Oct 25, 2010

Long-distance driver

*External link to the Japanese website
**External link to the website except written in Japanese


My younger brother, Ryoma, headed for Koriyama city, Fukushima prefecture (福島県郡山市), our hometown where our parents and youngest brother lived from Kochi prefecture (高知県) by car through the following prefectures: Tokushima, Kagawa, Hyogo, Osaka, Kyoto, Shiga, Mie, Aichi, Shizuoka, Kanagawa (徳島県, 香川県, 兵庫県, 大阪府, 京都府, 滋賀県, 三重県, 愛知県, 静岡県, 神奈川県).
And he dropped in at my room, Tokyo to give me some Kochi souvenirs and take a rest on the way back to Koriyama; he said that he had kept on driving on the expressways without stopping for 12 hours except some short rests at service areas. And he said also that his legs were numb slightly and this was the first time for himself.

I said to him, "how crazy you are!"

I asked him whether he was hungry or not because I had eaten nothing but tsukemen in the evening today (already yesterday) and felt a little hungry.
He answered, "yes, a little" because he had not had dinner because of the long-distance driving.
So we went out by car in order to buy gyu-don (牛丼) at Sukiya (すき家) (I drove his car because he said that he was extremely tired.)
It was about 2:30 a.m.



And the day broke.

It was I who proposed that we go to Ramen Jiro Koiwa (ラーメン二郎 小岩店).
And we went out there by his car; Koiwa is a northern area of Edogawa ward (江戸川区) and close to the southern border of Katsushika ward (葛飾区) but we have to take a bus or use a car to go there from Kanamachi, a northern area of Katsushika because there are no railway to Edogawa running through the length of Katsushika.

About 1 p.m. we had to wait in line in front of the shop for a short while but got the seats soon.
This was the first time for him to eat ramen at Jiro.
He said that Jiro tasted good but was a little surprised at its strong broth and garlic.
I think that Koiwa Jiro is as good as Musa-ko (むさこ = 武蔵小金井) or Matsudo (松戸), better than Ikebukuro Jiro (池袋).
And Koiwa reminded me about a taste of old Takada-no-baba Jiro (旧高田馬場店).


Small-sized ramen (小ラーメン) (700 yen) we chose





By the way, because of Jiro Koiwa we had not felt hungry until about 9-10 p.m. lol

After going back to my room from Koiwa, about 5 p.m., we went to Akihabara (秋葉原) in order to buy a switching hub and LAN cables (Ethernet cables) for him.
We walked around there and looked for more reasonable products at some shops.
A new switching hub was a little expensive therefore we bought a secondhand one (made in 2002) at Sofmap* while we bought new LAN cables at Tsukumo*.

At first we had planned to eat Sutadon (すた丼) at Densetsu-no-Sutadon Akinabara* (伝説のすた丼 秋葉原店) but we were still full (because of Jiro!) about 9 p.m. so we went back to Kanamachi for the present.

In the train on the way to my town, I had just thought of the idea that we go to Bamiyan* (a Family Restaurant) in Katsushika ward by car and suggested that idea to my brother. At that time we had started feeling hungry.
It was about 10 p.m. when we got to Kanamachi, and about 11 p.m. when we started eating dinner at Bamiyan.
He said that Mabo doufu (特製おぼろ豆腐のコク旨マーボー) (418 yen) he ate was very delicious.
And I chose a set meal with deep-fried chicken (特盛り唐揚げ定食) (999 yen.)
(Here* you can see Bamiyan's menu.)



After the late dinner, about 0:30 p.m., we went to Nonbe Yokocho* (呑んべ横丁) (small pathways occupied by a lot of bars, pubs or "Snack Bars" (スナック) and "Izakaya"(居酒屋)) in front of Keisei Tateishi station (京成立石駅) not because we wanted to drink alcohol but this miscellaneous and dingy area might be lost because of the redevelopment therefore my brother would like to see the look of them.
(In view of that chaotic construction, Nonbe Yokocho is compared to Kowloon Walled City** (九龍城塞) in Hong Kong in rare instances.)
We were hanging around these pathways for about 30 minutes in the midnight but the sudden rain stopped our crawling.


The sigh of "Nonbe Yokocho" and my brother


Dingy pathway

(First updated Nov. 18. 2010)

No comments:

Post a Comment