Japan trip - Day 7

Hello again, thank you so much for all the nice comments urging me to keep posting as regularly as possible!

So day 7 was another calm day spent in the company of my familly (and when that happens there's a ton of food photos of course haha).
As opposed to last year we've been getting up quite early, around 6.30am every day. I am very happy with that, we get to have breakfast together and i find it to be much more respectful as well.
That day, mom made us some soup, scrambled eggs with salad, coffee and I also tried some rather odd cheese.

Corn creamy soup and a Camembert cheese piece.

Scrambled eggs with ham and a lettuce and tomato salad.

American style coffee with "milk" (i took photos of the cute packaged for you guys... they all have different flora pictured)

Cheese Vanilla dessert... little cheese triangles except it takes like cheese and vanilla. Not really what i'd pick from the supermarket but its ok tasting. My sister in law likes these.

After breakfast we just watched the 15min morning NHK soap opera together. I rather like it, its name is Carnation and the main theme is by one of my favorites Ringo Shiina. You can listen to it and watch the pv for the song on Youtube.
After the show, we watched some tv shopping ads and mom sometimes will fall in love with something and order it. So i witnessed one of those moments for the second time ever.

Pretty self explanatory,right?

A kitchen knife for a one time only (only happening that day, not like in my country where they'll same the same but still sell it the next day!) sale price. Quite a reduction but its still a 100euro kitchen knife.

This is mom's current kitchen knife, it has her name carved on it. I guess that proves they take their blades seriously still.

A couple of days later we found out she ordered one for us too. Not sure how customs will like finding a huge bad ass knife in our luggage but... we'll see how it goes.

After that dad took us out for a bit of shopping.

This is the staircase of the building they currently live in.

This is the parking lot outside.

This i think we should copy. It's the trash "tunnel". One just sends the trash out through these and they end up in the dumpster that will then be cleared out by the trash men. (not the recycling of course)

In Japan people can just leave their things out like this and nobody will touch them!

Their gps is not only big but also has tv! They drive while watching tv and we're talking regular folk. So jealous XD

My husband didn't bring a lot of warm clothes and it was getting cold. He also needed a pair of comfortable footwear so we hit the local "cheap footwear" store first.
I got in and found out that the regular shoes for women were boring boring boring BUT the sneakers were not boring at all (they had pink nikes!) and were sooo cheap! I felt sorry for sneaker fans in my country to be honest. They also had hello kitty Ugg style boots for less than 20 euros. i thought of bunny when i saw some of the sneakers (you'd go nuts!) and of Cherie when i saw the uggs. I successfully resisted buying something.

It is quite big.

I love japanese mini cars. You see them much more in the surrounding areas and less in Tokyo. I guess having a car in Tokyo is so expensive (parking!) that subway, JR and buses make a lot more sense so people who have cars have usually super expensive ones. This one is clearly altered to suit the owner's taste.

After buying some kickass tenis shoes we were already hungy and dad chose a place that always makes me laugh due to its name. I had not tried the food though so I was excited. We went to CoCo's curry house, a fast food chain that obviously sells a diverse range of curry.

The logo and signs.

This is what a typical fast food restaurant table looks like: huge colorful menu dragging you in, and toppings and/or free sauce and spice etc. Then you have the napkins and toothpicks and the bell to call the waiter if needed.

I'm adding this for that chart on the top.

 I prefer none spicy food so i can taste it better so I picked the regular one (0level) and dad went for level 5. My husband decided he needed to pick the same level as dad. Level 5 is the highest they'll let you pick the firsty time, the 6~10 levels are available but apparently you need to prove that you are able to eat number 5 to pass onto the next. I see that as a warning but he didn't care.
So obviously it was spicy as heck. Dad ate it as if its not a big deal and my husband ate it all but had to drink a lot of water. I tried a tiny bit, tiny tiny and my tongue hurt for a couple of minutes!

This was the salad that everyone shared.

This was my dish, cheese sausage curry.

So whenever you need cheap clothes I guess everyone just goes to Uniqlo. I ended up getting a Japan heat tech shirt (mom told me to) and a fur beret. The hub got a full outfit and a new coat.
After that we went for a ride and dad took us to the local garden. The weather was a bit crazy as you will see but it was the perfect after lunch stroll on a calm day.

Scary sky!

Vegetation made statue right in the middle of the garden.

One of the hills

After that we went for some errands since not everything was bought yet... and we got back home.

It is not odd for buildings in Japan and in China (probably in other countries that I do not know yet too) to not have an entrance door and instead have an open staircase.

I don't quite remember what we did then but eventually it was dinner time and we went out as a familly again. We did leave early because the place we were going to was always packed and we still waiting in line for a couple minutes. Maybe 6.30pm?
We went to one of those sushi places that have rotating sushi mats. It was cheap and the sushi was pretty good. We ate a TON!

This is what a place like this looks like. You sit on one side and wait for stuff to come out of the kitchen. If you want something that is not coming out just use the computer and ask for it. It'll come as marked for you and only you will pick it up. As simple as that.

Free green tea is always available.

This was a sort of custard.... shrimp tasting. I don't know how to explain what it is. I usually have this here and i like it so...

Free ginger is also always available and its one of my favorite things to eat. I adore this!

I thought this was funny because these tarts look just like the portuguese Pasteis de Nata sort of dessert.

These are all the plates that we accounted for. Each plate was about 1 euro. So basically you can pay 20 euros for 40 pieces of sushi. Not bad huh?

After eating we headed back home but dad took us to visit the famous xmas house again this year. It looks exactly the same, exactly the same. o.o So this year instead of leaving a photo i give you a video. I think you can't really understand just how massive this man's bill must be with just a photo.

We went back and spent some time in the living room as usual. I had fun asking about this and that using my new Japanese culture mini dictionary. It was a gift... its a bit childish but maybe i'll learn more if its hello kitty related!

Isn't this both ridiculous and yet so deliciously adorable? That's pretty much japan in a nutshell.

So after the usual chat and cup of coffee we finally called it a night. Hope you liked reading again,
Love,
Jo