I'm Sorry, But This'll Be Boring...

When I taught writing to my 8th graders, I told them to never start off by apologizing for what you're writing about. I'm afraid I'll have to break one of my own rules with this particular blog entry about my typical day-to-day life. The only reason I'm even writing this is for my friend, Julie Boucek, who after kindly reading about our weekend adventures, wanted to know what I did during the week. So, Julie, this blog's for you.

5:30am Pretend to wake up when Mike says goodbye as he leaves for work.

5:32 Go back to sleep.

Between 7:30-9:00 Wake up for real. Unless I've got an early morning wives' club board meeting at 7:30am at Starbucks. Then I have to get up at 6. And yes,I'm a board member of the wives' club here. It's a long story.

9:00-9:30 Convince myself that it's worth the pain to go to the gym because I don't want to hit the big 3-0 this year as a big girl. Read the Boucek blog as I procrastinate on the gym thing.

9:30-10:30 Work out at the gym and run my 2.5 miles on the treadmill. Feel really proud of myself until I notice that the much older and more out of shape lady next to me is still running as I wheeze to a stop.

11:00-1:00 There are several options for this time slot: 1) Catch up on phone calls and emails to my family and friends back home, 2) Meet Mike for lunch, 3) Attend a wives' club function, such as a Bunco game, 4) watch an episode of "What Not to Wear", 5) clean the house and do some laundry, or 6) any combination of the above.

1:00-3:00 Go to the Exchange/Commissary. I go to the grocery store almost every other day here. A lot of times it's because I'll forget an ingredient I need for tomorrow night's dinner. Also, they don't always stock what I need, so if it's an essential ingredient for my recipe, I'm out of luck. I'm forced to come up with a new dinner plan on the spot, but I don't have all my recipes memorized, so I inevitably forget something, and then have to come back the next day. It's a vicious cycle!

3:00-4:00 Reading time. I'm an avid reader and there's this pretty little park that is perfect for that sort of thing. When the weather's nice, that's where I go to get my book time.

4:00-5:00 Oprah!

5:00 Start dinner.

5:30 Mike calls to tell me he's going to be working late (again), so I hold off on dinner. I like to time it so that dinner is ready as he walks through the door. I hope that doesn't sound too 'Stepford wife-ish' of me. It's just that I actually enjoy cooking now and I want my meals to be displayed and enjoyed to it's best advantage, and that only happens when it's freshly prepared.

Between 6:30-7:30 Dinner time.

7:30-11:30-ish The rest of the night is devoted to catching up with my husband. We usually end up walking to a nearby Japanese convenience store to get some chocolate ice cream for me and then watching some tv. We have cable here, but it stinks...there's never anything good on and everything's behind schedule. Even though all my favorite shows have just started their new season, here, they're still playing last season's shows-- shows I've already seen! So we've gotten into DVD sets. Right now, I'm working through Grey's Anatomy since I never got a chance to watch it back home. It's fabulous! Mike doesn't like it so much, but he watches it with me with the unspoken understanding that he'll get to play videogames afterwards while I read beside him.

So there you are...a glimpse into my typical day. Come back again soon and I hope to have a more exciting blog up for you.

I Caught a Fish This Big!

OK, not really me, but on Saturday, we went to a place where lots of other people caught enormous fish-- The Tokyo Tsukiji Fish Market. Visiting here was not my idea because I still have memories of when my parents would take me to the fish market in Korea...smelly, dirty, raw fish guts...not my idea of a good time. But I figured, Mike's been such a good sport whenever I want to go on shopping expeditions that I'd compromise on this one. I agreed to go, but I didn't promise that I'd have a good time.

Here we are at the beginning of our fish market tour. Notice the difference in our expressions.








By the end of our time at the fish market though, I surprisingly had a great time. I eventually became numb to the smells, which in truth, weren't as bad as I remembered as a child. The market place was so busy and there were so many interesting things to look at that it was impossible not to have a good time. Take a look at some of the things we saw. If you're squeamish about seeing raw fish being filleted, you are hereby forewarned...

Inside of the marketplace

The constant traffic makes a traffic controller necessary. I love how he's in a suit and cap, but in fisherman's boots!


















Fish, fish, and more fish!















Fillet'o'Fish!! Check out the size of that knife. Mike got in trouble for getting too close here.












There was even a taxodermy shop!








Despite my initial reluctance about going to a fish market, I'm so glad Mike suggested this trip. Where else would I have experienced all this?

Nikko- a last minute adventure

I've always wanted to visit Nikko from the first moment I heard of it...beautiful scenery and the most ornate shrine in all of Japan. So when Saturday came around with nothing else to do, we decided to check it out. It took about 3 hours by express train to get there, even though our directions said it would take only 2 hours. And why it was even labeled an "express", I don't know because we stopped at EVERY single station. It made for an incredibly loooong day trip. Thank goodness it was a scenic route.

Our first stop was to visit the Shinkyo, or Sacred, Bridge (shown above). Back in the day, only the shoguns and imperial messengers were allowed to set foot on it, but now, anyone willing to pay 300 yen can have that privilege.


Next we went to see the temples and shrines that Nikko is famous for, Rinnoji and Toshogu.
























We even got to witness another traditional Japanese wedding, our 3rd one! Someone told us that it's good luck to visit a temple while there's a wedding going on. I certainly hope that's true.

We saw many beautiful sights that day, but here are a couple of my favorites: puppies! It's amazing how many people bring their dogs to temples and shrines, but I have to say that they are very well behaved.

Look at the cute little bows on her ears! I apologize for the goofy look of admiration... I didn't realize Mike was including me in the picture.


This cutie kept jumping up on her daddy until he finally picked her up and held her like a baby. Then she was completely content.

So there you have it...we visited one of Japan's most beautiful places and my favorite part of the day was spotting cute little puppies. I wonder what that says about me?

Baseball and Buddies

Doesn't this picture look like Mike and his buddy, Jeff- visiting from California, had a great time at the baseball game? In truth, they didn't get to the baseball stadium until 10 minutes AFTER the game ended. Jeff had arrived earlier in the afternoon and Mike went to go pick him up, and the plan was to meet up at the game. Things were going according to plan, and they would've made it okay had it not been for their missing the stop for the stadium and then getting completely lost. At least they made it and got to see the baseball stadium.



Here's Rich during the game looking forlornly at Mike's empty seat.





But other than worrying about my missing husband, the game was a blast! Japan loves their baseball!! Every player gets their own special chant that the fans dutifully call out as they come up to bat.



The winners... Tokyo Giants! Check out the size of that flag!



Fans are extremely loyal to their teams. Even though the Giants practically shut out the Yokohama Baystars, the Baystars fans stayed to the very end. There was no mass exodus to beat the crowds just because they knew their team would lose. It was amazing to see that kind of loyalty.

Sumo

On Saturday, we got the chance to watch a sumo tournament in Tokyo. All I can say is AMAZING!! We had so much fun-more than we expected.

Sumo is an all day event that starts at around 8 in the morning and lasts till 6 at night. A tournament lasts about 2 weeks and because we went on a Saturday, it was a sold out show. As we were walking up to the sumo stadium, we spotted a few sumo wrestlers making their way into the building. At first we were too scared to ask to take a picture with them because we didn't know what the protocol was about that--would we offend them if we asked them for a picture?

Turns out, they're actually very nice, despite appearances, and don't mind taking pictures with you. We read in our little sumo information booklet that sumo wrestlers can only move up in rank if they are "of good character". I guess that means being gracious enough to take pictures with fans- lucky for us.

I met my sumo wrestler while Mike and I went out for lunch. We were waiting at a crosswalk together and I just had to have a picture with him because he had butterflies (my favorite) on his yukada. As we walked together (alright, actually I was walking quite a few steps behind him), there were fans lining the sidewalk, and it turns out that my guy was pretty popular because fans were shouting to him and cheering him on.

Mike's sumo guy is really tough looking. I was almost scared to ask for a picture, despite the whole "good character" thing, but then this Japanese lady asked for it first and then proceeded to take 5 or 6 shots. After being so patient with her, we figured he was pretty nice, and asked for a picture too. Mike even shook hands with him!

Here are a few more pictures and interesting facts we learned that day...

***The sumo wrestlers smell really, really good-- like baby powder!

***This is because of the wax they put to mold their hair into different hairstyles. The more intricate your hairstyle, the higher in rank you are.

***Outside the stadium, there are many colorful flags that have the names of the sumo wrestlers.











***There are non-Japanese sumo wrestlers! Here's one of them walking in. To get this picture, Mike and I were like paparazzi...waiting on the sidewalk with all the other fans. Only we were silent because we didn't know their names, but the Japanese people would clap and cheer for their favorites.











***The wrestling matches can get quite violent, with a lot of slapping. Sometimes, a wrestler is thrown off the mound and lands on whoever is sitting at the front row. I was really concerned once when a big sumo guy landed on an elderly gentleman, but he didn't seem to mind at all. Maybe it's an honor of a sumo wrestler lands on you.

***Higher ranked wrestlers also get to wear fancy aprons when they walk into the arena to be introduced. These aprons can cost as much as 2 million yen ($200,00)!! Which is why you get one only if you're really, really good.






















***Sumo wrestlers can be surprisingly muscular.





***Higher ranked sumo wrestlers get the privilege of throwing salt (white stuff on the ground) for purification purposes. This can also prolong the match because they have up to 4 minutes to "purify" before they actually begin wrestling. So most of the time, the purification lasts much longer than the match, which can be over in as little as 15 seconds.





***Here is a "forbidden shot". Mike took this before the security guard got to him. He honestly didn't know it wasn't allowed...oops...







***Here is the Yokozuna, or Grand Champion. Once they make it to this rank, they can never be demoted, although they are expected to retire if they consistently start to do poorly.

The sumo tournament made for a long day, but it was worth it. As long as you bring a ton of snacks with you, you're good to go. We cleaned out a little convenience store of all their sandwiches and onegiri (sushi-like, tuna-filled rice balls wrapped in seaweed) before we went into the stadium and had fun munching on our goodies as we watched a bunch of hefty, yet muscular guys wrestle.

Catching Up...

I've been a little slack with updating the blog lately...sorry. I'll do my best to give you a quick summary of what we've been up to...

For Labor Day, we had a few friends over and had a potluck. Our Japanese friends brought fixings for sushi and I got a chance to see how it's made. Apparently, when you're serving sushi at home, there's not one person who rolls it all for you (much to our dismay). All the vegetables and fish are sliced and put on a platter, the sushi rice is in a bowl, the seaweed wrapper on a plate, and you put it together yourself. Kind of like a taco bar. It took a couple tries to get it right, but I feel like I'm a sushi pro now!

The following weekend, we took a tour to see some really cool waterfalls- Joren Waterfall and the 7 Waterfalls of Nanadaru. Thank goodness the heat and humidity of summer has begun to pass so the day was really pleasant, despite the hiking. (I'm not fond of outdoor physical exertion during really hot weather that'll make me all sweaty and gross)

The first waterfall we visited was Joren. This one's famous for all the wasabi that are planted near it. Because the water's so cold, the wasabi plants really thrive. The picture of Mike below shows him pointing to the wasabi crop. They even had wasabi ice cream there. Our friend, Yuki, got some and she let me try it, but it's definitely an acquired taste.










If you're the kind of person who thinks of wasabi as a blob of green paste on the side of a sushi plate, it actually looks like this- before it becomes your sushi condiment.


Next up on the tour was Nanadaru's 7 waterfalls and onsens (hot springs)...














Here we are in front of my favorite waterfall. It looked so romantic! I just wanted to dive in and go swimming (if I knew how to swim).















Here we are in the middle of our hike. Doesn't it look like we're in the middle of a jungle? Sometimes it felt like that...crossing rickety bridges, climbling crumbling steps...very Indiana Jones-ish...











We ended the day with a relaxing dip in the onsen (hot spring) with a beautiful waterfall in the background.



There were even some onsens that were in caves...kinda creepy, but kinda cool too. By the way, normally in Japanese onsens, you would have to go naked, but THANKFULLY, bathing suits were allowed at this one.


By the end of the day, I was exhausted, and the next day, my calves were so sore from all the hiking. But it was worth it.

A Day on the Water

We've been trying to schedule a day out on the boat for a few weeks now and we finally got our chance on Saturday. The weather was perfect- plenty of sunshine, but not too hot and humid, as it's been for the past month and a half. Mike was the captain, and I was his lookout guy...as in "Look out for that ship!" or "Look out for that oncoming boat!" Actually, he was a very good driver. I just get really nervous whenever I'm out in the open water. But there were times when we'd be going fast and hit a wave and the boat would go up, and then inevitably down again, which would make me scream and consequently get nasty harbor water in my mouth from the resulting splash. Still...it was good times...

Here's the boating guy helping us out because our motor wouldn't start at first. He also had to teach Mike how to start the boat because of all the things they taught him in the boating class, they failed to teach him how to do that...

Lynn and I enjoying the ride. Check out Colin's coffee in the background! Boating on a summer day with a cup of hot coffee- that's a combination I wouldn't have thought of...

Some of the sights... A fishing boat and a really big scary-looking ship.









Monkey Island- not sure why it's called that, but I'm pretty sure there aren't any monkeys roaming around...