Day 12, Wednesday, May 23rd: Sumo Scalpers

Late down to breakfast this morning and got talking with a Swiss couple sitting next to us. After a few days in Japan they are on their way to a wedding in South Korea. It is a late departure from the hotel this morning to sumo. Prediction of rain for most of the day and once we reach the sumo stadium it is indeed lightly raining. Fortunately, we have two umbrellas.

Naomi and Hikaru were going to join us at sumo, but Naomi's Dad was ill so they cancelled and gave us their tickets last night. Our focus was to try and sell their tickets and give the money to them when we see them tonight.

We believe it is probably illegal to scalp tickets, but no officials were around the front gate entrance. We think the only way we can sell these tickets are to approach Caucasians. Today is another sell out so that works in our favour. We approached two young men but they are only looking to buy one ticket and we want to sell both as a pair. There was an Italian couple near the gates and the fellow eventually came over and agreed to buy the two tickets for full price! He speaks some English. We take them to our seats as they are sitting beside us. Of course, we immediately head for the railing to get excellent seats until the owners show...

Example of Shinagawa train station gate rules. 

As you can see there are gates along the train track platform. The train pulls up and the train doors open even with the gates below. It all works well. These gates discourage people from diving onto the train as the doors are closing (which causes delays of course) as these safety gates close at the same time. 

Food Truck (aka Kitchen Car) outside the Ryogoku Kokugikan where we purchased our lunch for today. 1000Yen for a large bowl of grilled pork loin on rice. You need to go through a special exit gate and get your wrist stamped. On re-entry at the same gate they inspect your tickets and place your wrist under an ultra-violet light to identify your stamp. Another interesting thing is there are hundreds of fans standing by this entry/exit gate waiting to see rikishi entering and exiting. You can get very close to the rikishi. These athletes are not like North American pros delivered in limos/buses to private gates with no public access. They all walk. In the case of the lower division rikishi you can meet them on the trains!

This is our lunch that we bought outside and then smuggled inside the stadium. It is raining outside so not able to eat lunch in the rain. This simple meal was delicious. The pork was tender and filling. The rice was hot and perfectly cooked with flavourful sauce on top. 

Japanese style snacks for sale at the Sumo stadium concession. Notice the english translation of each of the foods--even the stadium food can be very elaborate.

In previous blogs I had mentioned we had made a friend of an older fellow at the sumo stadium. This is a picture of his rikishi son who is in the Makushita rank (#49) in his bout. Katsu is on the left. Regrettably, he lost his bout and his Dad was disappointed. Pretty cool guy to speak with and with the knowledge his son was at a fairly good ranking. 

Lana figured this sign out pretty quickly. This sign is on two walls facing each other. Basically, it is a scoreboard of the Juryo and Makuuchi bouts in Japanese script. You read from the right to the left. The top is the East rikishi and the bottom row is the West rikishi. The two red horizontal lines mean this is the first bout of the Juryo Division. When the winner is announced the red line stays with the winner's rectangle. We use this to ensure we are on the correct round.

After our lunch we take our correct seats and the Italian couple show up as well. Around 15:00 a stadium employee approaches us to see our tickets. We discover we are in the wrong seats and need to be on the exact opposite side of the stadium in a different section! Doh! She escorts us to our correct seats. 

The Makuuchi procession occurs at 15:40 and now the place is filling up. We estimate though that today is the least attended day so far. There are a number of empty seats despite this being a sell out. Where we are now seated there are a number of fellow tourists. 

Observations:

• rikishi never acknowledge the crowd even with lots of fan support (yelling their name)
• no waving, smiling or other behaviour that would endear the fans - completely unlike North American pros who are often playing with the crowd or shouting insults/trash talking
• Lana figures out that the more advertising during each pre-bout means more money in the white envelopes the winning rikishi receives from the judge?
• today the final bout is finished at 17:52
• the last bout between Kakuryu (Yokozuna) and Mitakeumi (Komusubi) was excellent as it looked like Kakuryu might be beaten and then he swiftly recovers and throws Mitakeumi to the floor

 Three different kinds of strawberries in this Tokyo ad for a dessert place? Lana says we have two types of strawberries: organic and conventional :) 

We are meeting Naomi and Hikaru at Torishichi Yakitori restaurant for 19:00. We walk with the crowds leaving the stadium to the train station and then on our way to Shinagawa area. We use the Handy to navigate our walk to the restaurant and we have the correct address from Naomi. Our friends are waiting for us although we are there about 10 minutes early. Yes, Japanese are on time! Yeh!

Pretty small place which is apparently typical of yakitori restaurants in Tokyo. Very casual place with friends and salarymen alike eating and drinking. Very warm vibe. We defer to our friends for ordering the skewers of meat and vegetables. Smoking is permitted in this restaurant and there are some smokers. Draft beer is ordered. We learn a lot about yakitori cuisine from our friends and have a fantastic meal and company. We learn Japanese enjoy small dishes which we would call tapas and their word is tumami. 

Tsuki Dashi (small appie dish comes with beer order). This dish is boiled fresh fav beans (special for the Spring months). Very yummy--you peel them and eat the green bean inside!!

First dish of Tsukune - chicken meatballs with mustard. Very tender and tasty meat.

Second dish of Wakadoru (young chicken). They really know how to grill chicken!

Third dish of Asuparagas (grilled asparagus) with some mayonnaise for dipping. Best asparagus I have ever tasted. 

Fourth dish of Rebac - chicken livers (no picture). Very soft texture.

Fifth dish of grilled Shiitake Mushrooms.

Sixth dish of Sasami - chicken breast with wasabi. A North American would never put wasabi on any type of meat. We found this really enhanced the flavours of the meat. 

 Seventh dish of Chicken rice -  chicken with rice and ketchup. As good as it looks. Specialty of this yakitori joint.

Yakitori grilling of chicken and asparagus video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vzzMiDSluGM&feature=youtu.be

Yakitori grilling of chicken meatballs getting a dip in sauce video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vzzMiDSluGM&feature=youtu.be

Yakitori grilling of chicken skewers video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z7Nq9aMXdhE&feature=youtu.be

For the regulars of this restaurant your personal bottle of booze is set aside for future visits and they write your name on your bottle. 

Another excellent day at sumo and then a delicious yakitori dinner with our friends. We are back to the room and I am busy uploading pictures and updating our blog. Fortunately tonight the internet is working fairly well!

Walking stats for the day:  Over 11,000 steps and 8 kms walking and 13 floors.