HAPPY BIRTHDAY SHARI!!!!!

Last Friday belonged to my most excellent friend Shari.Shari and I. It was her birthday, and so I planned a little to-do for her at a fabulous lounge called UNICE in Daikenyama. We invited all of the good folks that we work with (and Hiro:)) GO BUNNY GO! Everyone thoroughly enjoyed the all-you-can-drink deal for fifteen bucks, despite some poor folks having to get to work at ten in the morning the next day!

A little background on Shari is definitely necessary…….She and I met when she moved to Tokyo from Florida and joined the crew that I spend my days wondering about weird, weird students with. She’s been a fixture in my life since then, and has never failed to make me feel GREAT about my colour choices……for some reason we always end-up with matching outfits in the office:) We made a mad attempt to join a Salsa dance class together, but never actually managed to swing it because the teacher called-in sick TWO WEEKS IN A ROW! We’ve now given-up on THAT and have decided to join a cooking class:) Looks like we’ll be learning a little of the French cooking. I’ll keep you updated on that one.

OH! Hanami!

As some of you already know, this last week has been the week when the cherry blossom trees blossom in Japan. cherry blossoms This is a mad-house national event, in Japan, and EVERYONE makes a point of getting out to view the flowers. As it happens, I ended-up heading out to various places 5 or 6 times this year, and got to REALLY appreciate the festivities:) Most people go with friends or coworkers and spend the day/evening drinking, relaxing and generally enjoying the first hints of Spring. If EVER a man needed more time in his schedule book, this would be it!

The tour guide…..

This weekend has been absolutely WONDERFUL! I got to act as a guide for my friend Hiro. Hiro

Hiro is from Hokkaido, which is the big island at the top of Japan. He moved to Tokyo a few months ago and had never had a chance to visit my lovely town of Yokohama. He is now living in a place called Mukogakoyuen, which is in Tokyo. He tells me that there used to be a theme park there and that’s how the place got it’s name.

So, after a bit of a late start (no worries, Hiro:)) we headed off to see the sites. Yokohama is quite famous for a lot of things, not the least of which is Aka Renga. Yokohama Port area Aka Renga used to be a storage depot back in the day, but has been converted to a shopping area. It has kept all of the original building structure, however, so it’s like shopping in an old barn:)

In the photo, you can also see some of the more famous buildings in Yokohama. This make-up the most popular of the shopping areas in the city and it’s FULL of couples strolling and enjoying themselves on the weekend.

We started-off there and made a bit of a circle tour. Our plan was to get to Motomachi Chukagai, which is Yokohama’s China Town. China Town
Here we hoped to have a lovely dinner of proper Chinese food. So, we got there and started looking at the restaurant windows on the main street. EVERY restaurant was charging about $20 for a plate of whatever!!! Anyway, we headed-off down a side-street and found a FAB little restaurant that was packed with people and managed to get a dinner for two for the same price as a single dish at the other places! Word to the wise here…….side-streets ROCK!

Once dinner was all done (it was SUPER delicious!) we started walking back toward where we had started. By now it was dark out and all of the skyline was lit-up. Yokohama Skyline

It was an absolutely WONDERFUL day! I hope you all like the photos…..I’ll be sure to add more from our next adventure……wherever that may be!