Kodomonokuni (Children's Land)

Sarah and I found a wonderful children's park outside of Yokohama called Kodomonokuni or "Children's Land" in English. This brings up an interesting point, so please bear with me a moment -- the link I provided above takes you Wikipedia, specifically to a web-page about the train line supporting the park, because that is the best site I could find on the park in English.

Here is the official website for Kodomonokuni. Note that it is in Japanese. I have been studying Japanese for several months now, and I still can't make heads or tails of it. Fortunately the good folks at Google have an automated translation service: Same URL, but now in English. It might not be perfect, but it's a heck of a lot better than nothing. Station names make some of the most interesting reading, because they tend be literally translated.
We live near "black eye" (Meguro) station, just down the line from "bitter valley" (Shibuya) station.

Kodomonokuni is a very large park by Japanese standards: 240 acres. It was originally a Japanese military storage area, continued as a military facility administered by the US following WWII, and was finally repurposed into a children's park in the mid-sixties.

There are facilities for children of various ages, but we focused on the "farm" area. It contains a large petting zoo, as well as a functioning dairy. They also had pony rides which Robbie and Sarah availed themselves of. And at the end of a very hot day, we were able to cool down a bit by purchasing ice-cream cones made with milk from the park's own cows.

Here are photos from our first visit:





In fact, we enjoyed our first trip so much that we invited our friends Andrew, Deb, and their son Josiah along with us for a second trip a few weeks later. Unfortunately it rained that day, so we more-or-less had the park to ourselves. The petting zoo was not open, but we were still able to see many of the animals from a distance. The squat little goats, for instance, were lined up head to tail at the edge of their enclosure under a 6" overhang, trying to stay out of the rain.

The sheep and cows came down to their fence to visit with us, even though we had no food for them, and we were able to see the prairie dogs, raccoons, geese, chickens, ducks, chipmunks, donkeys, pigs, etc., through a fence, as usual. Two of the main attractions however, were not available: guinea-pig and rabbit holding, and the pony rides. That settles it. I guess we will have to go back.

Here is a picture from our second trip, along with a movie:

More to come ...

I apologize for having let the blog go for so long, this post may not be worth the wait... there is more to come, but not tonight. The application I am here to help develop just moved into UAT (User Acceptance Testing) and along with that, a lot of work. We just purchased our tickets home for the holidays. We are flying into Seattle on Saturday morning the 15th of December, and flying back out again on the 5th of January.

We will be spending the time leading up to and including Christmas in Lacey with David's parents visiting family and friends on the West side. After Christmas, we move East of the mountains and visit our family and friends over there for the balance of our trip.

We will be bringing gifts with us, to be sure, but If there is anything specific you would like us to pick up here and transport back with us when we come, just drop me a line.

Tomorrow or Thursday I will write more about what we have been up to over the last month; there is plenty to write about.

Tokyo Shopping

All right, so it has been far too long since I last posted an update. We have not left Tokyo again since our trip to Kamakura, but we achieved a better sense of the scale of Tokyo during our trip to Tokyo Tower a couple of weeks back. In case you were not aware, Tokyo Tower is modeled after the Eiffel tower, but is 13 meters taller and just over half the weight.

The Tokyo Tower has two observation decks. The lower of the two is about 25 stories high, the upper, around 40 stories. It costs approximately 8 dollars to get to the lower deck, and another 7 or so will get you to the upper deck. Because it was not a particularly clear day (and due to the length of the queue for the elevator to the upper deck) we did not pony up the additional cash to get us to the top, instead contenting ourselves with views like this:



Perhaps I will eventually become numb toward Tokyo's scale, but it hasn't happened yet. What strikes me most about this picture is the high-rise buildings along he horizon, way off in the distance. They are still Tokyo.

At the bottom of the tower is a tourist area with souvenir shops, restaurants, and a trained Japanese Macaque that performs tricks to amuse the crowd. I probably do not need to tell you that Sarah was quite taken with the monkey, and even Robert appeared to enjoy the performance.

There was also an aquarium on the premises, as well as a smallish amusement park for toddlers:



Other than our trip to Tokyo Tower, we have been keeping it pretty close to home though we did attend several local food/drink festivals such as the Azibu-Juban festival seen below, and Brazil Day. These festivals are an excellent excuse to go for a walk, eat some tasty but bad for you food, and down a couple of overpriced beers while doing a bit of people-watching.



The next two Mondays, September 17th and 24th, are public holidays here in Japan, and now that the weather is beginning to cool a little, we plan to try and try and get out into nature. We found a promising looking book called "Day Walks Near Tokyo". It details a number of hikes on the outskirts of Tokyo and beyond, and we are itching to try a few of them out.

Oh, and in closing, we experienced our first Typhoon on Thursday the 6th. It was pretty wild. I left the office on Thursday with a friend; we were going to meet up with Sarah and Robert, then head over and have dinner with his family. Even though the full gale-force winds were still several hours away, I was only able to keep my umbrella pointed safely into the wind for about 30 seconds before a gust from an unexpected angle caught it, inverted it, began to tear the webbing from the frame, and finally bucked several spines. My friend (his name is Andrew, incidentally) managed to keep his umbrella together a bit longer, but eventually it suffered the same fate as mine.

Perhaps I should back up a moment -- Japanese really seem to like their umbrellas. A lot. Perhaps they appeal to the Japanese sense of practicality, of cleanliness and self-reliance or it could just be that during August when it is 90+ degrees and raining, the last thing you want to do is don a rain jacket, but at any rate, umbrellas are ubiquitous. Every commercial building has a rack just outside the entrance for wet umbrellas, and every convenience store has a display of umbrellas for sale next to the checkout stand. When the weather report indicates a high chance of rain, everyone, and I do mean everyone (excepting us clueless gaijins of course) brings their umbrella to work with them.

So we ate dinner (an Australian take on Thai food -- and excellent by the way -- well worth braving a tropical storm for) made it back home, and as we were getting to sleep the wind really began to howl.

Tokyo seems to be built to withstand Typhoons. There were no reports of major damage, no flooding nor injury that I heard of. But there was some detritus. Evidentally Andrew and I were not the ones foolish enough to take an umbrella out into a hurricane. Ruined umbrellas adorned everything: sidewalk railings, hedges, gutters, they poked up from garbage cans, stuck out from under parked cars, and blocked drains. All in all though, it was kind of a fun experience. One thing you can say for tropical storms: at least the rain is warm. :-D

August in Tokyo

Sorry for not posting for a while, it has been very hot and humid here lately, over 90 degrees with humidity to match, so we have been sticking pretty close to home. There is plenty to see without leaving the city though, and many interesting districts are just a short, air-conditioned subway ride away. Yesterday we went to Ginza, and as soon as we made it up to street level I had one of those "gosh, we really are in Tokyo" moments:



Ginza is a high-end shopping district. Every luxury brand I am aware of (along with many that I had never heard of until yesterday) all have stores in Ginza. We did a lot of window-shopping, ate lunch at a TGI Friday's to see if it was the same as a TGI Friday's the US (it is, by the way), and passed by a bonsai store with an apple tree out front (you can see the TGI Friday's banner behind the bonsai):



Robbie and Sarah also posed for a picture with what I can only assume is the physical manifestation of an animated Japanese cartoon character:




After we took this picture, we went to the Ginza Baby Gap to find Robert a couple of new outfits since he will soon be out of his 18 month clothes. At the Baby Gap, Robert threw his first tantrum.

If you were not previously aware, you should understand that Robert has a thing for balloons. On a lark, we bought him a mylar balloon for Valentine's day, and Cupid must have gotten him with an arrow because he was smitten by this balloon. Robert was about 9 months old, not even crawling very well yet, but he would sit with that balloon, tug its string, and laugh and coo as it bounced and jiggled in the air. Over the week and a half or so that it held its helium, it was quite literally hours of entertainment of the very highest caliber.

Several months later we were in the checkout line at the grocery store, it must have been early June, and Robert pointed toward the ceiling. I had never seen him point at anything before, so I looked toward the object of his desire and what could it be? A "Congratulations Graduate!" balloon, of course! And because it is never too soon to begin practicing spoiling your child, I immediately grabbed it, purchased it, and we took it home with us for a second week and a half of buoyant, bouncing, helium-filled, mylar wrapped fun.

We have not seen any mylar balloons since we have been in Tokyo, but at the Baby Gap there was another toddler with a green helium-filled rubber balloon attached to her stroller. Robert soon spotted that balloon, and he wanted it. He was out of his stroller walking around the store and began stalking the green balloon. Soon he began crying, then wailing because he could not toddle fast enough to catch up to the balloon. A clerk came up and asked if there was anything she could do to help. When I explained that my son was a balloon freak, she nodded sympathetically and then disappeared. The balloon stroller lady had left the store by this point and Robert was inconsolable. He was casting about the store, looking for that balloon, and crying miserably because he could not find it.

Generally, if Robert is crying and we pick him up, that's the end of it. He almost never cries when we hold him -- unless we are trying to get him to sleep of course. This day though, even being held was no comfort to him. Suddenly however, he quit crying and began to squirm. I turned around, and the clerk had returned with an orange helium-filled balloon! She slipped its string around his wrist and it was as if she'd thrown a switch. His tears dried up, and he showed off all 8 of his teeth in a big wide grin as he played with his new toy.

We thanked her, made our purchases, and headed back home again with a very happy little boy. The balloon lost its buoyancy overnight, but not its magic; Robert has been dragging it around the apartment off and on all day.

One final note regarding TGI Friday's. We decided to take a meal there to see how it compared to a stateside TGI Friday's, mostly because shortly after our arrival we discovered a Denny's near our apartment and decided to have a breakfast there one Sunday morning. For those of you who have known me since school, you are probably aware at there was a point in my life when I felt about as strongly for Denny's as my son does for balloons.

I figured that Denny's is Denny's, so was caught completely off-guard by the selections awaiting me once I opened the menu. They were, uhm, ethnic: soups, salads, rice, grilled or boiled fish, noodles, etc., were the major categories of breakfast selections. You could get a side of eggs, of course, but the "Grand Slams" and "Moons Over My Hammy" were missing in action, no short stacks of pancakes, biscuits and gravy, or hashed browns greeted the eye, and I dare say this Denny's staff had never heard the term "covered and smothered". Of course, 覆われ、窒息させる (according to translate.google.com) doesn't roll off the tongue (certainly my tongue, at any rate!) quite as well in Japanese as it does in English.

Perhaps that is why we Americans tend toward heavy? If only it were more cumbersome to order that our pile of pan-fried shoestring potatoes come replete with country gravy and cheddar, but I digress...

As the final blow, Japanese Denny's have a different blend of coffee. It is stronger and more bitter than in America, just like most coffee you will find here. And, adding insult to injury, it is served in a proper china coffee cup with saucer; no classic Denny's mug, jumbly-lettered or otherwise.

So I ordered myself a bowl of vegetable soup with a side of toast for breakfast, sipped my coffee, and drank in the strangeness of it all. I have not yet been back to the Japanese Denny's, but I probably will at some point -- it appears to be part of the cultural experience. TGI Friday's on the other hand, we can probably hold off on until we are in the states.

Oh, and as a final food-related note, we couldn't pass up the opportunity to eat at the "Seattle Burger" we found last weekend in Akihabara:



It was good. They were playing the Beach Boy's Greatest Hits, and we were the only people in the restaurant. Robert was asleep in his stroller the whole time; Sarah and I each had cheeseburger meals that probably cost about 8 dollars each. We could have had the ¥1,890 Teriyaki burger, barely visible on the upper left-hand side of the photo. It would set you back about $15.60 at the current exchange rate of 114 yen to the dollar, but it looks like one heck of a burger. Maybe next time.

Kamakura!

Today has been a great day from start to finish. To begin with, the French Toast breakfast was tasty, as expected. Once we cleaned up from that, about 9:00 am, we hopped the train for Kamakura and spent our day alternating between dazzling sunshine and dimly lit temples. The temples were surrounded by meticulously maintained gardens (buzzing with Cicadas), and intricately carved stone and wood sculptures.







We enjoyed the finest lunch we have yet had in Japan, a traditional "bento-box" style with cold noodles and dipping sauce, tempura vegetables, rice, and a sort of sweet-rice jello with ground sweetened peanut for dessert. We found it in an unusual location along the walk into Kamakura, just around the corner from a more traditional looking tourist cafe. It is a good thing we were too hungry to make it around the corner!

Unintentionally saving the best for last, we visited the "Great Buddha" at Kōtoku-in known as Daibutsu. Photographs do not do it justice, the statue is massive. And, for ¥20 (about 20 cents) you can go inside the buddha and peer up and out at the sky through windows in his back.



The end of our walking tour was Kamakura's beach, and it was packed. Granted the temperature was probably hovering around 90, with humidity to match, but the number of folks on the beach was staggering. Waikiki beach in Hawaii is the only parallel I have. There was a steady sea breeze, and dozens of sail-boarders were out, taking advantage of it.

On the return trip to Tokyo, we rode the Eno-den along the coast to Fujisawa station and hopped a JR express back to Meguro station and home.

Robert really seemed to enjoy himself today. He watched all of the people at the temples, enjoyed playing with our waiter at lunch, and several ladies in the afternoon who wanted to take his picture. His favorite moments though, were certainly at the the temples. Many of them had broad, flat, stone-paved areas where we could let him out of the stroller to toddle around for a while. All of the sunshine, toddling, and commotion eventually took their toll though, and he slept the whole way back to Tokyo.

Edogawa and the Fireworks that Were.

We went out to Edogawa this evening for a second and more successful attempt at viewing a summer fireworks display. While still in Tokyo, Edagawa is definitely not as urban as the central parts of Tokyo that we have become accustomed to. I have some pictures and video that I hope to post tomorrow.

Tomorrow morning (after a French-toast breakfast that I have been looking forward to all week) we are heading to Kamakura, a beach resort town on the outskirts of Tokyo. It is about an hour's train ride, hopefully Robert can maintain his composure. With luck, we will have pictures and anecdotes to blog about tomorrow.

Goodnight.

Asakusa and the Fireworks that Weren't

We trekked out to Asakusa today, (Sunday the 29th of July). It is on the other side of "central" Tokyo from us, in that it is on the far side of the Yamanote line. The Yamanote line is a rail line that runs an oval circuit around central Tokyo measuring approximately 7km from East to West, and 12km from North to South. It would take around an hour to circumnavigate it, but I digress... we intended to see the annual Sumida fireworks display, but as it turns out, they were on Saturday. The English language website where we read about them got the date wrong.

The trip as not wasted though, as the Asakusa district is home to a number of shrines and temples. Here are a couple of photos:





As we continued past the shrines, and dusk began to settle, we happened upon a neighborhood playground and decided to let Robbie out of the stroller for a while to play. He is a relatively good sport about all of Mommy and Daddy's galavanting around and exploring their new environs, but he has recently learned to climb, and now he thinks he should climb everything: the couch, the chair, the bed, the kitchen table, Mom, the bracing pole in the train, Dad, and even the playground climbing wall.



When we arrived, the playground was deserted. It had rained earlier in the day, and the swings, slides, and other toys were all still a bit damp, so we dried our way around the playground and Robert had an excellent time. Once we were through, we walked back to the station via Sumida river where the fireworks had been the night before. For the most part, the infrastructure was still in place from the night before, when an estimated 900,000 people had come out to watch two separate fireworks displays, each over an hour in length. By the time we arrived, all that remained were barricades and roped off pathways, somber in the gathering dusk, a visceral reminder of the thousands that passed through yesterday, keeping us on the main-line through the riverside park, back to the JR station and home.