Cheap, cheerful and not especially cleanly bars and eateries remain common finds in Tokyo. Utterly unpretentious places where anyone can pull up a chair and enjoy good, honest food and booze. All of which is served in a similarly genuine manner.
Many of these establishments have memorable quirks too; their confined nature often meaning certain compromises need to be made. And from experience, this can result in some interesting, or at least interestingly placed, lavatories. I’ve had to go to one behind a fridge. Others that have involved going outside and then back in again through a different door. Plus another that required a walk down the area’s main street, before turning into an alleyway where the bar’s toilet was. Or at least a toilet was.
But in Yakitori Shima, the fact that the question of whether a wee or a poo was needed when enquiries were made about the toilet’s whereabouts, suggested it could be more of a concern than a mere quirk. And such concerns were indeed confirmed when directions led to this (blue) bucket-based affair round the side of the bar. A toilet made all the more public by also being across from the entrance to an apartment building.
Mercifully for the ladies, or indeed men needing to evacuate other matter, there is actually a more conventional facility through the door to the right of the bucket. It is, however, up some stairs that are so steep a rope has been added in a slight nod of sorts towards health and safety.
And yet at the end of the day, none of these peculiarities hurt Yakitori Shima’s back-to-basics charm. As with cheap beer, good food and a wonderfully genial host, how could they?
Geoff says
Wow, that’s pretty basic! Is that actually allowed by law? No checks by the authorities?
Lee says
I honestly couldn’t say. That said, I have been told that licenses are issued — have to be issued. And some similar places I’ve been in have such things on display. But clearly they can’t be all that strict…
Hans ter Horst says
Wow, looks like a place to go for the food and hold it until you made it home or the station to ‘freshen up’ 🙂 The master looks jovial, how was the yakitori? I’m particularly fond of the chicken skin ones!
Lee says
We were there for a long time, and got through more beers than I care to remember. Or indeed can remember. So there was little chance of that. It was a case of drunkenly grinning and bearing it!
The yakitori and a few other things we had were good. Had the option of miso along with the usual salt or sauce for the yakitori too, so that made for an interesting change. Chicken skin is one of the few I can’t stomach. Not a fan of skin at the best of times (unless it’s crispy), so a load of it on a stick is far from ideal!
June says
Ewww! So woman have to walk past men using that blue thing? And what about washing your hands?!!
Lee says
Yes, afraid so. Then up the stairs using the rope!
There was a sink upstairs if I recall correctly, but not by the bucket. Instead, plenty of hand wipes were supplied at the table.
Coli says
Awesome. I don’t really mind about the bucket and all. I just wouldn’t want to have to throw it away. Much like one of the places I go to in kobe. Just a nonfunctional urinal placed above a hole in the side alley. The thing with great joints like these is that you’re feeling too good with the food and beer to care much about what the toilet looks like. Am I right?
Lee says
Yes, not an enviable job…
That sounds like quite a place in Kobe. A little izakaya?
100%. If anything it actually made the evening more enjoyable. The sheer novelty of it was fascinating.
Coli says
Lee it’s actually a yakitori place too. It’s great because everything from the drinks to the food is from Kyushu. One of the only places I feel safe eating chicken sashimi.
Lee says
Nice. Yakitori places often tend to be the most basic, don’t they? The simplicity of the food perhaps has a lot to do with it.
Jeffrey says
Okay Lee. You might have finally crossed a line too far for me. (And he cooks his yakitori on gas!)
Lee says
That’s a fair shout. If I wasn’t already a few beers to the good when I first had to go, I’d have probably been the same. After that. Or more accurately after several more beers. I didn’t really care.
And yes, you are right. That hadn’t even registered. He was such a lovely bloke though, I’ll forgive him!
Marcin says
You’re seriously destroying my perception of Japan here man – I always thought it was all robotic talking toilets down there 😉
Lee says
Haha!
The robotic toilets have all become sentient, meaning it’s back to buckets for us mere humans…