Farewell party

Tonight, my lab threw me a farewell party! They kept trying to find a time for a 'welcome party', but by the time it was arranged, it was already time for farewell. I think time really flies faster in Japan.

First our lab went to a restaurant in Ikebukuro (the closest part of Tokyo to RIKEN), which has an all-you-can and all-you-can drink (within 2 hours!) shabu-shabu and sukiyaki. Both involve putting very thinly sliced pieces of meat and veggies into boiling broth of some sort. Shabu-shabu is then dipped into a mix of soy sauce, vinegar, and green onions. Sukiyaki is dipped in a raw egg. (It tastes better than it sounds, really). Both are incredibly delicious, but Shabu-Shabu felt more comfortable, given the lack of the raw egg. (at some point I started cheating by dipping Sukiyaki meat into the soy sauce, instead of the egg mixture. The rest of the group either didn't notice or was too polite to tell me that I was doing it wrong, for which I'm grateful).

After a brief stop at a 9-story bookstore (I'm not exaggerating) for the dog fashion magazine I've been searching for everywhere (I'm not lying; nor am I insane), we stopped at a sake bar. I'm really loving umeshu, a kind of wine made from Japanese plums (very different from the plum wine we have in the US). So flavorful and subtle at the same time.

The night ended with a present from Ozaki-san (the guy on the very left of the last picture). His wife makes jewelry and she made for me sushi-shaped earrings. They ar lovely!
Of course, the whole thing is bitter-sweet. I've been very happy here; learning lots without the everyday stress of graduate school and also having insane amounts of fun between my work hours. But home is waiting, and I'm glad for it.