Everybody Wants to Be a Cat

Miako-San is the jazz playing, anti-war, vegan chef, Zen Buddhist Monk badass who we were singularly fortunate to discover here in Kyoto.

Through my research about vegetarian eating in Kyoto, I found an excellent travel blog, A Never-Ending Voyage, which mentioned Mikoan as a vegan restaurant serving unbelievably delicious, and remarkably affordable, food in a funky, cat-equipped jazz pad near Gion.

However my further research uncovered the regrettable fact that Mikouan burned down one night while the owner, Miako-San, was asleep upstairs.

We later learned that Miako-San was unconscious from smoke and very badly burned when firefighters rescued her from the blaze. She spent two weeks in a coma, near the end of which her own mother had given up on seeing her alive and well again. However, Miako-San revived, and is recovering more everyday.

We decided to visit another establishment with which Miako-san is connected, a cat place called Nekouan (meaning “Cat Temple”), where people can pay a small fee to hang out with a bunch of cats—a type of establishment apparently not entirely uncommon in Japan.

We entered Nekouan, took off our shoes (of course), and settled into a room filled with several other patrons (notably all young ladies), and of course the cats with whom we had all come to visit.

In particular, I made fast friends with a small, sleepy kitty named fuyu-kun (pronounced, “foo-yoo-koon”) who, as I explained in Japanese to my bemused onlookers, was my friend because we were both dressed in black and white.

The Princess made friends with a black kitty, who was also quite sleepy.

Among those present at Nekouan was none other than Miako-San herself, wearing long sleeves and skeleton gloves to cover her burns (sorry for the blurry photo).

Her arms and hands, when she showed them to us, were badly damaged, with red vein-like scars stretching across her scorched skin.

We explained that we had been looking forward to dining at Mikouan, and were sad to discover that it had burned down, and in particular, I attempted to explain that I was touched by the message on her website, which declared the need to manifest Zen principles in a down to earth and accessible way through food and music.

As we played with the kitties, Koji-San continued to converse with Miako-San, and by the time we were ready to leave, a private luncheon for the three of us had been settled upon for the following day, set to take place at a different jazz bar nearby where Miako-San herself would cook for us.

We thanked her profusely, paid the old lady at the counter (who I assume is Miako-San’s mother), and returned to the cold streets of winter-time Kyoto, warm with the affection of kitties, and excited for tomorrow’s meal.