Shinjuku and Shinagawa

Posted on 2006/11/20 13:03:07 (November 2006).

[Saturday 18th November]
I woke up this morning and thought, highly unusually for me, that I would quite like to visit the dentist today. It's been about two years since I last went, and before that it was a further 9 years. I was quite surprised by how quick and easy it was to book an appointment here in Japan, and before midday I was in the chair being prodded about by a complete stranger with some unnerving implements and reminded of that childhood feeling of mild terror.

I basically just had a bit of a clean-up, and apparently that was basically all I needed really. I'm not sure if the experience was made better or worse by the fact I couldn't understand the bulk of what they were saying.

Later on in the afternoon Chie and I went out shopping, she wanted to show me a couple of dresses she was thinking of wearing at the wedding. I had quite painstakingly explained to Chie how it was bad luck for the groom to see the bride's dress before the wedding, but she seems to have sidestepped this issue with a combination of loopholes - (A) because we're in Japan and (B) because this is not the dress she'll be wearing for the ceremony itself, but one for the party afterwards. So somewhat begrudgingly I went along. I opted for the dangerous gambit of actually giving my honest (i.e. somewhat negative) opinion about the first two dresses she had pre-selected on an earlier visit, which to my surprise was received quite well. In the second shop we saw an alternative which I thoought would look really good, and as it happens the designer (Tadashi-san) was visiting the shop at the same time, so we could even get a bit of advice from him. Still though Chie wasn't prepared to commit, so I guess we'll (or better still she'll) have to come back another day.

In the evening we went to Shinagawa to have dinner with one of my colleagues and his wife. On hearing I was leaving his wife had said she wanted one last chance to see me - I have that sort of effect on people you know.

After dinner we headed back to Shinjuku and met up with another colleague (and his wife too), and the six of us went for a couple of drinks there. Somehow or other it got too late for everybody to get back to their respective homes, so we decided to spent the night in a karaoke place until the first train went. This had seemed like a great idea to start with, but I have to admit somewhat regretting it towards the end - even for someone who likes karaoke as I do, five hours of it is a bit too much.

We eventually trudged back home, somewhat wearily, around 5:30AM.

I think that 5 hours karaoke is a world record!

Posted by Lox at 2006/11/20 16:47:26.

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