d&h : in Japan for 3 years

Miyakojima

We went to Miyakojima in Okinawa with a friend.  The island is mostly flat with many beautiful beaches surrounded by coral reefs.

We had lots of yummy Okinawan food, including sea grapes (a kind of seaweed) and goya (bitter melon) stir fry.

We also had the most delicious lobster lunch!

We went to a local izakaya where the owner performed traditional Okinawan songs and also shot fireworks at the beach.

We visited about half a dozen beaches including doing lots of snorkeling.

The sand at this beach was amazingly fine and white.

The snorkeling was quite fun.  We saw clown fish among the colorful reef fish and many different kinds of coral.

We hiked along the beach to a cave where we swam to a stalagmite formation.  We saw a huge fish while we were snorkeling back.

Can you see what’s looking back?

Overall, it was a nice long weekend in the sand, sun and sea.

Hakone Girls’ Weekend

My friend and I went to Hakone for the weekend to enjoy the cooler climate while it was still hot in Tokyo.  We arrived on Saturday night and had a relaxing time at the onsen.  The ryokan had a nice view of the lake and all the green hills.

We went to the Hakone Shrine and took the pirate boat across the lake with views of Mount Fuji in the distance.

We toured around Owakudani and ate some eggs boiled in the sulfuric pools.  Their shells turn black and each one you eat is supposed to add 7 years to your life!

We also took a stroll around the silver grass meadow as well before returning to the ryokan and relaxing in the onsen.

There was beautiful weather for our trip and it was such a relaxing and fun weekend!  Thanks M!

Dance Dance Awaodori

Besides the big Awaodori festival in Shikoku, Koenji, near Shinjuku, holds another festival with many dance groups – including Microsoft!

We hung out and watched the colorful dance groups – the kids were especially cute.

They each had “bands” with them and some of them were quite interesting.

Check out the shoes and the hats they danced in!

French around the corner

I guess it’s been a while since we’ve had a good food porn post so here goes…

While Henry was checking out the restaurants around our neighborhood one day, he ran across a French restaurant right around the corner from our apartment – Restaurant Bacar.  It was ranked Top 50 Tokyo restaurants on a popular restaurant review website.  I called 2 months ahead for 2 days to get a reservation and it was clear that this place booked up fast.  We went to celebrate our anniversary with a special dinner.

The waiter was quite entertaining and we started off with an amuse of caramel covered cherry tomato with salt and pepper.

We also had the bagna cauda made with crab miso for dipping lots of fresh, colorful veggies including an oyster leaf (that really tasted like fresh oyster!) and fried ayu!

Then we had an appetizer of eel and foie gras with mango.

Yummy! The main dish was a roasted quail filled with grains.

We also had a rice course – I had chicken and negi and Henry had eel.  Dessert was peach with chamomile ice cream and hazelnut souffle.  It was an amazing, simple, delicious meal that ended with freshly made caramel.

Collon

It’s called “Collon” and it looks like a colon with white filling.  Looks similar to an american treat…hrmm