Friday, January 09, 2004

London-style Party in Tokyo

I visit University of Tokyo again, meeting Aoki-kun, Takahashi-san, Kato-san, Kanaya-kun, Kawamoto-kun, and Waki-kun.

For lunch, I take away Yoshinoya's gyu-don (a bowl of rice topped with beef). Just paying for 280 yen (1.4 pounds), you can get your lunch. Unthinkable in London. Another moment I'm impressed about Japan.

In the evening, I throw a London-style party at Bobby's Cafe in Shibuya, inviting my best friends in Tokyo: Mihara-kun, Misao-san, Yoo-chan, Jun-chan, Torolin, Ono-san, Reiko, Tomoko, and Mark. Why is this London-style? Because each of my friends doesn't know each other. It's not uncommon in London to invite your friends from different backgrounds. But that's not true in Japan. We usually go to restaurants or bars with our friends from the same background so all of us know each other in the first place.

So I'm a bit anxious about it. Does a friend of mine enjoy talking to another friend of mine who he or she didn't meet before? But it turns out that everybody seems to enjoy the party more than I expected! Of course I enjoy the party, too, surrounded by my best friends. It's really a good evening.

When the party is over, my last train has already gone. In Tokyo, there's no night bus. So I visit and stay at Mihara-kun's place overnight. Actually, it's good to have a chance to talk to him a lot.

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