Day 14: uchi!

Today, we took one last tour of the ramp at roppongi hills and the sculpture at Tokyo midtown, purchased our last milk tea and $4 kiwi, thought about trying to fit in a round of our favorite taiko drumming game but couldn’t wait for the game center to open, received our last notices about phone calls under our door, picked up a final convenience store nigiri, and headed to the airport. We catch the airport bus at the ANA hotel down the street. It is apparently THE place to get married on a Saturday morning, which meant we got to watch a parade of finery (kimonos, hanboks, gowns, tuxedos) while we drank our milk tea and waited for the bus. Not to be outdone, we had dressed up in clothes laundered in the hotel bath, I’m surprised no one mistook us for part of a wedding party. We got to the airport plenty early so toby could tire himself out. Narita has a kid’s playroom where toby insisted on hugging one boy slightly older than himself. The boy just wanted to go down the slide, but whenever he would approach it, toby would run over to hug him and so the boy would jump back onto a bench with his parents, and toby would go down the slide. And that’s about it. I really should end there. But, you’ll say, how was the flight back? Well, not surprisingly, the flight was long, very, very, very long. So incredibly long. There was the “turbulence” which required us to stay seated for the first 4 hours. Toby did not like this much. And then there were the curmudgeonly flight attendants, one of whom accused toby of breaking the plane when, after finally being released from our seats, he discovered a piece of rubber molding that was coming loose from the bulkhead. Jon and I did not like them much. I mean really, if a 2.5 foot tall, 24 pound toddler can “break” the plane, I’m not sure I want to be flying in one. As it is, I’m not sure that we’ll be stepping on a plane any time soon. It was very tiring. It’s two weeks later, and writing about it makes me tired. And to top it off, on our way out we lost one of toby’s new shoes. I’m pretty sure one of the surly flight attendants stole it off his foot as we passed by. bitch. Hmmm, that seems like the wrong way to end this last post. because, those 9 hours aside, it was a fabulous trip. and while spending 24 hours a day with a toddler sure is exhausting, it was awesome to get to hang out with him for 2 whole weeks. But still, it’s good to be home, where everyone can sleep in their own bed. And if some of them, I won’t name names or anything, but if some of them wanted to sleep perpendicular to the normal sleeping axis, they could do so without putting their feet on my head or crawling into my armpit. Unless jon decides that’s his new thing. But that’s what the extra bed is for. See, it’s great to be home. Phew!

here's a taste of some of our homecoming celebrations.

day 13.5: kouri

Our trip started and ended with zeno. We had dinner with him tonight, ramen at a hole in the wall that jon and I passed on our many excursions to Tokyo midtown. We followed that with a drink at a shochu bar. We were looking for a sake bar and I made the joke as we approached it that they probably only serve shochu, as a reference to our night out in nara where we ended up with shochu and hot sake. Of course it turned out that they did only serve shochu, pages and pages and pages of shochu. Apparently it’s all the rage. So we had a drink. The ice cubes were spectacular. For the entire trip I’ve been impressed at the ice cubes here, they are always perfectly shaped, solid cubes. However, at this place, the ice cubes were perfect spheres about the size of a racquetball. They were amazing. I wanted to sneak mine out in my pocket, but fortunately I hadn’t had quite enough to drink to actually go through with my plan. We then bought some drinks for the road and headed back to our hotel to put toby to sleep (he can’t seem to get to sleep without nightcap these days). Zeno joined us. He did a little dance for toby, the video of which I will save for a rainy day (hmmm, I guess today is kinda rainy. . .). we had some pleasant banter, and of course, not to let pleasantries be the last word, we discussed at some length his impending crowded train ride home where there was a high probability that someone might violate his leg. And then we wished him luck and he was gone.

day 13: inu

Today we went shopping for gifts for ourselves and others at muji. My dream of remaking myself as a stylish Japanese woman was thwarted by a combination of my body shape and my own stinginess. But we did find some cool stuff. All while toby played on a little toy filled section of carpeting in the middle of the store. We then went to lunch with kunchan and hiroko, friends of jon’s parents who own a 2 michelin star restaurant that only serves fugu. When we ate there a few years ago we were just in time for the peak season of shirako or ‘male egg sacs’. while it was overall an amazing meal, after 5 courses involving shirako, I feel I can now say that pufferfish testicles are not one of my favorite foods, but I do like that I can say so from experience whereas most people can only guess at their opinion of blowfish testicles. In any case, lunch with kunchan and hiroko was one of those experiences that made me wish I spoke Japanese. They are both friendly and funny and appear to tell great stories. If only their stories were about cats, then I could maybe follow along, though I suspect that might reduce their greatness. Toby slept through most of the lunch, though he did wake up in time to meet their dog. Toby very much likes to indicate the presence of dogs, by pointing at them while panting. And often he becomes upset if, after he has indicated there is a dog nearby, you take him away from the dog. But there is a minimum distance that he likes to maintain between himself and dogs such that while he might appear as though he would enjoy petting a dog, once you bring him in close enough he loses interest or becomes frightened and turns away. However, if you were to then move too far from the dog, he would begin to complain. It’s a very slippery slope. Such was our interaction with kunchan’s poodle, who was either too close or too far for toby’s liking. I’m not sure what this means about getting our own dog since I think having to maintain proper distance between toby and a dog would quickly drive me insane. Fortunately getting a dog isn’t high on our agenda in our small, yard-free apartment, so for the moment it’s a non-issue.

Day 12.5: akachan

For dinner, we met up with andy, a friend of jon’s from high school, and his wife and 7 month old daughter. We of course went to Tokyo midtown because we only spent a couple hours there today. We ate at a place that I would compare to that semicircle of nations at disney’s epcot, except with bland versions of international food all housed in one restaurant whose decorating scheme reminded me of a german cafeteria. It was fine, and to its advantage, toby’s meandering around wasn’t disruptive at all. At one point we let the kids sit next to each other. Andy and his wife sat back and watched, confident that their quiet daughter would sit still, while I hovered close by, confident that, because toby loves babies, he would try to hug their baby and in the process knock them both off the chairs to form a pile of very angry babies on the floor. Fortunately, this did not happen. Whether it was due to my excessive vigilance or not, I don’t know, although I’d like to attribute the absence of an angry baby pile to my meddling since then I can feel like I contributed something other than just getting in the way of the picture taking.

day 12: denwa

Each time we enter a new hotel room, one of the first orders of business is to unplug the phone so that toby doesn’t bankrupt us by calling argentina. This means that either we are unable to receive calls, or can only receive them on the phone in the bathroom. Until a few days ago, this didn’t matter at all since no one, perhaps with the exception of a toddler playing with a hotel phone in argentina, has tried to call us. Now, we seem to get a lot of calls. Jon’s parents call every day or so to make sure we’re all still fine. And in addition, our good friend mrs. N calls us once or twice a day. Often, she calls when we’re gone or not standing in the bathroom. This results in the front desk having to print out a piece of paper telling us her message, which is usually just that she called and hopes we are well, and slip it under our door. We now have a stack of these papers in our room. toby of course likes to eat them. In addition, today we received a package from her of candies and other goodies, mostly because during one of the times when jon answered the phone and spoke to her, he mentioned that we were looking for a specific kind of candy to bring home as omiage. sadly, the candies she sent were not the candies we were looking for, but we sure do have a lot of them. Having never been stalked by an elderly Japanese woman, I found all of this quite exciting, and lamented that jon had not told her we were looking for something more unusual, perhaps a pet fugu or a small elephant. It inspires me to plug in the phone, at least until toby gets Sweden on the line.

Today we went to the imperial palace. It was hot and sunny and there were lots of spiders. Then, perhaps feeling a bit of withdrawl, we headed to Tokyo station for lunch, which is, yes you guessed it, a high-end shopping center. Toby played with some other children until he got sleepy. as he napped in the backpack, we headed to Tokyo midtown for some coffee and dessert. He awoke while we were there and lead some old ladies in a clapping exercise. As you’ll see in this video, I think he has a future as a guitarist for the kind of stadium playing band that stops playing to clap their hands over their heads and encourage the crowd to clap along. rock on!

day 11: yoguruto

It turns out that our hotel is situated midway between two very upscale shopping centers, roppongi hills and Tokyo midtown. We stayed at the same hotel a couple years ago, completely oblivious to the presence of either of these places. However, now that we are trying to figure out what one does in Tokyo with a toddler, we have found them to be oases in the middle of an urban landscape that is not generally child friendly. While we have neither the money nor the desire to spend much time in the actual stores, the places themselves are immaculate, full of interesting architecture, sculpture, and other decorations, and have wide concourses and spaces for toby to run through. So we spent the first half of today in midtown. Then after a rest, we headed to the meiji shrine, but because toby fell asleep on the subway, we wandered through harajuku and eventually made our way to yet another high end shopping area, omotesando hills, to taste some sake. On the way, we feared toby might be peckish so we purchased a drinkable yogurt, which, it turns out, is essentially sugar masquerading as a more nutritious food. As jon and I quietly sipped some sake, toby slurped down the last of the yogurt drink, and transformed. I admit that in some respects I was mildly disappointed that he didn’t somehow break out of his clothes or turn into a green lou ferrigno, because that might have provided us with a better indication of what we were in store for. Of course in other respects, I’m quite happy that toby remains regular colored and not lou ferrigno. Anyway, we spent the next hour or so trading off with one of us chasing him up and down the ramps and stairs in the shopping center while the other would sit peacefully, cultivating a nice buzz and watching, bemused, as our sugar monster sprinted past. Just for your information, it’s very hard to catch a sugar monster after a few glasses of sake. But eventually he slowed enough, and we regained our energy enough, to capture him, eat some dinner, and return at last to our hotel, our lesson about the dangers of yogurt related drinking products learned the hard way.

Day 10: shinkansen

Today we took the train to Tokyo. Toby slept most of the way, which is good since the pay phone on this train didn’t have as good a shelf to hold him up while he punched buttons. We ventured over to roppongi hills where toby continued to work on his ramp walking skills. This particular ramp had some nice round rocks in the adjacent landscaping so he could pick up a handful of them, roll them down the ramp, then chase them. I have the feeling that we could be spending a lot of time here over the next couple of days. Toby has a very elaborate ramp walking regimen that he has to keep up with.

Day 9: gyunyu

Today we went to kiyomizura where toby was engulfed by a veritable paparazzi of Japanese students from some sort of athletic team. They took his photo alone, then had all of us pose with them, then posed with him individually. Just when we thought they were done, we ran into them again at a different part of the temple, and then again, and then one more time. He was quite the star. Who knows, maybe he’ll be the next Japanese fad, bigger than pikachu or frilled lizards or skirts that look like you’re not wearing any pants.

For dinner we headed to a tiny place purported to make the best oyakodonburi in all of japan. We waited quietly in line while toby befriended a large testicled raccoon statue out front then sat down at two of the twelve seats to eat. And I have to say, it was really good. But perhaps even better, we may have stumbled onto their secret, the key to making eggs, chicken, and dashi somehow transcendant. There are a small number of foods, well actually just one that we know of, that toby’s skin is a wee bit sensitive to. And after a couple bites of the oyakodonburi, he had the telltale red marks on his chin. He’s like our own little hercule poirot, just without the mustache.

Day 8: daruma

There is a map in the lobby that toby likes. In particular, he likes the picture of the daruma, a little red guy with big eyes and a beard. The map is not to scale and provides only a vague indication of the location of various temples and other sites. However, based on the map, we decided to take toby to visit the location marked by his little red friend. We set out on foot with our free umbrellas from the hotel, various warm clothes to deal with the rain, and a copy of the map. Two blocks into our walk, the rain cleared, and the temperature started to rise, making most of our baggage obsolete. But, we reasoned, the daruma temple can’t be that far, so we continued on. but after another 45 minutes of walking and pestering numerous pedestrians and shopkeepers, most of whom had no idea what we were talking about, we realized that toby would probably be just as happy if we let him chew on the map as he would be if we ever found the temple, so we hailed a cab and headed instead to kinkakuji, the golden temple. It was quite pretty. And golden. Toby was especially impressed by all of the rocks on the ground, which further convinced us that we made the right move to give up on the daruma temple. I bet their rocks weren’t nearly as nice.

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.

Day 6: Taifu jusan-go

Seems the typhoon has followed us here to Nara. This morning, between downpours, we headed over to a covered shopping street and brought back some pastries and coffee for breakfast. After eating them and then lounging around the hotel for a spell waiting for the rain to subside again, we headed back to the covered shopping street to meet toby’s hi-ojichan for lunch. Afterwards, we wandered around window and actual shopping where toby’s grandmother bought him some nifty shoes. In the past 7 days toby has managed to outgrow one pair of shoes and we realized that the other pair that we brought is just too dorky looking to be worn out in public. Outfitted with his new shoes, toby quickly fell asleep so we returned to the hotel for a nap, a bath, and then some puddle stomping in the rain. Toby doesn’t have much experience with rain, so he thought the puddles were the best thing since, well, owls I guess, or maybe that noisy plastic car from Kyushu. After we dried off, we thought we were going to see a different part of town, but it turned out the taxi was just taking us to the covered shopping street area via an alternate route. We may not know much about Nara, but we do know that covered shopping street, which is really helpful if you’re eager to buy tiny, 1 cm tall porcelain cats, inflatable deer, or Frisbee sized dorayaki. It’s the place to go.