Indeed we returned yesterday evening to the same sushi restaurant as the day before, for one of our last meals in Japan, because the end of this voyage is rapidly approaching! During our dinner, we were preparing ourselves for our today's meeting with our precious Japanese friends Toshiharu-san and his wife Setsuko-san, because we were realising that we had trouble to remember what we did see 2,5 weeks ago and even the day before yesterday was already gone out of our vivid memory: there is so many of it! and those Japanese names are so difficult to remember! Anyway with my photo-logbook (yes, that is another log besides of this webblog....) we succeeded to make a hit parade of the 6 best places we liked most and in general we highly enjoyed in comparison to our previous 2 Japanese voyages the authentic pilgrims, although in 2008 version, which are still actively part of the Japanese landscape. On top of that we loved the nature at this period of the year: lots of flowers in all kind of colours.
This morning only the 2 of us left with the 10.25 a.m. flight Okinawa to return to Tokyo (2,5 hrs flight to Haneda airport); since we had to meet our friends tonight we preferred to take an earlier flight than the initial planned flight at 2.05 p.m.
Around 2.30 p.m. we checked in our hotel (which I know by now by heart, very convenient!) and we rapidly left for the nearby district Yanaka, an old part of Tokyo with narrow streets, small houses and particular shops, where we finally found the roasted green (Japanese, of course!) tea we were looking for.
Back to our hotel to take a shower - it is pretty hot in Tokyo today, though not that humid like Okinawa in the south - and get ready for the farewell dinner. We got a little lost in the huge Tokyo (central) station, but we managed to find the restaurant in due time, where both Toshiharu-san and Setsuko-san were already waiting for us, with the 3 flags of Japan, the Netherlands and France! The restaurant is familiar to me, but still very exciting, because the food - Toshiharu-san choose again the shabu-shabu (Japanese variant of hot pot) - is exceptional delicious, accompanied by champaign and (French, of course!) Burgundy red wine and.... the presence of Satomi, the daughter of our friends!
It was hard ;-) working to get through the dinner and the presents, because the restaurant closed its doors already at 10.00 p.m., but the Delft Blue soja-set, Royal Crystal Leerdam presse-papiers and the Mariage Frères tea have been highly appreciated by our Japanese hosts. Right now I can not say anything about the gifts we have been presented, besides of the dinner, because such is still a surprise for our friend Florence.
Anyway it was an evening which we will not forget and we hope we can see each other all together again somewhere very soon; maybe Satomi will come over to Paris this year for holidays!
Tomorrow we will spend our last day in Japan, in Tokyo; the day after, Friday we will leave our hotel around 7 a.m.
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