Day 12: The Forgotten Happenings
It was finally not raining, at least according to the window, so I put on my new skirt and shirt. That's when I noticed that dark blue panties are highly visible through a white skirt. Okay, not a big deal. Unless you forgot to bring a solid light pair, which I did.

Later in the afternoon, I stopped into Takashimaya with intentions of buying a unoffending pair. Since I still can't read Japanese and I didn't have my trusty phrasebook with me, I walked over to the information desk and asked, "Pantsu wa doko des ka?" Who would have guessed that I'd ever need to use Chii's favorite word in real life?

In the lingerie section, I made quite the discovery. Apparently Japanese women are willing to buy 7800 yen panties. Then it got worse. I found a 13400 yen price tag, followed by a 21300 price tag. I was about to give up hope of ever wearing my skirt on vacation when I spotted the holy grail. One pair for 4200 yen!

I picked up a pair, trying to figure out what size they might be. It was then that a very helpful sales woman to assist me. She looked at the panties, looked at me, and before I knew it, she had me encircled by a tape measure. A second later, she handed me a pair, gesturing that they would fit me perfectly. She was obviously the expert, so who was I to argue?

I now have 4200 yen panties. It can be friends with my mom's $125 slip from Bergdorf.

Day 13 (18 September)
After having exerted the effort to get the damn panties, I was sure as hell wearing my skirt. Or so I thought. It was raining again, just to make me miserable. Fine, two can play that game. So I wore sandals.

We walked a couple blocks to the Currency Museum where we saw... currency! New and old, from both Japan and around the world. There were some really nifty coins that are colorful, but we haven't been able to get our greedy little mitts on any.

Next we aimed to complete our cow hunting. We can pretty close, getting up to 71 of 73. The details of the hunt have become rather redundant, except for the two missing cows. Cows 12 and 29 still insisted upon playing hide and seek, and we ran out of daylight before we could explain the fallacy of this game to them. Alas.

We had dinner reservations for 2000 at Kondo, in Giza, and with nothing pressing to do before then, we decided to spend a couple hours wandering the stores there. The first H&M in Japan just opened on 15 September, so we figured we'd check it out. Apparently we weren't the only ones with that idea. There was a line to get in that went three blocks before turning. We never actually found the end, not that we would have even considered waiting. The Zara in Ginza was amazingly packed, most likely with the people unable to get into H&M. Two stores down, 617 left to try.

Dinner time! After some guesswork, we found the building and headed up to the ninth floor for some real tempura. When we walked into Kondo, the smell of cooking oil immediately hit us. Unfortunately, so did our lack of any idea what to do since no one was seating people. Eventually, we were told our seats were ready, and in we went.

There were thirteen seats around a cooking area where the tempura is prepared. As it is made, the chef delivers it straight to your plate, much like hibachi restaurants in America. His first delivery? Some sea creature with more legs than I cared to count. I sneaked them to Matt, so as not to insult the chef. Then came two giant pieces of shrimp. In a moment of starvation, I actually ate one. It didn't really taste like I expected; it was neither bad nor good. The second magically appeared on Matt's plate.

After that, I ended up at least trying everything else put on my plate, even if it did get donated to the Matt's Plate Fund. The best, by far, were the sweet onions. Matt gave me one of his halves as a receipt for my donations.

We were very impressed with the efficiency the chef and his assistant prepared and cooked the food. They never stopped moving, and every piece came out perfectly. The chef very obviously takes great pride in his cooking. On our way out, I told him, "oyshikatta," and he practically glowed.

Many arrigatos later, we dragged ourselves back to the hotel to digest. In my case, that consisted of falling asleep on top of my book.