On the evening before I left, I had a great local sake (another passion of mine) called Tenka Happo in a restaurant. Deciding that it would make a nice gift, I went out to try to find a bottle... and that turned out to be quite a search. Asking near the restaurant, I was told it was available in the Happo district, a bit north of where I was, so I cycled for about ten minutes on a quiet back street in the darkness. Asked at the next shop I came to: nope, I wasn’t in Happo yet, but I was on the right track. Finally the road dead-ended at two gift shops. Walked into the one on the left and was told: Nope, the OTHER shop. (Just how local IS this sake, anyway? I wondered.) It turned out that there was a big tank that came directly from the brewer in that shop; you choose your bottle size and they fill one up like the wine shops in Spain and Italy. For the record: I took that bottle to a party in the U. S. and the consensus was unanimous: well worth the (fairly high) price.
Don’t bother looking for it, though — this was special-ordered (OEM’d) by the gift shop, which has closed, and so Tenka Happo no longer exists.