Eating and Drinking in Kanazawa

Kanazawa is known as little Kyoto, and I can hardly disagree with the description after visiting the Katamachi district. The streets are slightly less accessible, but it is a large city, teeming with pedestrians casually strolling in the brightly lit streets. The city was so electric that even when I closed my eyes, the lights dizzily danced through my eyelids making me feel as I had stood up too fast.

However, no matter how much one praises Kanazawa, one cannot ignore its most blaring downside. Due to lack of imagination, it seems, rather than any discrediting factors of the city itself, the only thing to do there is drink. This is, naturally, not true. The city is host to gardens, geisha districts, and many other attractions. However, with the small amount of time I had (being there only in the evening), and having no earthly concept of the geography of Kanazawa (the streets are annoyingly twisting with little or no method), I was forced to eat and drink as entertainment.

It was because of this, as a sober person, that I found I hate being around people who are drunk. They are loud, obnoxious, and think themselves to be unerringly funny. Ezzie, my friend who I love dearly, did very little to endear herself to me. She was touchy-feely and laughed at everything in a loud cackle that sounded as if it bordered on octaves that only dogs could hear. Anything derogatory was sported like a mortal wound that made her whimper and cry, “why are you being so mean to me?” She would then mope by burying her head in either my, or Michael’s shoulder. Fortunately, she forgot most of the rude things I did say to her the next day. I feel bad for being a wet blanket, even though I did my best to drink.

All in all, the trip to Kanazawa was not as fun as I had originally imagined it would be. When one goes to Little Kyoto, one expects some experiences. The only real experience I had made me cry. I thought my supervisor left me to fend for myself. It was wholly embarrassing. Not having a cell phone, I had to ask the office workers at the Jyosei Center to let me use the phone, and I called the one phone number I had. Unfortunately, this number was a person that I had not met yet. He was very kind, but told me that he was in Tokyo, and thus, unable to help me. However, he did give me the Prefectural Advisor’s number, and Fiona’s (a very nice Irish girl) number. Neither picked up, so I left a panicked message, which made me break down into tears. I told the very worried office workers that I was lost, and they spoke to me so rapidly that all I could do was cry. Then, at my most panicked moment, my supervisor walks in with a very confused look on his face. He had thought, because my orientation made me so late, that he was supposed to pick me up at the other hotel, but he could not find me so he came back. Sobbing every two breaths, I tell him that we were supposed to meet at the very spot I stood weeping.

“I know you won’t believe this,” he told me as he helped me get into his car, “but this is the first time I have ever made a girl cry.” I told him that he was lying, and he’s probably broken a whole stream of girl’s hearts. Then, I made him promise not to tell anyone that I was so distraught that I was crying. I don’t know if he will keep that promise.

After that, it was a very nice two-hour ride home, during which we decided that the blame for what happened in Kanazawa should be divided 51/49. I, naturally, was 51 percent to blame.