Adventures in Japan

Eleven Pipers Piping

I did not sleep well. I slept a cat-filled sleep. So wrong.

So I was not in the best frame of mind when we woke up. And mornings are never my time to shine. Plus we just wanted to get out of that hostel. I'm just making up excuses now. I cut the tip of my finger off. Just the fleshy bit. I was blindly grabbing through my toiletry bag, trying to find the travel case for my toothbrush. Instead I found out that my razor was lacking its travel case. Ow. The kind of ow that shuts your brain down for a couple seconds. The blood brought me back around. There was a bit of it.

Of course the day we leave the hostel is the day it seems the friendliest. A little old lady who we had never seen around before helped us through all the checking out and kept saying good bye to us in happy broken English.

We dumped our bags at our hotel and then went out shopping. Today was shopping day.

Y'see Theo, when Japanese people go traveling, they always bring back presents for all their friends and acquaintances. These gifts are called omiyage. Different parts of Japan are known for different things, so when you go to these different parts of Japan you know exactly what to buy for folks back home. But not if you're us. We spent a fair few hours trying to think of who would get what.

After that we took a nap. Our hotel, in addition to having bibles for several world religions (no love for Scientology, Will Smith must be so sad), also has a couple movie channels. But not really. What they have is a couple of rented DVDs and some spare channels on the televisions. You tune in at the appointed time and some monkey somewhere presses play.

Or not. Spiderman 3 just sat on the menu screen for over an hour. Funny.

Not as funny as where we ate dinner. It was a place called Quaratine Plan. Remember that time we ate at that theme restaurant in Tokyo? Whoever opened Quarantine Plan had had a similar dining experience. It was kooky. The entrance looks like something out of a cheesy post apocalyptic action movie from the 1980s. There was a Vic 20 keyboard embedded in the wall, man!


You enter through an automatic sliding door into a reception area that is all curved walls and bright whiteness. As we were waiting, another couple wandered in off the street. Not quite in in. They were looking at all the sci fi trappings outside. A waitress appeared out of nowhere and hit a button near the door. A zombie popped out of a barrel right next to the couple outside. The lady shrieked. Good times.


The lady who had pushed the button then handcuffed herself to Carla and led us to our table.

Our waiter knew a little bit of English and was happy to whip it out whenever necessary. Or unnecessary. He ended each encounter with, "Yes Sir! Yes Ma'am!" and a stiff salute. The food was good and the drinks were interesting and we had a great last night in Matsuyama.

Most interesting food of the night? Something devised by a scientist more mad than Professor Carla McDrinky up above? Let's see if I can remember the Japanese and translate it into broken English. Surprised/Shocked Eating: Crispy Chicken Wing Gyoza.


It looks fairly normal at first glance. Maybe a bit too plump, but that is rarely a bad thing. When you pick it up, you notice that the weight is... off... somehow. Let's take a bite!

There ain't no bones in there baby! There ain't no regular chicken meat either. All the meat had been sucked out, ground up and mixed into gyoza filling and then stuck back into the skin. Crazy.

Our night might have been greater still if we had remembered to return to the liquor store we had found earlier in the evening. Crown Royal for 15 bucks. And Earl Grey liqueur.

Dang.