We still don’t know if it was all fake. The fake Catholic chapel? The fake Caucasian priest (with his perfect Japanese that still sounded wrong)? The fake nuns with their big cross necklaces? The fake blossoms we were throwing at the newly wed. The fake Olive tree we were hanging our wishes on. The broccoli the groom was throwing into the assembled group of male guests (a friend of mine caught it and he’s now and forever called the broccoli man). We thought it’s an old Japanese tradition, and the Japanese thought it’s an old Swiss tradition (we told the Japanese that we will tell anybody in Switzerland that it is an old Japanese tradition). But the food was real, the beautiful kimonos some of the female guests were wearing were real. The French foie grois, the Bordeaux, the speeches, the love, the tears of the bride’s friends. All very real. The Japanese schedule of moving between the fake chapel behind the Anniversaire at Omotesando street to the wedding venue in the Anniversaire itself (the ööös of the Japanese when we told them that the wedding party was there). The moscow mule before the dinner. All real. The second party in a place called las chicas. The groom that did not come to the second party. All real. The speech I gave. Kind of real. The realisation that my Japanese became much worse, but it’s still good enough to casually talk myself through any conversation. The stupid Japanese drinking game I was playing later with old friends under the tracks of the Yamanote line in Yurakucho in one of the typical hidden Salaryman Yakitori places. Very real. Very stupid. Stupid things are usually quite real. And Japan feels as always half real. Not to be confused with surreal. Just not really real. All my love to S&Y.