MmMmMmmmHimmmeji

Tonight I'm in the same hotel as last week but I've been bumped up two rooms and three floors.  Rarely is progress this measurable but I'm taking in the view while I can.  Had I known the fame of Himeji's oden (apparently world famous in these parts) and had had more than 500 yen to spend on a meal last week, I most certainly would have ventured a little further.  But this time, with the support of a group of tomodachis, I enjoyed some amazing oden, food typically reserved for vats of overdue broth left boiling in convenient stores.  Not so this evening.  Cooked in a light broth, we enjoyed mochi filled tofu skins, octopus, tofu, fish cakes, noodles, mushrooms, boiled eggs, seaweed, tofu skin, gingko nuts, potatoes, daikon radish, bamboo root, and probably something else I've forgotten– all of which we dipped into a ginger soy sauce.  After this feast, we returned to the tempting waffle stand with the ever present line and waited to fulfill our olfactory expectations.  Matcha, chocolate caramel, maple, ice cream to go with if one wished....I was please with a simple almond waffle this evening.  Amazingly, one of the nihonjin in our group had planned a second dinner of ramen and some in the group were headed that direction and perhaps on to Karaoke.  I felt pretty satiated by this point and ducked underground to a tea shop.  That's where you duck in Japan, the dark green tea under belly of Himeji.

if you're going to have drink coasters- why not?

very happy, beautiful people (and oden)

carefully preparing matcha waffles