Nihonshu

Japan, People

As I mentioned in the previous post, there are many things from Japan that in the west we are very familiar with. But as I also said, many of those things we know about Japan are slightly wrong. And this picture represents a perfect example. Nihonshu... not a word we are familiar with right? Yet it redefines something we are very familiar with; Sake. One thing I learnt while in Japan, that I didn't know before is that Sake means "Alcohol" not just "rice wine" and is the Japanese word for all types of alcohol not just the clear "wine" we are more familiar with.

This Sake bar in Akihabra, was on the eighth floor of the biggest electronics store I have ever seen in my life Yodobashi Akiba. The closest thing I can relate it to is Hamley's the toy store in London, which when you first go there is amazing to see 5 floors of toys, but Yodobashi is easily 5 times bigger !!

We didn't actually drink in that high-rize bar but the bottles alone are somehow hypnotic to the average green westerner who is just off the plane. However the second picture here is from the bar where we finally sampled some authentic Japanese nihonshu. We found it on the way back to our luxurious capsule hotel. Yes, one of those! And many thanks go out to the bar owners who gave us free nihonshu from those fantastic huge bottles. ;-) What a way to spend your first night in Japan :-)

Canon EOS 40D - 1/30s F4 ISO-800 40mm

Thursday 17th April, 2008