Day 7: ba ba

On our morning walk we saw some of the infamous Nara deer. Most of them were sitting in that refined looking deer pose, legs curled under them, head held high, you know the one. One deer was not. After discussing whether deer sleep splayed out on their sides, completely immobile, we decided that probably they do not and that ended our morning deer-viewing excursion. Because the typhoon seems to have moved on, we then wandered around to see some of the local pagodas and other sites, including a number of healthy deer that were standing on their legs. Toby of course slept through all of this until we reached the covered shopping street. We ate some pastries and headed back to the hotel to pack and catch the train to Kyoto.

Toby’s great grandfather accompanied us to Kyoto where we had lunch with a woman (whom we’ll call mrs. N) and her daughter. Mrs. N had planned to take us out to dinner, in part to repay a favor from jon’s parents, but additionally because she was apparently just really, really excited to meet us. I know this is cynical, but I find it weird when someone we’ve never even heard of is said to be excited to meet us. And I find it more peculiar that someone would want to have long, awkward dinner with us as we spend most of our time trying to calm and feed a squirmy toddler. Such a dinner is not really a favor at all but more of a punishment. So we managed to coax her into lunch instead, where, as usual, Jon and I raced through our meal, this time tiny and delicate bento boxes, so that we could juggle taking toby up and down the stairs to visit the pay phone while everyone else ate in peace. I can only hope that the experience was all that she dreamed it would be.

Once we finished and bid farewell to N-san we headed to our hotel where we also bid farewell to jon’s mom and ojichan. Toby has started calling his grandmother ba ba and every morning when he’s ready to leave our room he goes to the door and says ba ba, indicating he’s had enough of the two of us and is ready for better company. I think he’ll be quite disappointed when he goes to the door tomorrow morning and says ba ba only to discover a maid or an empty hallway or a copy of the japan times. I think jon and I will miss her too, since she’s been incredibly helpful. Although toby’s timing on saying ‘bye’ is usually a little late, often minutes after the person has left, for his ba ba, he managed a ‘bye’ as she headed out. By her next visit, he might even have ‘thank you’ down. It’s something to work towards, anyway.