Asakusa

Last Sunday we took a day trip up to the Asakusa (pronounced ah-sock-sa) neighborhood in Tokyo. As you can see, it was a 'little' crowded. It's hard to tell from the picture, but Ryan and I were a head taller than most of the people there. Ian had a lot of attention, of course, including people asking to take his picture.

Here is the temple Senso-ji.

I paid 100 yen (about $1.00) to get a fortune at the temple. Apparently it's pretty rare to get a decent fortune. A friend told me she's only kept 1 fortune out of the many she has bought in past years. You have to shake a stick out of the silver box and then pull a fortune out of the corresponding numbered box.

Here is my fortune, which was labeled as a medium fortune. It's a bit hard to read, but it said, "Your request is not granted. The patient will not recover soon. The lost article will be hard to find. [more bad stuff that I'm too lazy to type]...Marriage and employment should be stopped."

Needless to say, not a great fortune. Not to worry, though...as long as I tied the fortune on the rack it won't come true. Although I suppose typing about it doesn't help. Here's hoping the rack took care of things! If this is a medium fortune, I'd hate to see what a bad fortune looks like.

Asakusa also has the 2nd largest pagoda in Japan. It's pretty crazy that this is located in the middle of the city.

As we walked through the neighborhood we spotted this guy biking while balancing a tray with a bowl on it. He turned from our street into this alley, all the while keeping the tray upright. Impressive!

Before we headed home, we stopped to get some gelato. It was the perfect end to our day!

Costco

That's right, we finally made it to Costco. The Japanese pronounce it Costoco. Not surprisingly, it looks pretty much like what you'd find in the US.


This store had great conveyor belts for us to ride with our carts.

Note Ian is covered by the ergo carrier in the picture. This was our unsuccessful attempt at trying to get him to nap in Costco.

Our main mission at Costco was to find decent wine, but I also managed to sample quite a few things. We went on a Saturday, which was definitely busy, but not as bad as you'd imagine. Japanese people have a 6 day work week, so Saturdays are typically not too bad. Sundays, however, are a different story...

This cracked me up. In one aisle, I found Calvin Kline underwear and just below there were packages of nori. (dried seaweed)

Ah, Costco...

The store is actually not too far from our house if we take the Yoko-yoko. (the Yokohama Yokosuka toll road/super highway)

Kit kats

I recently heard that the words for 'good luck' in Japanese sound similar to kit kat. Apparently parents buy their kids kit kats before big tests, competitions, etc. I'm not positive that this is true (I haven't learned good luck yet in my Japanese class), but it does explain why kit kat has developed a ton of flavors in Japan. Some flavors are seasonal and some are regional. We have a friend, Denise, who has been traveling this month and bringing us back kit kat flavors to try. So far we've tried:

tea (it was ok)

coffee (love it)

lemon (my favorite)

corn (nasty. leaves an awful corn after taste)

melon (ok)

maple (ok)

flan (pretty good)

wasabi (surprisingly good)

dark chocolate raspberry passionfruit (not a fan)

citrus (tastes like a creamsicle, but in a good way)

I heard there is a ginger kit kat, but I believe it's seasonal and won't be out until the fall. I do find myself running into convenient stores quickly to check their selection.

Here are a few that we've recently sampled (maple, strawberry cheesecake, wasabi, citrus):

If you're curious about some of the more wacky flavors, here's a website to look up. (or, you can look it up on wikipedia for a longer list)

http://inventorspot.com/articles/japan_kit_kat_chocolate_bars_5324

The views from our home

We're not quite organized in the inside yet, but figured we'd give you some views from the outside of our house.

First, here are a couple pictures of the front of our house (and note our minivan in the driveway):

We're less than 1/2 mile to the ocean. (Tokyo Bay, to be precise) From our windows in the back of the house you can see all of the huge ships coming in the bay.

On a clear day, you can also see Tokyo and Yokohama in the distance.

We're also located right above a train station, so if we look down we can see trains. Luckily, it's not too loud. This is a train station with only local trains (no express trains), so all the trains that go through have to stop. I think Ian is going to love this when he gets a little older.

We also just figured out that on a clear day we can see Mt. Fuji from our balcony in the front of our house (or if we lean our head out the windows in the back of the house). I don't have a picture of it yet.

Also, from the front of our house, we can look into our neighbor's window and see Lassie in his upstairs window.

The neighbor never actually opens the blinds, so Lassie is always longingly peering inside. I haven't figured out yet what is next to the dog.

About 2-3 blocks away from our house is our new favorite bakery. Reason #75 for why you should come visit.

The Japanese bathroom

Now that we've moved into our new home, we've been spending a lot of time trying to figure out appliances and other features of the house. If you're not familiar with Japanese toilets, you may not realize that there are a lot of options to memorize. Japan has really perfected the toilet.

With our toilets, we have the option for a small flush or a big flush. But even better...the seat is heated. It took a little getting used to a warm seat, but I pretty quickly realized how great a feature it is - especially in the winter. We can also adjust how hot we want the seat to be. There are also various bidet options. (reason #43 for why you should come visit us in Japan - ha!)

Our toilet downstairs has a sink above it. When you flush the toilet, the sink automatically starts running so you can wash your hands. That same water then refills the tank. It's brilliant! It's also incredibly cold water, but I imagine I'll appreciate it in the summer. Based on a trip to a local home store in Japan, Ryan thinks this toilet is close to $900 - $1,000.

Here is our control panel for this toilet:

A couple weeks ago I went to a restaurant where the toilet seat automatically rose as I opened the door. (which made for a little confusion - do I close the lid upon leaving or assume that the lid will close when I shut the door? I chose the former choice, which I think was incorrect)

I've also heard of a toilet in a restaurant that has a button you can press to create some noise to - ahem - cover any noises you may be making.

The other great feature about our bathroom is the soaking tub. This is the real reason #43 why you should come visit. (at least in colder months) I didn't take a picture, but the tub is essentially like a hot tub without a jet. With the push of a button (either from the bathroom or from our kitchen), we can fill the tub. Once you're in the tub, you can push another button to reheat the water. Again, brilliant!