Spanish Restaurant

Laura and I headed out to dinner with Carlos and his friends tonight. All I knew was that we were going to meet near Omote Sando. When I got there I waited with Carlos, Adrianna, and Laura. Eventually their friend Alberto, from Spain, came and we waited for the others to come. We then headed in to the subway station to wait for the remaining members of the party, who included I-chun, Surjith and a Japanese guy I didn't catch the name of. The other guys were all from the chemical engineering department at Todai. I-chun was doing a short post doc at Todai and in January is heading to NYU to do another post doc.

We headed to a Spanish restaurant that Alberto had found and vouched for it being the best Spanish restaurant in Tokyo. He said there were really only about 3, but this was hands down the best.

The owner was a great host and was fluently speaking Spanish with Alberto, Carlos and Adrianna, English with Surjith, Laura and I and Japanese with the last guy. He was from Spain and from the sound of his accent he was from Catalonia (it didn't hurt my detective skills that the restaurant was also called El Catalon or something like that). He had that slight lisp that I know is common in that area of Spain.

The food was great as well. The owner took the time to explain the origins of gazpacho and paella to us. Apparently, the poor make the best gazpacho because they keep it simple. You start with cold water, then you add some tomato and a few other spices, like salt and pepper and that's about it I think. (I'm writing this well after the fact, so my memory is failing me.) He also explained how you make sangria out of cheap wine because the fruit makes it taste better. Then he showed us how to drink out of a wine skin. I almost had a chance to drink out of a wine skin, but I was sitting on the wrong side of the table. I learned that eating rabbit is much more common in Europe than I thought. I had eaten some on Poland and my Polish friend's dad had explained to me how he and his brother had raised them to sell for pocket money when they were young. I'm not sure how easy they were to get in Japan though.

The restaurant itself was also pretty cool. There were messages written all over the walls from people that had been there. The waiters all seemed to be Spanish as well. Sadly, the building was going to be torn down and the restaurant was going to have to move.

The entire night we had been talking about where we lived and it became more necessary when it was time to leave and make our way home. I had been told that I-chun also lived in Komagome, so we started talking about where we live in Komagome. Long story short, we live in the same building. So I had some one to head home with on the last train.

After dinner, Laura, Alberto, I-chun and I headed to Shibuya, which was a short walk away. We were going for a last drink. We tried to go one place, but decided it was too loud to talk. We ended up going in one of many tiny bars in Tokyo. There was room for about 10 people in the entire place, which had 2 floors. These places define "hole in the wall."

We had our drink and just barely made the last trains home.