Sticker Shocked

On Saturday I moved into my new home, unpacked, and cooked my first home dinner: lamb, rice, and tofu. At least it was edible. Costco provided most of the ingredients — yes, Costco has made it to Japan, although you'll need to know someone with a car to help out. Most grocery store items most of the time are expensive, although there are some strange exceptions. I found a big bottle of grapeseed oil on sale for 315 yen at Nissin World Delicatessen, for example. I haven't exactly figured out what to do with a big bottle of grapeseed oil, but what a find!

My favorite grocery store so far is the Pororoca store, and that's not just because there's an English pub next door. They had lots of sale items including some vegetables priced below the 100 yen barrier. I got a fairly large leek for 58 yen, 200 grams of straw mushrooms for 98 yen, and a package of bean sprouts for 58 yen. Pororoca has a laundry on site, and their shirt prices are a bit lower than the Ark Towers delivery service. Nissin had a small double package of mustard greens ("day old") for 105 yen, and I also found a roughly one pound package of chicken for 164 yen. I thought the chicken was a great deal until I got home and discovered it was just leftovers for soup stock, so I made (expensive) soup.

A block of tofu seems to be 89 yen predictably. Canned tomatoes aren't too far out of line (about 85 yen per can at Costco), and Pororoca had a large can of mandarin oranges for 100 yen. Beef is ridiculous, especially now with the embargo on U.S. beef. Spices are pricey, but I found a packet of chili powder for 71 yen and a bottle of minced ginger for around 330 yen.

After studying the rough English translation of the washer and dryer manuals, I did a couple loads of laundry. My office compatriots will appreciate my breakthrough in fabric management.

Tonight I went to church. There are a few Catholic churches in Tokyo, and one of them is a ten minute walk from my apartment. There are five weekend masses in English including the 6:00 p.m. mass. This mass was a bit somber: last night one of the parish priests died after a long illness. There were a couple other unusual aspects to the mass. Parishioners could submit personal intentions to be read aloud, and one of them requested prayers for a successful visa application. Also, a karaoke machine (or something sounding like it) produced nearly all the instrumental accompaniment.