Radies what runch

Today I`m in one of the internet cafes executive porn booths. The extra cool air conditioning and low-slung soft leathered seat are perfect for many things, but typing isn`t included. There is rhythmic moaning coming from the booth next door, but I am telling myself that it is just an exhausted Salaryman catching up on some sleep - they`ll do it anywhere and here is better than the floor of Omiya station.

I`ve just come from lunch with one of my classes, or the Menopause Sisters, as they have wackily titled themselves. It was an amazing feast. Although I`d invited myself into Hirako`s home, we first went to an old style izukaya where we got our own booth (the politeness of the Japanese does not stop them from moaning to get the waitress to close the shutters then still insisting on another booth) with a small pit under the table for your feet, so you are still sat at a table in the English way, but much lower down. I may have a very weak sense of humour, but that tickled me whenever the waitress came in and crouched down to take or deliver our order.

My hostesses checked that I ate everything (I made a terrible faux pas, again, by saying everything but tofu and miso, when Hirako had painstakingly - perhaps - prepared it as a special Japanese treat for when we went on to her place later. I don`t even mind it, it just seems pointless drinking dish water when there are better things to put in your mouth) and ordered plate after plate after plate. Sachiki asked if I`d eat horse sashimi and I revealed myself to be a cannibal before she revealed herself as a joker.

The vastness of the feast was astounding. First we had sashimi, which never fails to be meltingly soft and so tasty, then various other Japanese specialities that I can`t even remember. We got through tempura, then had to make way for sausages and I had to restrain myself when asked if we had weeners in England. After those came a plate of something between omelette and pizza which was lovely, but I still don`t know the name of. Then came around seven kinds of yakitori and I had a brief moment to pause for breath to answer questions on whether I had left a boyfriend in England and how I feel about Japanese men. Then (you should have been there!) came out bigger platefuls, we even had pizza and wedges, followed by soba noodles and finally two enormous dishes of sushi which we just couldn`t finish (thankfully, if I`d tried, more plates would have been ordered) and I was given those as takeout. Only once did the meal falter, at the reprisal of the Menopause Sisters gag as I was shovelling soba into my mouth. It took my back to my old market research days when I`d have to listen to withered old hags drone on about IBS and dream of a job with the young uns in McDonalds.

I was then ushered back into Sachiko`s car and given a further tour of the area and driven to Hirako`s villa. It looked quite shabby from outside and her protestations that it wasn`t very big or clean seemed real until she opened the door. The misleadingly small and grubby exterior masked an enormous, palatial home. The wooden floors shone with fresh wax and she had a room the size of my entire apartment for almost every purpose. Unfortunately, as I knew I would have to take my shoes off when going into her home, and also perhaps the restaurant, I had carefully considered my footwear, but not well enough; now poor Hirako has enormous footprints all through her polished house.

Hirako was in her element and took us all on a tour of her house, which was amazing, but also showed that the others hadn`t even been there before and they have known each other for almost a year. During the feast, I had tried to apologise if it had been impolite of me to invite myself to her house, but she was pleased I had as they wanted me to go, but were too shy to ask. This is the Japanese way, so it is occasionally handy to have a blundering Western idiot break the ice.

The house was a bizarre blend of class and kitsch, from the classic minimalism of her decor to the Hello Kitty slippers in the toilet. Every wooden floor had a sheen of glass, the living room was quite small and turned into a bedroom at night when the screens were pulled, holing Hirako and her husband up in a little den with the biggest flat screen TV I have ever seen. Her conservatory was the size of my apartment and there was a piano in the area between the two. Her kitchen was in a hallway to the side and ran further than the length of my 1LDK (living room/dining room/kitchen). Actually, mine is a DK as I have no living room aside from where I sit when I pack up my bed. It would have been stunning and very elegant, if it weren`t for the bucketloads of cuddly toys cluttering up every surface. I was told last night by the gaijin landlord, George, that Disney denotes mafia connections, so I won`t be marking Hirako`s homework too harshly.

We were seated around a low table and Hirako waited on us, challenging Sachiko and Takako to name some Japanese specialities that I hadn`t tried in the restuarant. Unfortunately, almost everything that wasn`t available in the restaurant was vile. I was given natto, a nasty bean dish that smells repugnant and has slime hanging off each morsel making it more like larvae than food. Then came the pickled apricots, which weren`t so bad, but vinegared fruit shouldn`t be forced on guests. Out of politeness I said I preferred the pickles to the natto, and so more pickles were brought out, this time small, sweetly pickled onions not dissimilar to silverskins, which made it feeling quite festive. I was then offered une, sea urchin eggs, which I thought I should try just once at least. It was a salty paste that tasted of the sea and, though not the most offensive thing I`d been forced to eat today, I had finished my tea and was left with that taste for a good hour and Takako`s sympathetic face whenever I had to eat something made me question their motivations. I also had two types of nori (seaweed): Japanese and Korean. I was told it was healthy (as is the natto - a diet food, but only because it is a bulimic aid), but my idea of health does not involve frying and matching the weight of food with salt. Japanese nori is slightly better as it just tastes a bit like une. I was finally given cherry blossom tea and a sweet potato and red bean cake, which sucked any saliva out of my mouth and left me faint and panting to come home. A bell chimed, I was ushered into the bathroom and then into Sachiko`s car, more full than I`ve ever been before.

It was exhausting.　They have basically managed to get me to give them a four and a half hour free conversation lesson for the price of a meal. I had to tell them what I thought about salarymen, whether gaijin is an offensive term and planned my mum`s pending visit. They want to meet her and also are plotting ways of getting me to give more free lessons, like taking me to the antiques market in Kawagoe. I am more than happy to go and have them explain the temples to me, but I am going to have to barter to make sure these don`t happen too regularly. I am quite tempted to accept Hirako`s offer to befriend her belly-dancing daughter as she has studied in America and is my age. She and Takako also want me to meet their single sons, so I may invent a boyfriend soon.

I think I will base him on George, the landlord, as I do have a small crush on him anyway. He has Trans-Siberianed and also been to RADA and is most definitely the best-looking gaijin in Omiya, although I was forced to admit this to him when I was describing my boss as the second most good-looking to Karen and she asked who was the first.　George was listening and said `me` and I had to agree. He also lets me use his CD player as my personal jukebox and even played Crowded House without my having to request it last night. He tried to avoid Like A Prayed but Karen and I bullied a salaryman into requesting it too, so it had to go on. I also got to pour my very first pint last night, for myself as George was busy, so you could say I`ve established my local fairly quickly - I didn`t actually have one in England, so am a bit ashamed of the ex-Patness of it all, but not enough to stop.