A couple of years ago, my generous boss offered me two return tickets to anywhere from London with Virgin Atlantic.
My Irish flatmate and I chose Tokyo. We knew a couple of ex-pats from work, so we wouldn’t be entirely alone.
When we arrived, our apartment was amazing — huge compared to our London digs, and massive by Tokyo standards.
In the beginning, I didn’t do very well food-wise.
For our first lunch, we ventured to a local eatery. With neither of us speaking Japanese, it became a matter of pointing at a picture and hoping for the best.
My travelling companion’s food smelt great.
Mine looked amazing.
Unfortunately, the raw egg on top of cold noodles did not agree with my stomach. Out of politeness, I did my best to finish the dish.
The slippery, egg-coated noodles did not showcase my chopstick skills. I left hungry, covered in wisps of cold, eggy broth.
The lads from the Tokyo office later took us to a restaurant where the walls were fish tanks.
It was amazing.
So was the sake.
The next day we ventured to the Imperial Palace via the subway. We were taken aback by the helpfulness of the general public, who guided us onto the correct platforms and trains. People went out of their way to help us, and it was deeply appreciated.
Did I mention we were sake-hungover?
By the time we reached the Imperial Palace, we were very quiet and a little grumpy. At the gates, we learned the Palace was closed.
Closed.
It had taken us two hours to get there. It was shut. And it started to rain.
Instead of getting cranky, we collapsed onto a park bench and laughed so hard it hurt — manic, wonderful, aching laughter.
For our second and final night in Tokyo, the ex-pats took us to an Irish pub (why?). From there we went to a cocktail party in a luxurious apartment, and then on to many, many clubs in Roppongi.
At around 3.00 am, we headed back to the apartment. On the way, we encountered a man walking a monkey on a lead. The monkey was dressed in Chanel and seemed very happy.
No one batted an eyelid.
Ex-pats party hard, and after two nights in Tokyo, we were glad to return to our little London flat.
Was it raining?
We hadn’t noticed.