Rice and Ramen

A few weeks ago I got the best news: A museum was reopening in Tokyo. (OK, yes, I probably have gotten better news than that in my life, but this was still pretty good.) The Museum of Contemporary Art Tokyo (MOT)  had been closed for three years in order to renovate the building. And since I only moved to Tokyo just under two years ago, I had not yet gone! I promise, for me this was quite exhilarating. So this past Saturday I took myself all the way out to Kiba Park, where the museum is, on the other side of the city from my apartment. And after a full two hours in its current exhibit, "Weavers of Worlds: A Century of Flux in Japanese Modern/Contemporary Art," I just wandered around taking pictures of some of its better architectural features. Some architecture details: The museum was designed by Takahiko Yangisawa, who also worked on several other notable buildings, such as the MOA Museum in Atami, Shizuoka Prefecture (1981); New National Theatre, Tokyo (1997); and To...

On Sunday I went to a CAMP Yale BBQ at the American Embassy Dormitories in the heart of Tokyo. The complex is located in Akasaka, right in the middle of the city. There are three "towers" like the one above, each with a different color assigned to the balconies. Personally they remind me a lot of the Piet Mondrian paintings: the ones that are white canvasses with stark black lines and occasional blocks of primary colors. Despite the rainy weather we held our BBQ outside (albeit with a gazebo and pop-up tent handy). There was a bouncy castle for the children present, while the adults did both an egg toss and a water balloon toss for Tokyo Embassy-themed prizes. Then there was classic American BBQ fare--hotdogs, burgers, grilled chicken, potato salad, corn salad, watermelon, brownies and beer. The Yale community here seems really friendly and I hope I'll get to know everyone more over the course of my time here. Interestingly, right across from these dorm...