“Oh my god,” said my friend, Lee Anne, while picking my camera off the table.

“Huh?” We (including my mum) were eating lunch in the food court at Mitsuwa in New Jersey (because, alas, I am a New Jerseyer and not a New Yorker) before having to go to LaGuardia Airport to drop off Lee Anne, who was visiting NYC for a few days.

I looked around and didn’t see much besides Asian people. Nothing worth an “oh my god” and a photo, at least. Hey, a non-Asian person!…nah, that doesn’t count.

“It’s Bjork.”

“…huh? What?” I stood up. Yup, it was her, Matthew Barney, and their daughter. …wait, what?

Lee Anne took a blurry photo but we felt very strange about it. The last thing we wanted to do was play paparazzi. Lee Anne walked around the checkout to where she saw Bjork and her daughter go to and stood eerily close by; even I felt uncomfortable just watching them from afar. (By the way, I’m a moderate Bjork fan. I say “moderate” because I’m not flamingly obsessed but I have her major albums, some singles, some DVDs, some books, too many magazines, and I went to one concert. Is that moderate?)

And that was it. Following her was bad enough; we surely weren’t going to say anything. I almost couldn’t breathe when her daughter (who I will say in all honesty as someone who is not enthralled by small children is above-average cuteness) tottled towards in my direction and I moved aside as Bjork walked after her. I’m quite sure I will never be that close to her ever again and for Lee Anne’s first visit ever to New York for less than a week’s stay, seeing Bjork grocery shopping in New Jersey wasn’t something she could’ve thought would ever happen.

Then we went back to eating, feeling kind of uneasy. I poked at my katsu curry with my chopsticks. Lee Anne stared at her udon noodle soup. My mum probably thought we were really weird. We didn’t want to actually go into the shopping area knowing that Bjork was browsing around (and she was there for a while)

Lee Anne and I felt guilty about…something. About making a big deal out of Bjork going shopping for Japanese goods with her family (and then stupid people like me blogging it). We weren’t the only people that noticed but most seemed unaware of her presence. I can’t think of any other famous person that would make me quite that nervous.