26 May 2009

Our appointment to meet with Don this morning was at 9:30am. It was difficult to get out of bed, especially since we were the first group to go. I was jealous of everyone who got to sleep in. Don liked the progress we had made on our project and told us just to continue developing it. We had an appointment to meet with Shigeru Namba at 1:30pm, so I was able to take a quick nap between the time we finished up with Don and noon when we had to meet at the gate. Power naps really help get me through the day sometime. We caught the subway from Yoyogi-koen Station and took it to Tokyo University where Namba sensei teaches. Don got us there a bit early so that we could get lunch at the university cafeteria. I wasn’t really hungry, so Shae and I decided to share a meal. All of the food offered by the cafeteria looked really good, and it was very reasonably priced as well. The ordering process was a bit strange, since there was a glass case displaying all of the meals they served, then you bought the meal ticket from a vending machine. From the vending machine, you proceeded down to the cafeteria level and went to the correct window to get your food with your ticket. Once I figured it out, it was fine, but it was a very confusing process in the beginning, and it was really funny to walk around a glass case looking at all of the plastic fake food. Shae and I ended up splitting an order of fried chicken with mushroom cream sauce, salad, miso soup, and rice. Mugicha tea was free, so I drank a couple glasses of that as well. The meal was really delicious, and I wish campus food at Cal Poly was as reasonable and tasty as it is here in Japan.
A little before 1:30pm, we made our way through the campus to Namba sensei’s building. We met him in a small lecture hall, and he proceeded to give a presentation on his Box House series of works. It was really interesting, and I was glad that he was able to present in English. He already had plans for after the presentation, so we finished up, and we went our separate ways. On our way out, Don walked us through one of the architecture studios at Tokyo University, and it was a lot like Cal Poly’s studios except with much more people in one room. I assumed that we would head back after the meeting, but Don wanted to take us to the book district to visit a couple used bookstores. It took us a good 15-20 minutes to get to the district, but once there, we were on our own. Don pointed out one really good used architecture book store, but that was about it. Rather than all crowd into the bookstore at once, Norio, Derrick, and I went to a coffee shop just to relax. I ordered a small iced café mocha, and it was better than any café mocha I’ve had in the States. What a treat! After resting for a bit, we went to a couple bookstores, but only Norio bought some books.
From where we were, we decided to take the subway back to Shibuya, then walk back to the NOMYC from there. In Shibuya, we stopped and did a little bit of shopping, and Derrick bought more t-shirts at Uni-Qlo. For dinner, the three of us tried a Chinese restaurant across the expressway from the NOMYC. It was really really good, and I ordered fried rice that came with a cup of soup. It cost 680 yen, and the portions were pretty big. I am definitely going to eat there again in the near future. The rest of the night, I worked on my studio project and worked on my submission for a scholarship. I was really tired from staying up the night before, so I made sure to go to bed a little bit earlier.