Eat and Meet

Back to Contents of Issue: April 2000


West Park Café

by Chieko Tashiro
In the quietTokyo neighborhood of Yoyogi-Uehara is a California-style restaurantcalled West Park Café. A successful Netpreneur who recentlyreceived a large dose of VC funding -- and whose writing oftenappears in these pages -- told us that while he was eating herea VC sitting at the next table offered to help finance his startup.We smelled networking and decided to drop in for lunch.

After a quick glance at the menu on a blackboard next to a wooden framed door, we stepped inside. The place has a sort of West Coast café atmosphere, with mellow rock music, yellow tablecloths, and the staff wearing denim shirts. Everything but California's dry air. Our friendly waiter brought us a bilingual menu featuring fresh-baked breads, deli items, rotisserie chicken, big salads, Mexican bretoo-style sandwiches, New York steaks, and a good selection of wines. We ordered some sandwiches -- which were huge and came with chips -- and some wine. All good.

The customers were quite diverse -- young couples, girls, businessmen... We didn't accomplish any networking ourselves, or witness any cross-table action, but we did discover that West Park is an enjoyable, foreigner-friendly place to do lunch. The networking, as always, is up to you.

 

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