The very first restaurant I tried when I arrived in Japan was a gioza shop. One night after a day of training, my co-worker, Dave, took me to this tiny little restaurant hidden in a dark Fukushima alley. The low sliding door opened up to a bar sort of place that smelt like frying oil and garlic. The air was smokey and the decor was grim and busy, but the gioza were like little pockets of heaven. Almost, every week since then I have been to the gioza lady, who is, although almost deaf, the sweetest lady. I think her geijin clientel has trippled since my arrival in Fukushima. I guess gioza is the Japanese equivalent to the tapas that Heidi always raves about. And why would I not keep on going back? It's cheap, its yummy and the sweet gioza lady always likes to offer us free food.

Last Monday night, my friend Michelle and I decided to have a quiet dinner at the gioza place before going back home for an early night. But much to our surprise we ended up spending the whole evening out until 1am.

I was the first one to arrive and I had to wait for Michelle a few minutes. I didnt quite know how to tell the gioza lady that I had another friend coming... so I was a little embarassed by my little Japanese in front of these Japanese businessmen that had just taken a seat next to me. They opened a bottle of beer and offered me some. At first I declined, but since they insisted I just couldnt refuse. They asked me a few simple questions and with the little Japanese I knew, I tried to awnser the best I could. Then Michelle finally arrived and cut the awkwardness. Michelle's Japanese is 10 times better then mine, so the conversation became a little easier. They also started to serve us more and more beer. It didnt take too long for them to get drunk and start being a little bit more friendly. I can't use the word flirt, because that is not what they do. I can't really explain. I guess Japanese people are just more social then usual when they drink. Then I noticed that 2 of the 4 men that gave me and Michelle the most attention were married. After 10 huge bottles of beer (Japanese bottles of beer are as big as wine bottles) and a giant bottle of sake, their dopey behaviour caused me to throw a few funny one-liners in their face knowing that they would not understand. At this point, we found our situation so ludicrous that we decided to stay with the men a little longer and see what would happen next. We knew that something like this was rare and that we should just sit back and enjoy the ride. Besides, the alcohol was free and I was practicing my Japanese.

After dinner, they invited us to go to another bar with them for more free drinks. On our stumbly walk across the city, I had to remind the married man a few times that he was married, but then he invited me to his house to try some of his wife's cooking. How bizarre is that? Anyway, after giving Michelle a chance to pick up the good-looking single one and seeing another one fall off his bar stool, we decided to leave to our next destination: Karaoke. I sang my usual show tunes, Heart of Glass and Eternal Flame. They sang their usual Japanese songs mixed with some Queen and White Snake.... A few times I would have a microphone fly straight into my face as they were dancing on top of the couches. They paid for us yet again and wanted us to join them for the next bar, but it was already 1am and we had work the next day. So, Michelle and I thought that it would be much wiser to head back home.



On our sobering walk home, we were bewildered by the evening's turn of events. We didnt quite know what to think of it all. She was somewhat happy about exchanging numbers with the single good-looking one, but my evening wasnt about picking up. I basically sat back and observed. We also realized that we didnt even know their names.. we only had terrible nicknames for all four of them: Tom Cruise, ArmyPants, Nori and Nabe (a japanese dish). Anyway, what was important for me that evening was to give these men a good impression of foreigners. We weren't easy, but we were fun and respectable. The next morning I started thinking about the big picture and realized that this was all very typical of Japanese society. While the wives were at home with the children, their husbands were gallivanting around town bar hopping completly drunk trying to pick up younger women. I just hated thinking about this, but then I realized how I had just lived a huge cultural experience. I was actually observing and experiencing their lifestyle and that was more enlightning then visiting a Japanese touristic site or eating Japanese food. I think if you really experience the people's culture and their way of life then you can really understand... I could read books my entire life about Japanese culture and society, but that night made me understand a little better about how it is really like to be Japanese. I think its the people that matter the most.