Raw Fish Rules

Aww sigh, I had the best day today. I came straight to Tokyo after work last night and woke up around 5:30 to go to the Tsukiji Fish Market. It is the biggest fish market in the world, and starting in April they will formally request that tourist stay away - so many people come now that it is starting to interfere with business! At 7 am, I had Sushi Breakfast #1, and then Sushi Breakfast #2 at 10 am. It was that good!!!!

At the first place, a young Aussie couple came in and sat next to me. They looked absolutely terrified! It was painfully obvious that it was their first time in a sushi restaurant and they had no idea what to do with themselves. I was giggling to myself like a snobby expat, but at the same time I totally felt sorry for them because I have been in that situation so many times - in an unfamiliar country eating strange food and totally scared of breaking some cultural taboo by accident or offending someone somehow. That is part of travel though. But this poor couple, they just weren't having any fun at all! The girl didn't like fish so she just nibbled at the tamago sushi, and the guy managed to wolf down his plate as fast as he could. And then there's me, reveling in absolute sushi heaven while I alternate between speaking bad Japanese with the sushi chefs and staring into space wondering how I could ever bring myself to leave such a wonderful country. I tried to make conversation with them but they didn't seem to into the whole talking thing either. Oh well, I tried.

But I just kept thinking that Japan seemed wasted on these people, or at least the sushi part of it. And it made me think about people back home who tell me how badly they want to come visit me here, but then have some silly excuse like money for why they can't make it. And I though, YOU are the ones who SHOULD be sitting here eating sushi at 7 am on a Saturday! You know who you are!!!!! You have 5 months, better start saving the money now!

Anyway, then I headed out to Yokohama, wandered around in the wind, took a ferry ride, hit up a really good history museum and geeked out for a bit, and THEN :-) met up with 5 of the girls from my volunteer group in India! We went to Chinatown, and of course ate a whole lot of Chinese food and shared memories of India. It was great to see them all again.

Nice day, I love Tokyo. It makes me wonder why I am leaving after only a year. And then I remember that I live in the countryside. Right!