Ah yes, July in Japan! Stifling Heat, high humidity, and... beer garden parties!
Ahem, what is really meant by "beer garden" is "department store roof-top."
Last Saturday found me at the Sogo department store beer garden in the centre of Hiroshima, attending a Warhammer nutter's birthday party. (Yep, the guy with the red and white teacloth round his neck in the bottom photo.)
This Saturday I spent a cheerful few hours at the Mitsukoshi department store beer garden with the boss and teachers of a language school where I teach three classes each week.
Once everybody was there, our party consisted of eight people from five different countries:
2 Japanese
2 English
2 Trinidadians
1 Filipino
1 Mexican
Both beer gardens charge just under ¥5,000 ($33) for the duration, and for that you can eat and drink as much as you like, which is always an attractive deal for beer-swilling foreigners!
I must say though, that as I have mellowed with the passing years, I no longer feel the urge to "get my money's worth" on the beer front. The old calculation was that you needed to drink 8-10 beers to "get your money's worth" at which point the grub was effectively "free"! Ten minutes before "last orders" the guzzlers would gather up as many empty glasses they could find and we'd end up with a table full of beer which we'd wolf down as "Auld Lang Syne" - the Japanese "end of party" song - would play over the tannoy. Ah fond memories!
Even so, I'm pretty sure I "got my money's worth" at these two most recent beer garden parties, not necessarily by downing ten glasses of beer though.
So how do those two beer gardens compare?
Mitsukoshi has a somewhat higher reputation than Sogo. As you can see from the photos, the Mitsukoshi beer garden has a much more festive and attractive appearance which strikes you as soon as the lift doors open upon arrival at the roof.
Also, Mitsukoshi is a popular choice because it offers a "Ghengis Khan" barbecue that you cook at your table. It includes a range of meat including mutton (he he, they call it "lamb").
My memory of the Sogo beer garden was that the food was not so great, so I was pleasantly surprised last week when I saw the range and quality of food available. It's been a few years since I was last as Sogo beer garden and it's good to see that they have improved the grub department. It just took me ages to be able to get near any of it...
My timing was more fortunate at Mitsukoshi as I hardly had to queue at all at the beer garden, whereas it took me ages to get into the Sogo beer garden. When I got to Sogo I went up the escalators to the tenth floor where the restauruants are. From there there is a long escalator that takes you to the roof... but when I got to it, it was not working! So I waited for a lift to take me up one more storey to the roof... There are four lifts at Sogo, but only two got all the way to the roof. I missed the first one because I was standing in front of a lift that didn't go any further than the tenth floor, barely avoiding the inconvenience of getting in and going back down! I was at the back of the crowd for the lift that DID go to the tenth floor. I squeezed in - the last geezer to get in... and the lift didn't move. Someone shouted at me to get out, so I did, and watched that lift go up, and go all the way back down to the ground floor, which is where the other roof-bound lift seemed to be stuck for ages.
When I finally got to the roof, I was met by a huge milling crowd, and just ONE ticket window, so there I was stuck for another twenty minutes until it was my turn to get a ticket, all the time with a tantalizing view of everybody else having fun in the beer garden!
Oh, and when I finally got into the beer garden, I gave up on the idea of getting any grub for the first hour or so - because of the huge queue! Fortunately, things were moving faster at the beer taps.
Post Beer Garden Parties
A beer garden party is really just the aperitif to set you up for the rest of the evening. After the Sogo beer garden, although the birthday boy sheepishly went home, a bunch of us partied at a few watering holes and I got home just as it was getting light on Sunday morning, something that I haven't done for quite a while.
After the Mitsukoshi beer garden, the English and Mexican contingents headed off to a couple of bars. At twenty minutes to midnight I was about to order another beer at the second bar when it occurred to me that I could catch the last train if I legged it pronto to Hiroshima station... and so that is what I did, jogging and speed walking all the way.
It was just as well that I didn't dilly-dally because the last train was leaving at 12:03am, and not at 12:08am as I had thought. When I got to the platform, there was the train, doors open, air-conditioners on full blast, and an empty seat for me to flop into, covered in sweat from my exertion, but feeling quite spiffing for having had the nouse to prize myself out of the bar and save myself a taxi fare home!
Cheers - until the next party, which could well be next Saturday at our local street festival!
David Hurley
#InspiredFocus