Open Doors to Japan

As close as we're gonna get to Izu: A Pre-Halloween Special

2008-10-16T04:03:00.012+09:00

I know I haven't written anything in a long time. We are, after all, not in Japan anymore, and that's what this blog was all about. But our family had a great weekend, and it both reminded us of our trips to Izu and highlighted the very American-ness of our surroundings.

We took advantage of the cute little beach house owned by our friends Robin and Dan, down in Ocean Shores. It's never really warm there, so it didn't matter at all that this is October. It's a fully-furnished place with heat and hot water, very near the Pacific coast, so it's perfect for a weekend getaway.

Our stocking-up trip to the grocery store did not have an auspicious end, as you can see. We were trying to be frugal and bring as much food as we could from home. In rearranging the food in the back of the Jeep, it was, belatedly, discovered that the box of spaghetti was not adequately closed.

I did what any mom would do: put it all back in the box. I mean, you boil spaghetti first right?

I also got a visual reminder of why Halloween will always be superior in the States:

At the grocery store. Any grocery store. Yeah.

There was a very quaint and very Pacific Northwest sort of genral store on the way down. Jeff was very excited about it.

It had everything one might need:

Novelty candy (it fizzes! it lights up! it paints your tongue!) I had to get Red Hots. M generously offered to buy me some. I love Red Hots.

indispensable reading material (guns! motorcycles!)

and belt buckles!

Once we got there and chilled a bit before dinner, we had a night hike to the beach, through this crazy moonlit field of dunes and sea grass. We lost M for a minute, but he thought it was fun to hide from us in the dark. The beach itself is crazy. It's a very wide (and often windy) stretch of perfectly flat, hard-packed sand. You can even drive on it! In fact, they call it the beach highway.

While we were staying so close, we took a day trip the next day to the rainforest near Lake Quinalt. Yeah, I said rainforest. Not a poison-dart frog, boa constrictor, toucans and monkeys kind of rainforest, but that's what it's called. It gets a lot of rain, and it's a forest. It's like fairy-land, really, trees all covered with furry moss and gigantic cedars and pines. Lots of ferns. And not a vending machine in sight.

And lots of adorable chittery little squirrels. Very cool.

For the drive back, Jeff wanted to take the long way back, up the left coast and over across the upper coast, just across from Canada, beach-hopping and finding adventure along the way in towns with names like Moclips, Queets, Sappho, Beaver, and Pysht.

There was no direct highway up the coast, in fact, there was no road there on the map at all, but Jeff "drove" it on his blackberry the night before, via mobile gmaps, so he knew there was something there.

Well, we found the road. Very ominous.

But we had a Jeep, for crying out loud. Time to try 'er out. Besides, that road didn't look all that primitive.

Well, it did get a little more primitive:

And more primitive. When we reached this bridge, I knew we were in for an adventure. I held my breath and squeezed my eyes shut as we drove across it.

It got more primitive.

It also got really bumpy. Good thing we had 4WD, but I still was getting a bit queasy from all the rocking in and out of potholes and huge puddles of uncertain depth. We began to joke about the locals digging huge pits and filling them with water, to trap the unwary out-of-town Jeep adventurer.

The road got downright spooky when we entered into a dense forest, full of huge spooky old trees that looked like either homes for ancient trolls or were ancient trolls themselves.

The road was very muddy, it was kinda dark because of all the trees, and we were constantly keeping our eyes open for deer or other wildlife that might possibly run out in front of the car. This seemed far more likely to happen back here, where nobody goes, apparently. I was getting a bit nervous.

Then we drove up on this.

Let's take a closer look.

That was it. No way. This spooky-ass gutted van is here to tell us that we should not attempt to drive around the gaping hole in the road. I got as close as I dared to take this photo, hoping I would not see any dismembered bodies, and ran all the way back to the car, just in case the same locals we were joking about earlier decided to come out of the trees to a soundtrack of "Dueling Banjos."

We had to turn around. We tried a bunch of the other tiny "roads" that showed up on Jeff's Blackberry, but nothing passable came of those, either. We had failed to find a way up and had to backtrack to the boring ol' highway. The kids were pissed that we had wasted so much time, but then they were watching a movie in back the whole time we were creeping ourselves out, so they didn't appreciate the adventure we'd just had.

We did see a cool beach or two, once we were back on the beaten path. Like this one:

And a beach across from Destruction Island. There's a fun story behind the name:

The island is the place where two ships under the command of Spanish explorer Capt. Bodega y Quadra anchored on July 14, 1775. Seven men from the schooner Sonora were sent ashore to procure wood and water but met with an immediate and distinctly hostile reception from the natives near the mouth of the Hoh River. The party was killed in short order and their boat was subsequently stolen. Bodega y Quadra sailed away, after entering the island in his log and giving it the name, Island of Sorrows. In 1787, Captain Barkley, skipper of the Austrian East India Company's ship Imperial Eagle, also sent a party ashore from the island for the same reason, to collect water and wood to replenish the ship. Again, the shore party never made it off the beach. Barkley named the river where the killings took place the Destruction River. Eventually, the river came to be known once again by its native name, the Hoh, and the island inherited the name of Destruction.

We could see the island from the beach (it's that long one out there), which didn't look very hospitable itself, what with all the jagged rocks and loads of washed-up driftwood.

Somebody made it seem a little more hospitable, tho:

We picnicked here and drove a lot more, looking for coffee and ice cream. After being disappointed by one blink-and-you'll-miss-it town after another, I bitterly crossed Sappho, Beaver, and Pysht off the map. No coffee? In the Pacific Northwest? You don't deserve to be called a town, and you don't deserve to be on our map. I don't think we found coffee til Port Angeles, but hurray for them and for the Itty Bitty Buzz, that had both good coffee and delicious ice cream.

Jeff had found a restaurant online called the Three Crabs, and made reservations. It was Crab Fest, after all. The restaurant was in Sequim (pronouced "squim" for you foreigners). I was highly underwhelmed by the seafood chowder, crab shooters (like jalapeno poppers) and crabcakes I got. I think I am just not excited by Dungeness crab. But the view was cool

and we managed to make a ferry from Bainbridge (the posted wait at Kingston was 2 hours!) and get home for the kids' bedtime (and more importantly, Mad Men).

I might make one more post, for our Halloween party. Just to have a contrast between our parties in Japan and in Seattle. Maybe. Then I'm wrapping this thing up for real.

Still waiting...

2008-08-29T01:32:00.004+09:00

So our shipment from Japan was delayed a week. And now has the illustrious honor of being selected for a "detailed customs inspection." Oh, joy. Hopefully we will get our stuff really soon. I am sick of the air mattress.

Things are happening, though, in our house. I got it all painted. The living-room armoire has been put back together. Our new couch arrives tomorrow (it's so cool!). The basement gets carpeted next week. All will be standing in readiness for the rest of our household goods.

I entertained four kids yesterday. This is not something I would have cheerfully taken on two years ago. But they are all 2 years older, and Tarran is actually helpful these days. I took them all to the newly refurbished Seattle Aquarium, because I wanted to see what they had done with the place, and because I heard my friend Kristine, much to my surprise, was volunteering there nowadays. We snuck up on her this time, but she said next time, if we call her in advance, she can give us a personal Secret Squirrel behind-the-scenes tour.

She did take us to an Access Only area above the giant tank up front to see the wave machine in action and to meet their baby shark. It's momma had birthed 20 babies, but only this guy survived. I didn't know sharks swam sideways like that. He was very cute, and kept poking his nose out to say hi.

We also got to see her feed the octopus. He is the coolest thing in the aquarium, in my opinion. Kristine told us a story about him: apparently there was once a female octopus introduced to him when he was in rut, or whatever you call it when an octopus is horny. He said Can I get some, she said You can't get none. So he ate her. I guess male octopuses don't handle rejection well.

We got out of there after 3 losses-and-findings of kid items (one camera, one Piggy-wink, and one set of rubbings), which led me to voice the opinion that all children should have their belongings stapled to them, and to have a renewed faith in Seattlites. They may be shitty drivers, but they at least turn stuff into Lost and Found.

The kids start school next week. Hoo. Ray. I think they are a little nervous.

Hopefully, my next post will show you our house with all the stuff in it.

Home camping

2008-08-21T01:18:00.006+09:00

Things are settling around here. Sort of. Don't have much of a routine yet, as the kids aren't in school til the 3rd, and we still don't have most of our stuff. We are still camping in our house. Still sleeping in the basement, cooking with crappy old pans, wearing the same clothes. But we got our dressers out of storage, so I don't have to live out of my suitcase anymore, and we have a dining room table again. I would dearly love a couch. And my bed. That's coming this week sometime, theoretically.

We have been been painting all the walls new colors. That's fun. The colors, I mean. Not the painting itself, so much.

Yeah, that's a gold bedroom. Not just the gold-like yellow color, but real metallic gold. I love people's reactions when they see it. "Wow. Gold, huh?"

The kitchen looks the same, actually, but it'll be getting a facelift soon. New floor (proper tile instead of crappy linoleum that can never be clean), new fridge (so produce stays fresh for more than a day), new cabinet knobs (not so scratched-up brass, ghetto).

Fascinating, I'm sure. I think it's gonna look awesome once we have furniture. I can't wait. It's really echo-y in here, which is not a good thing when one has two not-so-quiet boys.

Went with Anuska to Uwajimaya, our Asian Super Grocery Store, to see if I could find the food to which I had become accustomed, and check out the prices. I did find a lot of the familiar food, and the prices were about as I expected: ridiculous.

My maitake is about 3 times as much. But it was interesting to find out that it is known as "Hen of the Woods" in English. It was also surreal to see the exact same packaging for condiments, but with English words in "Japanese font."

How much for a bottle of tea? Jeez. I'll just make my own, thanks.

The sashimi selection was pathetic, and now I understand why Macky et al turned up their noses at it when they were visiting a few years ago. BUT they do have a huge tank of live fish to choose from, so that's something.

So, anyway, I spent far too much money stocking up on staples like dashi, miso, wasabi, soba, ramen ("fresh" noodle, not that fresh), and yakisoba. I don't know how often I'll be doing that. I'm afraid that Japanese food is going to have to go back to being special occasion food, mostly. We do have a ton of kick-ass Thai restaurants within easy distance, so there is some consolation.

The boys have quickly re-established their sibling-like relationship with our family friends' kids. Tarran and M will be (weather permitting) celebrating their birthdays jointly for the first time in awhile this Saturday at Wild Waves. Tarran is one year and one day older.

Olivia Macy is again like a little sister (which she likes when M is giving her a piggyback or fetching her blackberries, but chafes at when M tries to tell her what to do), as Anuska and I swap kid-care as our schedules demand. She is the daughter I will never have. I took the three kids to the beach yesterday.

Nothing like the beach for low-maintenance kid-watching, though there was a marked lack of vending machines on the wooded trail to the beach itself, spawning thirsty whines. Gotta remember to carry more then one bottle of water in the future.

Our old nomadic friend Stephanie was in town, and stopped to have dinner with us last night. She's the same. Love her. She's a badass mountain climber.

Tonight I am, embarrassingly, going to meet some friends at Hooters tonight. Before you lambast me, it's for Pat's 21st birthday, and some coworkers of his are taking him out after work. So we're going to meet him there. I've never been, neither has Shannon, and we are both prepared to do soem heavy sneering and mocking. I'll be wearing a padded bra, and still feeling wildly inadequate. But I'm all for new experiences.

Rainbows and Cheese

2008-08-12T03:06:00.019+09:00

I finally have internet after weeks of computer near-silence. I didn't even have a phone for the first few days back. It's amazing how dependent we are on these devices. Anyway, I am connected again, so I can at last post about our last days in Japan and our first days back in Seattle. Let me tell you, it's been quite the whirlwind, and I'm going to need a detox period when the summer is over. Warning, this is going to be a long one.

So, before we left our abode in Baba-cho, we had a nice day at the beach with Cynthia and Osamu. It was the perfect summer day.

Some other stuff happened (it's kind of foggy), and then we had our last Buzz Attitude at Club Lizard. I got to make my DJ debut! And Yamato cried all over me.

Following that, we had our last home party. The usual mayhem, food and lots of drink, and the signing of the underside of the "Davis izakaya table."

I was too hungover to be of much use the next day, which was spent in preparation for the packer-movers, who arrived on Monday. It was a small army, and very entertaining to watch, as they thoroughly wrapped and padded all our stuff.

What they didn't move out, like the washer-dryer, the fridge, etc., we managed to get rid of (thanks Macky, his parents, and the Hooch guys).

We did get many gifts from various people on our way out the door, from Buzz Crew friends, the owner of our home, etc., because the Japanese adore giving gifts. We got some lovely fans, towels, a wind chime, sake, wine, and a "cricket" cage. Macky also loaded us up, with plenty of chopsticks and bamboo skewers so we would not lack for entertaining accoutrements back in the states, as well as 2 ramen bowls from the Yokohama Ramen Museum. And a lamp. That guy.

Left with a (mostly) empty house, we moved to the Landmark Tower for the last few days. This was a great place to say our goodbyes to Yokohama. Killer view from the 63rd floor (for which someone coined the term "rock me" floor - Japanese pronunciation joke),

and conveniently located to activities like Hard Rock Cafe (which we did twice), CosmoWorld, and the Mitsubishi Museum (which was cool, because it was fairly bi-lingual). The kids and I met Michiko and her kids Ricky and Louie for a day at CosmoWorld.

Michiko, also having two spastic boys, feels my pain.

Our proper last night, we had a dinner at a beer hall at Yokohama station. It was pretty much my gaijin crowd (Helen and Kevin, Martine, Cynthia, Michael), with which Osamu and Shingo are lumped because their significant others are gaijin, plus Yamato, who did not cry this time.

Much of this crowd went back to our hotel room for a party, which resulted in people sleeping illegally all over our floor.

This night was the last time I was to see my bestest friends in Japan (you know who you are), but I managed not to cry, despite the fact that Helen totally cheesed out and gave me a rainbow-colored Care Bear with an artist's pallette on it's fuzzy belly (State of the Heart Bear), which will live in my studio and remind me of her. Helen herself did not manage to avoid weeping, but we'll just blame the alcohol.

We packed up our remaining possessions into various suitcases and boxes and headed to the airport late the following morning. As we waited to check in, we spotted this by the door.

Macky and a bunch of others had come to see us off. This was not a cheap undertaking, as it is about $60 in tolls to get to the airport and back. We had lunch together and many bon voyage toasts, and they followed us all the way to security. It was at this point I lost my battle to remain cool and stoic, and some tears squeezed out. What an amazing two years. Although a lot of times it was difficult and frustrating, we met some fantastic people who really made our adventures unforgettable. It really hit me at that moment that we were actually leaving. I am trusting that the connections we made will be lifelong, because otherwise, I don't think I could stand it. And even though I didn't have a very deep relationship with a lot of the Macky crowd, they all tried very hard to make us a part of their crowd and were genuinely nice people. And Macky, well, what can I say about him that would express how much he did for us? We wouldn't have even been there if it weren't for him, and he helped us with so much once we got there. And my girlfriends: Helen, who found me a comfortable place in a land where I was at sea half the time. And Martine, who is one of the coolest people I've ever had the pleasure of knowing. And Cynthia, with whom I was supremely comfortable and will be following me soon to Seattle, with Osamu, which is awesome. And everyone else who was nice to me and joined my extended worldwide family, thanks, and I hope to see you again someday soon.

On the other hand, I was supremely excited to get back to Seattle.

Here is my first glimpse of Mt Rainier, who was nice enough to be out to welcome us home:

We didn't go to our house right away, but stayed at Dan and Robin's, who happen to live just in front of Shannon and Ian, which made it all very convenient as re-acquaintance spot. Many of our Seattle family showed up to welcome us home.

Shannon and Robin:

Anuska:

Eric and Dan:

Rob:

Tarran and Ian:

even Pat, who has apparently become more of a fixture since we left, was there:

We were surprisingly lacking in jetlag, maybe because we got to Seattle in the morning (several hours before we left Japan), and were outside all day. They say that being outside helps acclimate you to the day-and-night rhythm. M finally succumed in the evening, though, in a very odd, but very rock 'n' roll, spot.

We spent a few days saying hello and taking care of re-grounding ourselves (get phones, cars, house keys). We stayed at Kevin and Anna's new place for a night after helping them move into it, and re-met Silas, who was only a baby when we left.

We moved back into our house, with it's fabulously redone floors, and assessed what needed to be done while we are camping here without most of our stuff and no furniture. The house is in pretty good shape after two years of a renter. It just needs some repainting on the interior walls, really. The back yard, which we are thrilled to have again, was an overgrown nightmare. When we helped Kevin and Anna move with a small army of friends, we hit on the idea of having the same army help us get started on what was an overwhelming amount of yardwork. For the price of food and drink, our friends helped us make a huge dent in that nightmare. We also had volunteers for annoying jobs like getting the moss off the roof and covering the floor and painting the ceiling. These people really are the best.

We don't have a lot of useful stuff in our house right now, but we do have the costume box, which made for a fun first dinner with Anuska and Olivia:

Anuska (and Eric, I guess, but I doubt he had much to do with it) had a gathering at their place. As a bunch of us stood around the kitchen drinking and eating, I remarked how loud Americans are. I also enjoyed getting the wordplay and the jokes, and loved that I was laughing because I really got it, not just smiling in a confused manner because our Japanese friends were laughing at something.

Kevin:

Mickey:

Some things I realized about Seattle right off:

It's colder here. It's downright chilly in the evening. Apparently, it has been an unusually cool summer.
American toilets and showers are vastly inferior to Japanese. I miss my bidet, my deep, reheatable tub, and my whole-room shower.
Food is just as expensive, if not more, as in Japan. I was appalled. My sources tell me that there was a huge hike in prices a couple months ago. It has a lot to do with the ridiculously-high gas prices.
Seattle is a tiny city. You can get anywhere in 20 minutes or less. And it's practically empty.
You really do have to drive everywhere. Busses only run sporadically, there is no train system, and taxis suck. They are nearly impossible to hail, and even if you call one, it takes an hour.
Bar time is evil. You get kicked out the door at 1:30, despite the fact that last call is technically 2am. And they're rude about it. And there is almost nowhere to go after 2.

All that aside, I haven't been this relaxed in two years. I am back amongst the freaks-of-a-feather who really understand me and with whom I share a warped sense of humor. There is a whole passel of kids in our group who can hang out together. I can drive here, and I enjoy it (in my, sorry, our, new Jeep). There is a huge variety of food choice. I about exploded with happiness when I saw the cheese section:

Everything is really green here, and much less manicured. I have a garden to dig in. There are tons of trees. I have my own studio again (nothing in it yet, but still), so I can get some good painting done (I hope) while being surrounded and inspired by other artists. There is no humidity issue, and a lot fewer mosquitos. I can play music really loud in my house and not worry about the kids screaming as much. There is so much space. I can (and do) talk to eveyone around me.

Some things have changed. Everyone we know seems to be going through a transition of one kind or another: new homes, new jobs, new family. This is wonderful, because I was a little worried that we'd fall back into the rut we went to Japan to escape in the first place. Everyone seems a lot happier and more optimistic after the changes they've implemented.

Our two years in Japan almost seem like a dream now, especially since we are back in our old house and have none of the stuff we bought there yet. I don't know exactly what our life is going to be here yet, but soon we will settle into a new routine, surrounded by familiar faces and places. Like Jeff said, we have hit a huge RESET button. I think we belong here, and Nature gave us an affirmation of this the other day. That's our house:

Holy crap, I've been typing for 2.5 hours. Thanks to everyone who has followed our adventure on this blog. I may post once or twice more, I may not. Stay tuned.

BuzzBQ and Bye-Bye Blue Corn

2008-07-21T22:33:00.005+09:00

Sunday was our third, and likely last, BuzzBQ. It's always held at this tiny little hard-to-find park in Yokohama (I know it's hard to find, because anyone who hadn't been there before sent me dozens of texts saying they couldn't find it). Anyway, it's right by the water and mostly in the shade, so it was the perfect place on a really hot day. It was also the BuzzBQ with the highest attendance ever. It might have had something to do with the fact that there would be Yokohama fireworks in the evening. Like they were just for us. Yokohama saying goodbye. Not, not really, they do it every year. But the entire usual Buzz crew was there, plus my gaijin friends. And more kinds than just ours, for once, including some new babies! There were vast quantities of food and drink (that kept needing to be replenished due to the high volume of guests), music, sports, and the fireworks. It was a wonderful party, and I'm sure Macky was very pleased.

By the way, the last few pics are Walter's; I stole them from his facebook album. If some of you latecomers are wondering why there are no pictures of you, it's because I was sick of taking pictures by the time you showed up. And then it got dark. I probably should've. Oh, well, I'll get you Saturday.

After, a few of us went to the Blue Corn. Kevin's parents were there. They seemed like nice people. They had the front open, so we got to do our drinking in the open air, which was nice. After a while (Kevin wasn't feeling great: might've been the Jager), it ended up just Cynthia, Osamu, and me, and a deck of cards. That was kind of surreal, sitting outside, playing cards, drinking Maker's, watching the dawn arrive, knowing that when I left, it would be forever (maybe). I drew it out as long as possible. When we were the only customers left, Susan came and joined us, and we taught him how to play rummy. Then Takeshi and the other guy, who's name escapes me at the moment, also joined us. Takeshi and Susan both took pictures of all my tattoos for some reason, and we did group pictures on 4 different cameras. With the Cowboy/Indian. Takeshi, who I am sure was close to tears, dumped a margarita glass full of Blue Corn matchbooks in my bag. Hugs all around. It was 7 am and I was really tired, but it was kind of hard to leave. That place was a comfort-zone for me in a place where I feel like I don't fit in. Thanks, Blue Corn staff. And thanks to Helen for bringing me there.

The rest of the week is booked up with various social and logistical events. The big one is Saturday night: Buzz Attitude and house party. Man, it's going fast.

I didn't do anything, but Jeff did

2008-07-18T00:14:00.006+09:00

I haven't done much in the past week besides hang out with some folks. I met Helen for lunch, who suspects, as you already know if you've been keeping up with her stuff, that she has latent TB. Here she is, very happily showing off her skin test gone blistery in an ominous way:

I also, that day, saw the people lining up for the new iPhone (some people for the past 3 days, I guess) on Omotesando-dori. I guess it's really cool , I don't know. At the moment I just want my phone to make and recieve calls and simple text, but I may change my mind after Jeff gets one and I have phone envy.

I wandered around for a couple hours and got kind of lost on purpose to avoid shopping on Takeshita-dori, and later met with Martine, with whom I went to Kichijoji for my farewell to that bit of Japan. I met Andrea Innocent, whom I knew was talented, and her friend Beck, whom I did not know, did not know was talented, and is. She made these:

Those two (Andrea and Beck) went to karaoke with Martine, Christian, and Dr. Dave, and me.

If you've ever wondered what karaoke in Japan is really like, well, here ya go. If you're not wondering, too damn bad, because I just got a new laptop and I can actually make movies with my computer crashing, so I had a good time making it whether you watch it or not. And maybe you don't want to.

I took the kids to Ueno Zoo the next day, not that exciting, I've posted pictures of that already but JEFF WENT TO GO CLIMB MT. FUJI. With Macky. That's way cooler. I stole these photos off of his guide's website.

He said it was hard. And great. And he'll never do it again. Except maybe in a few years if the kids want to do it (maybe), or me (fat chance).

Then I kind of lost the rest of the week. Something about meeting Cynthia for lunch and getting home at 5am. Oh, yeah, that was the night we met up with Helen and Kevin (shhh!). Stuff was closed, no darts, no pool. Some cards, I think. I'm not sure what happened. And then, did I mention I got a new laptop today? I also went to Jeff's farewell BBQ on the base. But only because he bribed me with a new laptop. He got a giant signed-by-coworkers picture and a really nice speech was made about him. Cuz he rocks.

One thing that did happen this week is that I turned around and noticed that we have TWO WEEKS. Shit. Go ahead, ask me if we've started packing. Go, ahead, ask me. The answer is HELL NO. We don't really have to, anyway. It's being packed for us. All we have to do is put aside the suitcase stuff that we can't do without for a month, and get rid of a bunch of stuff we aren't taking. Kids' bunks are going on Monday. POS half-working washer-dryer (have I mentioned that I've finally gone Japanese and started hanging my clothes outside to dry on one of those 100-yen plastic things? Why do some clothes dry so stiff and nasty, like tube socks and towels, but other stuff is fine? Ancient domestic knowledge that has died off in my neck of the woods) has a home, as do some other household items. Car needs to go. Some books. Fish. I keep thinking there's time for these things. But the days are slipping by.

I swear to god, Helen, if you leave me a sad comment, I'm gonna stuff you in my closet with all the suitcase stuff.

Happy Knife Day

2008-07-10T17:27:00.003+09:00

We went to our first live muay thai fight last weekend, courtesy of Martine's sweet new promo connections. It was at Ariake Differ (same place I saw Johnny's fight). It was rather surprising to see Martine, a pacifistic soul (I thought), get into it. She was so excited to take pictures, she went right up to where the press photographers were. Nobody said anything to her, beyond some encouraging thumbs-up from some spectators we suspect were interested the view of her from behind. Anyway, the Thai guy, of course (despite the crowd cheering for the Japanese guy) won the final match, but this was an earlier one, in which I saw my very first live K.O. It was awesome.

We also saw a guy carried off on a stretcher. M was all excited whenever there was blood.

Wednesday, I checked off one of my last-month goals. I had been searching for a "ramen" lantern for Jeff, and my internet search yielded Kappabashi-dori, which is the Kitchen Street of Dreams for restaurants and cooking geeks. It's near Asakusa, which happened to be having it's matsuri that day. Asakusa is crowded on a normal day; that day, it was nearly intolerable to me and my second-day hangover from hanging out at the Tavern with Cynthia and Osamu (strongest drinks in Yokohama, especially if you are friendly with the bartenders), and later, Smiley at the pool hall. Anyway, the good thing about the matsuri was that there was the obligatory yakisoba stand, which is my favorite hangover-remedy food.

It was a relief to get away from the Sensoji area and its throng, and walk to nearly-deserted - by Japan standards - Kappabashi-dori. (See here for vague directions. Not great, but they got me there). I had fun looking at all the kitchen shit I could've spent lots of money on had I known of this place's existence two years ago. And all the plastic food! I managed to just buy my treasure-in-mind, and yes, it made Jeff very happy.

Speaking of Jeff, we went to see Shonen Knife at Shinjuku Loft last night (it was our secret-anniversary celebration. 14 years!). For those of you who don't know them (incredibly) they are a Japanese girl band that gained mild popularity in the US in the '80s and '90s, far more than in their native country. But they totally rocked and I have never seen a Tokyo crowd so excited. There was a mosh pit and some crowd-surfing and lots of sweaty pogo-ing fans were happily bouncing around. There was a heavy gaijin presence. Maybe that had something to do with it. (There was this little mohawked guy who totally reminded me of Tom Smurfski. Few of you will know who I'm talking about. Val, are you reading?) There was a new bass player, about 20 years younger than the original members, with a huge, permanent grin. And they played the most rockin' version of "Top Of the World" I've ever heard, for an encore.

It was also a night of amusing train ads.

Read this one fast.

And this one reminds me of the conversation Shannon and I recently had about nonsense phrases. You know, those meaningless syllables you say when someone is rambling or saying something that makes no sense? Personal extrapolations of "yaddayadda" and "blahblahblah." Seems like a lot of people I know have had those things, like "orble-jorble" or "ee-ba-dee." This one is Shava-Dava. I don't know what it is, but it's a funny name for a drink.

Today I am back to Tokyo (been spending a lot of time there lately), for lunch with Helen, and an evening of karaoke with Martine and the Kichijoji crowd. I get to meet the illustrious Innocent Girl, visiting from Australia, at last. Looking forward to it.

Beginning of the end...

2008-07-05T17:27:00.007+09:00

Well, it's happening. Starting to say goodbye to people. Said goodbye to Janie and family last Friday.

After we hung out on Thursday, I wished we had spent more time together. She was lonely, too, and an outsider-mom like me. Oh, well, there's always the internet.

Also said goodbye to Hamza's family, at a farewell Turkish feast last week. As there were no men present, Sevda was sans headscarf. First time I ever saw her hair. She's the one in red. The other one is Shirin, with whom I finally have something to talk about, now that she's pregnant (congrats!).

It was also the first occasion I ever had to buy one of those ridiculously-priced boxes of mikan. $30 tangerines. I was kind of hoping she would bust out with them at the feast, but I never saw them again after I handed them over. I hope they were good. They left for Turkey for the summer soon after.

On Saturday, I did the kid hand-off in Shibuya to Jeff, who had just flown in from the States. M got to say goodbye to his teacher, one of the good ones and who is probably too good for HJIS, Cynthia Thomas.

We were off to Miss Norie's sayonara extravaganza of dinner, karaoke, and dancing 'til dawn.

I made some new friends that night, like Wye-Khe and Walter; kinda wish I had met them sooner. Coulda used some more male friends in Japan. Oh, well.

What followed were 2 days of M & I hanging around the house, due to various indispositions and D being off at Yokosuka base day camp (which he resisted). Not too exciting. D begged off camp the next day, insisting that he really just wanted to hang out with his brother, and we walked to Mitsuike Koen for a lazy day in the sun.

M made some friends on the playground, where kids speak the international language of Yu-Gi-Oh! D and I laid on the grass, enjoying nature and talking about this-n-that.

Next day was an official DRS Outing (Jeff's company) at Fuji-Q Highlands with Wilson's and Frank's families. That was the third trip for the kids and me. Jeff braved the scary-ass roller coaster that you couldn't pay me to ride (the name means "it's all good," more or less, but it definitely isn't, if you ask me):

Eejanaika, 249 feet tall, 78.3 mph. Opened in 2006, it is only the second "4th Dimension roller coaster" ever built (the first being X² at Six Flags Magic Mountain in California). As a "4th dimension" roller coaster its seats can rotate 360 degrees forward or backward in a controlled spin, thus allowing Eejanaika to invert 14 different times, even though the actual track inverts only three times. It surpasses the first built "4th dimension" roller coaster, X², in both height and speed.

He said the build-up was totally justified. We also did Great Zaboon, the wettest water-ride ever (you buy ponchos to wear on it),

and Jeff and I finally got to do the Haunted Hospital.

It was pretty effective. The setting reminded me of Condemned: Criminal Origins, the xbox game that I won't play because the atmosphere is too creepy. You get a small flashlight and no clear idea of which way to go (we actually did a loop twice by accident). Then they take your flashlights away. There were plenty of live actors around, and they didn't just pop up randomly to scare us, they also followed us around, sometimes two at a time, and occasionally chased us shrieking down the dimly-lit halls. One of them kept appearing beneath my skirt with a flashlight. This was called "a perk of the job."More like perv. Lots of missed opportunities to be truly scary (the sometimes-shoddy models bugged me a bit), but good fun all in all.

Yesterday was, of course, the Fourth of July. We took Cynthia and her visiting family to the Navy base with us for the festivities. Plenty of the usual carnival games and contests , plus "The World's Largest (Military) Yakitori" (which was apparently hard to flip but came out quite tasty),

and performances by Eagles (not too bad), Fleetwood Mac (eh), and Madonna (pretty sad) tribute bands. Ironically, the bands were mostly Canadian. "Madonna" was backed by, we believe, strippers, and her fake Gautier-Blonde Ambition Tour gold cone-boobs kept pointing in odd directions. None of the energy of the original.

Good for a giggle anyway. And of course, there were fireworks.

Cynthia, her sister Liz, and I went out for karaoke after, at Liz's request. I think that after this past week and next week's Kichijoji-sayonara, I might just be karaoke'd-out for a while. Which is good, because, really, can you get decent karaoke in the US? I don't think so.

Also spotted an umbrella vending machine at Tsurumi station. Can't believe it was the first time we had ever seen one.

Oh, on a side note, Kevin is finally getting out of the hospital! He will be on home isolation, but at least he'll get to eat more food and not get hassled for humming while brushing his teeth. And he won't be surrounded by hacking, wheezing Japanese men with whom he can't communicate. And Helen won't have to make the trek out to the clinic every night after work. I'm sure they are both pretty happy about it.

Tomorrow we get to go to the Muay Thai championships! I'm pretty excited. Next week is my week "off." Both kids are going to camp on the base. I'm not sure what I'm going to do with my time yet, but I have a couple ideas. I am also open to suggestions.

food & flowers

2008-06-25T13:24:00.005+09:00

I know I probably posted about it last year, but I have really been enjoying the ajisai (hydrangeas) here this season. They come in a wonderful pink-to-blue spectrum, in many different shapes. I am confused by the array of colors, though: I was always told that the color of the flower is dependent on the pH of the soil, more aluminum in the soil produces blue flowers, etc. But there are pink ones right next to blue ones, right next to purple ones! I don't get it, but it only increases my sense of wonder at how lovely they are.

Lovely.

At the store with M & D yesterday, letting them pick out celebratory snacks and drinks for their last day of school, M pointed out these unlovely promotional Dr. Pepper labels:

let's take a closer look at the one on the right:

WHY do they need to market soda this way? WHY does this buxom fish-netted manga lass have a bottle of Dr. P in her cleavage?? And in the other, the same place is used as a gun holster. That seems like a very silly (and dangerous) place to store a firearm. But what do I know?

My own celebratory (or perhaps the opposite. what is the opposite word? Funereal? anyway, yesterday marked the beginning of the stress of trying to keep my kids from killing each other this summer) snack was a Haagen-Dasz flavor I had been curious about but never tried: kokuto & kuromitsu. It was quite delicious, a slight hint of coffee and burnt sugar. I had to look it up online to find out what I had actually eaten, which is apparently brown sugar & molasses, or the Japanese equivalent. This led me to research H-D in general, because I am fascinated by the array of bizarre exclusively-Japanese flavors, like Rich Milk, Affogado (whatever that is), Azuki Milk (red bean to you), Alphonso Mango (who is Alphonso?), and of course, Green Tea (click here to see them. If you actually click on the flavor, it will give you the name in English). When I went to the Wikipedia article on Haagen-Dasz, I was rather surprised to find out that it's an American company, and the name, meant to look Scandinavian, is complete fabrication and doesn't mean anything or even actually resemble anything in any Scandinavian language. Hilarious.

This led me off on another tangent: Kit-Kat. There really odd flavors for these, too, and they are usually seasonal.

These are some fun flavors, in Japan only:

Iced Tea
Caramel and Salt
Kinako (soybean flour)
Green Tea
Café Latte with Hokkaidō Milk
Kiwifruit
Cantaloupe
Cherry Blossom

click here for the Wikipedia article, with a list of flavors all around the world.

I found this blurb somewhere ages ago about Kit-Kat in Japan:

Japanese learners using the katakana pronunciation when asking for a KitKat could well get a blank look when they ask for a 'kitto katto.' Incidentally, this particular phonetic rendering proved a massive marketing success for KitKat in Japan as 'kitto katto' has a resonance with the Japanese for 'certain victory', thus making it a popular snack for those doing exams or entering sports contests.

Isn't that interesting? It is to me.

So the kids are done with school. M was very sad yesterday, having to say good-bye to most of his friends. They all seem to be leaving in the next few days for their home countries, so they won't be able to hang out this summer. D, too, was seen with his head on the shoulder of his good friend Ravindu, looking forlorn. It's hard for them. They've been here two years, and now it's likely that they won't see any of these friends again.

Me? I got away from the school with a quick wave good-bye to the small cluster of Japanese moms. A few of them had made a polite attempt at friendliness, but it was always clear to me that I was an outsider. Due to language, tattoos, general freakishness, I don't know. Only a few really seemed interested in me as a person, and not as a novelty: Ricky's mom Michiko, who always seems a little bit of an outsider herself. She has invited me over to her house in July. Janie, Hana's mom, and my first friend at the school. She is Phillipina and used to live really nearby, so once a week we would have a board-game afternoon. We are going over her house this week. Kumi's mom, who has always been very nice to me and my family, but I rarely see her anymore since Kumi & M aren't as close as they used to be. Kumi has grown up and would rather fit in with the girls, I guess. Kumi's mom is having a sayonara gathering for us.

Most of them, Michiko excepted, weren't among those who are on the playground after school. As for the rest of the moms? I am glad I will no longer have to stand around awkwardly, not talking to anyone but the occasional kids, who are easier to talk to.

And tonight, we are going over Hamza's for a goodbye Turkish dinner. Hamza has been a great best pal for M, and his mom has always been very cool about feeding him and letting him sleep over. I think this will be the hardest night for M. It's been interesting for me to learn about Turkish customs and Muslim dietary laws (I had a hard time reciprocating the dinners when Hamza was over our house). His mom is a fantastic cook. I wish I could communicate with her more (and get recipes!), but my Japanese sucks, my Turkish is non-existent, and her English is limited (though she's been taking lessons). Cynthia and her mom & sister will be there, too, so I will have someone to talk to. And I will definitely enjoy the food.

Happiness, Sportiness, Bizarreness, and a Little Sadness

2008-06-18T16:59:00.004+09:00

So Jeff is out of town, right? I'm in the bathroom, ready to go to bed 'round midnight, and I hear my front door being unlocked. Wha?! It's Macky. He has the key because he's borrowing the car while Jeff is gone. He has a girl with him, who has missed the last train, and bags in his hand, full of food. He tried to call me, but my phone was in the other room all night, and I never heard it. After hearing that Tomoi will also be coming over, I declare the Davis Izakaya and Hotel open. And go to bed. Too tired for the shenanigans.

Was I annoyed that Macky just let himself into my house at midnight on a Tuesday? A little, at first. But then I just shrugged. He's like part of the family, and our house is like home to him, so why not. Besides, he was gone by the time I got up, and left me a fridge full of leftovers. And a broken glass on the patio. I have a feeling that was Tomoi, around whom glass tends to break. Whatever. It's not like were going to take that glass back with us.

What I thought about was how sad Macky is going to be when we, and our house, are no longer available for impromptu late-night eating and drinking and listening to records. And how sad we will be that he won't be popping over at strange times to whip up yummy treats.

Jeff was also getting a little melancholy when he realized that he has already started saying good-bye to people, namely those parents and teachers at the kids' school who will be gone by the time he gets back from his trip. Hakan will be off to Turkey to get married. Some fellow-parents are also going back to their home countries. First good-byes at the Horizon Sports Day.

This was a re-scheduled-due-to-rain annual event on what was also, coincidentally, Father's Day. Like the old field-day-type thing. Sack races, tug-o-war, races. Jeff did two separate races with a kid on his back (I couldn't believe they didn't stop at 2nd graders - they expected parents to piggyback fifth graders), and won! D won his age-group sprint. Our team, of which I was actually a participating member, won the relay race, too! We were (unofficially) voted Fastest Family.

Here's a quick montage, you know, for anyone who cares, like family (I know the one long-jump pic is up too long, but that P.O.S. Windows Movie Maker froze up every time I tried to fix it, sue me):

D standing with his medal, with dad and Mr. Kara, the principal:

The day's winners:

A swell Father's Day, I think, though having M on his back had some ill after-effects for Jeff.

Earlier in the week, I went with Helen to visit Kevin in the hospital. I had to buy a mask inside the front door. Heavy-duty, too, not just the usual sort you see on the streets.

Kevin's sister Sarah was there already, inside the Germinator's tiny curtained alcove. Helen gave him his weekly contraband beer, and we chatted for awhile, listening to the guy in the next bed hacking and trying to breathe, and reading quotes from an inspirational book Helen's grandma (?) sent.

I don't think it's helping. Especially after Nurse Ratchett came and rudely kicked us out. Fair enough, it was after visiting hours, but they don't usually hold to them, as Helen has barely any time after work to visit and WE ARE THE ONLY PEOPLE HE TALKS TO since everyone else around is Japanese. To make it worse, bitch-nurse was complaining loudly to another patient how rude these foreigners are. Not realizing that one of us speaks excellent Japanese (Helen, not me, duh). Jee-zus. He has also had complaints about humming while brushing his teeth, whistling while making coffee, and wearing deodorant. Apparently these people have never heard about positive thinking aiding in the healing process. THERE WILL BE NO HAPPINESS HERE. Poor Kevin. If it were me, I'd act up as much as possible, in defiance. Sing. Tap dance in the halls. Recite German poetry to the other patients. What are they gonna do, kick him out??? I'm sure he'd welcome it. Kevin, are you reading this? Don't let those assholes get you down.

His sister is very cool, by the way. Very mature for her 22? years. Pretty, too.

I also went to Tyler's event called "29 and Shoe" with Martine. I was dying to know why it was called that. Apparently, Tyler just turned 29, and he was having a little exposition of his photos, which center around, you guessed it, a shoe. Floating in the water. They were very cool, way cooler because they were unaltered in any way. Couldn't Photoshop such serendipitous art. Anyway, there were a few performers, including a guy who does Tuvan throat-singing, which sounds cooler than it looks. Weird. And ipod dj-ing. Which is my favorite. Which drove most of the guests away. Which degenerated into Darrin instigating a Queen-themed karaoke session. Awesome.

Speaking of weird, this was parked outside the bar. I don't know why.

To wrap it up and book-end the Father's Day thing, we went over to the Makimoto house to present Macky's dad with the painting I did of the old ice-company family photo. Total surprise. Apparently, the original photo was given to the city of Yokohama, as an historical treasure (behind us is the plaque-thingy they gave him for it). Macky said his dad got teary. I didn't see.

So the kids' last day of school is next Tuesday. Yea. I jump up and down with glee. Remind me to stock up on wine.

2008-06-10T13:33:00.006+09:00

Jeff was surprised that I'd brought home "pink carnations." First of all, they are peonies, not carnations. Carnations are cheap tacky flowers they always dye stupid fake colors like blue or green. And they smell like nothing much. I always hated that they were the flower of my birth month. Second of all, I have said on many occasions that although I despise pink as a rule, natural things like flowers and sunrises and kitten noses are totally allowed to be pink. In choosing this combination of peonies, which are pretty and smell good, I was reminded of Victorian botanical illustrations. Or like this.

I do have a romantic streak, people.

Anyway, Friday night, Mooney had his birthday party at the Blue Corn for the first time (his usual venue had closed). Happy for us, too.

This makes me think that Mooney and Jeff share some kind of Gachapin/Mukku affinity, or that Gachapin/Mukku-wear is the in thing for birthday gifts this season.

I was determined to capture my favorite Mooney song on video this time, as I do not have it in any other format. I don't know what it's actually called, but I know it as "The Neko Song" or "The Spoon Song." Love it.

Again I was coerced into drinking a shot. This one was Jagermeister, which I hate almost as much as tequila. They got me when they said it was for Kevin, who really wanted to be there. Crap. Fine. I did the shot. Seems like Kevin was really there in spirit, because just as we finished our shots, the table mysteriously tipped and spilled my Maker's-soda and Helen's beer all over my foot, just as if some long-legged coltish German had upset the table in high spirits. Just the alcohol, not the water that was also on the table. Helen may have been the vehicle, but the Germinator was definitely driving.

Things got sillier after the last set, as they do. Mooney kindly shared his ordered-in sashimi with us. I was closely observed as I tried raw horse meat. I disappointed my observers by shrugging. It was okay. Red meat. Less chewy that the tako that was next to it (I dislike chewy octopus. So hard to get it tender).

Streamers came from somewhere. Which looked dashing on Susan and Helen both.

These flowers-on-wire showed up, too, twined around our fingers. I somehow ended up engaged to Mooney, as well as to Susan, who is also engaged to Helen. Hm.

I awoke the next day, happily still married to just one man, and the family went to go see Indiana Jones 4 with a couple of kid-friends. I was very anxious about this long-anticipated movie, but I ended up liking it. Biggest point in its favor: Karen Allen. Only good Indiana Jones heroine. And nobody tried to make us believe that no time had passed. She had aged, Indy had aged, it was the 1950s. Every bit of 50s iconography you could think of was there, giving it a great pulp-serial-adventure feeling, which is exactly what the original Indy Idea was all about. I had to remind myself of this when something seemed a little too much, like Cate Blanchett's silly (Boris and) Natasha accent, or the origin of the chosen Precious Object of this movie (the crystal skull). It's not meant to be realistic. But it didn't annoy me anywhere near as much as Temple of Doom did, with its Scooby Doo ooga-booga tiki/voodoo-god crap and the most annoying heroine in the world.

"Oooh! I broke a nail!" And what's with that hair?

So yeah, on the whole, I dug it. It's no Raiders, but you just can't top that.

After, we went to Negishi Koen for a bit. M & his friend ran off into the woods to shoot their BB guns, while D & his buddy attempted to fly the cool eagle kite he got in China. Though Jeff flew it most of the time.

That's pretty much it for excitement this week. Oh, and some guy got stabbed at a bus stop in our neighborhood. And a bat-shit crazy guy went on a stabbing spree in Akihabara, killing 7 random people in the crowd. After running into them with his truck. Because he was "tired of life." Whatever. Japan is losing its reputation for low violent crime statistics. I'm getting out of here.

I'll leave you with this. Jeff chided me for snapping this photo. I couldn't help it.

Me! It's all about ME!

2008-06-03T11:49:00.005+09:00

I had great fun playing model this weekend for Martine, at her gorgeous pad in Kichijoji. She took like, I dunno, 1200 photos or something. We were attempting to recreate the old-school Hollywood glamour shots (I know, in American spelling, there is no u, but I think it looks better that way, don't you?), for her portfolio and my life-long dream of pretending to be a movie star of the Golden Age. The woman has talent. She does great things with lighting. Worship her. Send her money. At least check her blog often and see all her amazing work. It's always right there on the side of this page: frangipani, or just click here.

These are just a few of my favorites, in their raw form. Martine has not touched these with her magic wand yet, but I can't wait to see what she conjures.

I think this one, as far as the raw photos go, has to be my very favorite. Especially the mirror-me. So glamorous.

When I saw all the mirror photos, I was a little disturbed. It's like, if I had a long-lost twin that I suddenly ran into one day, would I like her? It's a scary thought, two of me. I know you're thinking the same thing.

In other non-news, Kevin, the Germinator, is still in the hospital, doubtlessly bored out of his mind. Jeff and I were supposed to go visit him this past weekend, as our kids (the TB clinic doesn't allow kids) were supposed to be off with their respective friends, but the plans went awry. Damn kids.

M and his friends currently have an obsession with BB guns (plastic BBs, less dangerous than metal, but tend to get everywhere. They sell them in 20 oz bottles). He is definitely reaching the age where peers matter. And where we introduce a new horrible phrase into his life: "You're grounded."

I'll end with a look at the spectacular world of Japanese facial "esthetiques." I don't know if you remember a post last year sometime (I tried to find it, but I'm too lazy to go through all those posts) when I compared the "smile fixer" device to Victorian chinstraps? Well.

And you can make your nose narrower, too! Those plastic wheels will whittle away bone in no time!

This one is my favorite. The heat from the shower helps melt away that wattle! I guess. May interfere with singing.

Love in the Time of Tequila

2008-05-29T17:14:00.010+09:00

It's wacko weather time here. Sunny and hot yesterday, rainy and cold today. Ah, the rainy season.

So, Jeff's Birthday (Party) Present last Friday was a success. I think it was everything he hoped. Red Shoes is a really cool space, and a famous one, too, at least at its former location (Rolling Stones played there back in tha day, as well as Sheena and the Rockets, and other famous folks) .

On this evening, there was musical entertainment by Tequila Muchos

Darkside Mirrors

and Golden

and DJing by several people, like Macky, Tomoi, Max, and Jeff himself, making his DJ debut.

Tequila Muchos, true to form, forced a lot of people to come up and do tequila shots to, you know, that song, including me (again I show my love -- everyone knows I despise tequila). Abby had Jeff's mom write a birthday letter, which was read by Macky and translated into Japanese by Abby (at least, I believe it was; I had to assume he wasn't supplying his own version). Accompanied by sentimental music, it was quite touching. Awww.

Abby also ambushed the crowd all night with his hooch-filled squirt gun.

Lots of friends showed up, from all our various tribes (this is just like the Society section in Vanity Fair or whatever, right?)

Golden, playing last and finally forcing me to recognize the guy sitting at the bar all night (Kota! What's with the mustache?!), was the hit of the night. Their performance was followed by an impromptu rendition of "Yokohama Hachi-ji No Densha" by Jeff and much dancing (DJ Max was under orders to get everyone up and dancing. It worked. Can't resist "Rockafella Skank").

At the end of the evening, Helen, Cynthia, Osamu, Jeff, and I attempted to find Whitney, who had theoretically absconded to a local place for some quieter conversation (all conversations at the Red Shoes were necessarily conducted through shouting), but we had to give it up as a wild goose chase. Helen, justifiably annoyed at our drunken Tokyo meanderings (she'd had a rough week), escaped in a cab, while the remaining quartet of us ended up at the Train Bar (used to Mistral Blue) in Rappongi. The owner/bartender treated us all to shots of Jameson's, which made my third shot of the night (I never do shots, ask anyone. I can't believe I was still upright, let alone coherent. Maybe I wasn't, I was hardly a good judge of that).

When Jeff and I walked out of there, it was full daylight, and lemme tell you, there are few sights less beautiful than Rappongi at the other end of a Friday night. We attempted to find a nearby love hotel that the Train Bar guy told us about, but that ended up another fruitless endeavor, so we hopped a cab to Shibuya.

There was another frustrating search, because, as we should have guessed, it's really difficult to find a love hotel in Shibuya with a vacancy at 6 am on a Saturday morning. But, we had success at last, in the form of a room that was twice as expensive as we had planned. But, at that point, it was totally worth it, and besides that was a "Living in Japan" box we had as yet unchecked.

OK, I guess I need to explain what a love hotel is to those some of you who don't know. Love hotels only exists for one purpose, and I bet you can guess what that is. The reason for them is that privacy is at a premium in large Japanese cities: a lot of Japanese live with their parents or other family members, because apartments can be very expensive. If you are lucky enough to have your own place, it's tiny and has paper-thin walls.

These are the official reasons for love hotels. Any others are not mentioned in the tour books, but you can pay for "rest" (an hour or 90 minutes) or "stay," which means you spend the night. You cannot leave once you are in your room. We were happy to find that our check-out time was 3:30 pm. Woo!

The room was nice, and a little what you might expect. It had no proper windows, so we were suspended in whatever time we chose (which was not daylight). The bed was round, and so was the bathtub.

Said round bed revolved, which may not be the best idea in our condition, but the controller was awesome, reminiscent of those giant buttons one finds working factory conveyor-belts.

There was the oddest vending-fridge, and lots of toiletries.

As for the rest, I'll leave up to your imagination. This is a family blog.

We rolled out of bed and took the train on a surreal afternoon to go meet up with our kids, who were in the patient custody of Jeff's folks.

We spent our last day with Rich and Mary Lou doing the Shibuya tour, which every visitor has to see at night (which came rather quickly due to our late waking time). Rich and I got yelled at for taking pictures from the Starbuck's upper window (which has the best view of the outrageous intersection), which is absurd. I guess our product-empty hands prompted such ridiculousness. Whatever.

We had a lovely Italian dinner at Jeff's favorite Italian place (really good, can't remember the name, but I must recreate the anchovy-olive-basil-capers-red pepper pasta I had), and we said our goodbyes to the elder Davises. I hope they had a great trip. They are, as always, easy guests, and are welcome to stay with us anytime. At this moment, they are basking in the Hawaiian sun, recuperating from their busy Japan vacation. Aloha!

I leave you with a PSA we spotted Saturday morning:

No, it wasn't at the hotel, it was at the train station. Read the fine print. Better than doing it driving. I've never been able to do that.

Black Ship Festival, Shimoda

2008-05-21T18:08:00.005+09:00

Theoretically, Jeff and his folks are on their way back from Kyoto, but I can't get a hold of them. Or anyone else, for that matter. I suspect someone forgot to pay the phone bill.

Anyway, we had a fabulous time in Shimoda. My fourth trip! Such a great place. I think I would like to retire there. Have to make some buckets of money first.

Coincidentally, it was the 69th Black Ship Festival, which celebrates the opening of Japan to the US by Perry and his fleet of scary black ships. Kind of odd that they celebrate an invasion and humiliation, but whatever. There's also a Shimoda festival in which they remember this chick Okichi who was forced to "keep house" for Townsend Harris, the US Consulate left there, separating her from her lover. When this guy went back to the States, he left her there, where nobody would touch her and she drowned herself. Seriously. There's a neat article on the whole Black Ship and opening the country to the barbarians thing here.

We got down there just in time for the fireworks that kicked off the festival weekend. Fantastic display. There were also taiko drummers that danced with us by force.

We went to the Paradise Cafe, of course, afterwards. No Keni. Apparently he and his wife were off on vacation, but there was a new bartender called Ross, the bizarre Andy from London and his dog Lamb, and my favorite person to drunkenly sing Pogues songs with: David Nix. His wife and one of his daughters were there, too, so now I believe in their existence.

Midnight, and Jeff's birthday, was approaching rapidly, and the bartender was insufficiently inspired, so I hissed "just give me something flaming or sparkling or something!" Andy ran off somewhere and came back with a large pack of fireworks (while I settled for getting Jeff a double shot of tequila - which proves my love, as anyone who knows me and my no-tequila-for-Jeff-in-my-presence rule knows). The staff was totally cool with the sparklers burning in the bar, though we had to go outside for the bigger stuff. The kids had passed out in Grandma and Grandpa's room next door at Ernest House, and we adults got all kinds of sauced.

The next day, Jeff's proper birthday, we had lunch at a lovely place where Rich ate rice.

Happy birthday Jeff!

We ended up downtown looking for an ATM that was open past 12:30, where the matsuri was going full-swing. There was the usual matsuri food and games, plus one of those portable shrine things covered with musicians and lots of old ladies dancing. All kinds of people were walking around in Black Ship period costumes, as well as American sailors from a Navy destroyer there for the occasion.

Another night at the Paradise Cafe, this time with a BBQ and shooting off fireworks on the beach. We were joined by this twelve-year-old kid Daniel who spoke like a 19th-century scholar, and his journalist parents (I swear I can spot a fellow Jew within two sentences. It's amazing. Not really. Their New-Yorkness is what really gave them away). Rich & Mary Lou didn't make it too late, as we had messed them up the night before.

Sunday was a beach day, at the Sand Ski beach we had driven by on the day before. We had never been there before. Really cool rocky beach with little tide pools for D to explore and corral tiny crabs in, and a huge sand hill to ride down on plastic toboggans. We had a little picnic on a grassy patch and enjoyed the warmish and windy day. The kids, and Jeff, got sand in their every orifice.

The trip back took, naturally, twice as long as it took to get there, but the 'rents got to see the Spiral Bridge and some great mountain views. Still no Fuji, tho, sadly for Mary Lou, who keeps hoping to catch a glimpse. Maybe she saw it on the shinkansen to Kyoto.

One more weekend with the folks, including the night they are watching the kids in Tokyo: Friday night! You're coming to the party, right? You'd better. Very sad that Kevin has to miss it, since he was so excited. But if you haven't heard, he has TB and will be in the hospital for at least 2 months. See Helen's blog for details (a link is to the right). This would be the part where I say to keep Kevin in your prayers, but I'm not into that stuff, so I'll just say to send Kevin your happy thoughts, because this sucks for him. And for Helen.

There was supposed to be a cool montage of all the music and dancing and stuff from the festival, and some footage of the sand-skiing, but I am experiencing technical difficulties, so maybe next time. You can, however, see more pictures of our picturesque weekend here.

The Adventures of Ma & Pa Davis, Part I

2008-05-16T12:29:00.006+09:00

Jeff's parents, now retired, are blowing all their money on a two-week trip to Japan, followed by two weeks in Hawaii. Then they will settle down and live in a tent in Madison, Ohio. Just kidding.

Their first week here has gone swimmingly, except for the crappy weather they seem to bring with them, or so we like to tease them. It's been really nice the last couple days, and we are off to Shimoda for a beachy weekend that happens to coincide with the Black Ship Festival.

Firstly, to satisfy my loyal readers the Piazzas, here's proof that they went to the famous Blue Corn Cafe. I did not take this picture. Look at it like those UFO-spotting photos.

Helen, Kevin, Cynthia, Michael, and Shingo joined us. Sadly for those that left (everyone but Helen, Cynthia, and me), they didn't get to meet the fabulous Hya-chan, who believes you are never too old for hot pants.

On Mother's Day, we had brunch at the top of the Landmark Tower

then caught the buskers outside

and spent some time at Cosmo World

Monday or Tuesday night, I forget which? Macky came over and cooked us a sukiyaki feast. We also tried whale meat.

The meat tasted like fishy ham. The blubber tasted like fishy rubber bands.

Macky had secretly invited Toru, Ben, Tomoi, and Nori-chan so Jeff would look popular in Japan for his parents. Hence a stupid amount of food and a late ending hour. He and I fell asleep on the floor while the feast continued.

We took the folks to the Ramen Museum, where Rich and Mary Lou got to try their first proper ramen. We ate a Fukuchan (which Rich liked to pronounce differently). I don't know who this guy was supposed to be, but he liked Rich.

Then next night, Mary Lou taught me to make homemade noodles for the Secret Soup Recipe from Rich's mother. I am privileged to have the secret passed down to me.

The folks spent the next day on the base. Or at least they tried to. They didn't bring their passports, and apparently those are needed to get on. They managed to amuse themselves in town, though, so it was OK. We had a big steak dinner at home. Rich is the steak-grilling master. I ate a whole deliciously rare steak, almost still mooing, and I can't remember the last time I did that. Seriously. I never eat steak. Usually too much jaw-work.

The weather finally broke yesterday, and we had a sunny afternoon in Chinatown, followed by a surprise at Yamashita Koen: all the roses were in bloom! Gorgeous colors and smells.

Dinner was at that crazy fish-for-your-dinner place in Tsunashima. D caught the first, and biggest, fish. M was a close second. Rich was rather unimpressed by the still-twitching sashimi. Luckily, he doesn't eat sashimi anyway, and they had lobster and a personal hibachi for him to play with, so he was happy. We ended up with a ridiculous surplus of fish, because the boys wanted to catch another one, and Macky caught one, and I don't know what happened, but it did all managed to get eaten, mostly by Jeff & Macky.

Today, as soon as the kids get home from school, we are off to Izu. Send us happy sunny wishes so we can do lots of hanging out on the beach.

Rob's visit/Nagoya

2008-05-06T20:10:00.005+09:00

Yes, I realize this is out of order. Sue me.

What did we do when Rob was here? Our big adventure was a roadtrip to Nagoya, where there was a Custom Bike show, some music, and Macky was DJing. Martin, from Austria, also came in our car, and Macky's car contained the members of Hooch. And Hiroko. And the other chick, whose name I can't remember.

At a rest stop, we found this modern technological marvel:

a coffee vending machine (of many preparation choices) that played music and had cameras installed inside! The screen on the front showed your coffee on its journey to you!

The Custom Show had, along with the obvious, the last performance of the Soap, which is sadly disbanding because one of the girls is moving somewhere with her boyfriend. It's a damn shame.

The bikes were cool, and there was a lot of ridiculously-priced merchandise and concessions for sale. M liked his Virgin cola.

The parking lot was full of attendees' fabulous hot rods, including Jeff's new-found dream car:

The night before, while I was at the show Macky was Djing with Rob and Martin and eating stupidly-hot (in Japan!) curry, Jeff had discovered a shop full of gems with the boys, including M's new bloody bear buddy and a stuffed toy from Happy Tree Friends. What a find! If you've never watched any of their adventures, be sure to follow this link.

Back in Tokyo/Yokohama, Rob & I did some of the usual stuff, like a trip to Meiji Shrine

and a walk down Cat Street, where we found The Irony Corner. It's nice to know that there is someplace you can go for a little irony. With a heart.

Rob was fascinated with this giant ad in Shibuya, for some reason. There is something that draws the eye in an unsettling way.

Martine took us to The Beat Cafe, which was a good find to replace my now-defunct favorite little punk-rock bar Garageland. We were at first wary when the sign said Metal Night, but it turned out to be a request-driven YouTube fest of 80s "metal" videos like "We're Not Gonna Take It" and "Hot For Teacher." Awesomely bad fun.

For the rest of Rob's adventures, see the previous post, if you haven't already.

Jeff's folks are arriving on Friday, for a whole new adventure. We'll be in Shimoda the following weekend, coincidentally for the Black Ship Festival, and the weekend after that (23rd) if Jeff's (not) birthday party extravaganza. If you live anywhere near us and aren't coming to the party, you suck.

San Francisco

2008-05-02T08:16:00.006+09:00

First off, let me apologize in advance for any typos or unfocused ramblings, because I've been up since 4:45 am. Stupid jet lag.

Rob had one more night out in Japan with Jeff & Macky. Yokohama style. You'll have to ask Rob about it, though, as this is (most of the time) a family-friendly blog.

Shabu-shabu dinner

We flew to San Fran the next day, and were met by the one and only Chad Fox, who so graciously allowed us to take over his apartment and life for nearly a week. Lemme tell you about Chad. I have known him since Cleveland 1988 or so. Chad IS Cleveland to me and we spent a lot of time reminiscing about it (much to Rob's boredom). Chad is also responsible for introducing Jeff & me.

The main reason we were in SF, though, was for Karla's wedding. I got to meet Zion and his family beforehand at a family dinner. Nice people. I also saw my mom, Karla's mom, and various Hungarian step-relatives I haven't seen in awhile. Karla seemed very happy, and they got my approval to marry.

The wedding was lovely. It was in a Garden Center in Oakland, and the weather was perfect. Karla looked beautiful, of course. The ceremony was Quaker style, which meant that there was a period of silent reflection punctuated by people getting up and saying nice things, giving advice, telling funny stories, or reading poems. I tried to avoid it, not really enjoying public speaking, but after being poked by both my mom AND Karla's grandmother, I was compelled to get up there and say something that I cannot remember. Anyway, it was really nice and full of fun people, including Katie, whom I have not seen since 20 years ago in Cleveland.

The family

Katie is on the right

Here's a slew of wedding pictures.

Apart from wedding-related festivities (the dinner, dancing at the End Up, the event itself), we spent a lot of time relaxing, keeping stupid hours, being slackers, playing instant-gratification DJ (think of a random song and download it), and exploring the lovely city of San Francisco. We were blessed by days and days of (from what I hear) unusually nice weather. What a great place. So colorful. So full of amazing architecture. It was so awesome to spend all that time with Chad (it had been like 8 years or something since I'd seen him, and I don't know how long since we had that kind of quality time). The experience reminded me of who I was. Really. I can't thank Chad and his city enough for the sense of affirmation.

This is the mission from Vertigo

In case I got homesick for Japan

Chad lives in a really interesting building. His neighbors live in the apartment that once housed Janis Joplin, and his other neighbor is Vale, the guy who started RE/Search publishing. He is an SF punk institution and has hung out with the Avengers and Devo, along with other early punk greats. He also had an Abyssinian cat, which is my favorite breed. This is the first time I ever got to touch one. I know, I'm a dork.

The view from Chad's roof

The day I was supposed to leave, Chad and both slept right through two alarms. We are blaming the constant sounds of construction outside his windows that drowned out the sound of the alarms. So I got a bonus day! Chad & I had a dinner and a movie date. The dinner was at The Stinking Rose, a famous restaurant specializing in garlic dishes. I love garlic and have always wanted to eat there. On a whim, I ordered the rabbit. It was crusted with rosemary and (duh) garlic, and roasted with black olives. Di-vine. With the bottle of red (NOT chilled, thank you) and the garlic mashed potatoes, it really felt like a proper feast.

The movie was Zombie Strippers, starring Robert Englund (aka Freddy Krueger) and Jenna Jameson. If you don't know who that is, I can't tell you. It was awfully great. I mean, literally.

Here's a bunch of San Francisco pictures. You should go see them, because there is lots of cool architecture and street murals and stuff that will help you see how colorful the city is.

I did manage to catch my flight the next day. This one had a connection in Seattle, which I had so far managed to avoid going through. I saw the Space Needle and the hideous EMP from the air. It was really tempting to just walk out the front door of the airport. But, I had barely enough time to make my next flight, so not enough time to contemplate it. But I'll see you in 3 months!

This month'll fly by. Jeff's folks are coming next week, we are going to Shimoda again, and Jeff's (not) birthday party is on the 23rd (all you Japan-dwellers had better be there!).

Crap. I just realized that I didn't do the post on Rob's visit here, like I thought I had before we left for SF. Maybe I'll post some of that tomorrow. Maybe I won't. I got stuff to do.

Shenanigans

2008-04-18T09:05:00.004+09:00

This is a short post, as Rob just got here, and many adventures will follow. But this needs to be posted.

It's all about a Friday night out with Janet, a San Diego coworker of Jeff's who was in town with her husband Ted.

We started out at The Lock-up, about which I have posted previously

and ended up, with Cynthia, at The Tavern, near Yokohama station. Yeah, we closed the place. But not before Jeff had run off to Don Quixote at like 4am to purchase his Gachapin costume. Mayhem ensued.

Many thanks to "Tom" and "Smiley," our friendly and tolerant bartenders. Those aren't their real names. I call him "Tom" because he reminds me vaguely of my friend Tom Simmons, and "Smiley," well, you'll just have to ask him where that name came from.

No more really needs to be said.

Hanami

2008-04-08T14:50:00.005+09:00

I am sitting here listening to the rain that has been falling for about 24 hours, and I am fondly thinking of the sakura and sunshine that graced the past two weekends. Such is the bipolar nature of spring weather.

The hanami, or cherry blossom viewing party, is the high point of Japanese seasonal celebration. The snowy white and occasionally pink (one of the few things I can appreciate in my nemesis of hue) petals are a wonderful excuse for doing nothing but enjoying the view, your friends, and copious amounts of alcohol.

We kind of accidentally hanami-ed two weekends ago when we strolled to our local Mitsuike Koen for a spontaneous picnic and found the place adrift in sakura at their height of beauty and thronged with viewers. The trees were indeed lovely.

Last weekend, though, was our scheduled hanami at Inokashira Koen in Kichijoji, organized by Martine. The organized hanami is no small affair. You can't just show up and expect to find the perfect spot for your little picnic blanket under the prettiest tree.

People come days before and mark out their territory with ubiquitous blue tarps, which amazingly, seem to remain unmolested by rivals. Luckily, we had Martine to stake our claim, as we had a Family Fun Day at the school to attend in the morning.

It was complete with face painting (maybe not of the usual sort when my kids are involved)

and a demonstration of Turkish dancing, performed by mostly Japanese women and maybe one Turk.

Then it was off to Inokashira Koen, to somehow find our friends among the thousands of sakura enthusiasts. Martine solved our dilemmas by telling us to look for the "Tarp Full of Trannies" just next to them.

This fascinated (and slightly confused) me until Helen, when she and Kevin arrived, explained to me that the day before had been April 4th (4/4). March 3rd (3/3) is Girls' Day and May 5 is traditionally Boys' Day (5/5). 4/4 falls between the two and is thus embraced by the homosexual and cross-dressing community. SO, apparently they had adopted the whole weekend.

The day was full of hoola-hooping (at which Martine and D surprisingly excelled)

music, eating, drinking, and A Napping Buddha.

I guess this person did not want to feel exposed while snoozing, but it seems like it would be rather suffocating. Maybe she had mastered the art of Zen breath-control and didn't need much air, I don't know.

Martine very generously allowed us Davises to crash at her place for the night, and after a slow-rolling morning of sunlit breakfast, we strolled back to the park and just kind of hung out for a bit in the sunshine.

It was a glorious day, and while the boys went off for a paddle-boat ride, Martine and I enjoyed soft cream (sakura-flavored for me, of course) and coffee, and watched the people go by. I really liked this guy, or more to the point, his cats.

He carries them around everywhere, Martine tells me, in a bag, and they don't wander off. One of the cats was really not into the sharing-the-top-of-a-post-with-its -sibling-for-the-amusement-of-passersby-with-cameras and kept jumping down, but he didn't really go anywhere. He let me pet him, which made me happy to get my kitty fix. When it was time to go, he just hopped back into the bag and off they went. When Jeff got back and I told him about the cats in the bag, he asked if the bag had a drawstring top and was weighted with rocks. Bastard.

Sunday evening, I again joined Helen and Kevin for the Psysalia Psysalis Psyche (say that five times drunk) show in Shibuya. They were great, but the wonderful surprise for me, as well as for Kevin, was The Suzan. They totally rocked the place. I also discovered, via the DJ and Helen's Japanese ability, a band called White Rose Movement. How can I not have heard of them before? They are so obviously influenced by all my favorite 80s bands that I fell in love instantly and actually bought the CD on iTunes. Retrotastic.

China Part II: Beijing

2008-03-27T17:25:00.018+09:00

If you don't want to read all my really interesting commentary, and just want to look at the pretty pictures, you can go here.

The first part of our China trip had already been a success. We had seen the more modern city, and now it was time for some history. For real. Really old stuff, history I've seen in movies or learned about in school. Places I never dreamed I would see in real life. For instance, on our first day in Beijing, we went to:

The Forbidden City

It's not actually called that anymore, by the way. It's called the Imperial Palace Museum, and the first thing you see before you even enter is a giant picture of Mao. The second thing you see, before going into the the City proper, is lots of people trying to sell you things. This was a constant theme of our trip. I expected a certain amount of this in the touristy areas, like trinket booths and whatnot, but we were constantly being approached by peddlers with items like clip-on roller skates, cheap toys, and other random bits of junk. And they don't take no, thank you for an answer: this is merely an invitation to try and tempt you with a lower price. They really want to sell you something. Jeff ended up buying a set of clip-on skates in Shanghai from two different guys because when he agreed to buy from one guy, another guy started yelling and pushing the first guy and it was nearly a full-blown fist-fight. This guy showed M a cool magic trick that ended up in D buying it.

It doesn't even stop there. Groups of "students" or "Olympic volunteers" who want to "practice their English" really just want you to visit some "art exhibition" where you they can get you to buy cheap crappy art. I've read worse, like "students" who take you to a cafe and stick you with a huge bill. And, what really got me was the women working in the drug store trying to get me to buy this or that product if I browsed too long in any aisle.

But I totally digress.

The Forbidden City is huge. So many red buildings and carved bridges and stairs that it led my kids to wonder how the emperor ever found his way around without getting lost (The kids were excited to be there because I had them watch The Last Emperor before we came to China, to give them some history and get them excited to see this stuff).

bird's eye view

We saw the throne, too, and a museum full of imperial treasures, of which the kids and I took exhaustive photos you can see on the flickr page. So much history happened here since it was built 400 years ago, and no outsider was allowed in until fairly recently, and there we were. Cool. See more pictures of the Forbidden City here. Go on.

After we did that, we went to some other park with cool temples and stuff, but I don't remember what it was. You can see the pictures, though, if you click above.

In the late afternoon/early evening, we decided to do a rickshaw tour of the:

Hutongs

These are mazes of old-world Beijing alleyways where people still live and shop. Tiny, some of them, and all ancient. We were told one wall was 700 years old. Whole neighborhoods in these crazy places, and lots of stories I'm sure. The royal Eunuch's palace was back there, along with a place Mao lived for a year (our rickshaw-driver guy assured us). They were also doing a lot of work back there. (In fact, they seem to be doing construction work 24 hours a day in Beijing and Shanghai, getting ready for the Olympics. Dozens of half-finished skyscrapers were everywhere and they don't have that long to finish).

Mao's house

D and I were in one rickshaw, and Jeff and M in the other. We had agreed to a price and length of trip beforehand, like we were supposed to, according to all the guidebooks, but it was getting to the point of all the alleys starting to look the same, and they just kept pedaling and pedaling and D and I were freezing, so we finally called a stop near some restaurants. The trip went on twice as long as we had thought!

Go here for more hutong pics. They're cool.

So we decided on duck, since we were in the city famous for it and all, but we figured the kids wouldn't be any help finishing a whole duck. So we ordered some duck dishes, including this one, which we thought was some kind of duck-on-a-stick. That's what it looked like in the picture on the menu.

M figured it out first. Those weren't sticks, they were beaks. We had ordered a plate of duck heads. They weren't too bad, really, but the rest of our meal wasn't that great, either. But anyway, it was really cheap. Like $16 for a big exotic meal.

This didn't do much for my opinion of Chinese food. It's never been my favorite, anyway. I was thinking, though, that Chinese food is bound to be better in China. Right? I don't really like Mexican food, either, but I loved the food in Mexico. Oh, well, maybe this stuff is an acquired taste.

The next day, we had our one official guided tour, to the:

Great Wall

We got picked up at our hotel by "Joe," a pleasant Chinese guy with really good English, in a van. He introduced as "the Davises from Australia" to the folks already in the van. It was a group of one young girl (Stephanie), one woman (Shauna), and one guy (Jake) who really resembled, I'm not kidding, Brad Pitt. So now we were on a celebrity tour with Tom Cruise and Brad Pitt (surely I've mentioned that everyone in Japan thinks Jeff looks like Tom Cruise?). They were Americans from, get ready, Washington state. Wait, it gets better. The girl, Stephanie, goes to school at SPU, which is just down the street from our house in Seattle. Talk about small world. We soon picked up one more gal, Sarah, from Canada. She was a photographer-in-residence in China for a month. Swell bunch of people to share a two-and-a-half hour road trip with. Sarah played word games with the kids that we used the whole rest of the trip (you say a word and the next person has to come up with a word that starts with the last letter from the word the first person aid, and so on, with no repeats. Stuff like that). She was M's new best friend, and stuck with us for the whole rest of the Great Wall adventure.

I had picked the Simatai part of the Wall, not the usual Badaling part that most tourists pick from Beijing, because it was less restored and less crowded.

It was breathtaking. I mean that literally as well as metaphorically; it was hard work. It's really high up, and you have to climb about a million steps.

I bought a fur hat at the bottom, because it was chilly and looked to be chillier at the top. Joe left us at the bottom, but we were instantly picked up by Ni Fen Youn, a 63-year-old farmer, and another woman, who climbed with us every step of the way (I am ashamed to admit that he felt he had to grasp me by the elbow and propel me up the steps after a while because I was gasping like a fish. And before you blame it on the smoking, he smoked those nasty Chinese cigarettes that make mine seem like Capris. Must be a farmer thing, that stamina). I guess it's what the locals do around the Wall. They attach themselves to visitors, as spontaneous guides. Naturally, they have stuff to sell you (lovely books and pictures of the Wall), but they really work for it. Jeff absolutely adored his new buddy Ni Fen Youn, who had OK English and stories to tell, and the most fascinating teeth.

Once I got high up, I was no longer cold, for sure. Sweating, even. But the views from up there were amazing.

M and his best friend for the day

M&D and their "I Climbed the Great Wall" medals

the group at lunch

Joe

Joe set us up for lunch at the bottom, and it was the best food we had the whole trip. Simple, recognizable dishes, and lots of 'em. Mm.

On the way back was the requisite stop at the silk/jade/pearl factory (all the tours have one of these). Ours was supposed to be jade, I thought, but it turned out to be pearl, which I liked much better. We got a little tour and explanation about where freshwater vs saltwater, natural vs cultured pearls come from (if you get one of these and the girl asks how many pearls you think are inside the huge freshwater oyster, don't say 3 or 5 or anything conservative. She said we could have the pearls if we guessed right. It was more like 20. She let us all pick a pearl, anyway).

Then was the "tour" of the rest of the "factory," which was of course, a store selling pearls and pearl products (part of me wanted to buy the Pearl Cream, because I totally remembered the commercials about it from when I was a kid: "what is the secret of the beautiful skin of the Orient? It's pearls!") I'm also kind of a sucker for pearls. I know I may never have a real string of them, but I did get a pretty pretty black pearl ring, because Jeff said he always meant to buy me pearls when he was overseas in the Navy.

Go here for more pics of the Great Wall.

Needless to say, we were pretty exhausted when we got back, so we just ordered a pizza and called it a night. We did also try some Chinese liquor. Two different kinds, actually. One cheap one tasted like (I'm imagining from their smell, OK?) urinal puck. Jeff went out and got a prettier, more expensive bottle:

It was 104 proof. That's 52% alcohol, folks. Sadly, it was also totally undrinkable. It tasted like grass. As in lawn. That wanted to mow me. But he did also find this gem:

This PBR was better than the PBR in America. This one at least admits it's water. And it tasted better, too.

Next day, which was supposed to be our last day in China, we made a quick stop at the local grocery. They wouldn't let me take pictures, really, but I did manage to sneak a couple of the abundant roasted duck and whole chickens in a bag (I don't think this is what Jake Blues meant by whole fried chicken):

M also found this sign, which made me and the kids giggle for days.

We are still giggling about it. Ah, the amusement from misplaced punctuation. We may be calling each other "knockhead" for years.

Our real destination for the day was the

Beijing Zoo

They had really cute Red Pandas. They looked really friendly and frisky as they followed the keeper around their enclosure, begging for food. I totally want one. They had regular pandas, too, of course. Sleeping, mostly. I liked the White Tigers the best

Jeff decided his new favorite animal is the Slow Loris. Cuz they're really chill.

His favorite part of the trip to the zoo was the purchase of four cheap masks, just so we could get this picture:

Lots more animals here.

We rushed back to get to hotel to be picked up in time for the Legend of Kung Fu show we had signed up for.

It was pretty great. Yeah, lots of flashy lights and fire and unnecessary floor-opening, but fun king-fu demonstrations, including the whole iron-body thing (spears in the throat! laying between knives and nails and lots of weight! Breaking metal bars on heads!), demos of different styles, like Monkey and Scorpion, and a lot of fun weapons I can appreciate the difficulty of using, having played with them myself. I couldn't take pictures, of course, but this website has some nice slides.

Afterwards, we went to our Last Supper. We were walking toward a shopping district when we
were approached by a trio of young Chinese "Olympic volunteers." Jeff, I love his trusting soul, was excited that these nice young people wanted to practice their English skills with us and show us a good place to eat. My Spidey-senses were tingling, however, and I was polite but wary. Jeff went and mentioned that I was a painter, and lo and behold, the subject turned. "Do you like Chinese art? Have you seen any exhibitions? No?! Well, we can take you to a student art exhibition..." Ugh. Luckily, I must have exuded enough disinterest that they left us at the restaurant. I wondered what their discussion was with the hostess at the door was, tho...

We ordered some innocuous-sounding dishes, which stood out among these fun choices:

What we got was this

It was spicy and delicious, and I thought maybe I don't hate Chinese food after all. But.

Even looking at the picture now makes me slightly queasy, because at about four in the morning I awoke and was violently ill. By the time proper morning rolled around, M was also sick and it was obvious that we weren't going to make our flight out after all. Jeff, bless him, worked diligently all morning to change our flight out and get us accommodation for another night in another hotel (our present hotel was going to be full). We couldn't get a flight until two days later, and we spend those two "bonus" nights mostly in hotel beds, watching dissatisfying television and trying to sleep it off. On the first bonus day, D and Jeff got out for a a bit of kite-flying by the remaining section of the old Beijing city wall

and then they got sick, so we couldn't blame the dinner, or the mystery-meat stick M had bought off the street near the zoo (we thought at the time that it might've been chicken or pork, but upon further reflection, it could easily have been cat or dog),

because D had neither of those things. We finally, the other day, deduced that it was likely the milk at our hotel breakfast buffet. It was lukewarm and of unknowable age or pasteurization, and we'd all had it. Ah, well.

Not many pictures of the last two days, but our hotel room's bathroom did provide us with this jewel of insulting toiletry:

We finally made it home, obviously, and I was never so glad to be in Japan, where it is clean and the food is of trustworthy simplicity and freshness. In the Narita airport I had the first food in days that didn't make me nervous and or queasy: an onigiri that tasted like ambrosia from the gods.

So am I glad we went to China? Absolutely. Reading back at what I've written, it strikes me that it may have a negative undertone. Don't ever let that dissuade you from traveling to China. We saw some amazing stuff, a real once-in-a-lifetime adventure. We stood in the Forbidden City, and atop the Great Wall of China! We met some nice people, had experiences that a lot of people never will, got a broader perspective of the world we share. That was worth the dirt, the chaos, the smells, the general distrust I felt of the citizenry for always trying to sell me something, the constant staring and lack of a sense of personal space, even the illness. If I had the chance, I'd do it again. Just not in this lifetime.

One unexpected side-effect of the trip was to make me appreciate Japan more, which will make our last few months here much happier. The sakura are blooming in the sunshine and warmer air, and I am feeling renewed (may be all that purging I did) and hopeful for the future. I have some more fun adventures coming up, like Rob coming, and Jeff's folks, and a trip to San Fran. Life is good. Welcome Spring!

China: Shanghai

2008-03-27T12:43:00.014+09:00

What a week we had. Longer than expected, but I'll get to that. I'm going to divide it up in two posts, Shanghai and Beijing, so you can spread it out over two coffee breaks, if you want.

When people ask me how our China trip went, I have been answering "wonderful and terrible." What an amazing amount of history that civilization has. Great palaces and walls were being built hundreds of years before any white people even conceived of "discovering" my young country (of course, the natives were there long before, but that is not my civilization and they left no permanent record of theirs before we killed them off/concentrated them in pockets as shells of what they were --I'll shut up now) .

My first overall impression of modern China? Dirt and chaos. Sorry, but it's true. That isn't to say that there isn't a lot to off-set that, because there is some amazing stuff. But right off, I noticed the spitting I read about.

It's rampant. It's not even considered rude in the middle of a conversation. People loudly hawking up---ugh. I'm not a squeamish person normally. I'm a mom, I've dealt with every bodily fluid. But something about mucus really gets to me in a very visceral way.

Moving on.

If I had to pick between which city I preferred on our visit, I'd have to say Shanghai, where we went first.

Shanghai has always interested me because it hit its fame during the 1920s and 30s, an era which, as anyone who knows me knows, has a dear place in my heart. This is when the Western world came into Shanghai and the expat community had a huge influence on the architecture, the government, and the culture (there is a lot of negative connotation here, as it was rather forced on the Chinese, but I'm going to stay away from politics in here as much as I can, aforementioned Native Americans notwithstanding, because it is complicated and confuses me. No, I'm lying, it's going to come up and I know it).

Anyway, on our first full day, we took a subway

and did a wander through Old Shanghai. If you squint and imagine away how people are dressed and anything plastic, looks as if it hasn't altered a bit since the 1930s.

We also walked through a park that had this crazy exercise equipment instead of the normal playground stuff

and thought "how unusual to have a park full of exercise equipment," but we ended up seeing these things all over China. Maybe it's a Communist thing: the people must be fit.

We also spotted this fun scene: a guy getting a shave on the street, right by the shoe-shine guys.

There was a huge shopping street, whose name escapes me because Chinese names are really hard to remember, but we did it backwards from the tour-book way and so went to this lady's place first. She was great, with her kinky hair and nose ring, and I saw no one else like her in the rest of our trip. I think she's my Chinese sister.

Her shop had a sorts of cool stuff and pseudo-antiques in it.

After her shop, the mind-boggling number of stalls selling the exact same watches, figurines, toys, and pseudo-antiques as each other wasn't as exciting. That isn't to say we didn't buy anything. The stuff was unique to us and quite cheap. We did the whole haggling thing, which is both kinda fun and rather aggravating, and did better at some times than others, but hey, it was still cheap.

We walked by this place, but didn't go in. This picture brings me to relate my first public toilet experience in China. Public bathrooms around the world are always fascinating. (They are, just trust me) In Italy, you can go into any cafe and use theirs (in the US, you have to be a customer). In Japan, you can use the nice Western-style ones in any combini (like in gas stations in the US), or in the more public ones like train stations or touristy sites, they have the slipper-shaped squat hole that I'm totally used to and sometimes prefer for hygienic reasons.

I was prepared for a hole in the ground, but this one was a whole new experience. 3 stalls, with no doors. A tiled gutter to squat over, communal to all 3, that was flushed out periodically. Otherwise, all the waste matter is sitting there waiting for the next flushing. The no-door thing wouldn't have been so terrible, except the next waiting customer stands there and watches you do your business. The women after me didn't even wait until I had done up my pants before she pushed her way into my space to take her turn. I had to laugh. A nervous, kind of horror-filled sort of laugh, but humor was required for the situation.

So. We visited the Bird and Flower Market, which is a giant warren of a pet shop with every kind of small animal you can buy and take home. This ain't no Pet Smart. Utter chaos, people shoving around tiny alleyways and a cacophony of Chinese voices and animals sounds.

These guys were obviously popular. Crickets.

I guess a lot of guys buy them and carry them around in their little houses. When they are cold, they don't chirp. When they warm up, they do. They chirp when in a pocket, giving comfort and companionship to the owner, and when they want them to shut up, they expose them to the colder air outside. Kinda cool.

We had some famous Shanghai dumplings for lunch. I was underwhelmed by them.

We walked some more, down a lane that was tree-lined, with birds in cages to sing and cheer strollers. A very ancient practice, I bet. And weird.

We were really over-stimulated by the time we got the Yu Gardens, so all we saw was the big, foreigner-thronged shopping area and the odd store-front-looking temple compound where you could worship your gods-under-glass. Missed the "garden" part completely due to being so overwhelmed by the amount of foreigners crammed in the Starbucks. I left before I could use the bathroom there. Too many damn people.

As the sun started to go down, we were heading toward the famous Shanghai skyline. I have never seen buildings like they have in Shanghai. So modern. I guess most of it was built in the last 12 years. Isn't that nuts?

We had to go up into the Oriental Pearl TV Tower. How could we not?

We had dinner up there in the second ball, a decent buffet including all kinds of weird Chinese stuff and the universal tater-tot, and got a view from above (it's 468 m or 1,536 feet high and the third tallest TV/radio tower in the world). I always thought parts of Tokyo were the inspiration for Blade Runner, but this skyline, with it's neon and crazy architecture and haze of smog, surely was inspired by the movie. Unbelievable.

(Incidentally, while we were up here, as our kids were borrowed for many group shots, we were acquainted with the fact that the Chinese thought that M was a girl. The long hair and the long eyelashes, I guess. This impression was universal, too, including the hotel worker in Beijing who refused to let him into the boys' bathroom.)

They also had a Space Center in one of the balls, and a much-more-extensive-than-expected history museum. Creepy-wonderful wax figurines about Shanghai's opium dens and Western influenced culture, and lots of propaganda about the noble farmer and the Anti-Japanese War, which is what they call WWII.

That was all in one day, can you believe it?

The next day was a lot more low-key, at least for us grownups. We stayed around the hotel. We had discovered this park the day before by the subway station, but didn't go in. It was a total low-rent kiddie amusement place, the highlights of which were the jumbo slide

and the Most Awesome Bumper Cars Ever. Fast, sparky, hard to control, whiplash-inducing collisions and just like they used to be before America got so sue-happy. Also notice on the right the cool pre-videogame shooting game (reminded me of Magic Shot). It had great recorded noises of dying animals.

If you ask the kids, tho, this might have been the best part.

They were in there for twenty minutes. The guys running it were so amused that they were taking a bunch of pictures with their cell phones and everyone walking by had to stop, until they had drawn quite a crowd.

The park was a lot more extensive than it looked from the entrance. Beyond Doraemon Kid Paradise, there was a sand beach where we stumbled across some kind of photo-shoot for a wedding magazine or something.

There was also a big lake with paddle boats and lots of paths through different kinds of landscapes. It was huge.

That night we went to Shanghai Circus World for an acrobat show called ERA: Intersection of Time. Multi-million dollar production with some of the craziest acrobatics I've ever seen. Apart form the usual flying and contorting, they had this huge ferris/hamster wheel that made me cover my eyes in terror of witnessing a horrible fall.

And you know those motor-cycle Ball of Death things like they had in The Simpson's Movie? They had one of those. But not just with one guy on a motorcycle. Not 2, or even 3. EIGHT riders, male and female, were zooming around at high speed inside this round cage. It shouldn't be possible. Amazing show.

Our last day in Shanghai was spent at the aquarium, the highlights of which were: The Scariest-Looking Alligator Ever, the ultra-creepy (to me) Giant Salamander, various weird-looking fish, and the World's Longest Underwater Viewing Tunnel. D was in heaven taking pictures, and decided he is going to be an animal photographer for National Geographic when he grows up.

It was then time to catch the overnight train to Beijing! I've done it once, Brussels to Prague with Karla, but a first for the rest of the family, so it was exciting. Before we got on, tho (after nearly missing it due to ignorance and station chaos), I manage to finally snap a picture of this kid. I was trying for like 20 minutes, because he had on the pants I had been seeing on toddlers all over Shanghai.

I guess they don't bother with diapers or training pants, and the bodily functions of toddlers fits in the same category as spitting and old men urinating on the walls: Eh, whatever. What city smell? Oh, watch where you're stepping...

Off to Beijing!

Lots more pictures of Shanghai here and the aquarium, where wonders abounded, here.

Jacki's Visit: In Which Some Questions Are Answered

2008-03-14T14:44:00.020+09:00

Jacki just left, after a week's stay with us. We've known Jacki a long time, Jeff longer, but basically, since high school in Cleveland.

TSURUMI

The first night, we were at Saizeriya with the now usual Horizon teachers crowd (i.e., Cynthia et al), then on to Sugar Tea. Pretty normal.

TOKYO

The second day, Saturday, was when the questions began. I took Jacki to Harajuku (where I finally bought the poofy petticoat-thing I've wanted ever since Cyndi Lauper was big) and the Oriental Bazaar, which is a great place to stock up on souvenirs. This was where this question was initially raised (and continued to be raised later in the week): Can you buy too many kokeshi dolls?

That night, the big question was :is there such a thing as too much karaoke?

Jacki, Helen, Kevin, and I went to a huge place in Shibuya, where Jacki discovered the delights of a karaoke box in which you can drink as much ume shochu as you want and get caught up in the fun which leads to continually asking for "one more hour" when the call from the downstairs desk comes. We eventually did that past the time when we could catch the last train home. Soon after this point, Kevin and Jacki passed out and Helen and I shrugged and did the only thing we could do, which was to keep picking songs and singing ourselves hoarse to songs we could barely sing anymore. By the time we ran out of songs, it was 6 am and we were confronted with a $500 bill for the evening.

So, is there such a thing as too much karaoke? I'd have to say "yes." Was it worth it in order to see Kevin's long-ass legs sticking out from a bush and some kind of metal box behind which he had wedged himself when he fell in? Completely unable to extricate himself due to his height and the improbable position between box and wall? And to hear him say "could everybody please turn around" in his German accent because he had gotten his pants caught on said metal box on his way down?

Oh, hell yes. Totally worth a sore throat, a hangover, and a huge bill.

SLEEPING

We pretty much slept Sunday away.

ASAKUSA

Monday I took Jacki to Asakusa. All those stalls are fun, if a bit over-stimulating after the first twenty.

Jacki and I got our fortunes, with the shaka-shaka stick-and-drawer thing. We both got Best Fortune. Jacki's said something about dining at the palace and people hailing her as she rode on horseback, which goes to show that this really is an ancient tradition (and was good for a giggle or two over the week). Mine had something about "travel and removal" being favorable, which is good, considering our plans for the near future.

Jacki continued to indulge in her kokeshi obsession, and the question can you buy too many kokeshi dolls was explored:

Apparently, the answer is: not if you are Jacki.

More pictures of Asakusa here.

NIKKO

Tuesday, we took a day trip to Nikko. We got a Nikko World Heritage Pass at the Tobu line tourist office outside Asakusa station, which was a pretty good deal. It gets you round-trip train fare, unlimited bus usage in Nikko, and the entry fee to the major temples and such. We got a limited express train and it took us about an hour and a half from Asakusa.

Nikko, a city I've wanted to visit, is lovely. It's up in the mountains a bit and has lots of fresh-smelling air and majestic conifers. It's like a ski resort town, with famous on-sens and a lake and a waterfall we didn't have time to see. It is also famous for the Toshogu Shrine, dedicated to Ieyasu Tokugawa, the first shogun. Apparently he fell in love with Nikko and wanted to be there forever.

The Toshogu shrine buildings were unexpectedly Chinese-looking, ornately carved and brightly painted.

Here you can see the origin of the famous Hear No, See No, Speak No Evil monkeys

and the bafflingly-hyped "Sleeping Cat" carving (in an area that is inexplicably not included in the areas our pass covered).

I found an explanation of its meaning on the web,

The "Sleeping Cat" exists at the entrance of Okusha Inner Shrine, which is located in Higashikairou (East Corridor.) It is told that the "Sleeping Cat" was made by Jingorou Hidari, and it is the most famous sculpture in the Toshogu Shrine.

Also, there is a sculpture of sparrow on the backside of the Sleeping Cat. The sparrow will be eaten if the cat is awake. However, the sparrow and the cat co-exist. It means that nation wide chaos is over and peaceful society has come.

but I still don't see why it is so famous. There are lots of sleeping cats along with the monkeys in the gift shops.

Also in this area is the where Ieyasu Tokugawa is enshrined.

After we left the shrine compound, we walked in the pleasant mountain air to a pretty bridge on the tourist guide. Seeing it from the street as we walked toward it, we were kind of underwhelmed by the surrounding buildings and highway, but the view from the other side was quite beautiful.

By the time we got back to the town proper, it was practically deserted. We had dinner at a place across from the station that had lots of yummy-looking fake food in the window and an English menu. Couldn't tell you what it was called, but it was big and we were almost the only customers. It was a Tuesday.

We sample the local specialties: Nikko ramen and yuba, which is tofu skin. We had to have Nikko Beer to accompany it, of course. It tasted just like every other Japanese beer (just fine), but the food was good.

They turned off the lights right as we left, so we felt a little bad that we had lingered so long. We had nothing better to do until our train. We decided to try for the second-to-last train (18:10), to be safe from possible full-capacity, but we needn't have worried. There are no more reserved-seat limited express trains back to Asakusa by then. Just regular trains. Now I know why the place was deserted: the trip back takes two and a half hours. Just to Asakusa. We then had to take a train back to Shibuya, which is another half an hour. And we weren't done yet. But at this point I should ask: was it worth the trip, even though we probably spent more time on the train than in Nikko? Yeah. It's pretty, it's fresh air. I would, however, suggest buying more beer and a deck of cards for the return trip.

We were in Shibya three hours later and about to embark on the second-to-last leg of the journey (there's a a bus or cab from Kikuna for the final leg), literally with ticket poised at the wicket, when Jacki decides that it's too nice a night and we're in Tokyo, so she wanted to buy me a beer before we go home.

We're walking down the street, looking for Garageland (which has apparently gone, dammit), when Jacki actually spots two guys on the street she knows from San Francisco. This question is rhetorical: What are the odds, huh?

Their names are Jesse and Christian and we had one very amusing drink with them at the nearby International Cafe (which I picked because it had "no table charge" and a good drink menu advertised outside. It's right near the Outback Steakhouse). Nice guys, professional photographers getting some stock of Tokyo. Then we went home. Whew.

More pics of Nikko here.

TOUR GUIDE'S DAY OFF

Jeff took Jacki to Yokohama during the day and to a show in Tokyo at night (SF Christian went, too). I puttered around the house and had a long nap. The kids and I watched Terminator 2. Need I say more.

FIELD TRIP

I had signed Jacki and me up as chaperons for M's class field trip to the Shitamachi Museum on Thursday. It's in Ueno Koen and has a reproduction of a late Edo-era street on the ground floor and some old toys and appliances and stuff on the second floor.

The fabulous Ms Thomas and the English-speaking guide

Japanese toilets have come a long way

I thought it was cool, if the kids were a bit rushed about it and ready to go back outside and enjoy the nice weather in the park.

It was a lovely day, and a lot of performers were out, including the New Age American Indians in Full Dress

and the Bike-Courier Xylophonist, who is apparently featured in the Lonely Planet.

Was it worth taking fourteen 5th-8th graders on a bus and a train to hang out in the park on a nice day, learn a bit of history, and see Injuns in Japan? Definitely.

More pics of museum and park here.

Thursday night, we were invited by Hamza's mom to a Turkish feast. It was all female teachers from Horizon and Jeff. The food was AMAZING. I know she cooked all day, and I don't know what the occasion was, but I need those recipes. All of them.

Jeff might've been asking himself if being surrounded by a bunch of chicks was worth the food. And I asked myself if I had ever eaten that much in my life. I think the answers would be, "yes" and "no," respectively. I looked at myself in the mirror when I got home, and I swear I looked four months pregnant.

Jeff and Jacki went out after, to meet Macky and fulfill Jeff's burning need to show Jacki Osambashi Pier at night. I got home and promptly passed out.

So Jacki left around noon today. We are leaving for China tomorrow. We did a hell of a lot in the week she was here. Was it worth it? I say yes, and I hope she does, too.

The final question of this post: Do I perhaps have too many pictures and too much to read in this post? Yeah, probably. Just wait til the next one: China.

devilsnot

2008-03-05T11:56:00.002+09:00

Remember this stuff?

I should've read more into the picture, the flames, and everything, because this stuff is FROM HELL.

I put it in my bathtub, and it turned my bath water kind of a light red. OK, that's cool. And then it started making noises like I had just poured Pop Rocks in there. Not fizzy like a bath bomb, but popping! Really cool. I got in. It smelled pretty nice, a little spicy, a hint of clove. I approve of such smells in my bath water. Awesome. I didn't notice that the water was any hotter, but I did get tiny tingling sensations here and there. That and the smell made me wonder if there was a touch of cinnamon or clove oil in there, because those are pretty volatile oils and can cause some irritation if put directly on the skin (maybe it really was just Pop Rocks, tho, they tingle, too). I saw little pinkish blobs of oil floating around on the surface of the water, which would support my theory. Well, a lot of bath additives have oil in them, for skin-softening benefits, all well and good. I'd just smooth it into my skin when I got out and I'd smell good all day.

But then I got out of the water.

I soon came to the conclusion that there was too much oil left on my skin to just rub in. In fact, there was a reddish film all over my body. Great. Now I'd have to take another shower. I knew it wouldn't just rinse off with water, being oil, so I lathered on some soap.

Big mistake.

I was now covered with a sticky, slimy, mucilaginous layer of goo, like I was greasing up to swim the English Channel. And it wasn't coming off.

I had to spend ten minutes scraping off the goo and a layer of skin with a scrubby towel. Maybe that's the hidden ultimate benefit of this diabolical product: exfoliation.

I also had to spend 5 minutes re-washing the tub. I had just washed it before I filled it, due to the rubber-ducky-induced mildew and kid-scum sticking to the sides.

Well, to mix my adages, curiosity skinned the cat, I guess. Live and learn. That's what I get for not being able to read Japanese. It probably has warnings on the package: Caution: May cause slime to form on some individuals. Remove with dish detergent. Or there are some specific instructions on how to use it, like in cold water, or only on Thursdays.

I may never know. But at least I can warn you.

Random blog fodder

2008-03-04T15:51:00.006+09:00

I haven't really done anything blogworthy lately. I tried to go to the Calico Cafe on Saturday afternoon to hang out with the kitties, but I wandered around Kichijoji station for an hour looking for it, and when I finally found it, they asked me (from a handwritten English crib-sheet) if I had a reservation??? There were full, could I come back in 2 hours? If I could've made a little black cartoon cloud appear over my head at that moment, I would've. Maybe I'll try again during the week.

Anyway. I did go shopping today, to get some stuff for our China trip (next weekend!!!). I bought a new wallet. The cashier lady gave me this with it:

I assume the shiny-new 5 yen coin is supposed to go in my wallet as some sort of good luck attract-money thing. I'm sure one of my smarter ex-pat friends will enlighten me in the comments section.

I decided , while I was taking that picture, that you all might enjoy more of my Japan shopping experience.

For instance, I also bought this today:

I've been kind of curious to try it. As you may or may not know, Japan is the land of really hot baths (and they need never go cold - you can reheat them while still soaking!). This product is some sort of bath salts that make your bath even HOTTER because it is good for you to boil yourself alive, apparently. I'll let you know how that went.

When I saw this, I said to myself, no, it couldn't really be for that, could it?

But it was, yes it was. Naaaaasty. They also make them for ears.

And make sure to also use your Etiquette Tweezers, because unsightly hair is just bad manners.

This made me think of those old line drawings of Victorian chin strap devices that we think are so quaint and thank god we don't believe in that quackery anymore (except you, over there watching TV and thinking about buying one of those electric vibrating belts that melts away your belly fat while you relax and watch TV and eat chips).

The rest of these I took awhile ago, but they fit this post well, so we'll start with Ankle Warmers

What else would you find in Japan as an alternative to plastic Army Guys? Why, Plastic Ninjas, of course.

And do you have old people in your house? Great, because the 100-yen store has an entire line of products to help you care for your elderly live-ins. I especially like the utensils for people with bad arthritis. They were really close to the adult diapers, which made me think about the circle of life and how we become babies again in the end and how I'd really like to avoid that if possible.

Gotta have that Buttocks Washing Sheet.

That's it, folks. Today is Macky's birthday (tanjoubi omedetou gozaimasu) and Jackie is coming to town on Thursday. Nobody has any idea what to do this weekend. I am open to suggestions on how we could entertain our guest.

Getting a Visa/Tokyo is Big and Weird

2008-02-25T09:53:00.011+09:00

The first half of this entry is about getting a Visa from Japan to China. If this doesn't interest you in the least, skip ahead to "More Interesting Things," which has pretty pretty pictures and is slightly R-rated.

Getting A Visa to China

I knew somewhere in the back of my mind that we would need visas to go to China, but we kinda forgot about it until Jeff was on his way out of town. We both spent a good deal of time researching the process of getting visas and still messed it up, so let me lay it out for you. There just isn't enough practical information out there.

First of all, it costs money. If you're American, it costs lots of money. Like four or five times as much as for anyone else. If you're an American citizen, it costs 15000 yen per person ($130-140 US). For everyone else, it 3000-4500 yen. If you're a Japanese citizen, I don't think you need a visa. I'm not sure why it costs so much for Americans. I'm sure there is some political-economic reason for it, we are Capitalist pigs who don't support The People or whatever, and it sucks. Anyway, you won't need the money til you've gone through the whole application process and are picking up your visa. Which I haven't even gotten to yet.

SO. You need money. You need to fill out a visa application (one per person), which can be downloaded from the website at the end of this section. Make sure when you sign it that you use the date you are submitting the application, because I got scolded for having the wrong date (it was filled out the day before). You need a picture to attach to the application. Go to any of the Visa/Passport photo kiosks you can find around train stations or other places. We luckily had one right outside of Create Super Drugstore near our house, and the instructions were in English (still managed to mess it up the first time by sitting too close to the camera. Don't try to second-guess the instructions, just follow them faithfully).

You need a passport with two blank facing Visa pages. This is important, because if the blank pages don't say "Visa" at the top, they aren't Visa pages, and they won't let you get a Visa. Trust me. Jeff had filled up his passport with all the traveling for work, and they wouldn't let me submit his application. You have to go to the US Embassy to get more pages. (a whole other experience in which you must surrender your ketai, cameras, iPods, water bottles, candy and gum, and go through a metal detector. Once inside, tho, it isn't terribly painful. Though they did take Jeff's passport, gave him no receipt for it, and said I could pick it up with a letter of permission signed by Jeff. Whole thing makes me a little nervous.) And you can only get extra pages once. Then you have to get a whole new passport.

Note: you don't need everyone present to apply for a visa. Anyone can prepare your applications and take them in with your passport.

You need to find the Chinese Embassy. It's near Roppongi station. About a 10-minute walk. Go out the Roppongi Hills exit, go left, and follow the main road as it passes Roppopngi Hills and bends to the left. You'll see an ugly place near the fire station. Look for the door that says Consulate Department on it, on your left. If you aren't there during business hours (9:00-12:00), you'll never find it. As Jeff found out when he tried to go in the afternoon. You need to take the elevator up to where applications are submitted (2nd or 3rd floor, I forget, but it's obvious), where you are greeted with a mob scene very reminiscent of the DMV with a little added chaos. I joined the cluster of people around a desk on the left, because I saw a bunch of people there. I presented my sheaf of applications and passports, and the nice English-speaking lady underlined my incorrect date in red and sent me to the copy machines (by the elevator) to make copies of all the passports. Once I had done this, I got back in line and she checked my stuff over again and gave me a number. Then the resemblance to the DMV really took hold, as I sat there for 20 minutes in a chair in front of 4 windows and watched the numbers slowly tick up. I was sweating because it was ticking very close to noon, closing time, and this old woman kept barging in on everyone at my window (I think I was at the foreigners' window, because the numbering was different than the other 3) to ask yet another question. I had visions of my number coming up at the stroke of twelve and the window shade coming down as I approached. Luckily, I got up there with moments to spare. She checked the stuff over, took 3 of the applications, 3 passports, and 3 photocopies of the passports, and gave me a receipt for them. I am to pick them up on the ground floor in 3 business days, with 15000 yen per (it was 12000 on the website I saw, but apparently it went up in January). Jeff's stuff she handed back to me, with the explanation about the blank Visa pages mentioned above.

A good place to get most, but not all, of the info you need on getting a Visa to China here.

More Interesting Things

As I gratefully strolled out of there with my task for the day done (with a bit of annoyance that there would be extra work involved due to Jeff's missing Visa pages), I looked forward to the rest of my day. I now had plenty of time before I met Helen for after-work drinks and food to explore the Roppongi Hills area, where I had never been.

Jeff, in his abortive attempt to take care of the Visas a couple days before, had found some interesting stuff in the area, and practically had an itinerary for me. I wanted to see if I could do a little shopping first, but most of the retail space was closed for the next two days for renovation. Just my luck. Probably a good thing, considering the reputed prices.

Roppongi Hills is pretty on the outside, but is really horribly designed as a retail experience. It's a complex spread out over several buildings, and I got lost among the multiple levels, stairs and escalators, trying in vain to find somewhere to eat or shop. Matters were made worse by the dead-ends I kept running into because of the renovations. I gave up finally and backtracked to the Chinese restaurant that Jeff had told me about. It seemed an appropriate cuisine for the day, anyway.

It's called Chinese Cafe Eight, and it has a cheap and decent set lunch menu (in English). I got more food than I could eat for 550 yen. Now, I was pre-cognizant of it, but Jeff said he sat there for 20 minutes before he started noticing something odd about the decor. Yes, the giant bell and its uh, gong, are what you think they are.

Full of food and beer, I had another stroll around The Roppongi Hills complex, before I decided to do the next thing on the Jeff itinerary and go to the Mori Art Museum. It's on the 53rd floor of the very tall Mori Building, which is hard to miss. I never would have gone to this exhibit if Jeff hadn't seen it, because the picture they chose to represent it made it look some inspirational Art Month exhibition for Junior High students.

The show was OK. I wasn't expecting much, because it is a corporate collection of modern stuff like Warhol and Lichtenstein, which really isn't my cup o tea. But there was some cool photography and enough to interest me that I didn't feel like I wasted my money supporting art that a talented six-year-old could've done.

The real draw of the 53rd floor is the observation deck, which comes with the price of admission to the museum. I got myself a fresh "Stamina" smoothie from the juice bar and sat down to write a letter and absorb the sheer hugeness of Tokyo as the sun slowly went down. Like Jeff said, we've seen panoramic views of big cities before, but the flatness of Paris, with its short buildings and neat courtyards, was totally unlike the undulating scraperscape that is Tokyo. I probably killed 2 hours and 200 pictures on the sight of it as the light changed.

Already feeling rather insignificant and ant-in-a-hill-like, I boarded a rush-hour train (always an exhilarating experience to meet Helen in Shibuya. She had found a place called Lock-Up, which is a jail-themed izakaya.

It was really more insane-asylum haunted house. To get in, you have find the right door. There are surprises behind the other doors.

The pleather-miniskirted hostess (supposed to be a sexy police officer, I guess, but in red?) will put one of your party in handcuff (one handcuff on a chain) and lead you to your table. Some of the tables are behind metal bars, which is fun, but we didn't get one of those. The lighting is dim and creepy, the music American-poppy, the food average izakaya stuff, except for the names and the occasional dry-iced dressing. They have specialty drinks from the lab, presented interestingly in beakers and test tubes, but rather sweet. Mine was called Jekyll & Hyde and came with a capsule that may or may not have altered my drink in any way.

Helen said hers, which had a presentation that would thrill any self-serve soda fountain mad scientist, tasted like Calpis.

At one point in the middle of our conversation, the lights suddenly went out and sirens started going off. Unintelligible announcements were being made and a drama was enacted for the chills and thrills of the patrons. I obligingly shrieked as loud as I could, because how often can you get away with screaming your lungs out in a restaurant? This place was a fun spot to take your visiting friends. I am looking forward to trying the other theme izakayas in the area, like the church one and the Buddha one.

Anyhow, I had a pretty nice day wrapped around the administrative tasks.

This calm lull in activity I've been experiencing the past couple months is about to burst the dam, as the deluge of visits and trips begins next month. First through the rupture: Jackie.

I'll leave you with this nice picture of Devon, M's "new best friend." He's half-Japanese, half African-American, and speaks almost no English. We thereby discovered that M speaks a lot more Japanese than he lets on.