Have a nice time in Tokyo

Being only for 2 weeks in Tokyo its not really difficult to entertain youself. Basically everything you experience has high similarities with your previous life but slightly different, enough to upscale it to entertainment.
One of my main activities is exploring the Japanese cuisine in different environments. So, up to now I have randomly tested 14 restaurants. The majority of these places are identical, <30 sqm, a limited number of tables and a bar for the unaccompanied people (usually I have a reservation there). Since most of the times the menu-card comes in Japanese, without pictures the selection process is the following: a) either I point someones food, which is not the most polite thing to do; imagine an 187 cm greek, with a mohoc haircut and a couple of earings, pointing your food and barking in an unfamiliar dialect when you are 170 cm and maximum 60 kilos. I see the fear in their face and smiling doesn´t always help. b) me or the waitress mimic different animals and accordingly we choose pork, chicken, beef. Unfotunately this approach limits me in the sea food.
However, this gives me the opportunity to try many different tastes but always in the base of rice or noodles. The quality was very high in all 14, whereas normalization of the data with the price ´´ejects´´ the quality to the highest level. I should mention that I am refering to a class of restaurants that do not exist in Denmark while in Greece you found them under the name ´´koutoukia´´ (small tavernas, not funcy decoration, limited selection of food, very friendly atmosphere). Usually its a family business and the couple (wife and husband) are easily spotted.
The price for dinning in such a place is maximum 1000-2000 YEN, or 40-80 DKK. This explains the 14 restaurants in 16 days. Trying to make these restaurant-nights a bit more interesting, me and myself made an agreement. I will not go twice to the same restaurant these 12 months. This adds an extra level of appreciation in everything happening there. Especially the moment before I leave has something almost ritual. Knowing for sure that I will never come back makes me a bit sad. And then I try to see every detail of the place (it doesnot really take long for <30 sqm) and notice anything that could be the trademark of it (ok lets be honest usually I dont find much). Anyway, its a nice game. The exception, because you always need an exception, is the first restaurant that I joined when I arrived. I am allowed to go again.

Dont miss us next week, we talk about nightlife and clubbing, as well as how someone becomes a collector.

Closing with some random thoughts.
They hate microbes. I am eating in a restaurant next to a woman around 55-60 (you never know with them, they look 16 and they are 30, so maybe she was 90). The first two sentences was an introduction the third one she goes, ´´you know there are a lot of viruses in Japan and foreigners get them very easily. Every time you go home wash your hands very well and then put water and soap in your mouth and gargle. If you do this every day you will be ok´´. If I do this every day I will freak out. A lot, a lot of people are wearing these classical white masks when they are sick. If this is to protect the society from spreading the viruses is not working, there are simply more people with masks than without.
In a discussion with a colleague at work he told me that usually stays at work until 23.30. But not on the weekends, he comes later. In my question ´´this doesnot really gives you a lot of free time to do other things´´ the response was ´´I watch tv´´. This is when my hopes to establish meaningful relationships with my colleagues died.
Usually I am writing the blog in an Italian cafe. The Japanese that run the place have been advised to say an Italian word in every order. Its simply hilarious to hear a long Japanese sentence finishing with the words ´´prego´´ or ´´porfavore´´, with a Japanese accent. Simply hilarious.