Where's Scott?

We wake with a plan to not leave the lodging to the last minute. We motor down to the 5-star hotel’s meager i-cafe (2 English computers) and at extortionate rates find a couple of real i-cafe locations. That sorted, we wander the town a bit and I listen to Seb lament that we missed the “girls that dress up like schoolgirls” area by about a block the previous night (his internet time was well spent!). We have a nice breakfast coffee and then try to find on of the i-cafes on the list. Problem is, without a map, a way to translate the street signs, or even an understanding of the street addresses (5 – 7 – 42 means where?) we’re hopeless. After asking around a bit we finally locate one – in plain sight, and totally invisible. At least now we can look for a hotel without it costing a night in one.

We decide to head to the “shopping” part of town: Ginza. With a nice map in hand, Seb suggests we head to Times Square, and a huge bookstore that’s supposed to be there. After many escalator excursions, and general circling common to mall travel, we find the bookstore at the far end of a long skyway (Tokyo has a love of the elevated walkway). I flip through the guidebooks while Seb tries to find his sister-in-law Lisa’s latest novel on the shelves. He can’t.

With a guidebook in hand, at least we now have a clue. The park nearby looks like an excellent detour, but by the time we’ve found the gate, it’s closed for the day. I flip through the guidebook, and find the Toto Showroom. Perfect! Toto makes all the fancy toilets in Japan, and when I say fancy, we’re talking Japanese style fancy! As we all know Seb spends 1/4 of his waking life on the can, and the showroom idea is an instant winner. We flag a cab and make for the 29th floor of some office complex where said showroom is hiding. We’re a little disappointed there’s not a whole floor dedicated to toilets (turns out they make all forms of bathroom gear as well), but we spot a “trylet” – ie. a bathroom splash demonstration room. As I approach my trylet, it sees me coming and thoughtfully lifts its lid, and warms its seat in anticipation. I sit down, and a quiet deodorizer kicks into gear – what a thoughtful, comforting device this is. On the wall, there’s a complex remote full of buttons, all labeled in Japanese of course. A try a few at random and, whirrrrr … click … pssss Whoa! Water sprayed right up my anus! Ooooo … oooo … where’s the off, off, oooo. Noooo! Stronger bad, very bad, this one? Hot seat, hot seat, not right. Yellow panic button? *flush* noooo, nooo, corner button? Ahhhhhh. Ok, so definitely not for the amateur!

We finally dry off (Seb’s had a similar experience!) and decide that we can settle our ruffled feathers with some sushi. We explore the basement mall of the building (did I mention any otherwise unused space in Tokyo is a mall?) and locate a quiet sushi bar, so quiet in fact, we have it completely to ourselves. We sit at the bar facing own, personal master sushi chef. The place is very formal, and three assistants stand quietly in the corner, only moving to present us with hot towels or fill our tea cups. We start with our ever faithful otoro. Our chef pulls a wooden drawer with sushi from below his counter and expertly slices and presents our fish, and then politely steps back to wait our next order. This is serious old school, we’re in heaven. We order a scallop, and he quickly appears with a shell, expertly opens it, slices out the still twitching scallop and prepares it for us. That’s fresh! We continue with this for as long as we can stuff sushi in our bellies, the whole restaurant at our beckon call. Why would you ever want to leave?

Physical limitations eventually come into play, and we’re forced to confront the fact that we still have to get across town and find our hotel. We again expertly divine the secrets of the Tokyo subway, and arrive at a dark, cold and windy station. Fearing a repeat of our first night’s limb numbing experience we pay close attention to the map, and duck into our hotel just before any permanent damage is done.

After a quick shower and a bit of a thaw out, we strike out for the main shopping strip at the cross between Harumi and Ginza Dori. Now we’re talking! Electric city has the name, but Ginza has the lights. The Dori is ablaze, neon lights crawl skyward into the distance in both directions, every major designer and brand name is there. I’m thumbing the map, and realize that we’re only a few blocks from the Imperial Hotel where mom and dad have just arrived at the start of their Japanese cruise trip. We orient ourselves and make the cold windy few blocks to the hotel, and it’s warm and inviting lobby.

I call up, and they’ve just checked in. We pop up to their room and spend awhile catching up. Sadly, they’ve eaten, and we’re starving, so we promise to catch them for lunch later, and head down to ask the concierge for a nice local sushi joint. Sushi’s just across the street, and we find it’s the same 24hr chain from the previous night (Sushizanmai for reference). We pay a bit of the “white tax” waiting in the cold somewhat longer than the Japanese patrons around us, and Seb eventually walks in and demands some of the open seats visible at the bar. We quickly divine why the sushi is so good here: they’re pulling out flounders and cod from their tanks, and cutting and serving them minutes after they were swimming! We have some more excellent sushi (the scallops again are heavenly!) and gorge for several hours until our guts can take no more.

The Imperial’s concierge has given us a top notch sake bar to find, called The Bar. We try to flag a taxi outside, but the driver points us to the front of the line, several blocks out of sight. The taxi line is insane, 2 lanes wide, and stretches away in both directions; the driver we’re talking to is facing the other way, but is nonetheless in line, as it has looped the block! The dinner beer and sake has steeled us against the cold, and The Bar not far, so we decide to hoof it.

The Bar is in Shiodome, which sounds grand, but is just a few office buildings with a mall in the bottom floors, and is totally closed up when we get there. Our directions are in the wrong building, and we spend some time wandering the empty skyways looking for some life. Seb’s ready to bail for the hotel, he’s cold and tired and we want to hit the fish market early; but I want to at least see what the bar is like. We eventually locate a reference to it on a placard in a deserted office building, looks like a bust. Just then, a spectacularly dressed Japanese couple walk by us and step into the elevator. I follow them in just to see where their headed, and a minute later we’re at the top floor in a majestic foyer that has several restaurants and The Bar! $15 cover, but screw it, we’ve come this far, and Oh My God, what a view! The bar sits low (you sit at floor level), with the tenders behind even lower. It’s made of a beautiful solid dark wood, and as you sit at it, you look out over a 180 degree view of downtown Tokyo. The bar is quiet, with some nice reflecting pools and a few other groups enjoying the relaxing atmosphere. I immediately fall in love with it.

We plant ourselves down, and learn the bar’s open ’til 4am. We decide up front to spend all night here drinking sake, pull an all nighter, and head for the fish market at dawn! An ohhhh, the sake is really, really good.