The best thing about having a break is going out without the sense of urgency I normally feel. I do not have to hurry. I can take my time, walk slowly.
First I booked an appointment with a health spa in town for next Tuesday. That’s a first for me, a result of my rather severe upbringing. That kind of self indulgence was considered ‘common’. Consequently my muscles ache with stress related knots. Time for a 60 minute pounding.
I spent the rest of my first day off taking it fairly easy, doing some light shopping: A Jamie Oliver cook book for a family member, a new soundcard for myself (to be installed in a new computer to be bought later this year or next year), a ‘rocket air blower’ to clean the dust off my camera’s sensor. Looked at boots and sneakers, none took my fancy. Looked at jackets, none fit.
In my quest to test all the Japanese sushi places in town, I settled at Tokyo Cafe on Spui. I think they fancy themselves a rather chique ‘grand cafe and restaurant’, with the staff in traditional black and white clothing. But my overall experience was less favourable. It’s hard to see inside from the outside, and the first impressions were ‘tacky’ and ‘stuck in the 70s’. A waiter told me to shut the door behind me. I thought he sounded a little rude, but I did as I was told.
Someone had parked their Vespa in the front bar and the place looked like it hadn’t been open in a while. I was shown to my table where, once seated, there was a distinct whiff of the sewer.
All the staff were Chinese. Is there ANY Japanese restaurant in town where the staff isn’t Chinese? Have Japanese people all been deported? What’s the story there?
I ordered edamame, sashimi sake, sashimi hotategai, nigiri hokegai and nigiri ebi. And some sake to drink.
The sake tasted a little funny, but it may have been the cup they served it inl. The edamame was fresh and warm, but I wasn’t sure of their sashimi sake (salmon), and I definitely didn’t like the slices of lemon they put between the hotategai (scallops). The lemon just didn’t taste very nice in combination with the soy sauce and wasabi. I wasn’t impressed with their nigiri sushi either, the rice wasn’t sticky enough.
The rest of the day I spent encoding videos to upload to youtube.com. You can check them out, but it’s all old people’s music.