WAITING GAME

I REALIZED THIS MORNING,” said my friend Leah, “that this is who I am, here in Tokyo. I am a person who waits.” We were, at that moment, 23rd and 24th in line at Fuunji Ramen, surrounded front and back by locals and tourists, part of a neat queue that snaked out the restaurant’s entrance to the curb, where it broke for the tarmac only to pick up again in the grassy park across the street. Every few minutes, the noren curtain hanging in front of the door would twitch, discharging bodies into the Tokyo dusk, and we would steadily shuffle forward. To pass the time in this line, Leah was telling me about another: her wait the previous morning at Sushi Dai, the legendary morning omakase restaurant and sushi bar at the Tsukiji fish market, where even showing up at 3 a.m. may not be enough lead time to guarantee a first-round seat when the restaurant opens for breakfast at 5:00.

I am not a person who likes to wait for things. At home in New York, if a friend suggests a meal at one of those tremendously cool restaurants that doesn’t take reservations, I’ll agree only if we eat geriatrically early or owlishly late. I politely reject any brunch plans that involve putting our names