sushi

street sounds

Everywhere I go I feel like robots are singing to me. Things make happy music–from the street lights to the subway doors, to the washer and the toilet.

Here I was waiting for the train. There are speakers that play fake bird sounds on a loop while you wait. It’s trippy. I hear them in my sleep.

For the visually impaired there is an audio cue for crossing large streets in Tokyo. Some sound like birds, some are little songs, some are beeps.

Really???

I find myself curious and pleasantly confused on a regular basis.

Oh really?! Is he now?

Are these people really lining up for McDonald's???

The Burning Building? Really? That's what you decided to call this place?

a dumb moment in the bathroom

I wasn't paying attention, so I pushed the button; it said PUSH. I only looked at picture #1, so I thought it might automatically dispense a specific amount of tp. Alas, no. I should have looked at #2 and #3, maybe then I wouldn't have sprayed myself with toilet seat cleaner. At least it had a flowery happy smell.

misoshiro & fried tofu

My neighbor taught me how to make a chicken and vegetable misoshiro. It's supposedly a winter soup, but it was really cold and rainy earlier this week, so it was just the thing to make.

First we need some supplies so we went to the supermarket where they play super happy elevator music versions of classic rock and cheezy 80's hits. I get a kick out of that place. The ingredients include: chicken, shitake and buna-shimeji mushrooms (aka beech mushrooms), carrots, potatoes, a leek, white miso, kombu (a kind of seaweed), tofu, dashi (a soup stock) and a few small peppers.

As a side dish we made some fried tofu. It's pretty simple. First, cut up the tofu. We made the pieces small so that they'd cook quickly. We were really hungry. Fry the tofu in vegetable oil. Flip the pieces so all sides brown. Then put them on some paper towels to soak up the oil. Top the tofu with finely shredded daikon (a big radish), bonito flakes, seaweed, soy sauce and some rice vinegar.
The place where I can make food in my apartment can hardly be called a kitchen. It's super small; so small that my neighbor and I had to utilize both of our kitchens just to make dinner. The misoshiro came out great, the tofu was really yummy, and it was a lot of fun to hang out and cook with my neighbor.

miss koco: the podcast

Oh yeah, by the way, if you want to hear more messages and responses I put the more interesting ones on the podcast. You can subscribe to it using itunes by going to the advanced menu, then "subscribe to podcast" and paste the address below into the window. Voila!

http://misskoco.podbean.com/feed/

Or you can check it out from time to time at http://misskoco.podbean.com

トイレはどこですか。

One of the first things I learned in Japanese was how to ask where the bathroom is, "Toire wa doko desu ka?" When I got to my new apartment I was pretty surprised and impressed to find this:

Before I get into the details, there's a tangential story that must be told. If you notice, I don't have toilet paper in this picture. A box of household items provided by the company I'm working for was due to arrive on my second day. Thus, for the first night they provided a package of 20 or so individual use tissue packs (like the ones you might throw in your purse. The sign next to the tissues said that they were providing them to avoid "a crisis." I couldn't help but laugh at that one. I mean yes, I wanted tp, otherwise I would have had to go out and get my own. I just thought the word usage was cute and comical.

Toilets here have all kinds of ridiculous features. First of all, when I get close to my toilet a fan starts. The seat is always warm. There is a remote on the side with additional things you can do. There's a bidet spray or a more general spray. The water is warm and you can adjust it on the remote. There's also a stop button. On some toilets there's a music note button. I thought maybe it would play a song, but it plays a digital flushing sound.

I like the water saving features the most. There are two kinds of flushes: 1. a small flush, 2. a big flush. Once you flush the water starts to flow out of the faucet on the top into the sink on the top of the tank. The tank fills and you can wash your hands.

I tried to explain this on the hello happy line but apparently some people just didn't get it.

I've been really nice about the messages I've been getting. I don't want to discourage anyone from calling. I like the bizarre ones, I love the artsy poetic ones, even the kid with an addiction problem was awesome, but these two... who are these people? I'm up for listening to just about anything, but... the guy is the worst. Are they on drugs? Are people that bored?

If anyone is so bored that they want to call and leave a ten minute message like that one, I suggest watching some Japanese television instead.

the last 2 min. are the best.

so so fabulous

I'm in Japan. So much to process, so much to do. The update on how cute my apartment is, on how everything has a happy song, on all the good stuff I'm eating, on my hilarious toilet, and other observations are coming soon. Till then...

2+2 is 4