Japan

Woke up this morning at 5:30am... 5 hours of sleep. Ugh. We went to a Bento Box place for breakfast (bento boxes are packaged collections of fresh food), then walked around the various shops at Kyoto station. Someone suggested a new soda, Mango Fanta. We found it and it was really good. We also bought an umbrella, beause it's very rainy today. We wandered around for a while in the Station, before going back to the hotel to for a nap. When we woke up, the rain had finished and we were ready to walk around some more.

We had lunch at a hot pot place. I ended up having this egg and bacon creation with rice and a sauce. It was delicious. (I don't know the title of the dish) I've never had thick squared off bacon before. By thick, I mean 5/8" square, 3" long. Little rectangle squares of bacon. We also went to a Buddhist temple not far from the station. There wasn't much to see, but it was still very peaceful.

After the temple, we went to Kyoto Aquarium. Wow is this nice. I've always loved the Baltimore Aquarium. Even though there isn't tons of water (compared to other Aquariums), they still find a way to show you a lot. Kyoto Aquarium does the same, but in a much better way. The exibits are well lit to easily see everything. It was also very tranquil there, where as baltimore can be hectic. This is mostly be due to the people that attend both aquariums, but whatever. Natsumi saw a few Giant Japanese Salamanders (3 feet long) and got so excited. She would run around the section pulling people over just to point at them and scream. It was pretty funny. She made friends with a younger couple that way, who later bought her a Nemo looking gift from the gift shop. Very nice of them. I loved the outdoor sections of the Aquarium. There was a garden that had small bridges and thin winding paths without any railings. People would absolutely find a way to fall from this in America, just so they could sue the aquarium. Good job, Kyoto! They also had an outdoor observation deck for the Dolphin show, and an area where the seals play (Natsumi liked the seals as well), and an outdoor snack area.

After finishing there, we met up with Manami's aunt again. Her uncle & cousins are all busy, so they were no shows. I had mentioned wanting ramen, so She had a couple of great places in mind. The first was a 10 minute walk (more of a power walk. Her aunt has tons of energy) from Kyoto station. Unfortunately It was closed, so we decided to walk back to the station and get on a train to hit up another place. The restaurant we decided on was called Gogyo. It looked like an up beat "hip" kind of noodle restaurant. Very comfortable seating. We had gyoza (dumplings), an appatizer thing which was crushed tomatoe (almost like maraniara sauce) on an assortment of different beans. That was really good. When the ramen came, all 3 of us had ordered different styles. Usually they have different flavor broths per style, but this place also had a different type of noodle per style. I had them order me something random. It ended up being good, but having an angel hair pasta noodle, pork, eggs, and a bunch of other stuff.

They also ordered me a glass of Matsumoto sake. It was another really good one. No after taste to speak of. The guy poured it in what amounted to a tripple size shot glass sitting in a wooden box. He intentionally overfilled it so 1/3rd the box was also full of the Sake for presentation. It was very good. Sweet and enjoyable. After finishing the Sake, I also had a big glass of Kirin, and I swear the glass itself weighed 4 lbs.

During the entire meal, they played old American rap and rock & pop. The songs I remember hearing: 50 Cent - In Da Club, Red Hot Chili Peppers - Fortune Faded, and Sonique - It feels so good. There were also a bunch of other songs that I knew the lyrics to, but don't remember their names. These were songs from when I was in high school and I really dug the nostalgia of it all.

Natsumi woke us up this morning at 4:10am. After goofing around our room, we decided to walk back down to 7-11 and buy some rice balls as a snack before a restaurant really opens. We ate in our room and I get a chance to finally write up the report from Wednesday. Fortunately, I jot down notes every day so I would remember everything.For breakfast we walked to one of the local deli/bread type places in the station. I had a grilled chicken sandwich with Bree (cheese) and lettice. Also had a really good cinamon roll as a desert. Unfortunately, we didn't have much time to do anything else. We had to pack up right away. Our bus for Osaka (flying from Osaka to Tokyo to Yamagata) leaves at 11am (it was 9:30am when we got back to the room)

Manami's parents made it difficult. They wanted our checked bag sent to Niigata directly because they didn't have room in the car for everything. We spent around an hour trying to fix everything so that it would fit our needs for the next day. What stinks, is that after all was said and done, they only wanted us to send the extra bag to their house because they didn't feel like taking snow shovels and other useless things out of their trunk.

Anyway, the bus to Osaka Airport took around 55 minutes. We ate our lunch at the Airport (more ramen), then flew to Tokyo. That was a 1:15 flight, and it went as expected. After unloading, however, Manami realized that she couldn't find her cell phone, but clearly remembered shutting it off on the plane before takeoff. She rushed back to our arrival gate, but wasn't allowed to re-board and search for it. The employees did a quick search and weren't able to locate it, either. Great... And we only had around 20 minutes left to rush (almost a mile) to board the plane to Yamagata. I told Manami not to worry, and that everything would work out just fine. That said, there isn't much hope.

The flight to Yamagata was nice as well. They had a feature I've never seen previously. There is a camera mounted on the front of the plane, and another mounted on the bottom of it. They stream live video of the takeoff (from front camera), then the ground below (from bottom camera). It plays that for the take off and landing. Really neat to see.

After landing, we see Manami's parents waiting for us where the luggage return is. Natsumi and Manami rush over to say hello while I wait for our bag / stroller to come through. In a few minutes, we hop in their car and start driving to a hotel. Manami is able to call the Airport's lost and found to find out about her phone. It turns out that another passenger noticed the phone laying somewhere, and handed it in. That was really unexpected. I know full well that it would have disappeared in almost any other situation.

When we got to the hotel, it was the same one we stayed at for our Wedding Pictures 5 years ago. It is also a hot spring. When we arrive, we see that Manami's grandparents, as well as another aunt, uncle & cousin are waiting for us. We have a really nice dinner that they prepared for us. It was a lot of small dishes. The dishes were (1) Sashimi, (2) Cold Noodles, (3) Hot Pot, (4) Snails, (5) Miso Soup, (6) Seaweed Soup, (7) Pickled mix, (8) Pork, (9) Fried Squid, (10) Mushroom mix, and (11) Rice Pudding for desert.

I also had close to 2 bottles of Sake during dinner because her relatives kept wanting to serve more, so I would finish off the shot glass sized thing to allow them to. It really felt like they were trying to get me drunk. Anyway, after dinner I staggered back to the room. The game plan was to quickly nap until I wasn't dizzy anymore, then take a shower. When I next opened my eyes, it was 2am.

I Went back to sleep for a little while before officially waking up at 3:30am. I read a lot more of the Mike Tyson book. It's a very well written biography, and he doesn't seem to hold anything back.

At 5:45, I headed down to the hot spring and was the only person there. Hot springs are the Japanese equivelant of bath houses, but they aren't gay. That said, It's not unusual to be sitting around in the nude next to 5-10 other people. The water in a hot spring is uncomfortably hot. However, it becomes very nice (still hot, but tolerable) after sitting completely still for a few seconds. I went in up to my neck due to my joint pain, and it seemed to help. Staying in the spring for 15 minutes was a bit too long, though. When I stood up, I was very shaky. I had also raised my body temperature a lot, so I was sweating profusely and had to cool down. Once everything was ok again, I went back to the room to take a real shower, then pack up for our ride home.

Leaving the Hot spring, next door is a huge indoor pool complex thing. They have an olympic style swimming pool, a huge hot tub with these stainless railings inside so you can stretch out and relax your muscles at the same time. Then a 2nd section of the building which has a 1 foot deep kid's pool with a tiny sliding board on it. A much larger "lazy river" style pool, but you're supposed to walk in it. People love walking the river. It's a big exercise style over here, rather than sitting in a gym all the time. People usually go to the rivers after work just to let off stress while walking in a circle with the water flow side from that, there was also a 3 story high water slide. We went down it with Natsumi in our laps and she loved it. We stayed at the pool having fun for around an hour.

After the pool we went to grand parent's house in Yamagata. They are farmers, and their house is probably 2x as large as the one Manami's parents live in. Their farm is 6 hectare (that's a unit of measure in Japan) but the conversion makes it a little smaller than 15 acres. They mainly grow rice to sell at market, but they also grow numerous vegetables for their own garden. Dadachamame is a more difficult edamame to grow, and tastes a lot better. They grow this and sometimes sell it. A full crop is only available once a year, and it doesn't stay fresh very long. They never freeze their crops. They also grow green & purple Japanese grapes, pears, chest nuts & red beans.

When we got to their house, they sat us at a table with grapes, pears & dadachamame to munch on until lunch was ready. Everything is organic and tastes great. Despite the taste, the grapes are annoying. You have to suck the grape out of the skin (spit the skin out), then find the 1-3 seeds hidden inside and spit them out as well. Doesn't matter, they taste awesome, so it's worth it.

For lunch, we had lots of cold noodles, which are also very good. When we finished up, Natsumi played with a bunch of things at their house before we drove 3 hours back to Niigata (Manami's parent's house). I love the drive... there is so much to see along the way. A good chunk of the drive is along a coastal highway, and the views are beautiful. Between the ocean and the rock formations, it looks like a place I would love exploring as a child.

We also stopped at a rest stop along the way, so people could use the restroom. I went into the store, and it was set up like a big flea market. Lots of little groups of goods being sold by people. It wasn't at all what I was expecting, after being in American rest stops.

Once we finally got to Niigata, it was a lazy day the remainder of the evening. The hotel from 2 nights ago dropped off our luggage, and Natsumi and I watched Monsters University on the laptop, while Manami and her parents went to the grocery store to buy dinner. Aside from that, we had gyoza for dinner, and went to bed early-ish. I'm finally really adjusted to the time difference, but it took 5ish days to happen.

Today is a very laid back day. We don't have any real plans. For breakfast, Manami's mother made us a little scrambled eggs, lots of vegetables (cucumbers, tomatoes & bean sprouts), and a few whole fish that were grilled. You eat them whole, heads and all. It was acceptable. I'm not a huge fan of that style of fish (the taste), nor do I like cucumbers or tomatoes, but I ate it all anyway.

After breakfast, she brought over some fruit from the store. They had the much larger Japanese grapes that I enjoyed my last visit. These grapes taste exactly like that grape flavor of everything you had as a child that doesn't taste like grapes. Well, they must use the Japanese ones as a reference point instead of the American ones.

Following that, I sat down for a few hours writing my travel journal for the past few days. I'm finally caught up. Manami and Natsumi are taking a nap, and I'm getting a chance to relax. For lunch, we had spaghetti.

About an hour later, we went out to the store. first up was this giant Uniqlo. It's a Japanese clothing store that just recently began showing up in our area. The shops around us are tiny, but this one was easily the size of a Best Buy. Next door to that was a super market. It was a Wegman's type of place. It was amusing to see all of the section areas (Deli, Vegetables, Beverages) in English, where as all of the labels are not. We had some ice cream while we were there, and it was phenomenal. I liked this soft serve better than the other stuff I had a few days ago. So good.

Outside of the super market, they had a setup for kids. A bunch of tiny baby pools with soapy water in them, and lots of giant hoops so you could make enormous bubbles. By enormous, I mean 3-4 foot long bubble masses. It was pretty windy right there, so just lifting the bubble thing out of the soapy pool would make the bubbles. Pretty neat, and Natsumi enjoyed it (much like the 15 other kids that were playing there). When she was finished playing with the bubbles, we walked down to the next section.

Manami said it was Japan's version of Home Depot. I disagree. They didn't really have any building materials. It was a lot closer to a Walmart Garden Center, in that you could buy things to put around the house to decorate and what not. They also sold lawn furniture, barbecue grills and pets of all things. Don't worry, they aren't Chinese, so the cats and dogs are safe. They also had a large array of fish and insects. The insects were what drew my attention. For $55, you could buy a 4" long Stag-Beetle, or for $148, you could buy an 8" long Hercules Beetle. I picked up the Stag-Beetle, and it's feet are hooked with hypodermic needles. Sitting on my hand, I couldn't get him off. His feet dug into my skin and I had to remove him 1 leg at a time. What an awesome bug, though.

After that, we went deeper into the city (Niigata City) because Manami needed new glasses. While waiting for them to cut the lens to fit the new frame, we saw this girl with a really nice voice promoting her new CD. Her name is Maki, but no idea of her last name. Manami wanted to buy her CD, but she wanted $30 for it. And on top of that, the guy who was buying the CD already gave her a $50 and she couldn't figure out the change. Manami thought she was dumb, so we walked away.

The rest of the evening was relaxing as well.

I didn't sleep much last night. Tossed and turned for whatever reason. Just know that as I type this, I'm fighting to stay awake, so if something doesn't make sense, I'm sorry. As for our goal of today, it was just another day with nothing planned. We had breakfast, then Natsumi and I sat around watching Anime for a bit.

As we closed in on lunch, Manami's mother had to go in to work. She wanted us to come so that we could see the hospital (She's the head nurse at her hospital). So we all piled in the car and took a drive into the city to drop off her mom. Once we got there, everyone got out of the car and followed her into the lobby of the hospital. Then she said what amounted to "Ok, this is where I work." and walked away. I'm still not sure why she wanted us to come for that.

After dropping her off, Manami's father, Manami, Natsumi and myself took a ride to a great restaurant. The place is called "Tonkatsu Masachan" (Tonkatsu is a pork, sliced thinly). Her father suggest that I try the fried pork as my lunch, so I did. All I can say about that is "Wow!" It was so tasty. Yes, the breading on the pork was very oily, but it was so incredible. And the way the pork was cut and breaded, it looked just like Fish & Chips, sitting on a bed of rice.

I noticed that the music in this restaurant was 70's-80's classic rock. Two songs that popped out were Jimmy Buffet - If You Like Pina Coladas & Eric Clapton - Change the World. It seems that every restaurant has satellite radio. In the same vein, Manami's father's car just has FM. As we drove earlier today, I overheard the station's "stinger" (that's the call sign for the station). "77.5 FM in Niigata". That's all it said, but it was a bassy American English voice that said it. Yet nothing at all on that station (aside from that) is spoken in English.

We also went over to larger department store right next to where we went for lunch. While walking around, we noticed a very large "kids only" section, which consisted of nothing but arcade games. Looks like those are alive and well in Japan. The oldest one on their floor was maybe 3 years old. They were all very modern and looked great.

Once we made it back home, her father asked if I wanted to try out Acupuncture a little later on today. The answer was yes (I had already planned on seeing one while I was here), and it was interesting. My first time ever getting acupuncture. Manami sat beside me to translate everything we said back and fourth, so that was nice.

She also did a strange Chinese massage to my shoulders. It was very light pressure, using nothing but the balls of your thumbs in a circular pattern. I had no idea how it would accomplish anything, but after I was done it, I couldn't get over how great my shoulders felt.

The girl suggested that I see an Acupuncture specialist in PA, but then I learned that it only cost $30 for a 1 hour and 30 minute long section. Compared to the $100 each that they gouge you in PA, At this point, I'm planning on seeing her a 2nd time while I'm here. I couldn't get over how little the pain was. I literally couldn't feel the needles at all.

Today started slow like a lot of this week has. It's to be expected when Manami just wants to spend time with her family. Especially because she doesn't get to see them very often outside of Skype. Breakfast was more of the same. Lots of fruit and vegetables. A bowl full of the grilled whole fish as well. Manami's mom had to leave for work as soon as we were done breakfast.

After cleaning everything up, I noticed that Amada responded to my emails. I will be able to attend their tool show on Saturday morning. They have a hotel on their property for Amada guests only, so I'm staying there on Friday night. They'll give me dinner, breakfast, we'll do the tool show, then also lunch before I leave. I guess they want us to buy a million dollar machine.

Next up, I've cemented plans to meet up with a friend from a message board while in Tokyo. I'm going to check out the "nerdy" part of Tokyo (He might be able to join me there), and then we're going to meet up and go to this really nice beef/steak restaurant for dinner. I'm a big foodie, so that sounds awesome to me.

We went to the bank today, so I swapped some of my USD for Yen. The trade rates are great right now. The best they've been in 8 years. I should probably throw a "Thanks Obama!" thing in there for how shitty our dollar is doing. Anyway, Yen:USD = 1.06:1 So they're roughly 6% ahead of us. The bank kept a few % for themselves, but still a lot better than a standard currency exchange. I ended up getting 1.0303:1 from the bank, meaning they kept .0207 of each Yen. Not bad.

After we finished up at the bank, we went to Mos Burger. It's a generic fast food place, but the quality is significantly better than McDonald's. My burger was meat, cheese, tomato sauce and diced onions for $3.40. Yes it was fast food, but really good fast food at that. It was a messy burger to eat because the tomato sauce & onions kept dripping off of it, but it was still great. Here's a link to my burger. I only looked it up because I wasn't sure how to spell the name of that place.?????? | ?????? | ???????????

When lunch was over, Manami went over to the Hair Dresser to get her hair done. She prefers the way they do it in Japan, to those in America. Something about how they do the cuts or whatever... I don't try to analyze it too much. While she was getting her hair done, I stayed back at the house with Natsumi. We watched Frozen again, then went and played outside for a while. After that, the two of us walked to the Dresser so that Natsumi could get cut as well. Manami died her hair dark brown again, then also got a perm. We ended up cutting 3-4 inches off of Natsumi, making hers much more manageable. I really like how it turned out. It'll definitely be a lot easier to handle every time we go to the pool.

Following that, Manami made dinner for everyone. That way it was easier on her mother when she got home from work. After dinner, we talked about the train schedules I would need to know for getting to the tool show. Looks like it'll be 3 different trains to get there, so it's a little confusing. Fortunately, the train stations have people who speak English to help me get where I need to go.

In other news, Manami's dad is excited for me to go to the show, just so he can hear how it was. Amada is popular in Japan, apparently.

This morning started off like every other. Without any real plan to speak of... just take it easy and relax. We had breakfast, and then Manami's mother had to go into work. She isn't due home until a little after 8pm, so we have plenty of time to kill until that happens. I've been playing Rayman on my cell phone, trying to get 100%. It's a fun enough game, but runs so slow on my old phone. Oh well, first world problems.

We gave a call to the Amada guy's cell phone this morning. He told us the best train schedule to get over to the showroom. We just had to plan which trains to take. It's going to take me a little under 6 hours to travel, between waiting for trains and what not. 40 minutes to drive to Niigata station and pick up the Bullet Train. From there, it's around 2:20 to get into Tokyo. I have to get off the bullet and pick up a connecting train there, but it's a generic line that departs every 5-10 minutes. A quick 15 minute ride, and then I wait for the last train. That train happens to be 1:30 long. Amada guy is going to pick me up and the train station and take me right to dinner.

With that in mind, we left the house to go buy train tickets. We also wanted to check out Niigata's aquarium while we were here. Supposedly they've been remodeling it, so we wanted to see how everything was going. The aquarium looked beautiful when we first got there The building itself leaves things to be desired, but it was nice enough. It was a concrete building. Inside, they had laid down nice hardwood floors of various colors. They looked really nice. I feel like "borrowing" the color scheme for my own house later on.

The first half of the aquarium was very new and remodeled. Then we hit a spot that suddenly took us back in time. Everything was antiquated. Then they finished strong with some outdoor exhibits. All in all, I would rate this below Baltimore. If you have a chance, go to Kyoto's aquarium, and ignore this one. Maybe when they finish this one, but as of right now, it isn't there yet.

We also got my tickets for the trio of trains I'll be riding on Friday. It came to right around $118 for all 3 tickets. After that, we went back home. Had dinner, then relaxed the rest of the night.

You guessed it. Today started off without any real plans to speak of. That's the joys of sitting around Manami's parents house. It's incredibly dull, but we can usually find something to do. However, that's what she wants to do, so I go along with it while playing on the computer most of the time.

We had an early breakfast this morning, because her mom had to go into work again. It was around 6:30am when we ate. More vegetables and fruit. I realized that, while I don't like full tomatoes, I can easily eat ones that are sliced thin. However, these pickled cucumbers have got to go. Yuck. We also set up the hotel I'm going to stay in on Saturday night, while in Tokyo. I'm really looking forward to that part of this trip.

A little after lunch we took a 3 mile hike from Manami's parents house down to the beach, walked along the sand for a bit, then came back. It was warm out, but I didn't get sweaty. The constant breeze was nice. We walked along the beach in our bare feet, and the sand was oddly cool as well. The sand itself was more of a gray color than the whiteish I'm used to. This is because it's a combination of standard tan sand mixed with dark gray. I guess that's from lava rock that has been pulverized over the years. It was really peaceful walking along the beach, but it was also filthy. It's as if there was a huge party there last night and everyone left without taking any of their trash with them. There was stuff EVERYWHERE. At least it was that way closer to the water line (I'm sure it washed up on shore that way), farther back and the beach was spotless.

When we got back home, we went out to the jeweler. Manami wanted to get her wedding ring resized, as it was flopping around her finger previously, which caused her to not wear it as much. We went over a few ideas to redo the ring all together, but eventually changed our mind about that. Plus, it would have been $600. We walked away with a resize alone for a little less than 1/4 of that.

After that, we went to pick up Manami's mother from work, then came home and had dinner. Again, a very uneventful day. Tomorrow I leave for Tokyo (by myself), so there should be more to report on. Specifically, how easy it is for an English speaking guy to handle the Japanese rail system. I'm a little apprehensive about that, but it should be alright. I mean, countless other Americans have been here before.

Today started with some pressure. I had to get all of my things ready to go by 11:00am. Fortunately, I packed most of my overnight case last night. I kept a few things (like my laptop) out, to use until the moment we left Manami's parent's house. That said, there was still a little pressure to make sure I was ready.

The morning was fairly easy. When I woke up, Manami's mother was the only other person awake, and she was cleaning the house as quick as she could. I lumbered into the kitchen area so that I could mess around with my laptop until the family woke up. What that means is I downloaded some of the latest podcasts and got my iPod ready for sitting on the train most of the afternoon.

I also packed the last of my things, with the exception of the laptop. Now it was going to be real easy to leave when I had to. Manami's grandfather had to go out a little after breakfast. He leaves the house 3 times a week to get some outside care from a local facility. The joys of getting older. Anyway, once he was gone, we had a little longer to kill until it was time to leave. Manami, her mother, and Natsumi took this opportunity to take a nap.

Manami and Natsumi wake up right around 11:00. Her father says "We need to go quickly!" so I pack up my laptop and finish getting ready Her mom wakes up shortly there after. When all is said and done, we leave the house around 11:20, so not too bad. For lunch, we head to Manami's favorite restaurant, which happens to be a Japanese steak place. The steak is really good, but small. For example, My large steak amounted to 7 ounces.

The steak itself is served on a 500 degree piece of lava rock. You use this rock to cook your food. It has been flash cooked on both sides to lock in the moisture, but it's raw in the middle. The steak is then sliced down the middle into strips, and you cook each strip and eat it. It's incredibly tasty, and for being only 7 ounces, it's really filling.

After lunch, we had 35 minutes to get to the train station. I'm kind of worried at this point because we aren't that close, and Manami's father is the most passive driver I've ever encountered. Slight exaggeration, but if he sees a turn signal on in the next lane on a car that's behind him, he'll slow down to allow that car to pass him and get in front. It's not really that bad, but it's VERY close. I never really noticed it previously, thinking that all Japanese people drove that way, but this trip I've been paying attention to other drives, and he is the most cautious of them all.

We end up getting to the train station with 18 minutes to spare. That means a lot because the Bullet Train to Tokyo hasn't even begun boarding yet. Some of the cars are general population (first come, first serve), some are pre-reserved seats. I went with gen pop, because it costs less. The bullet train alone ran me around $100, so less is better. It was a 2 1/2 hour trip to get to Tokyo, and a large portion of that was hidden away in tunnels. I guess that keeps the residents of the different areas happy because they don't hear the bullet train rushing past their house.

Please note, this is my first time trying to travel in Japan without having my tour guide of a wife there to dictate my actions. i was nervous about what could have happened, but it went flawlessly. The signs spell things out in English as well as Japanese. If you know the line of the train you want, its incredibly easy to find your place. Also, knowing the platform number comes in handy as well. Despite it being incredibly easy, I still decided to ask other pedestrians where I should go for this ticket, and was always given the right answer. People are very helpful over here. I actually had a girl give me the wrong answer first, and she ran over a few minutes later to say she was sorry and that I needed to stand over here. It was very helpful of her.

Anyway, I took a train from Niigata to Tokyo (2 1/2 hours), then Tokyo to Shinjuku (10 minutes), then finally Shinjuku to Hon Atsugi (1 hour). As I left the platform in Hon Atsugi, I was the only white person around. As a result, my contact from Amada, found me without needing to be called. I walked through the gate and there was a tap on my shoulder. "Are you Jonathan?" Bingo, we're good to go.

He wanted to quickly take me to dinner before going to the hotel. I had chosen Japanese BBQ for my meal of choice tonight, and the BBQ place is literally a 15-20 second walk from the exit of the train station. Same parking lot. Supposedly this is a super premium BBQ place as well. Prices were odd. Anything from $10 for something small to $60 for the "good meat" package. This is the massaged beef that is considered the best in the world. So that I didn't feel like I was taking advantage of the people, I allowed them to order for me. I was going to eat anything. Yoshi, my contact, also invited a girl he works with (Hitome) to join us. She handles European customers, where as Yoshi is a North American contact.

It seems they wanted to dazzle me with the meal. He ordered the premium beef and a beer. But then they kept ordering more. Throughout the meal, I ate cow tongue and stomach, the premium beef, regular beef, raw ground beef that has a raw egg poured on it, and a few other things. I was stuffed, and the meal was SO good. I give this the best meal of my trip. And it was completely free, which is even better.

After dinner, we took a cab ride over to Forum246. That's the name of Amada's hotel. It's attached to their headquarters, and it's entirely staffed by Amada employees. When I walked in, I was given a piece of paper to sign, saying my name, age, and what company I was from. Then I was handed my room key and that's it.

I'm exhausted now, and Yoshi is going to meet me downstairs in 11 hours to begin my tour of Amada. I'm really looking forward to it.