It’s About Time…

Do you know what I will miss after we move? Snow in Northern Japan! I don’t know why, but whenever I thought of Japan before I came to live here I always associated it with mild temperatures—never windy and snowy weather. Well, we’ve got it all here, in Misawa, these days. To enjoy winters to the fullest around here, one should definitely consider learning how to ski or snowboard.
Robert REALLY started skiing last winter and ever since then, he says, he just loves it (he was thinking of trying out snowboarding this year…but that never happened).

We have decided that this year could be the year when Katya could try skiing too. So we signed Robert, Katya and Alex up for a day ski trip with Misawa Outdoor Recreation center—a place where you can rent all sorts of outdoorsy equipment and sign up for trips.  The idea was that one of the staff members who was on the trip would be able to help Katya learn beginning skiing skills since he usually does that when kids come on the trip. Alex was supposed to go as well, but at the last moment he changed his mind and wanted to go to our church sledding activity instead…with some tears involved. We said, “Oh well!”, and invited our friend’s daughter to come instead of him.

The place where they went was Appi—a well-known ski resort in Tohoku, just 2 hours away from us. We were lucky enough that the guy who was supposed to teach Katya how to ski actually arranged a free lesson for her and her friend with one of the instructors at the resort. For two hours they practiced…

And then Robert let them loose…kind of…

The girls had a great time! I cannot believe how well they were skiing (from what Robert was telling me:).

The beautiful view of Mt. Iwatesan and Katya—light green person on the right.

The girls were happy but exhausted by the end of the day. They skied from 9:30 am till around 4:30 pm with some lunch/snack breaks.

Robert was so excited that Katya was doing so great that he took her for a whole day of skiing to Okunakiyama—another ski resort about 1 hr and 40 min drive from us. He went with some of his dental friends and Katya. Again, they had such a blast! This girl is so adventurous and brave!

Yes, she needs to wear a helmet now because she wants to go on intermediate slopes too.

I really hope Katya doesn’t forget everything she learned this year. I am sure we’ll try to take some skiing trips in Europe too but with so many other things to see around…I don’t know how we’ll fit it all in!

Skiing season is not over here—at least one more solid month of great snow. And this year, the resorts might be open till the beginning of May in some places because of the amount of snow we’ve received. Love it!

I could live in Tokyo

Our last day in Tokyo turned out to be one of those days that we rarely get to have together—just Katya and I, doing whatever we wanted.

So you know what was on Katya’s wish list of things to do—go swimming at the hotel pool while I was watching her and then watch TV together before we had to check out. Sounds like she really craves this one-on-one attention.

After we checked out of New Sanno, we walked up the street to explore this beautiful park that is located across the street from the LDS temple—Arisugawa park. Although this was in the middle of January, the weather turned out to be gorgeous. Here are a couple of shots of the park:

I guess life is so good after you retire in Japan that you can just go spend the day at the park and catch some fish at a local pond.

This park also had a rather big playground and a soccer field. It was great to see a vast area for kids to run around in the middle of a busy city.

Many parents take their kids to this place—lots of them ride bikes.

This area around New Sanno and the temple is a very international area—there a many different embassies located in the neighborhood, thus making it a very popular place for expats to live. 

While at the park, we noticed several girls (speaking English) running around and playing. I saw how much Katya wanted to join them but was scared to do so. I thought this would be a great opportunity for me to teach about how it is okay to be brave and approach new people to make friends. So we had a quick discussion about “What would be the worst thing that could happen if you ask them if you could play with the?”. After her thinking over if she could handle rejection and possibly them saying “no”, she decided to try to join them in their game. Fortunately, the girls noticed her trying to “hang out” closer and closer and she asked if she could play too. Of course, the girls said yes, and Katya had a blast for the next hour playing with these American kids living in Tokyo.

I chatted with their mom for a while about what it was like for them to live in Japan. Her husband works for General Motors, so they’ve been in Tokyo for over a year now. She told me that surprisingly it’s not as easy to find extracurricular sports activities for kids here, but an international school for kids is quite good. She also expressed her amazement with the Japanese people and how polite and nice they are. When talking to her, I thought to myself that I probably wouldn’t mind living in Tokyo for a couple of years either:)

After a very energetic afternoon, we were starving. We were doing everything in a standard way—it was after 3 pm and we still hadn’t had lunch! So, listening to the advice of that expat mom, we went to the Indian place (three minute walk from the Hiroo station) and had a superior meal! 

We ordered two curry lunches with huge naan bread. Of course, we couldn’t finish it all, so we had the owner of the restaurant bag it all for us and save for our dinner on the bus.

After “lunch” we had three hours to spare, so we took the subway to Harajuku. We were looking for some girly shopping. First stop—a huge Daiso shop—100 yen store (sort of like Dollar store in the states). It had three stories! The most complete Daiso I’d ever seen!

Here is Katya on the 2nd floor.

Each character—Hello Kitty, Shinkansen train, Winnie-the-Pooh—had it’s own section with all sorts of merchandise for kids.

After Daiso we stopped at Forever 21 (I could buy half of that store’s accessories if I could) and H&M. I was very surprised to find affordable clothes and jewelry there, at least compared to other stores in Japan.

Here is a cool picture of Katya near Harajuku station.

Well, our day was almost over. From Harajuku we went to New Sanno to get our suitcase and then to Shinjuku to find our bus stop. I won’t go into all the detail, but it took us almost an hour to find the spot where the bus was supposed to pick us up! Finally, at 9 pm we boarded the bus and 11 hours later were back in Misawa.

Katya and I had a blast—she is so mature and well behaved now when we travel. Hope she remembers this girls’ trip to Tokyo for a long time:).

Kamakura!

After a great night rest at the hotel, we decided to take a daytrip to one of the most famous places near Tokyo—Kamakura. We had to take a bus first to a train station and then transfer onto JR train and stay on it for about 40 minutes. It was very easy.

January 9th was a public holiday in Japan, so Kamakura was crowded!! We met up with my Japanese friend, Maki and her daughter at the station. Maki had moved back to Yokohama although her husband had to stay behind in Hachinohe (near Misawa). Maki was kind enough to spend almost the entire day with us in Kamakura.

So what is so significant about Kamakura? In the 12th century, it was the place where feudal government was established. The fact that it is quite near to Tokyo (50 km south) and is full of historic sights makes Kamakura a great place for tourists to see more of traditional Japan.

We started with fresh sushi for lunch. That’s the place were we ate…I guess we were too busy eating and talking for taking pictures inside.

Then we headed over to the Tsurugaoka Hachiman-gu shrine—one of the main attractions in Kamakura. This is Shinto shrine—therefore free entrance.

We had to climb 61 steps to reach  the main building.

My friend told us that on the first day of each year, people flock to famous shrines and temples. This one gets so crowded that it takes people an hour to walk up those stairs.

These arrows were sold all around shrines. They are talismans that ward off evil spirits and bring good luck.

After visiting this temple, we took a pleasant uphill 15 minute walk to  Kencho-ji temple, which is considered to be the most important medieval Zen temple in the area. You have to pay to enter the grounds of this kind of temple.

We could look into one of the halls were monks used to be trained and meditated. Nowadays, monks live up the hill from the temple, at a quite isolated location.

All around I was seeing these rain chains. I am looking to buy one! But I couldn’t find them at any shops…they are these antique rain chains…beautiful…

On the way to our next destination we were caught in a traffic jam…well, not us, but all the cars that were driving next to us. One of them looked quite interesting

We had to walk through the shopping district again. Maki convinced me to try this delicious purple potato fritter. My new Japanese favorite snack—comforting and a little sweet.

After our walk and then a ten minute train ride, we arrived at another part of Kamakura. Probably the most famous spot of all—Great Buddha (Daibutsu).

Daibutsu is 11.3 m tall, weighs 121 tons, made of bronze. Originally he was built to stand inside a building, but a huge storm destroyed the building and its pillars centuries ago. All that was left were big stumps from where the pillars were standing. And Great Buddha is now considered a national treasure. 

At night he comes alive and walks around wearing these huge flip flops. I am not kidding either.

He kind of got his head cut off on this one—by Katya.

After Daibutsu, we had to make a decision on whether or not take a local train to an island off the coast of Kamakura and explore there or visit another temple. We were running out of time before the sun was starting to set, so we decided to stick to Kamakura mainland and go to Hase-Dera Temple. We followed this street.

Personally, this place was my favorite. I really liked the architecture, liked being able to walk through a beautiful Japanese garden and climb up the hill to see the picturesque view of the Pacific Ocean.

Here is an amazing view from the look out patio. It was beautiful! The picture doesn’t do it justice.

And we got to climb inside the Benten-kutsu Cave.The cave is dedicated to Benzaiten—a sea goddess and the only female among the  Seven Lucky Gods of Japan . Her shrines and temples are located near water, she is the patron of music, fine arts and good fortune. Inside the cave you can see Benzaiten and 16 children are chiseled out of the rock walls.  This is Katya in front of the entrance into the cave.

I really wish it were summer or spring when we visited Kamakura. This seems to be a place that would come alive with all the flowers blooming on the temple and shine grounds. I’d say it’s a must-see place while you are staying in Tokyo for several days.

I am a pro at abrupt endings. So here is another one.

We got home exhausted and hungry. Had dinner at our hotel again (my mom enjoyed having her endless salad bar).

Next morning my mom left on a bus to catch her flight from Narita back to Ukraine.  We all hope she had a relaxing visit with the kids.

Good night,

Lyana

Toilet seats are not the only seats heated in Tokyo:)

And I am back! After a couple of crazy weeks, I think my head finally stopped spinning and I can catch up on my blogging. I will let Robert tell you later about why we are a bit distracted.

Do you like the title of my post? haha…Any guesses what other seats are heated in Tokyo?

On Ukrainian Christmas Day evening, my mom, Katya and I drove to our Misawa train station, parked our car across the street in our church parking lot, and…got on a night bus to Tokyo. It was my first bus ride in Japan, so I was not really sure what to expect.  The kind of bus that I booked had three seats in each row, each seat reclined more than a regular airplane seat does, and even has a footrest. Granted, it’s definitely built for shorter people, so I was not as comfortable as Katya was.

You cannot beat the price around $60-95 each way—yes, that is inexpensive compared to other options.

The worst part of the ten hour ride was the fact that the bus stopped every two hours, not matter what…the lights would come on, and the driver would announce that it was another bathroom stop for 20 minutes or something. Although I had my earplugs in my ears AND had taken a sleeping pill, I couldn’t sleep through all those stops. Exhausting… Katya and my mom did great.

As we arrived early in the morning to Tokyo, we couldn’t check into the New Sanno, but we were able to leave our luggage there before venturing out into the city. Since this was not our first time to Tokyo, I really wanted to see a different side of Tokyo than before. I searched online for ideas of where to go. One places stood out—Nippori-Nezu area, sort of by Ueno Zoo. This beautiful area is where you can get a feel for the old Tokyo. It’s quiet, not very touristy and historic.

Our first stop was Nezu-jingu (shrine). It is famous for its azalea flowers blooming in April. It’s a very colorful shrine, built  in gongen style—basically the main hall and the worship hall share one roof and are connected via a passageway

These are the gates to the shrine.

This particular shrine had about a hundred torii-gates. Beautiful colors in the sun.

The gates separate the shrine ground (holy ground) and our secular world.

People say prayers after they bow, clap twice, bow again and ring this special bell.

After Nizu-jingu, we decided that we just wanted to walk around the neighborhood some more. We saw some very cozy streets, secret passageways, tiny restaurants and shops…only guessing what all the signs mean.

A shrine built between the houses.

This area, also known as Yanaka, is famous for its cats. We saw many cats, many figurines of cats and even shops with a cat theme-like this one.

We were hoping to visit the clock museum, that sounded very interesting. But when we finally found it (after going through some really crazy windy streets), it turned out to be closed, not because it was too late in the day, but, we are thinking, because many museums are closed in January in Tokyo. We had no other theories, because we couldn’t read the sign on the door-haha.

Instead, we bought some street snacks (strange tasting fish crackers that my kids love for some reason)…

….and headed to Yanaka Ginza!

Wait, I have to post this picture for my friend Em, who was looking for one of these statues to buy and put by her door before she left Japan. Here we go—Tanuki-- Japanese symbol of generosity and prosperity. The whole time living here I thought this guy is a badger, turns out that Tanuki is actually the name of the animal.

I found some really interesting information on him here.

All right, so we walked and walked and walked.

Finally, we arrived at Yanaka Ginza—a shopping area with a small downtown feel.

We saw a lot of curious shops with souvenirs/clothes/toys and various shrines similar to the shops at Asakusa.

We also found some delicious crab filled…don’t know what you call them! They are not gioza, not wontons…if you know, let me know.

This is a picture taken from the famous Yuyake Dandan—"Sunset staircase” is a great place to view the sunset (as you can tell by its name:)). In the background, you can see what the street looks like.

After Yanaka Ginza, we walked around the area some more and then decided to stop by the Yanaka Cemetery where many famous people were buried. Of course, since we cannot read Japanese, it was not a very educational experience. But, we did get a picture with the new Tokyo Sky Tree that will be opening in May. That’s it in the background. 

By then, we were feeling quite tired, as you can see from our picture above. We headed home to the New Sanno for a refreshing Western dinner at their restaurant.  It’s a good thing we had a nice comfortable room reserved, otherwise, we would have to figure out how to take a nap on the bench at a bus stop.

Japanese sleep on the go a lot—I know it sounds funny, but there are so many people sleeping on the subway!

Oh, I almost forgot…now that I mentioned Tokyo subway…if you are riding the subway or train during winter, you will feel your bottom get really warm because their seats have built-in heaters. Now that is quite cool. It was hard NOT to fall asleep sitting on a warm cushion for twenty minutes. Gotta love Japan!

Well, I’ll need to write a couple more posts about this quick Tokyo trip, so stay tuned:)

Good night,

Lyana