Fishies!!

Photos:

• Top left: one of my co-workers mentioned that he was going to set his goldfish free in the local river because he'd rather have some pet shrimp. Naturally, there was no way I was going to let him do that, so Eugene and I convinced him to bring it to work. Now we have a fishie at our school!!
• Top right: Take a look at the chopsticks I picked up last month.
• Bottom left: this is a picture of me making the scary face with my branch manager. After viewing it on playback she said, "Sorry, I'm just not good at making that face."
• Bottom right: the one single benefit of all the smog in Tokyo is that it reflects the sunset beautifully. I took this picture just a couple hours ago at the train station by my school.

You say tomato, I say dessert

I know I haven't posted in a while...sorry about that. I'm hoping to have more to share soon, but in the meanwhile I'm leaving you with this image of my dessert at a restaurant in Yamato: tomato ice cream with plain yogurt and aloe jelly. And also raisins, just in case there weren't enough other weird things already in the dish. For those of you who were wondering, yes, it does taste distinctly like a tomato and is a little less sweet than regular ice cream. The sweet part was the aloe jelly and the raisins, which I didn't even know were there until the ice cream was almost gone. I recommend that everyone who has the opportunity give it a try. But I don't recommend ordering it if you've got a real craving for something sweet.

Chinatown, Round 2

In an (unfortunately unsuccessful) effort to see some Chinese New Year festivities this week, I spent Tuesday afternoon in Chinatown in Yokohama. (Please refer to my post from Oct. 1 to see pics of my last visit.) Didn't get to see anything extra-special like I'd hoped for, but I DID get a 5% off coupon for a pastry shop. Would have been nicer if I'd found something to use it on. But it was a nice afternoon all the same. Happy *early* Chinese New Year to everyone!!

Photos:

• Top left: this is the same street with lanterns pictured in my Oct. 1 post, only I took this one standing a little farther back.
• Top right: entrance to one of the two temples I saw on this visit. Last time I came, Kim and I didn't even realize that this was here. Chinese temples are much more colorful than Japanese ones. The temple itself is actually at the top of the cement stairs you see in the background.
• Middle left: This is a view inside the temple. The wooden slats you see in the foreground are part of the offering box (saisenbako) where everyone tosses their coins before "sanpai sahou", which is what a person does to worship the god: bow twice, clap twice (to wake him up if he's sleeping, my students tell me), then bow once more. Compare this interior with my picture of a Japanese temple interior on my post from Dec. 28.
• Middle right: view down the main street of Chinatown.
• Bottom left: another view of Tokyo Bay, about a 5 min walk from Chinatown. The ferris wheel you can see in the distance is the one in Minato Mirai. See my other picture of it here.
• Bottom right: Taken at Tameike-sanno this week. I couldn't have said it better myself, unless English was my native language...