Ebisu, Ebisu, I want you!

Ever since I walked around that Ebisu Nishi (West) hill on Sunday, I've been obsessed with finding the dream apartment there. You know: under 10 mins walk to the subway, bright and sunny in a quiet street with lots of cute cafes and restaurants, supermarket nearby, easy access to everything... I'm not giving up on the dream!!

Wearing my comfy low-heel slingback shoes (with stockings, I learned my lesson!), I visited 6 apartments this afternoon. Well, 7 in all, if you consider the re-visit to Izumi Gardens (Roppongi Hills), I'll explain why.

But first: I went to the office this morning, to meet with some people I haven't met before, and to meet the IT boss so we could finalize the setup of my Japanese computer. If you don't know this about me already, I'm a magnet for a) parking tickets, b) computer problems, and c)... let's just leave it at a) and b) for now. It took a total of 3 computer specialists and a good hour to figure out why Ctrl+Alt+Del (or a mouse-shake) would create no response after a 3rd reboot, and as much time to finalize the setup of my Japanese work email.

Anyway, I then had a nice lunch with 2 girls from work, then met the agent for the apartment-viewing marathon. Honestly, feel free to glance at the pictures, but none of them was "love at first sight", must-sign-the-lease-right now apartment. At least I am proceeding by elimination.

I have to say, though, that the one with all the Bentleys and BMW's in the garage had a lot of "je-ne-sais-quoi" charm to it. In the car with the agent and the broker, as we were chit-chatting like 3 giddy girls, the broker said "oooooh, you should move there and find good husband!!". Yes, dear, that's why you're the real estate broker, not the matchmaker...

Oh, scoop of the day!! I saw my first gang of Yakuzas!!! That's the name of the Japanese mafia. We were making a left into a small road and about 8 men in black suits and white shirts, some wearing dark ties, were standing in a circle near a luxury black car (I didn't even know the brand... but it looked like a big fat Bentley or a Maybach...). You should have seen the ladies immediately whispering, looking away, almost shaking. I couldn't help it, and said: "COOOL, can I take a picture of them too????" (Just teasing!! I wasn't actually going to do that.) (Although it would have been a cool picture to take because I hadn't seen any real photos in the Travel guides or the other blogs... but Dave Barry gave a pretty good descriptive of them in his book "Dave Barry does Japan" (pleeease please read this book, it's hilarious!!!!).) Seriously though, I think the Yakuzas are pretty harmless.... and you can't even carry guns in Japan... so unless they fire pachinko balls at me I'm pretty safe. (Pachinko is kind of like pinball, and yakuzas tend to operate those pachinko parlors. Since gambling is prohibited in Japan, this is as close as it gets, where if you win the games, you get little prizes like cigarettes and small items when you leave).

After the last apartment visit, I felt the urge to re-visit that Izumi Gardens apartment I found so nice last Saturday (That's in Roppongi Hills near the Credit Suisse Building and the ANA Inter-Continental hotel). The apartment was smaller than I even remembered, but the location was so nice, I found the supermarkets and cafes nearby. BUT (always a but...), I tested the 'commute' from that closest subway to Shinagawa station, from which I take the express train (10 mins) to Kawasaki, and it took me a good 25 mins. And in the subway, people read or sleep.

You could think that a good portion of Japanese people are narcoleptic and can doze off in the most random places, sometimes standing. I'm not even kidding. I can't even fall asleep on a chair, I don't know how the standing thing works. See the video down below of what the connection at Shinagawa looks like. In case you can't tell from the video, I do reverse-commute leaving Tokyo to go to the 'burbs. (By the way I learned the technique to walk against the current: make eye-contact. The crowds will part like the Red Sea). I guess I've become spoiled to consider a 35-minute, 3-connections commute annoying...? But the good thing about having 'tested' the commute from Roppongi is that I now have a secret weapon against the agent, she claimed the subway ride to Shinagawa would add just 15, maybe 20 mins to the commute. Ha!! I've TESTED it, missy!!! So don't treat me like a blonde gaijin no more!! (Gaijin = "foreigner").

Speaking of the blonde thing: as I was trying to work out the laptop and PC and cables and all that mess and wasn't making much progress the other day, my colleague came by for some help (and yes, fine, she figured it out in 1 minute). So I told her I was having a blonde day. She didn't get it. So I explained to her that, in America (just in America, not in France... hehe my French girlfriends will love me for that) we think that blondes are ... yeah, you get it. She did the cutest head-tilt, big eyes, "Huuuuh? Blonde is pretty, and intelligent!". I love Japan.

So to wrap up my busy day, I got lost for the 1st time trying to figure out a shortcut / monorail connection between the subway nearest to the hotel. Me and my shortcuts... instead, I took a nice sightseeing tour far, far away from the station I intended to reach. (Hey, I almost stepped right into the express monorail to Haneda airport, so it could have been a LOT worse!). Grabbed dinner, had a 10pm conference call with my boss in the US (13 hrs time difference, soon to become 14 hrs time difference with winter time), had more laptop problems (oh, shoosh, this time my laptop was overheating from uploading the apartment pictures!!), and now... bedtime!!

More apartments tomorrow ... shop till I drop...