Swine and Pig, Together in Japan Part Uno

The day after the Yamasaki's returned to Yokohama, my sister, Katie (AKA "Swine"), came to stay for two weeks! Don't ask me where the nicknames came from... all I remember is Katie started calling me "Pig" (affectionately believe it or not, LOL) so to retaliate, she was lovingly dubbed "Swine". Since then, Cole has become "Hog" and Joel is known as "Ham". We are weird, I know :-p

Anyhoo, we had a stupendous time showing her around and helping her vegetarianism navigate through this very meat heavy culture.

She looked mighty fresh after traveling for 24 hours straight! I was so proud of her - she made her way from one Tokyo airport to the next via public transportation with no trouble!

I brought her into my office to show her off

And yes, this is Joel being "Bro-Iced". We left a Smirnoff Ice sitting on the floor in the foyer so when he came home, he wasn't able to come in until he completed the ritual. This is a REAL thing folks! HA HA!

We took Katie to our favorite restaurant, Trois, that serves French/Japanese fusion cuisine. The owner is apparently one of Joel's co-worker's relatives so he made us reservations (and apparently when he described us to the owner, he knew exactly who we were. We only eat there about once every six months or so, but I guess we made an impression, LOL). Little did we know that they were going to hook us up with free drinks and a specially made dessert for Katie!!

The nest is actually sugar and was totally edible and delicious!

Katie was able to attend the Marine Corps Birthday Ball with us this year! We had a little bit of fun on the obstacle course before we went inside.

The wall is WAY more difficult than it looks!

Katie got to meet some of my favorite gal pals!!

Fun times

We had a GREAT table right up front by the guest speaker's podium! 

We took Katie to Hiroshima and ate at one of our favorite places. They had the owner of a local  micro-brewery hosting a game night and sharing his brews with the customers. It was all in Japanese and we were the only English speakers,  but we had a BLAST! In this pic, we are wearing the guys' face, LOL. Katie won a rock-paper-scissors contest and got a bumper sticker!

We went to another AMAZING new restaurant called Tent-o. And guess what?! It was in a tent!!! Their plating was be-u-tiful.

They even had vegetable sushi so Katie could get some of Japan's finest cuisine.

We walked around Peace Park for a while and visited the Museum. It's harsh, but real.

Taking in the sights

You definitely see some fun, interesting things walking around Japan

Katie had an AWESOME panoramic setting on her camera

Took the Swine to Miyajima Island and introduced her to mochi , which is pounded sweet rice with various sauces. This one was green tea.

She was so excited to try Dr. Fish and then freaked out and couldn't do it! In her defense, it is one of the weirdest sensations EVER having little fish eating the skin off of your feet, but what an experience!!

The precious deer of Miyajima Island

My brave sister went back to Miyajima on her own and hiked up Mount Misen!

THEN she went back to Hiroshima on her own (Joel and I had to work). She walked into a restaurant and said, "Watashiwa vegetarian-des" and they understood... kinda. The soup was all veggies, noodles, and tofu, but the broth was PORK! Katie was super respectful though and ate what she could, even though she hasn't had anything meat-ish in years!

Katie loved how the Japanese restaurants have fake food in their windows so you can see what they serve. This was one of our favorites!

Next blog: Swine and Pig take on Tokyo!