A friendly face

Stace is currently visiting me in Japan, which is very nice. ^_^ Yesterday I met her in Kawasaki (where she is staying) and we went into Tokyo to see Harajuku (famous for its interestingly-dressed people) and Yoyogi Park. It was awesome, we got to see the Rockabilly club. All these people in Grease-esque costumes, dancing to 50s music, and combing their Brylcreamed hair, hahaha...



Yoyogi Park rocks. You see so many interesting people doing a variety of things. So there are couples sitting talking, there are groups of people having raucous picnics, there are people practising random dance routines together, there are people practising juggling, there are strips of bands competing for who can be the coolest.

Today we went to Sankei-en garden, a traditional Japanese-style garden. It's very pretty, and was almost deserted because of the weather. (It was raining and unseasonably cold. In fact, the maximum temperature was 17 degrees. This time last week, it was 27.) We had tempura and soba for lunch, with free hot tea. I love tempura. ^_^ At the end of the meal I distinguished myself by walking straight into a glass door which I thought was open. Hahaha!



Then we headed to the harbour. The weather made it somewhat unpleasant but we looked around the main buildings and in the evening we met up with Ryu (my hairdresser) who is always enjoyable company, and went to an izakaya.


The Landmark Tower, which has no top, but continues forever into the clouds...

I was slightly amused because Stace said that after 9 months in Singapore, she'd never had to eat anything strange or disgusting. But within two days of coming to Japan she has eaten chicken's heart. (This was not intentional on my part!)

[Edit, two days later: Whoops. She has now also eaten beef diaphragm. This was also unintentional on my part. I thought I was ordering horse meat but I got my vocabulary confused. Hahaha! To be fair, we both liked it (it was in yakiniku, delicious Korean barbecue. :))]

I came home and on my way home I heard a meowing noise. There was a cat huddled under a bit of shelter, meowing hopelessly. I patted it and it tried to climb into my lap (difficult, as I wasn't sitting down). When I crossed the road, it ran after me. I gave it a piece of bread but I couldn't let it in my building, unfortunately. But I've heard a few lonely and saddened cats crying in the rain today. :)

It's nice to have a friend here in Japan. ^_^ She'll be here a couple more days yet.