Only two days in and I am head over heels in luuuurve with this crazy, kooky place. In many ways it feels like it should make sense, but in so many others it just doesn`t! It will take me far longer than the 3.5 weeks I have here to come to grips with it to the extent I would like. I have, however, quickly settled into the Japanese way of eating. No surprise there then. Breakfast is a tiny bit of rice, some miso soup, some pickles and a bit of protein (salmon, meat). And my mother would be quite proud of me leaping out of bed and immediately folding my futon into a miniscule pile - there is yet hope of a housetrained Alexia!

Yesterday, Saturday, I waltzed into town in the drizzle, to meet Fiona, a New Zealand girl who I recently met back in the UK, who moved to Tokyo 2 months ago. It is Fiona I have to thank for my seamless transition from plane to undergrund on Day 1. Essential gaijin (foreigner) know-how!

We then commenced Operation Fridge - smuggling a fridge, and Fiona, all in the back of a car (illegal practice in Japan). Rebels wtihout causes we are. Mission safely accomplished and Fiona happy as Larry to have cold storage once more (or more specifically, cold wine), we then headed for food: interesting experience numero uno...in a teeny bar serving delicious looking bowls of food, we fumbled through figuring out payment via vending machine (admittedly with some guidance from friendly Japanese bystander), and our effors were rewarded with delciious bowls of garlicky rice/meat dishes. Carbed up, we then headed for the All Blacks v Japan game. I admit I rather struggled to maintain loyalty to the AB team, my original favourites, once I had determined that the Japan team, somewhat confusingly, appears to have a store of quite scrumptious Western men. Can a rugby boy explain this happy phenomenon to me perchance?!

After a rather drizzly game, 15:13 to the ABs (see I WAS paying attention to more than just rugby thighs...), Fiona, Ako (Fi`s colleague) and I warmed our frozen cockles with some cocoa...mm... :)

An independent and highly successful shopping mission later, during which I decided Japan and I were very well suited indeed thank you very much - their Muji is to die for, I am officially a Japan convert - and one mini coffeeshop jaunt later, Ako, Yuri (another colleague) and I celebrated with some plum wine. Sounds innocuous, actually quite deceptively lethal. But scrumptious. Though the champagne no doubt helped! Heated cultural discussions abounded throughoutthe evening, and I somehow succeeded in finding my way across the entirety of the underground home!

Sunday: a brief update - swimming trip to the Tokyo American English club (ex-pat retreat) and lunch with Fiona, a trip to view the Harajuku girls (more on this later, as they deserve an entire blog entry, and minus camera I was not the ultimate observer), a wander round the park, then to Ginza, home of glitzy glamorous shops which I could not stand -　the Knightsbridge/Bond Street of Tokyo. A whiz to Asakusa, land of temples, and then home exhausted. Yesterday being a day of Tokyo adoration, today was real-life frustration, as I unsuccessfully tried to buy myself an adaptor plug for my terminally ill camera...no joy.

Food Fiend:

every meal brings new oddities:

- nato for breakfast - soya beans mixed with raw egg yolk, eaten on rice - beans have strong fermented taste and very odd gelatinous gloop sticking them together...but nice

- rice rolls in department store sprinkled with: seaweed/sesame, whitebait/sesasame crumbled, dark seaweed mixture

- sushi cake - round sushi rice base topped wtih slivers of trout

- sweet potato cake - very sweet cake with slightly cloying stickiness, not a fan

- mozuku - algae with vinegar sauce (Mai, a one year old, LAPS this up - Japanese children have very different palates from English children)

Fed up with my inability to commuincate, Yumi and I have started unofficial Japanese lessons. It is not a language to be underestimated, but I have faith in my ability to overcome it, at least a bare minimum! Sayonara for now!