Breakfast at the Isawa hotel is a 12 dish affair! We were ushered into a moderate-sized room by some very friendly uniformed women calling a friendly "Ohio gozimasu" (Good morning). A large low table sits on rice mats and is set with two large trays with small dishes and individual little candles burning under a dishes of small fish (cooked!). I try to gracefully sit down and fold my long gangly legs under the table and sit on the pillow. Besides the fish, there is rice (of course!), pickled vegetables, miso soup, seasoned mushrooms, seasoned burdock root, a salad with 2 small ham slices, green tea, toasted seaweed, soy sauce, a hot spring egg (a cold boiled egg in a special soy sauce and green onions), and a square inch of tofu with a small taro (like a potato) cut in a special shape floating in a special sauce with 3 green soybeans.
I dropped Akihiro off at the nursing home and came back to the hotel. This morning's entertainment for me is watching the hotel workers giving a deluxe send-off to their guests. There is lots of "arigato gozimashita"s (thank you) and much bowing. Then there are several uniformed employees with large smiles standing out in the parking lot and waving and bowing as the guest drives away--they continue waving until they can no longer see the car.
This is Japan!!!