Food Shopping
Grocery shopping on New Year’s Eve in Tokyo is every bit as bad as grocery shopping on Christmas Eve in Belfast. Normally I would avoid doing this but we only got back yesterday. In Belfast, when I wanted to go food shopping before a major holiday, I would go to somewhere like Tesco in the middle of the night. But here in Tokyo we don’t have 24 hour mega grocery stores. Normally I don’t miss them but being able to go to one shop would have made things easier today.
The first shop I went to was so crowded it was hard to get inside. I persevered as it’s the only local shop where I can buy cheddar cheese. The second shop I went to wasn’t much better. I wanted to see the display of crab and fish but I couldn’t face fighting my way through the crowds to do this. I quickly decided that we weren’t going to have any traditional Japanese New Year food and instead bought the ingredients for making chicken soup, Irish stew, and chili. The only Japanese thing I bought was a black Ebisu stout in the hope that I can use this instead of Guinness in my stew.
I’m also not going to eat soba to welcome the New Year. Instead I’m thinking about chocolate and champagne, though neither of those things is likely to help me have a long life.
Happy New Year!
December 30th, 2009 at 5:58 pm
Glad you are home safe – was nice to see you and hear Marty 🙂
Strange how your laugh was unaffected by the lost voice though…
December 31st, 2009 at 1:05 pm
It did still affect my laugh but nowhere near as much as my voice. It’s starting to come back again so Marty’s New Year might not be as peaceful as he was hoping 🙂