Good morning from Nagoya, everybody!
I can’t believe it … I actually slept until 10am this morning! I guess the exhausting pace and jet lag finally took its toll on this old body. Probably could have slept a couple of more hours too, but gotta get ready to check out and head on over to the station to catch our train to Osaka.
I also took yesterday off from blog writing as kind of my “day of mourning” for the recent elections. We are in big trouble people …
The Blue Note in Nagoya was a blast last night … what a great venue! The sound was amazing and the crowd was rocking! We did two high energy back-to-back shows and by the end I was totally exhausted! Blue Note even created a special cocktail called “Sweet Embrace” to commemorate our evening there (it actually tasted pretty good although I’m not a big fan of rum). Afterward, we headed over to Tsukuneya (that’s right, its the same restaurant as the one in Honolulu!) for some late-night food and drink. This family-owned group of restaurants is originally from Nagoya, and the owner, Sachiko Sakuma, surprised me by dropping by the hotel to say hi after sound check. I’m so used to seeing this gracious lady whenever we go to their Hawaii restaurant so it was awesome to see her here in their home town. She invited us to one of their restaurants nearby after our concert where we were personally taken care of by Niimi-san. The place is located in an old building which was supposedly used for clandestine meetings by government and business officials – very maze-like with winding hallways and secret rooms. I almost expected to see ninja leaping out from behind the shoji doors! I want send a sincere Mahalo out to Sakuma-san and Niimi-san for their wonderful hospitality and generosity!
And now … it’s off to Osaka!!
Aloha. “D”