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I can’t believe we are leaving, it just hasn’t properly sunk in.I was awoken by an earthquake this morning, probably the strongest I have felt so far. The quake was centred about 200 kilometres away, and sadly killed at least seven people. I cant imagine how scary it would be to be any closer to the centre, the thought that the earth itself could start to move under our feet at any time is hard to grasp. It does make Tokyo a little easier to say goodbye to.

I have at least said goodbye to all my friends here now, after finally meeting with Sam and Sidi this evening. Too many goodbyes!

Sidi took us to an Indian curry house in Shibuya, it was really good, really cheap AND the staff were very sweet. A pity we hadn’t found it earlier. I think it’s called Curry Plaza for anyone who is interested.

Before Sidi and Sam finished work, I met with Michael for coffee at Century Southern Tower. Before now, we haven’t been bright enough to think of going to the hotels for coffee and Keki. The view from the 20th floor bar was nice, but would have been improved if there wasn’t an unused 10 foot wide terrace blocking most of it.

The food was good though, with real mozzarella cheese in the salad, and hotel bars feel the same everywhere, so seem just a little like home.

Michael bought us the loveliest going away present too, he is an excellent present buyer.

Today was a bit of an unproductive day, as we were both a bit too hungover to want to get out and do much.

Luckily Michael took us out to dinner at a fantastic tempura restaurant in Shinjuku for dinner, so the day wasn’t a complete failure.

We sat in the tatami section of the restaurant, which wasn’t so good for our circulation, but was great for a farewell Japan dinner. It felt a little like we were eating at someone’s grandma’s house, all very cosy.

After dinner, we did our usual 30 minutes or so of wandering about trying to find some reasonable cake and coffee, and somehow ended up in a very strange cafe that appeared not to have had a customer since 1965 or so.

Walking into a shop or restaurant here always triggers a chorus of greetings and welcomes from all the staff, so we have a bad habit of sitting down in embarrassment rather than leaving a place we have decided is not quite up to scratch.

Despite the absence of customers, odd interior, musty smell and lack of edible looking things on the menu, we sat ourselves down and managed to choose a couple of cakes and drinks between the three of us. Unfortunately, this cafe also sticks to the irritating ‘everybody must order a drink’ rule that seems to apply throughout Tokyo.

It has to be the most annoying rule ever, and I don’t understand it at all. Even when Patrick and I have ordered two cakes and two pastries but only the one coffee, we have been told we have to order a drink each. $25 worth of food isn’t enough to gain a seat.

Luckily the odd cafe made for a memorable evening in all it’s weirdness, so Michael will not be forgetting us in a hurry.

Since I came to the sudden realisation that we are about to leave Tokyo, we have managed to fit in lots of time with friends.

Dan came up with the clever idea of going to the zoo on Friday, so he, Rohan and I spent an enjoyable afternoon in Ueno which included a thrilling 15 second ride on the zoo monorail.

I really should get out with my friends more, they come up with far more interesting things to do than I.

Friday evening, we went to Karaoke and discovered that Jason is an excellent singer and that Patrick can now read the English lyrics on the Karaoke screen. Now we are hoping that there are lots of English songs for Patrick to read along to in Hefei.

After Karaoke, we went to Sizzler for dinner, where we enjoyed our traditional buffet-dinner-before-leaving-a-country. We stuffed ourselves with salad and Australian beef and lamb, which might be a little hard to come by in Hefei.

Miki presented us with an amazing box full of Japanese treats, which we promised to save until we got to China. I don’t think Patrick looked really carefully, so I ate the caramel today, I don’t think he will notice.

Today we had lunch with Yumiko, who afterwards took me to an amazing craft store full of cute crafty things in Kichijoji. I am now well stocked up on materials, sewing books and patterns. So hope I can sew…

Finally, we met with Sachi and her boyfriend this evening, who treated us to a Japanese feast, a night on the town, and then the best ramen in Tokyo. Patrick proved he is very good at cheating at darts, but can win without cheating if necessary.

And best of all, after all that, my hair is still straight!

We had lunch with James today, he managed to be organised enough to get us available and hungry in the same place at the same time, which was good, because I am generally not good at arranging to see friends before I leave places.I hope he enjoyed the lunch more than it looks like he did.

Luckily everyone at work organised an impromptu dinner on my last day, or I probably wouldn’t have ever got around to seeing any of them. Good people I’m glad to have met.

I like moving around because we make so many new friends, but then I don’t like moving around because it means we have to leave all the same people again… at least blogs and msn make it easy to stay in touch now.

It was after lunch that I realised just how little time we have left in Tokyo, and how many people we should be having lunch with instead of hanging about wasting time.

Another interesting thing that happened today was that a friend I haven’t spoken to for years appeared on my msn and mentioned something about Save The Children in Hefei.

A few times I have considered volunteering in China, but haven’t ever come across anything in Hefei before. Now that a week before we get there, someone mentions it to me out of the blue, without even knowing I am on my way back, I think it must be meant to be.

There was a really interesting job advertised, but I think I will try and volunteer for a while first and see how I go part time. If I can spend more time studying Chinese when I get to Hefei, I will be far more use to everyone later on anyway.

I have put in my application, and convinced Patrick he needs to call them tomorrow for me and ask about what sort of opportunities they have, so now have my fingers crossed.

We set our alarm early this morning, and finally dragged ourselves off to Tarlum for breakfast.

It was well worth getting up for, as the breakfast was the nicest we have had in ages. Patrick had scrambled eggs with bacon and I had a cheese omelette, each was served with with salad, rye bread, hazelnut danish and a hot drink.

Patrick’s latte looked nice, but I think he was secretly a bit jealous of my frothy honey soy milk.

The nice surprise was that everything was about half the price listed on the website.