Chu Toro , Clubbing, TV, Valentines chocolates, nomnom and random stuff.

I love Chu Toro ( sometimes written Cyu Toro ) . I love it so much I feel like I need to have it some every 3 days on average.

There are several type of Tuna : some are different species, some are just a different part of the "classic" tuna. In order (of price ) :

• Maguro, the classic one. Good sushi.
• Bincho Maguro : A different variety, really good.
• Bin Toro : I think this is the same as bincho maguro or at least it's related in term of tatse (and price ) Have a look at this Bin Toro picture on flickr
• Cyu Toro : OMG OMG OMG ! So good :-) This is the real stuff : slightly fatty, really tender and delicious. My Favorite. on the expensive side though.
• Ootoro : The most expensive and fat part of the tuna, and apparently the most appreciated too. I like it, but it's not my favorite, and it's really expensive too.

By the way the sushis in Japan are so much better than in Europe. I mean this is something to be expected , right, but there's a combination of factors that makes it an amazing experience : The huge choice, the amount of fish (basically at least the double of what you get in Europe ), the freshness, the choice in terms of fish parts ( ref. above : this is some of the tuna sushis. Some! ), and the very reasonable price - of course, not everywhere, but you can find affordable and good places).
Wonderful.

Fiat Caffe

Last saturday, the 20th, I went to a club with some friends, and met new people (swedish, japanese etc).

The Fiat Caffe in Aoyama is a very "design" place ( as you can see here ) divided in 2 sections : the club itself, where we watched a cool concert of acid jazz and electro, filled with "arty" people with a definite sense of fashion.

The upper part is a bar lounge with DJs .

Another good night in Tokyo.

A walk around the Tokyo station.

I definitely need a new camera. Actually, 2 : A small one, because I mine takes too much place, and a big one, because the pictures Luca & jeremy takes are so much better than mines.
I walked around the Tokyo station, in the Otemashi area, where I once more saw beautiful modern architecture, and a delightful fountain garden next to the Emperor's garden. With the sunset it would have been a marvelous picture, but since I'm an idiot I forgot the camera. Oh well, it's nice memories anyway.

Japanese TV

I've been asked about the Japanese TV . Well, I must say I've never been a big fan of TV *ever* . I watch movies, TV series, but I'm not so much into TV.

So I haven't been that curious about the Japanese TV either.
However, in the Komagome Onsen, there was a TV in the Sauna :

The TV show displayed then was hilarious and very "Japanese cliche" (as we think of it in France at least), it involved some people in uncomfortable situations, strange humor ( some guy talking in Japanese to people in India or something and then laughs at the misunderstanding) , and a "reporter" woman discovering wild life while having a giant pair of fake, bushy eyebrows ( WTF?! ).

There were also quizz about how much force is deployed by the claws of a king crab (+300 kg for the big bastard !) versus a small dog, or so I understood. She then hold something that looked like the mix between a huge hamster & a huge mole, and when I say huge it was as big as a dog ! It looked cute, and it was actually very friendly, but I couldn't help thinking there's something creepy about a giant-sized hamster.

If someone knows the name of the show, please let me know.

BTW , for a good laugh, have a look at Japanese ads with Arnold Schwarzenegger :-)

Valentines chocolates :

Japenese have a few traditions for Valentines day, including chocolates. But the nice twist here is that girls are the ones offering the chocolates !

Here's some fun ones (small pic, mobile phone)

Nom nom nom

2 days ago Luca and I decided to go to a BBQ place at Meguro, for some ribs & beef parts. It was ok but we had a better & cheaper one in Ginza (a Korean place).
In a very cliche moment, on our way home Luca mentioned he had Pecorino cheese at his place, to which I replied I had wine, a great Medoc :-)
So we bought even more cheese & bread and had more food in a very Italian / French fashion. Neat !

Seen in the tube :

lol I love this stuff 

Random pics from another evening :

Pictures courtesy of Jeremy Kwok. The quality and colors are great.

Serious times

Soyo, with me posing in a very classic Japanese way :-)

Monster is happy :-)

( sort of private joke )

Careful this last one is slightly NSFW ( girl in bikini ) . Click to see it.

Birthday parties

 Ok, for a much less "emo" post, here's what we did over 2 evenings for my birthday.

1st evening took place on the 15th, at "Chum's apartment", a good looking restaurant / lounge suggested by Bryant.

They serve a mix of occidental & japanese style food, tasty & well presented. We even had foie-gras ( neat ! ). 

We had great dinner and a few drinks, but not too much as it was monday.


Pictures courtesy of Jeremy Kwok. I didn't have my own camera, but anyway his camera and pictures are much better. Makes me want to buy a new camera.

Truls & Mickael (sorry Luca, I don't have time to edit this picture and you're cut in half !) :

Bryant, Truls, Luca, Myself & David

Jeremy :

David and me :

Bryant :

Thank you people for the evening (and the bill :-) ! )

The second evening took place on Friday, a much better day for partying all night :-)

We went for drinks ( as usual on friday ) & then went to an Izakaya in Shibuya, followed by a club in Ginza , Sabaku No Bara (not sure of the spelling here) where Tom, Tom's friends, Terje, Mikael, Alessandro & Luca spent the night.

The club was good, and people were cool. There were gogo dancers ( including Tom's friends) & pole dancers... Ok, I tried 3 times to write this sentence, but no matter how I put it, it sounds pretty sleazy, but whatever :

The pole dancers had incredible & complex moves. It's impressive how thin they are compared to the amount of effort that must be required for such moves ( I'm thinking for instance when they stand perpendicular to the pole). The gogo dancers were fantastic :-)

At one point I got a birthday cocktail and a nice picture I may or may not put later on here !

Good times !

Adding a year to the counter.

(will post dinner pics later on ! )

Last monday I turned 29.



Rock on.

A much needed update

It starts here, 04th of December 2009 ...

http://tristanintokyo.blogspot.com/2009/12/much-needed-update.html

Kamakura / Enoshima

Kamakura !

( can someone explain why the cat has a baseball bat and why this guy is walking ... a boar ?!? )

Luca wanted to go somewhere outside Tokyo , either Yokohama or Kamakura. Since I have a rather peculiar experience with traveling ( maybe I'll blog about it, but to sum it up a friend of mine pretend I've done something bad in an earlier life and I'm being punished about it ), I chose Kamakura because I had reference in a guide :-)

We decided to start the visit with the Island next to Kamakura , Enoshima


We had a delicious meal in a nice restaurant, but two meals were delivered to us by mistake. We thought they were starters ( admittedly, we were concerned about the size) , so we ate them anyway.
The food had eyes.

I'm not sure if it was worms or fish but it was disgusting ( not to the taste, but to the view).

( pic courtesy of mr Luca )

Then the real food arrived and I had the best Sashimi ever. EVER.

Seriously it's so good I'm salivating just to think about them. I want more now, dammit !

:-)

( pic courtesy of mr Luca )

Then we walk around the Island, walking by shrines, food store, nice views etc
later on we went to Hase to visit a huuuuuge buddha, and Kamakura center.

Buddha's sandals :

Random pics from the trip :

GLARBLAGLAAAH

Triforce ?

Wishes

Even the food is cute :

Lovely

Ghibli merchandise shop, really nice :

The police force is ready to take on the triads.

Holy cat doesn't care about sacred stones

wtf dog :-)

Dancing cats :-)

And finally :

4th February to 12th february : Partying ( mainly )

Thursday the 4th

Lot of going out. I went to Omotosando and had a awesome Hawaiian burger with a girl I met earlier in a party not related here (because I haven't kept notes, but it was a cool club in Shibuya called "Ever") .

Huge and good burger. Then we moved to some French / Japanese meet-up party, which sucked ( sorry guys, maybe we were not into it, maybe it was the fact you advertised 150 people while in reality you were 30-40 hanging around ), then Rock No Cocoro, a great rock bar in Shibuya.

The next day I went out with Tom, Jeremy and Soyo to a bar in Aoyama , where we met some friends of him, gogo dancers. They performed a show I definitely can't either describe or put in pictures in such a blog :-)
I know it sounds sleazy and all but hell, it was cool, it was great, sexy dancing and it was good fun, I take complete responsability over the fact I enjoyed it.
The bar had huge windows that looked directly over the street, I imagine the people had an interesting WTF moment when passing by. More people arrived all of a sudden :-)

On Saturday the 6th

, I went with Luca & the friend from Thursday to Shibuya, where we had drinks, food, and then went to Club Asia to see Passion Pit.

We were later joined by other friends, including Tom.
Everyone went for Passion Pit, and they were good, but I think the Dj who came after them, some Japanese guy with blond hair, was much better. Awesome, actually.

Sunday  7th:

At this point I was quite dead as you can imagine, from partying and alcohol consumption. I still managed to visit the area around the imperial palace.

And later on, I joined Luca for ome food in Roppongi and a Salsa club, where Luca demonstrated his impressive dance skills. I'm jealous ( in a good way ) and think I should learn some day. I need to find some girl willing to teach me and join me for lesson, I really miss this in my "life skill set" . And then we'll fly to Cuba because whether it's for the dancing, the ambiance or the Mojito, I dream about going there sometimes !

Wednesday  the 10th:

Out in Shibuya again ! I met Terje and Tom in a bar for a few drinks. We then went to EN, a place so bad it was fun. Bad because the best song in the evening was Beyonce, and bad because (quoting Tom) "the guys at the table next to us made me lose faith in humanity" :-) Anyway, free drinks covered (barely) for the badness of the place, as well as Tom's charming friends. We then moved to Rock No Cocoro where I met new people & party. Good evening overall !

Next day is a bank holiday so all is good ...

Friday the 12th :
Out in Tokyo again. I should start being careful, it's been a lot of evening out lately but hey, I have circumstances + I am in Tokyo, none of those will apply for long.
So, I dropped by Rock No Cocoro as I was waiting for a friend. I didn't realize it was one of these Valentines evening. It was ... interesting,!
Funny moment : some guy wearing a happy panda mask :-)
I also met some Japanese girls who lived in Sweden for years (wtf) and 3 Norwegians people (wtf2) .
Tom called me for a regroup at Le Baron.
Le Baron is hilarious, It's a the same place as Le Baron in Paris : Posh, rude, full of superficial people who pretend to be important (there were also cool people, just to be clear) . It was interesting anyway, although really the music could have been better.
Oh, and I met one cool person, so it wasn't totally wasted.

Sometimes around those days I've also shown Ginza to Luca, who recently joined us in Japan. We visited the Sony center, and watched the prototypes of 3D TVs ! :-)
We played WipeOut HD on PS3, in "real" 3D this time, which was amazing even if I think the technology is not perfect yet.

WTF

View from my balcony this morning :