Izakaya, A Festival, a Beautiful Promise and Love.

I hope to focus on just two events in this entry. They deserve as much attention as they can get. Knowing me though, I will ramble and somehow find myself talking about how I spent 18 dollars on a movie ticket. Oh wait. Anyways, I will start with my first trip to a true Izakaya restaurant.

For those who don't know (and I would imagine that would be most – I hardly knew what it was before I came here), Izakaya is not a type of food. Rather, the word speaks to the dinner experience as a whole. Firstly, there are no large portions. Think of it as a dinner made up of an endless supply of appetizers. That's not to say it is all you can eat. Each snack is payed for individually. I only ordered one, and I think it was 500 yen (about 5 dollars), I might be wrong though.

I am not explaining this at all coherently. Let me try this again. Jake told me that he was going out to dinner with his friends from work. He asked me if I wanted to come, but assumed I wouldn't because I would have no idea what was being said (I was under the assumption that no one spoke English.) Before I came to this country, though, I made a promise to myself. That if it was possible, I would do anything I was asked to do. No saying no. Besides, a dinner out is probably the least threatening outing I can think of. So of course I said yes. Before we were set to meet for dinner, we caught a movie. I struggled to stay awake. Those who know me well enough should be surprised to hear this. Even movies I don't like usually have no problem grabbing my attention. I'm so enraptured by story-telling. But jet-lag is a marvelous thing. Just in case I forget what it was like to experienced it in its glorious fullness, I will describe it here. The first three days were constant nausea. A pounding headache set in immediately when I woke up every morning. I couldn't drink enough water. Even when I drank what would usually be more than sufficient, my body screamed for more. I ached everywhere. It's funny that I am saying all of this is past tense as if it is over. I am much better now, but I am still met with exhaustion at 6pm every night. I expect this to pass in the next few days. I digress. After the film, I was certain I could not attend this dinner. The symptoms I explained above were setting in quickly, and my mind was fried. My Toronto friends (especially Michael, I would think) know what I mean when I say I was the drunk kind of over-tired-Cody. But the people were expecting me, and even in North American culture, it is at least odd not to show up to somewhere you are expected. And so, against every desire, I went.

It was a small building. It was raining outside, and literally everyone carries an umbrella when it rains. It's a really cool site to see. And so, on rainy days, stores have these odd contraptions at their entrances that you slip your umbrella into in order to cover it in a light plastic casing. It catches the water and prevents the store's floors from becoming soaked. So we covered our umbrellas and took off our shoes. There was about nine of us. I forget their names, except Rika (only because of Erika, of course) and Masa. We exchanged those awkward 'we-can't-understand-eachother-but-let's-still-be-nice' greetings. Everyone was beautiful, of course. I feel like to work at any clothing store you have to be stunningly attractive.

We made our way to our table, which was more like a room. A sliding door separated us from the hallways and the other parties. The table was on the ground. Like, where my feet were. I tried to hide how unimpressed I was. I am so not down for this right now. My head hurt so badly, and I just wanted water and a bed. I noticed a sizable hole underneath the table. Everyone crouched and then shuffled their feet into the opening. It is difficult for me to explain. Once everyone was sitting, it looked like we were sitting at a regular table, except we were on the floor. It was an odd sensation. Everyone passed out the menus. More jokes were made about my tattoo. The joke is getting ancient, but I expected this to happen. Every time someone comments on it, Jake laughs along with them and then immediately explains to them that I wrote a 600 page script and I eventually want to make games. Even though I know, every time he does this I ask him what he said. “Nothing, it's okay,” he'll answer. This is how I know he's proud of me. He brags about me but then is too shy to say it.

They talked, I listened when I felt like it. I was being a Debra. A huge Debra. I wanted to go home. I ordered something to keep Jake off my back. I don't even remember what it was. I felt like vomiting. Smoking is allowed in restaurants, and there is nothing that makes me more nauseous than the smell of cigarette smoke. I excused myself for a moment until the one guy finished his smoke. The food arrived. Jake handed me a dish. “That's not what I ordered.” He told me to take it. “Who's is it?”

“It's anyone's, you can have it!”

“But I didn't order it.”

He took some of whatever it was and put it on my plate. “Just try it.” he said. He explained that people order what they want to have, but it gets passed around to everyone to try. This is such an odd practice to me. I don't think I even got to eat one of whatever I ordered. I remember it had something to do with cheese so I was looking forward to it. It didn't look that appetizing so I searched the table for something that did. In front of me looked like a dish of chicken-bites. I ate one. It was really crunchy. Not like the deep-fried breading was crunchy, but the inside was crunchy. The breading, and what I could taste of the chicken was really good, so I thought that one just had a bone in it. I remembered their rule about spitting things out, so I chewed it until I could swallow. That took some time. I ate a second one. The same thing, except this time there was a bigger bone. What the heck!? A third one. The same thing. I turned to Jake, frustrated.

“There's bones in these, can I spit them out?”

He laughed. “It's deep-fried chicken bones.”

...

Okay then. Debra wasn't happy. (Okay, this can be my first “note to readers.” 'Debra' is what you call someone who is being a downer/unhappy. This was me.)

He handed me a skewer. “This is chicken.”

Finally! I didn't even study it, I just instantly took a bite. I chewed. And chewed. Panic set in. This isn't chicken. This isn't chicken. What the heck is this? Holy crap, holy crap. Okay, calm down. Mind over matter. It doesn't taste that bad. But it's not chicken, so what could it be? No, no, no, don't think like that. It's chicken. It's chicken, it's just, you know, a part I've never had. Maybe neck or something. I made a rule to myself. I will not ask anyone what this is until I swallow it. It took a while. Gulp. Down it went.

“Jake. What was that?” He pointed to his chest. “Heart?” Mine dropped.

“Not heart, but similar.” Shit.

“Lung?”

“I don't know, I forget the word.” Maybe that's better for both of us.

I don't remember eating anything else. Maybe I had a piece of sushi. The guy who smoked came and sat beside me. He spoke to me in very good English. I spoke to him earlier as if he didn't speak a word. “HELLO. MY – NAME – IS – CODY.” Dear Lord, I probably look like such an idiot right now. I don't even remember what we talked about. The dinner went on. Another guy came and sat by me. He struggled more with his English, but he was still very competent. We opened the conversation with my tattoo of course.

“Jake says you want to make games,” he said. I smiled. Of course he did. We talked about Final Fantasy. His favourite is VII, I skipped the fact that I think it's overrated. The conversation stumbled along. There were awkward pauses, but eventually it somehow led to his girlfriend. From Oregon.

“Oregon!? As in, west coast America Oregon?” I was in disbelief. He laughed and nodded. My interest was peaked.

And so the telling of the story began. Two years ago, he saw a beautiful blonde American on the Tokyo subway. He was too shy to approach her directly, so he decided to sit beside her and pull out his English text book from college (what a sly move.) He pretended to study. Elisabeth noticed and asked him if he spoke English. The answer was actually a no, but he couldn't say that. He had to fake it. So yes, he spoke English. She was relieved, and explained that she was a little bit lost. She didn't know how to get back to the place where she was staying. He asked where it was. It just so happened that she had to get off at the same stop as him. There are 290 stops on the Tokyo Metro subway system. He walked her home, and they exchanged addresses. She was only in Japan for two months. They fell in love. But, America was her home.

Get this. For two years, texting and Skypeing was their only way to communicate. Part way through those two years, it became too hard for Elisabeth. She found a boy at her college. They began to go on dates, and they liked each other. They eventually made it official.

“Were you heart broken?” I asked Masa.

“No,” he explained. “I was disappointed, but there is nothing I can do. She is free.” I assume by that he meant 'she can make her own choices.' I continued to listen, completely enraptured.

Only a short time into her new relationship, Elisabeth broke it off with her new boy. She told Masa that whenever she was with her boyfriend, she was thinking of him. No one else could cover it up. A beautiful cliche. And so, she waited for him. And after two years of being apart, Masa finally made his way to America. He told me that this is how he learned English. By living there for two months. I wouldn't say he is fluent, but he told this story to me with clarity and little difficulty. Anyways, they were reunited. He said they cried in each other's arms at the airport. No kidding. He met her family. They are very Catholic, he explained. During their first dinner together, Masa explained to me that Elisabeth's father placed his hand on his arm, looked him in the eyes and said “Masa. Please do not have sex with my daughter.” He assumed this was North American culture. I debunked that rumour as fast as I could. I thought that only happened in the movies.

I asked him if he was Catholic as well. “I don't have a religion,” he explained. “But I believe it.” This was confusing to me, so I asked him what he meant. “I have to believe it. Why would she do something so big if it was a lie?” I encouraged him to learn more about it, and think about becoming involved. I told him how it changed me.

Masa is a beautiful man, and a beautiful person. I doubt I will see him ever again, but I will never in my entire life forget the time we spent together. Masa, if you somehow ever read this, I pray for complete happiness and success for you and Elisabeth, and that you feel God's love and comfort wherever you go.

The dinner was over. People were beginning to leave. I began to realize what was happening. The bill was being split evenly. Crap. It cost me 3000 yen (30 bucks!) for a couple of chicken bones and an unidentified organ. That's why Jake kept telling me to order more! It was being split 10 ways! I was the sucker that night.

I thought I would have enough time to write about my trip to a festival and about the friendships I have made in my traveler's house, but I have already written too much. I will include it in my next post. This country is incredible.