Photo 2: 1996 (Gifu City, Gifu Prefecture):



Now, there is a photo. Somehow, I thought that this was such an interesting picture for the 2nd in this series. There are so many details in this photo that bring back memories.


1st, the photo is of me and Tomo Imai, the magician/bartender at Milimeter, a little bar in Gifu where you used to be able to get what I thought was the best bloody mary in rural Japan: tomato juice, vodka, lemon juice, worcestershire, horeseradish, tabasco, and celery seed. Yummy, yummy, yummy. His bar was a revelation in the back alleys of Gifu, a place where Japanese and foreigners alike could get together for a good time to wile away the hours drinking, listening to jazz, and playing cards. I've been to a very few places where I felt so comfortable. Tomo went out of business in early 1999 right before I moved from Gifu to Kochi and while the last time I was in Gifu the light over Milimeter was on, I ended up not going in. If it had been someone else running a bar of the same name in the same spot, I could only have been disappointed. Of course, if Tomo is back behind the bar there, it's simply the one place in Gifu you have to go.


Now, I was only going to put one photo in this post, but all this talk of milimeter has me remembering this one great photo of my dad and I that was taken there, so I am going to post it as well. Here we are at Milimeter on January 4, 1997 on my parents' first trip to Japan. Somehow or other, I got half cut off on this shot, but it still should give you just a taste of what this great bar was like.

Now that I am back in the U.S., I have to say that the one thing I miss most about Japan is the local bar. The place you can go and just have a quiet drink, talk to the master, and listen to some music. Perhaps they exist in the U.S. and I am just in the wrong town and too busy with my studies to find them. Or, maybe, my idea of such a place is tainted by the memories of all the 10 seat bars I spent time in over in Japan. Either way, these photos bring back great memories of Milimeter, Tomo, and my friends Brad, Kathleen, Sarah, Maki, and Jodie. Maybe one of them will read this and remember what great times we had.