahah. The icing on the cake — the hotel decided to be nice and gave us our room earlier than the 3pm check-in time. Yayyy. 

We had landed to a cloudy Tokyo with plenty of odd rain showers. I stared at the news headlines. The first named storm and typhoon of the 2024 Pacific typhoon season—Ewiniar is approaching Okinawa, and due to brush past Tokyo. It would smack Okinawa, but at this point, Tokyo doesn't know if it could come in ferocious. Zzzzzzzz

ご飯は愛です

Totally bought this book for the cover. Heh. I didn't think that I'd be very impressed by the content, but hey, it looked like an easy read and I'm supposed to be practicing the language. It turned out to be absolutely hilarious, to me.

「恋が生まれるご飯のために」(2018) はあちゅう著. Written by thirty-two-year-old social media influencer and writer Haruka Ito, the title roughly translates into 'Love is Born of Rice'. It's written from a woman's perspective, and that itself is problematic because I don't share her views and I don't live in her world where I'm bound by certain rules of dating. It's a very...for the lack of a better word, goosebump-raising girl book, in its language, thought(s) and opinions.

The book proposes the viewpoint that romance is developed when there's compatibility in a couple's tastebuds and food preferences. I can't argue with that. A whole chapter talks about respecting the venue of a date, being punctual and not be overly critical of its food unless it's that bad. Hmmm.「食事の場を大事にしてこそ恋も仕事もうまくいくのです。」

Read this in the plane on the flight back to Singapore. By the last chapter, I was convulsing in hysterical giggles because I couldn't stifle them. My neighbor across the aisle peeked over quite a number of times to see what the heck I was reading. LOL. This line cracks me up, 「恋愛は、楽しくご飯を食べられる相手を見つけること、そして結婚は、一生一緒にご飯を食べる約束」It's saying that an ideal marriage is about finding two persons who can happily eat rice together for a lifetime. Hmmm...that's true, isn't it? That's perhaps quite an accurate gauge of all relationships- to have a meal together.

There's a chapter titled「朝ご飯で見極める朝ご飯が一緒に食べられる人は信頼できる人」, 'People who can have breakfast together can be trusted'. The author says that if the man she's dating likes to wake up early, and hence have breakfast together, she assumes that their future married life would be kept on a healthy pace too. 😂 Well, this, I can sort of get behind. Except that I have no wish to wake up every day to prepare breakfast for my husband. I don't need him to do it for me either. My stomach doesn't care about breakfast. Not as a kid, not as a 40-year old, and certainly never in-between. I rarely take breakfast. If there is a need to eat, it has to be cold milk, yoghurt, fruit, granola and the sorts. Not keen on bread or anything heavier. If I bother to get up early to meet you for breakfast, or maybe prep it for you, then chances are, you're already faeriefolk.

そこまで非日常なことではないでしょうために早起きてくれたガッツは信頼の証に思えますし、早起きが好きな人であれば、の人との結婚生活は規則正しく健やかなものていく気がする。 

朝ご飯の約束をしてちゃんと時間通りに来てくれる男性は、もうそれだけでちょっとイケてる感じがしますし、朝からもりもりと食べる男性は生命力が強そうでかっこいい。