Potato Ice-Cream

Maybe jet lag can catch up with you after all.

This morning I awoke later than planned so luckily unfortunately I couldn't have breakfast before heading straight to the training room. As things do when you're absorbed, the time disappeared and lunch time came around so we all went out to grab some lunch.

We went to Saizeriya which is a Japanese run family-style Italian restaurant. This is a full meal for a pretty good price so it is quite popular at lunch time. Since we had a large group of us, we split our group so we could be seated quickly and ended up with loads of time to eat. Each of us got something different but it all looked good. I got a chicken dish with vegetables and rice plus before the meal you get a potato salad too. The food was nice, even the potato salad which was served with a ball of potato which looked like ice cream on a bed of lettuce, which I dubiously ate.

Once we got back, we did some more training and had to do a drugs test for the company as part of the medical tests before we can work because drugs are taken very seriously in Japan. There is no soft/hard view, they are all treated the same and there is definite prison time for anyone who is arrested for drugs.

The process was quite entertaining in itself though, as we all had to sit with these flat thermometer type devices sticking out of our mouths for about 5 minutes whilst trying not to laugh too much as we'd drop them. The trainers of course immediately began making jokes and I couldn't look anyone in the eye without fear of dropping my test from laughing.

When we'd finished for the day, the four of us from the Nagahama group went out to find some food and ended up in this really cool Izakaya. An Izakaya serves small plate meals, typically you order 4-5 and share them all.

The place looked really nice and had little rooms with sunken tables so had a really nice vibe or 'ii genki'. It had a small entrance for removing shoes and lockers with wooden blocks where you can store your shoes whilst you eat. You take the wooden block with you which locks it and then match the symbols to the ones on the locker when you come to put your shoes back on.

It was the best food I've had so far and I tried many new things like Sashimi (raw cuts of fish) and a small cooked fish which is served whole which was actually nice if you don't think about what you are eating. I had a really nice chocolate fondant for desert which came with ice cream, raspberry sauce and frozen berries. This is slowly becoming a food blog! Hopefully, more to report on in the coming days once training has finished.