Summing it Up

If you’re wondering why the pace has slowed down around here, well, it’s because my time in Japan has come to an end. After three months and no job — no job that wouldn’t require me to stay for years, anyway — my tourist visa expired and I had to hop a plane back to the U.S. Not that sticking around for a few years wouldn’t be fun, but that would require making my relationship a long-distance relationship again, and we’ve both had quite enough of that.

So, how to sum up my vegetarian experience? …

Kyoto: Kitchen Raku Raku

Our first night in Kyoto, we stayed at a Zen Buddhist temple in the Myōshin-ji complex near Kinkaku-ji (the Golden Pavilion). It was a great experience: we slept in the recently-built guest house rather than in the small main temple building itself, but we got to attend a Zen meditation class and have a private tour of the temple, which was established in 1590. Vice Abbot Taka Kawakami speaks good English, having spent something like 8 years in the U.S., and also had plenty of restaurant recommendations for us.

Miso Ramen (A Cautionary Tale)

On the way to the Tokyo National Museum yesterday, we stopped to eat near Ueno Station. Just a door or two to the right of the restaurant with this hard-to-miss display was a shop with omu-raisu, or what looked to be a plain omelette draped over rice, displayed in the window. Not much to that, but our meal was going to be both breakfast and lunch, so it wasn’t too big of a deal. I ended up finding something besides the omelette that I could order, and a good thing too — I learned later that the “raisu” in omu-raisu is chicken rice. So I was even more glad that there had been something else I could eat.

Or was there?

Breakfast, Lunch, and Dinner at the Tokyo Sanuki Club

Well, I’ve crash-landed in Tokyo, and eating vegetarian is definitely just as much of a challenge as I expected — although if there’s one important thing I’ve learned, it’s that it’s certainly doable if you’re not set on eating Japanese food. I’ve already been out for Indian twice and Italian once, all within a 15-minute walk from where we’re staying at the Tokyo Sanuki Club in Azabu-Juuban. Unfortunately, I”m traveling with a non-vegetarian who loves seafood and all Japanese food in general, so I end up holding him back from the kinds of foods he’d like to experience. Luckily, we’ll be here through the spring, so there should be plenty of time to taste everything.

We’ve eaten a breakfast, two lunches, and a dinner at the hotel restaurant during the 4 days we’ve been here, with varying results for me. Read on for all the details.