“Pickles and Jazz”

This guy comes into the burger place I’m at and orders a big bowl of pickles.

They come out almost instantly. He pulls a tiny paperback book out of the pocket of his camelhair jacket, or whatever designer fur the thing is made out of. He eats pickles with his right hand and reads the small leather covered book with his left. He mechanically feeds the pickles into his mouth. He takes exactly four bites per pickle.

Bite.

Chew.

Read.

Bite.

Chew.

Read.

The pickles last for quite a while. It was a big bowl. They bring him some blackened beer and then he alternates between pickles and beer, reading the little book all the while. After the pickles are gone, the waiter brings out one of the biggest burgers I’ve seen in Tokyo. The thing is so big it forces the man to put the small book down. He applies ketchup mechanically. And then the mustard in the same fashion.

The man’s moves are a spectacle. I notice the couple next to me is watching now too. Everything about this man seems artificial and calculated, yet somehow poetic. Like performance art. It seems like an artistic routine that fits perfectly with the jazz playing on the sound system, accentuated by the rhythm of the occasional passing train. On this night, life is a poem.

Then the man starts to cut his massive burger with fork and knife. A train passes. The cymbal adds a flourish. American Graffiti is being beamed against the back wall of the joint. Silently. Beyond the knife and fork of the mechanical diner, a projection of a young Harrison Ford wise cracks from behind the wheel of a classic car. When the burger is devoured, the man moves back to the pickles. I guess there were some left.

Richard Dreyfuss looks nervous.

Then man picks up the small book.

A train unloads.

A horn blows a prolonged cool note.

My bill comes.

The man takes a bite of pickle.

Harrison Ford laughs.

Tsutaya Daikanyama is the Future

The popular Tokyo bookseller has just unleashed a Death Star of creativity onto the Tokyo scene. Located in the designer chic district of Daikanyama, this modern bookstore seamlessly fuses printed matter with ubiquitous digital presentation to create an outstanding mecca of creativity.

Occupying six large retail pods on two levels on the main street, the bottom three sections are dedicated to a quality selection of art, design, architecture and photography books. One second level pod is dedicated to Film and another to Music. The largest central space is a lounge/library that offers drinks, lights meals and a plethora of design, art and advertising annuals filling the walls on all sides. The space has a museum feel, with artifacts like a Picasso print and a modern Japanese mural scrawled along an expanse on the back wall.

Every table in the lounge contains a wi-fi enabled iPad that is free for customers to browse as well as search the store.

A designer stationary and fountain pen shop sits nestled in one corner of the street level. The selection of notebooks and pens offer plenty of unique choices for the design minded.

The entire facility mixes a modern and open floor plan with exquisite interior design and art objects, with touch screens and iPads of all sizes to help you further navigate the space. It’s the kind of space that could easily double as a creative agency if it weren’t designated a bookstore.

You keep getting pulled back to the idea that this is a retail space, but the notion just doesn’t seem to do the building justice. This is an example of Tokyo excelling where it does best. In creating and maintaining uniquely designed retail experiences. The sense of spacial design is sophisticated and practical.

It feels like a giant Apple store, that also believes in selling printed inspiration. The whole building feels like you are navigating a digital space. Some modernized second life in which you are merely an avatar exploring the space. Yet it is real. Perhaps only in a place like Tokyo.

Silicon and Mortar.

This is the future of retail. This is the kind of institution that makes books relevant again. That shakes the dust of antiquated tomes and gives them modern relevance. This is the kind of place that moves us beyond the debate of print OR digital, for the profound notion of print AND digital.

As I walked through the conjoined series of pods, I realized I was catching a glimpse of where everything will be in ten years. Convenient, accessible and potentially, insanely inspiring. This is the best of what creative culture has to offer.

It is a store, but it’s not. Calling it a bookstore somehow sounds vulgar and crude. I normally loathe the term experience, but it feels an accurate way to describe what walking through these Daikanyama Tsutaya buildings is.

A chance to experience the future

Restaurant Review: Linamha

The Daikanyama district of Tokyo offers many treasures to the curious urban explorer.

Just beyond the neon glow of Shibuya, you’ll find a pocket of Tokyo that is more homegrown than raver. There is a hand crafted, artisan ethos to it’s labyrinth of alleys. You’ll find handmade clothing, hand selected audio mixes and the finest in organic dining. In a city as modern, and at times as fleeting as trend hopping Tokyo, it feels like a counter-revolution in progress to browse the offerings of Daikanyama.

One eating establishment of note is Linamha, a cozy Korean restaurant not far from the station.

With atmospheric pin lighting, unique natural wood furniture and fresh ingredients delivered the right way, Linamha feels like a perfect fusion between Korean cuisine and the back to basics spirit of Daikanyama.

At most Korean restaurants, the appetizer vegetables are already on the table, packed inconspicuously in containers next to the salt and spices. At this joint though, they decide to bring them out on a plate, giving this oft neglected part of the meal some nice fanfare. It also gives an early look at the power of their lighting system. Even a small plate of veggies looks amazing in this place.

The second phase of the meal is the ‘cook-it-yourself’ portion of the evening. They bring out delicious slabs of pork and arrange them on a dimensional skillet. A small container made out of tinfoil is placed at the top of the skillet, filled with a combo of garlic and oil. It just simmers along with the pork.

After carefully attending the meat, it is ready for assembly. An attendant comes out from the kitchen and tells you the proper way to build your next bite. You start with a large leaf of fresh lettuce, and then stack a mint like leaf on top of it. Then you apply various sauces. One is miso based, and the other is some curious Korean combination of sweet and not too spicy. Then you apply the freshly cooked pork and decorate it with a single sliver of cooked garlic. Then you deftly fold it all together into a tight wrapping and promptly enjoy. This process is repeated five or six times.

Then comes what marketers like to refer to as ‘The Difference Maker.’

In layman’s terms, it is a seafood pancake. But to most ears and Western oriented taste palettes I’m sure Difference Maker sounds a bit more appetizing.

Anyway, the thing comes out, fully sizzling on it’s plate, baked to perfection, with a thin layer of delicious crust enfolding the bulk of the pancake. Inside are a medley of seafoods like calamari and the ubiquitous ‘white fish.’ The whole concoction is held together by a thin layer of flour and water, giving a truly pancake like texture. It greatly resembles the Japanese dish of okonamiyaki, only slightly more refined.

This is the kind of dish that makes you remember a place. It’s the kind of taste that gets etched into your tastebuds and won’t let go.

Finally comes dessert.

Or at least what you call dessert when you are too full to last another round into the meal.

Fried rice, served sizzling in a stone bowl. One last reminder of the natural ethos of the joint and district. Once the sizzling settles down, you are free to enjoy the Korean style rice, with again, signature sweet + spicy flavor. You eat it with a small spoon that more resembles a snow shovel than something you would scoop Rice Krispies with.

When it’s all said an done, Linamha lets you feel like you had a unique new Tokyo experience. It lets you out into the Daikanyama air looking to find a small bite of gelato or a mysterious back street art gallery.

The options are endless, for those willing to not know exactly where they’re going.

It gets five stars and serves as a badge for a very interesting district.

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