Everyday Eating & Shopping - Part 2

So as soon as I published my previous "Everyday Eating..." post, I thought of more things I should have included.   Some of these might be mentioned in guide books, but in case you missed it...

When I first arrived I had a hard time paying in cash so I wouldn't get a lot of coins in return.  I'm used to paying so that I get as few pieces of money back as possible - for example, if something cost $8 (800 yen), I'd give $13 (1300 yen) so I could get $5 (500 yen - 1 coin) back.  Sometimes it just didn't seem to work right - I'd get a handful of change returned to me.  It took me a month to truly realize - they don't have a 25 yen (25 cents) or 20 yen coin - it goes from 10 yen to 50 yen. 

Japanese coins - where's the quarter?!?

I have a trick to help me remember the values - the 5 yen coin doesn't have a number on it (the rest do).  But both the 50 yen and 5 yen coins are the ones with holes.  So if it has a hole and no number, it's the 5 yen one (the coin is more brown, too).


Speaking of money, there is no tipping in Japan!  So restaurants, taxis, bellhops, tour guides, hair dressers - no one receives a tip.  It's great!  It's an easy habit to break, and I feel a little bad  now when we travel to places that tip - we've gotten out of the habit of the generous US tips.  

basket for your purse/backpack/messenger bag

At restaurants, they usually have baskets by the table for your purse.  More casual places have plastic laundry baskets, but nicer places have prettier containers.  This way your bag doesn't get dirty from the floor and you don't have to hang it off your chair.  This is a great custom - we should adopt it in the US!  


Some restaurants will have a table charge, though it's typically the nicer restaurants, and generally the European-style ones (French and Italian), though we've seen them at high end Japanese restaurants, too.  However, you tend to "get" something for the mandatory charge - like a mini appetizer or bread.

Meals are often served in a style similar to Europe - each dish comes out when it's ready.  So one person may receive his food, but the others won't be out for a minute or two.  They want you to have your food when it's hot!

There are some places where you have a buffet or all you can drink/eat, but you almost always have a time limit (90 or 120 minutes).  One of the first times we ate at a restaurant that included a buffet we weren't aware of the restriction, and they almost charged us extra.  

There don't seem to be any doggie bags in Japan!  You can order take out at some places, but I've never seen (or been offered) the chance to take home leftovers.  Portions tend to be smaller than in the US, so most of the time you finish your food, anyway.

Perfect packing at checkout...

When grocery shopping, your basket is packed up perfectly at checkout.  Which would be great if you could leave with it, but the last step is to give you some empty plastic bags.  Then you walk ten feet to another set of counters to load up your bags yourself to bring home.  Unfortunately, you have to empty the entire basket to get to the containers on the bottom, because those are the items you want in the bottom of your bag.  There must be a more logical way to do this, but I've watched Japanese people with their packages and it's what they do, too.  I'll have to think more on this...




So this is just interesting - take out sushi containers in Japan use the same fake "grass" as the ones in the US.  I didn't realize it's a world-wide feature of raw fish.

Japanese omelet - where's the cheese and ham?

And one last thing - when a restaurant says "omelet," it's just scrambled eggs - no cheese, no fillings (and almost always shaped into a rectangle).  It seems in Tokyo they may add a little sugar to it because there's a sweetness to them.  When we're in Okinawa prefecture we have some and it tastes like regular eggs.  I happen to like Okinawa's version better.  

That's it for now...though I'm sure I'll have a Part 3 at some point!