Traveling with Children
This was not the weekend I was hoping for. It wasn't awful, but it wasn't that great, either.
Saturday, I was hoping to go to Asakusa with the family. I'd been there before, eight years ago. Even my dad had been there once, back thirty-some years ago, when he had his Japanese adventure. Aside from the shrine and the park and the rows of stalls selling food and tchotchkees, there's a whole bunch of other sights to see in the vicinity. I figured we'd go look at the main stuff, and then judge the kids' energy for what else we could do.
These days, from a combination of jet lag and early sunrise, our family is waking up at about 5am. We didn't get out of the house until 11. We got to the train station just in time to see a train pull away. Michelle raced ahead of the rest of us through the gate to try and catch it, but it pulled away. No matter; the next train was only ten minutes later.
As it turns out, Michelle hadn't managed to slap her card on the turnstile properly, so when she tried to go through the exit turnstile, the red lights went off and the gate closed. After trying a couple of turnstiles unsuccessfully, the official behind the counter called us over. I went back through the turnstile and over to the window. His English seemed comparable to my Japanese, so it took a little while to figure out what had happened. Eventually we cleared things up, paid the proper fare, and moved on.
By the time we got to Asakusa, it was after noon, so we started by looking for someplace to have lunch. This process is complicated, since we mostly have to look at the pictures of stuff outside the restaurants to pick something. Picking a restaurant is always challenging, but here in Japan it's a bit more so. We also have to try and judge the quality of the place based on a picture menu and plastic models of the food. Trying to figure out if it's a genuine restaurant or an awful tourist trap on these limited cues is... well, not really possible, but we try anyways.
In response to the different food out here, the girls have become pickier eaters. Michelle, in particular, doesn't seem to want to eat anything but udon.
After enough failures, including going down a flight of stairs to a restaurant which was closed (except that now I think perhaps it wasn't closed; there's something about Japanese restaurant ettiquette that means you have to open a door to go in), we finally ended up at a restaurant serving rice bowls and sushi. Going in, we had to remove our shoes and place them in these lockers that were locked with 8x8x3 cm blocks of wood. You pulled out the wooden block with a number on it, and the door closed. Spiffy.
Michelle couldn't find anything she wanted to eat. I suggested that she order what I was planning on--oyako don, chicken and eggs with a sweet onion broth over rice. Just to be safe, I ordered a bowl of salmon over rice, because she also eats that.
To help Rebecca decide what sort of sushi plate to get, I actually put together a six-word question to ask the waiter what kind of fish was in a picture. And I got an answer I understood (squid), so we ordered something else. Let's hear it for my broken Japanese!
The food came. Michelle tried a piece of chicken from the oyako don and said it was good, so I started eating my salmon. Michelle slowly ate her miso soup with a spoon while I consumed my entree. Once I was mostly done, she returned to the oyako don, took one more bite, and declared it inedible because of the onions. That was it; no more of that lunch would pass her lips. Chris tried sorting out chicken bits and onion-free rice, but that wouldn't work. And it was yummy oyako don, too.
So, as we set out through the alleys of street vendors, the first priority was to try and get our increasingly desperate Michelle something to eat. Eventually we found something sufficiently starchy and recognizable that would work.
We stopped at a store that sold candy, because they had some highly detailed image candy that reminded me of Greg's work. I bought a sample which I'll get back to him.
Both girls were now tired from the restaurant and the travel, and we hadn't even gotten to the shrine, yet. We pulled them along and looked at the place for a little while. We wandered over to look at the gardens. There's a place near the entrance to the gardens with a small koi-filled stream and a waterfall. We all spent some time watching the koi. The koi became particularly exciting after someone violated the posted sign and started tearing apart some sort of danish and throwing it to them. Those koi get vicious when they're fighting for food.
We walked a little further through the garden, but Michelle needed to rest. Rebecca went back to watch the waterfall for a little while. It became clear that the girls had had enough, so we went back through the halls of street vendors and headed home.
I found the experience very frustrating. Michelle was on nearly her worst behavior, and Rebecca was complaining about being tired awfully early. Apparently I'd expected more out of them then they were ready for.
On Sunday, things were little better. I noted Michelle's mood--already whiny before leaving the apartment--and decided not even to bother with the planned expedition around the local mall. Chris took Rebecca out for an afternoon of yummy Indian lunch and shopping for more household goods. Michelle and I watched Nausicaa and read in the apartment. We all went out to dinner at the local mall's food court, which was mostly okay because Michelle could get her udon.
Most likely, the trouble is that the girls are either finishing (Rebecca) or starting (Michelle) the cold that I had during the trip over. It's not a bad cold, and Michelle wasn't showing any symptoms until Sunday afternoon, but these things are draining. It's certainly contributing to their poor moods.
But it's frustrating being in Japan with all this cool stuff to see, and not getting to do any of it on my days off work. Today, I get to wander off to work again and leave Chris behind with slightly grumpy and ill children. That doesn't feel great, either.
We'd had vague plans about going to Kyoto for a four-day weekend starting Friday. I'm not sure that that makes sense, though, if all the kids are up for is sitting in the apartment and an hour or two of sightseeing. Grumph.
Saturday, I was hoping to go to Asakusa with the family. I'd been there before, eight years ago. Even my dad had been there once, back thirty-some years ago, when he had his Japanese adventure. Aside from the shrine and the park and the rows of stalls selling food and tchotchkees, there's a whole bunch of other sights to see in the vicinity. I figured we'd go look at the main stuff, and then judge the kids' energy for what else we could do.
These days, from a combination of jet lag and early sunrise, our family is waking up at about 5am. We didn't get out of the house until 11. We got to the train station just in time to see a train pull away. Michelle raced ahead of the rest of us through the gate to try and catch it, but it pulled away. No matter; the next train was only ten minutes later.
As it turns out, Michelle hadn't managed to slap her card on the turnstile properly, so when she tried to go through the exit turnstile, the red lights went off and the gate closed. After trying a couple of turnstiles unsuccessfully, the official behind the counter called us over. I went back through the turnstile and over to the window. His English seemed comparable to my Japanese, so it took a little while to figure out what had happened. Eventually we cleared things up, paid the proper fare, and moved on.
By the time we got to Asakusa, it was after noon, so we started by looking for someplace to have lunch. This process is complicated, since we mostly have to look at the pictures of stuff outside the restaurants to pick something. Picking a restaurant is always challenging, but here in Japan it's a bit more so. We also have to try and judge the quality of the place based on a picture menu and plastic models of the food. Trying to figure out if it's a genuine restaurant or an awful tourist trap on these limited cues is... well, not really possible, but we try anyways.
In response to the different food out here, the girls have become pickier eaters. Michelle, in particular, doesn't seem to want to eat anything but udon.
After enough failures, including going down a flight of stairs to a restaurant which was closed (except that now I think perhaps it wasn't closed; there's something about Japanese restaurant ettiquette that means you have to open a door to go in), we finally ended up at a restaurant serving rice bowls and sushi. Going in, we had to remove our shoes and place them in these lockers that were locked with 8x8x3 cm blocks of wood. You pulled out the wooden block with a number on it, and the door closed. Spiffy.
Michelle couldn't find anything she wanted to eat. I suggested that she order what I was planning on--oyako don, chicken and eggs with a sweet onion broth over rice. Just to be safe, I ordered a bowl of salmon over rice, because she also eats that.
To help Rebecca decide what sort of sushi plate to get, I actually put together a six-word question to ask the waiter what kind of fish was in a picture. And I got an answer I understood (squid), so we ordered something else. Let's hear it for my broken Japanese!
The food came. Michelle tried a piece of chicken from the oyako don and said it was good, so I started eating my salmon. Michelle slowly ate her miso soup with a spoon while I consumed my entree. Once I was mostly done, she returned to the oyako don, took one more bite, and declared it inedible because of the onions. That was it; no more of that lunch would pass her lips. Chris tried sorting out chicken bits and onion-free rice, but that wouldn't work. And it was yummy oyako don, too.
So, as we set out through the alleys of street vendors, the first priority was to try and get our increasingly desperate Michelle something to eat. Eventually we found something sufficiently starchy and recognizable that would work.
We stopped at a store that sold candy, because they had some highly detailed image candy that reminded me of Greg's work. I bought a sample which I'll get back to him.
Both girls were now tired from the restaurant and the travel, and we hadn't even gotten to the shrine, yet. We pulled them along and looked at the place for a little while. We wandered over to look at the gardens. There's a place near the entrance to the gardens with a small koi-filled stream and a waterfall. We all spent some time watching the koi. The koi became particularly exciting after someone violated the posted sign and started tearing apart some sort of danish and throwing it to them. Those koi get vicious when they're fighting for food.
We walked a little further through the garden, but Michelle needed to rest. Rebecca went back to watch the waterfall for a little while. It became clear that the girls had had enough, so we went back through the halls of street vendors and headed home.
I found the experience very frustrating. Michelle was on nearly her worst behavior, and Rebecca was complaining about being tired awfully early. Apparently I'd expected more out of them then they were ready for.
On Sunday, things were little better. I noted Michelle's mood--already whiny before leaving the apartment--and decided not even to bother with the planned expedition around the local mall. Chris took Rebecca out for an afternoon of yummy Indian lunch and shopping for more household goods. Michelle and I watched Nausicaa and read in the apartment. We all went out to dinner at the local mall's food court, which was mostly okay because Michelle could get her udon.
Most likely, the trouble is that the girls are either finishing (Rebecca) or starting (Michelle) the cold that I had during the trip over. It's not a bad cold, and Michelle wasn't showing any symptoms until Sunday afternoon, but these things are draining. It's certainly contributing to their poor moods.
But it's frustrating being in Japan with all this cool stuff to see, and not getting to do any of it on my days off work. Today, I get to wander off to work again and leave Chris behind with slightly grumpy and ill children. That doesn't feel great, either.
We'd had vague plans about going to Kyoto for a four-day weekend starting Friday. I'm not sure that that makes sense, though, if all the kids are up for is sitting in the apartment and an hour or two of sightseeing. Grumph.