The next morning we headed for late breakfast/early lunch in this tiny tangle of streets. There was a line to this corner noodle stall with only counter service – about 8 or 9 stools – and a fast turnover of mostly men, slurping quickly and loudly. I sat down in the middle of all these guys and looked to see what they were eating. When the guys behind the counter offered me a choice of udon or soba noodles, I chose the brown ones (soba), because that’s what everybody around me was eating. The guys behind the counter laughed, said what I can only assume is Japanese for “great choice!,” made other approving sounds and gave me the thumbs up. They asked me if I wanted tempura, then egg, then broth and each time I said “of course!” since that’s what everybody else had around me. I’m not sure what the tempura was, exactly, a jumble of vegetables maybe? We all had to eat separately due to the counter situation, and even though I was the third one to sit down, none of my other pals got that kind of reception, which was fun for me. :)
At this counter there was no time for good manners. Also no time for spoons! You have to eat quickly before the tempura gets soggy. So I was trying to keep up with my neighbors, but I’m not good at slurping and I was a mess. Broth, egg and scallions everywhere, including all over my shirt and the guy next to me’s shirt (sorry, dude!). I was doing the universal sheepish-shrug-and-smile to basically everybody about the mess and the guys behind the counter just kept laughing and handed me tissues. It was a fun interaction with just a great, great dish of noodles, even though we still aren’t sure exactly what it was!

Later we went on a Harajuku hunt! It’s a shopping neighborhood where young people with a certain visual style gather. We didn’t have much luck – but we found an interesting character in a MAC cosmetics of all places! She was an older woman with wire cat ears, rainbow tights, pink hair, beads and sequins everywhere, even on her face, platform pinks tennis shoes and a crazy rainbow back pack. There was so much going on I didn’t even notice half of it, and it was so quick none of us could snap a pic. We’re hoping to try again on Sunday morning (a supposed day for harajuku hang outs) before we fly out.

A rainy day, so we hit the Edo-Tokyo Museum. It was huge, with all sorts of interactive, moving and miniature displays. We ended up spending way longer than anticipated there! Edo is what Tokyo was called before it was the capital. The museum is right next to the sumo stadium, and when we were leaving we saw a giant guy in traditional robe, wooden shoes and a top knot getting on the metro. Sumos have to constantly wear the traditional garb and live a traditional lifestyle (plus metro?) until they retire.

Next we hit the Sky Tree but it was too foggy to see the top, so we didn’t feel the need to pay to go up and check out the view. We did stumble across an all you can eat dessert buffet in the mall below the sky tree, but I seemed to be the only one interested! :)

We realized we were near an owl cafe, so of course that’s where we headed next. We had to take an elevator to the 5th floor, and the doors opened into a jungle. I was very apprehensive about the whole thing (birds are scary, y’all!) but everybody else seemed excited. It was a small/medium sized room – think master bedroom ish – but filled with fake plants, a couple of aquariums, a tiny tiny monkey by the cash register and birds everywhere. Some so still that you’d think they were fake until they looked right at you. Some were leashed, some were not. Some were tiny, some were HUGE. There was a pop Christmas song playing on loop, and the Disney movie Anastasia, also playing on loop on a big screen. We sat down and a girl just brought a bird up to us, put an oven mitt on our hands and plopped a bird on our hands! Then after a while she came and took the bird away and gave it to another person. I was the last one to accept an owl, and while I was holding it the owl next to me tried to bite me! There was a giant owl in the corner, and I asked if it was really old – turns out only about 4 months. That sucker was huge and not leashed – apparently allowed to fly around whenever. Luckily he didn’t try while we were there.

Having held one bird, I was feeling brave. “Bring me the biggest bird you’ve got!” I exclaimed. My pals were shocked, but the girl brought over Benjamin. He was pretty heavy, and I was pretty uneasy, but I did it! Then Benny was passed off to John – and the girl walked away for like ten minutes. John’s arm was getting tired, and ol Benny had an accident on John’s pants, and the lady still wouldn’t come take the bird. It was pretty funny (mostly because it wasn’t me).