Sort of Okonomiyaki and an Event at Porta

The next morning, it was time to say goodbye to George. We decided to try for an early lunch in the underground shops near the station that I mentioned earlier. We found a place that had various types of okonomiyaki displayed behind glass at the entrance to the shop. I have always wanted to try this dish, so we went inside. What we had was pretty good, I thought. It comes as a “pancake” of sorts (egg, some sort of batter, sprouts, various bits of meat) with fish flakes floating and waving gently on the top. A rich sauce is available and you can apply Japanese mayo and other goodies. George said he has had better at “real” okonomiyaki joints (guess I will have to seek one out in the future) and the girls didn’t care for it. I liked it! We also tried some octopus balls. On the way out, it seemed they were filming/recording some sort of radio or TV show in the mall.

Oh, one thing I forgot to mention.  There are a lot of signs, brand names, etc that don’t make much sense to foreigners in Japan and can even be quite shocking.  Sometimes it seems almost intentionally so.  This was a gem:

Faggot Brand Shoes (photo by Sarah Chang)

We said goodbye to George who was headed back home (near Osaka). We had a great time with him! Hope I can make it back before another 6-7 years go by. We had a look at the Shinkansen entrance (since we were in the station) that we would be using in a few days.

Shinkansen Trains

After that, we weren’t sure what to do. It looked like rain, and we didn’t have set plans for the day. We decided to check out the grocery store in the nearby department store. Groceries in Japan are bought on the bottom floors of big department stores like Isetan, Takashimaya, etc. We headed down to a basement floor and sure enough, we found it.

Grocery shopping in Japan is an experience, especially if it’s a “market” type store. Everywhere, staff are yelling “irashaimase!!” (welcome) You hear it over and over, throughout the entire market. Some of the staff are chirping it to the customers nearby, others yell it at the top of their lungs, addressing the whole store.

Peaches, Melon, Beef in Japan (bottom two photos by Sarah Chang)

The fruit and produce is particularly stunning. Japanese take great pride in produce. Each fruit is usually individually wrapped and protected. Everything gets peeled before it is eaten- peaches, apples, even something as small as a grape.  Three items kept popping up at all of the groceries we eventually visited: peaches, melons and “muscat of Alexandria” (like a grape).  Some of the melons are perfect looking and go for $150 and up in gift boxes.  And, of course, the beef in Japanese markets is an exquisite wonder (and priced accordingly).

After this adventure we just wandered around Kyoto Station a bit. There is quite a lot to explore.

Vendors in the Station Shops (note the mask)

A lot of people in Japan wear these surgical masks.  I’m not sure if the woman above was wearing hers in order to protect the food or herself.  Many people, however, walk around with them all day in public to protect themselves from unseen threats like swine flu and whatever else may be lurking in the air.  At any rate, shortly after I took this photo, the workers began holding up their hands in an “X” shape and saying “no photo!”  That’s fine with me, lesson learned I guess.

Speaking of this, there seems to be two places you can’t take pictures in Japan.  One is inside mall-like places.  The other is in arcades (game centers).  The mall thing does not surprise me because it’s sort of the same in the US, though you rarely get called out on it.  I usually feel I have a good sense of what is OK to photo and what isn’t- I’m not going to break out my DSLR in the middle of the Chanel or Gucci store- however some people in these casual shops seemed more sensitive to the camera than I thought they might.  The game centers, however, are militant about it and I don’t know why.  If you so much as point your camera at the arcade machines, one or more staff will instantly let you know it’s prohibited.  Still haven’t figured that one out.  Either way, I stop taking the photos and apologize politely in these situations, especially while traveling to another country.

It began to rain. And pour. It rained so hard that even the inside of the station area became quite wet. The nature of Kyoto station is to be very open and exposed to the elements.

Kyoto Station Rain Storm

After watching the rain and the people caught in it for a while, we decided to spend the rest of the day shopping around the station. We started getting hungry, so we looked at some options near the top floors. Ultimately, we decided on a placed called “Tonkatsu | Wako.” The place specializes in tonkatsu or fried pork cutlet. My wife and I each got a nice cutlet with a heaping portion of shredded cabbage with sauce (typical side for tonkatsu) They also had donburi (pork, egg, rice) available and it was also delicious. Donburi is usually Sarah’s favorite.

Delicious Tonkatsu Wako (photo by Sarah Chang)

That was about it. It was a slow day but we got to see some regular life and really explore our immediate surroundings. Besides, we needed the break. The day before had been intense and tomorrow would be a big day- one of my favorite days of the whole trip.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, August 12th, 2009 at 11:04 PM and is filed under Travel. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.