October 19, 2017

We were walking through the plaza when I saw an acquaintance trying to attract customers for a restaurant in a maid outfit. He asked if we would like coffee or tea at the height of noon in the middle of summer.

A group of businessmen sitting outside were debating among themselves about how to negotiate the price of their lunch. They asked the waitress if they could pay a bit less. The waitress humored their request and offered to bring down their $19 bill to 18.96. The one paying said that he couldn’t afford that much. “Then 18?” she continued. He admitted that his balance was already in the negative hundreds.

The three of us decided to enter a sushi bar. My sister-in-law said that this was one of the first real sushi places she’s been in - she’d previously only ever had sushi at a friends house, with a South East Asian twist. The tables were mostly empty and business did not seem to be going well.