Places I'm visiting: Japan 2024 Day Two

Had a fairly random day of wandering in Tokyo yesterday. Spent the morning in Shibuya looking at guitars with my son and then visited one of Tokyo's giant record stores, in this case Tower Records (still alive and well in Japan), with its eight floors of offerings. I spent my time on the 8th floor, which is entirely classical. The selection is amazing. Thousands and thousands of CDs and LPs to look at. 

The Japanese have a tendency to be very thorough about everything they go about. In another record store I stopped into, the storage accessory section (outer sleeves and inner sleeves of every description) alone was as big as a small record store at home. 

Earlier, I came across a store selling children's school backpacks, which are a big deal in Japan. They are typically red or black, made of high-quality leather, built to last, costing hundreds of dollars. This store had an unusual range of these all in pastel colors and with large bows – fancy backpacks for the children of the well to do. I didn't look at the prices. 

I wandered through a Sunday morning farmers market. Expensive strawberries were a hot item. A lot of artisan bread. Handmade kitchen utensils. Carrots. Eggs. The carrots in many colors. 

Later in the day, visited Kagurazaka, the neighborhood I lived in when Tokyo was my home. It has changed a great deal. All my favorite restaurants are gone. The area has been tidied up and prettied up with new buildings. There were a few familiar storefronts, though. The noodle shop at the bottom of the street that I used to go to for tempura soba is still there. The Mosburger next door remains. I walked by the two apartments that I lived in that are nearby. The second of these backs on to the compound where the chief  justice of Japan's Supreme Court lives. At the entrance the  guard stationed there 24 hours a day was at his post. As if I'd never left. 

Feet aching from walking, we rested at a fancy Kagurazaka coffee shop where the prices for a cup of joe ranged from about eight dollars to about 15 dollars. Here was another example of the Japanese doing nothing by halves. Each cup is individually brewed and delivered to your table by a uniformed waitress in the beaker it was brewed in, the coffee then poured at the table, the ritual as important as the product. I was happy to pay for the rest that the visit afforded. The place reminded me of a San Francisco Chinatown teahouse in its design with its square cubicles and heavily detailed ceiling. 

We had had extraordinary luck with food at lunchtime, in Shibuya, on spec adding ourselves to the end of a line that had formed in front of Tokyo Tarako, a restaurant that serves nothing but mentaiko (salted cod roe or pollock roe) spaghetti. Absolutely delicious. Mine came with a small pat of herbed butter to melt on top. Many of the selections came with little pots of broth (made from kelp and bonito flakes) that you add to make Japanese-style soup-spaghetti. A treat. Tokyo Tarako is at Shibuya 1 Chome-14-9. They appear to have a sister restaurant in Harajuku as well. At dinner time, we were not so lucky. It was a Sunday night, many stores and restaurants were closed. We were craving good sushi, but had to settle for mediocre yakitori in Jimbocho, the district I worked in as an English teacher when I first arrived in Tokyo. 

Along the way, we passed Yasukuni Shrine, controversial because it enshrines all of Japan's WWII war dead, including the men designated as Class A war criminals by the post-war Tokyo Tribunal. It's a pretty spot, despite the controversy. Pictured here is  the large copper torii at the main entrance.