Life back on AFF

It's been a few days since I've been allowed back on AFF. It was so heartwarming and humbling when I was welcomed back so warmly by our friends in the Community. It's so nice to have been missed. 

I've been posting a few posts I posted here as catch-up posts on AFF. The penis festival one got denied once, but after contacting Tier 2, it got approved. The Tier 2 Support Team member who took care of the post seems to have enjoyed reading about the wacky festival held in Japan. LOL

On another note, I went to Ginza after work on Friday to have dinner at a restaurant that I've been wanting to go to. It's run by a bakery that's famous for their "anpan" (あんパン), buns with sweet bean paste. Everybody knows about Kimuraya anpan. I don't like sweet bean paste, but they have a nice bun with custard cream. 

I got to Ginza much earlier than planned, so I wanted to kill time browsing through a couple of stores, but everywhere was crowded with tourists. Man, as bad as it was for business, I miss how there were few people around during the pandemic. It was mind-boggling how tourists came out of Uniqlo with armfuls of clothes they bought at the store. 

The crowd was getting on my nerves, so I decided to get a table at the restaurant although it was too early. I figured I could enjoy a pot of tea while I waited for my friend to join me. The restaurant didn't mind as long as I ordered dinner later. 

The restaurant's most popular dish was beef stew and the servers come around with a basket full of freshly baked bread that we can have as many servings of bread as we'd like. My friend and I also shared a Caesar salad. 

My friend suggested we go to an ice cream shop for dessert. Being in Ginza, it's a bougie gelato shop selling bougie chocolates, too. As much as I like chocolate, I'm not about to dish out $60 for a bar of chocolate. A regular-sized cone of gelato with 3 flavors was $12. I chose raspberry, dark chocolate, and mango. Sure, the gelato was good, but not good enough for a repeat visit. 

We saw a couple of interesting window displays. I liked the displays at Coach and Hermes. 

We walked back to the station and came across a park with different types of cherry blossoms in bloom, multi-petaled blossoms, weeping cherry blossoms, and some Somei Yoshino hanging in there. 

The weather was nice over the weekend and I was surprised to see that my purple freesia bloom and wisteria starting to bloom. I was surprised to see how many flowers the vines produced this year. It's going to be so pretty when it's in full bloom. 

How was your weekend?