February 24th: Today started off a bit strained. 4am to be exact, but I regrouped and I got it together. Only 3 more days til my departure and its time to go home.
For the last few days, my mom had been hard to reach, so I channeled my inner Angela Lansbury( Jessica Fletcher), I called my 11 year old neighbor and he spilled the beans..My beloved Uncle William had made his transition and my mom was at the funeral in NYC! Being the matriarch of or family she basically dared anyone to tell me and "ruin" my trip! I was LIVID at first, but I got over it. I just mailed his post card telling him I'd see him in May! My uncle and I had a good relationship. He was going to be 80 in July. He was a smooth cat. A ladies man..Like all the Carter men. He called me the"Family Freeloader" as he sent me some packet change!
Afternoon was all about doing nothing. I finally got some souvenir shopping done.I got my mother a beautiful kimono style robe. Myself a short one and gift for family and friends! Phone charms are really popular here, so I got a few..well 7 to be exact. I stocked up on these peach mints. I had a ball in 100 Yen store..Yep you guessed it THE DOLLA STORE!
Beauty Blogger Jamie would Love this ! 
https://www.bnevertoobusytobebeautiful.com/
Don't sleep..some was really good. Eelman is a great artist.
Look @ the top corner...yea I missed that..expected to see an Asian Carrie..Umm no, it was really SEX and Tokyo City!
I love this picture. No matter where you are kids will be kids!
The Dollor Menu is universal!
OBAMA! OBAMA!
Meet Jero: The First Black JAPANESE Enka Singer
The day ended again with dinner and a long train ride home.
February 22nd: God Is Good, All the time and All the time, God is Good! Thanks to the World Wide Web, we found Tokyo Baptist Church. It was a nice service and everyone was so friendly. It was a long commute, but it was worth it. Here is the video they played during service.
Of course we did a bit of shopping and I fell in love with this t-shirt. This is one of those, “You shoulda bought it when you saw it!” moments. I could have worn it to the gym.
After my chat with Colonel Harland Sanders, we headed back to E-Village where I fried chicken for the Black History Program.
In order to keep my G.R.I.T.S. gold card...how was the chicken????
Bone licking good! 
It was a lovely evening. Ian did an outstanding job organizing the event. Everyone was asked to come with an African American in mind that was of influence. Here is our group photo!
Later, a few of us were sitting around talking and a glass dish spontaneously combust. Glass went everywhere. The evening ended with my cousin burning sage, which was both amusing and uncomfortable.
Now I lay me down to sleep....Good Night!
February 2oth: Before heading to the salon, Mattilyn and I decided to grab a bite to eat. I suggested a noodle house at the metro station. Ordering food was a process. First, the menu is a poster on the wall. Each entry is assigned a number. Once you decide what you want, you order from a machine. Think venting machine. Next, you pay and you take your ticket to the counter, give it to the cook and they prepare your meal. It was pretty simple. Of course, we had no idea what we ordered. A nice gentleman showed us how to order whatever we pointed to. So we got two different meals and shared. Press play to see the outcome.
Off to Studio 808. This is where I met Eko. Fellas if you are going to Japan and need a hair cut this is the place. Ladies, for the best shampoo job in your life, sit in Ekos chair. His fingers are hypnotic! I was expecting to walk into some stylish salon, decorated according it's Feng Shui with miniature water fountains and bonsai trees, but to the contrary, it was a one room shop with stacks of VIBE and Black Hair mag on the counter. Pictures of Rhianna and Janet plastered to the walls and hip-hop videos were on TV. It felt and looked like I was @ home in South Carolina and I loved it! While I was getting my hair styled, Eko had me translate the a few hip-hop videos. When it comes to my hair, I am simple. Not a lot of fluff and Eko did just that. The "Flying Saucer' Hair Processor freaked me out a bit, but I trusted him. The downside was it took all day, also like a salon back home, but it was worth it.
The travel channel is one of my favorite channels and recently I have been watching Anthony Bourdain and reading his blog. On a trip to Japan he had these things called, Takoyaki or Octopus Balls. So I asked Eko and he lead us up the street, around the corner, into an alley and up 4 flights of stairs into a one room bar with Jill Scott, Mary J and Ashanti on the CD player and the movie You have been served on both flat screens. We were the only two in the place, so we got the royal treatment.
As expected, Takoyaki wasn't my all time favorite, but it wasn't bad. It was crispy on the outside and the inside was spongy and slimy at the same time, but a glass of Hypnotic topped with Pineapple Juice made it all go down nicely! While Mattilyn did Karoke, I wrote on the walls.
and the night ended with us taking a picture!
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Things looked alot differnt than yesterday.It was busy! As I got closer and closer i could hear the commotion, but still didn't smell anything. Manuvering my way through ws tricky. Its a tourist spot, but is built for business. First thing watch out for the fok lift drivers they WILL NOT STOP FOR YOU!.Once I got in started walking around it was fun. I am glad I got up for this. It freaked me out a bit b/c there was SO much and they fish almost everyday! That is alot of fish. Round trip was about 2 hours. 
