New Years & Snow

As is the tradition we celebrated New Years with a feast at the Miyakoda's

Everything is so beautiful it almost seems like you shouldn't eat it...until you taste it and then you can't stop. 

Panithi, our intern from Thailand, also joined us this year, and of course no meal is complete without special new year's sake

Everyone takes a few deep breaths before we begin round 2

 Last Sunday we got quite a bit of snow here in Tokyo.  At first it looked like it would not accumulate, but by mid morning it became clear that was not the case.

It was fun to get out and walk in the snow which lasted all day long

Main Street in Kugahara 

The less traveled streets were much prettier than the main roads

And yes there were a few reports of bigfoot sightings.

As long as the trains are running life is 'normal' in Tokyo. 

Kiri in Tokyo

Just before Christmas Aya's friend Kiri came home from New York and stayed with us in Tokyo for a few days before going to see her family in Kyoto.  We had the entire day Sunday to hang out and do whatever Kiri wanted...

...which was eat her favorite Japanese foods and walk around Japanese alleys.  Pretty much a typical Sunday for us, so we recommended Togoshi-ginza to begin our adventure. 

 Our first stop was Ramen for lunch to give us energy to explore all of the alleys we could find

One of Kiri's favorite foods is Kara-age, or fried chicken tenders, & Togoshi-ginza is making a name for itself with its many kara-age shops.  So we decided to verify the "expert" rankings by trying kara-age from as many of the top shops as we possibly could.

Our first stop was ranked #1 by a television food show, and did not disappoint.  Perfectly golden brown fried thigh tenders with an amazing spicy yuzu-kosho (citrus-pepper) dipping sauce.  DELICIOUS!!! and definitely deserving it ranking.

Stop #3 is a local favorite that Aya and I stop at often.  Very casual spot to grab a drink and enjoy all kinds of chicken.  Unfortunately I forgot to take a picture at the 2nd shop because they only have a window and it came fresh out of the fryer so we all ate it so fast no one had anytime to take pictures.  Maybe next time?

 Compai!  I guess they have never heard a southern US-Japanese drawl before.  It was fun talking with Kiri.  We spoke a type of Japaglish where we both reverted to our native language when we got to words we did not know in Japanese or English.

 Kiri wants to remember this when she gets home...to N.Y. City, where she said chicken is decent but people tend to throw the bones on the floors of the subway when they are finished, which made us all laugh

Kara-age + beer = double good

Finally a lite snack at home before Kiri had to leave to catch her bus to Osaka.  I know you are asking how we could eat and drink so much, and the truth is I have no idea.  We'll just call it talent and years of dedication and training.