Trip to Tottori - Part Two

After a good night's sleep, T was up and raring to go (wearing Daddy's sandals and carrying K's bag)...

After breakfast we left the hotel and went to the toy museum. Downstairs they had an area set up as an old-fashioned school-room, and a display on traditional songs. A lot of popular children's songs were composed by people from Tottori, or at least have some kind of connection with the area.

There was also a room full of instruments for children to get their hands on...

Next we headed upstairs, to a large room filled with toys to play with. If we lived in Tottori city I think the boys would want to come everyday! There were lots of lovely wooden/educational toys and games, more musical things, an area for little ones and a workshop area for crafting.



There was also a very uncomfortable-looking ball pool!

K soon discovered a room with a huge collection of train tracks which he could play with. H and K stayed there for ages a while, but T and I returned to the main area to prevent Godzilla-esque railway destruction.

Finally we went up to the third floor, which houses an exhibition of toys through the ages, arranged thematically. H and I enjoyed spotting things from our childhood, and K found more trains!

After that it was time for lunch. H's brother lives in Tottori but unfortunately was busy that day. However, he did give us a great recommendation for a place to have lunch: a buffet-style restaurant where we most definitely got our money's worth :-)

In the afternoon our adventures continued - and that will be Part Three...

A weekend away

The 4 of us recently spent the weekend at Tamatsukuri Hot Springs, about an hour away from home. H's younger brother got married that week but didn't have a ceremony, so the 2 families gathered for the weekend at a traditional resort to celebrate and get to know each other.

The ryokan (traditional Japanese hotel) we stayed at was quite big and very fancy. The entranceway (pictured below) overlooked a lovely garden and there was a roof-top open-air bath as well as the 'ordinary' hot spring baths on the ground floor. H's brother had said that it would be a casual weekend, but I knew that his parents would ignore that and dress quite formally, so I didn't want to turn up in jeans. For the boys I appliqued matching neck-ties onto plain T-shirts for a bit of smart-casual fun. K is very proud of his ability to hop and stand on one leg lately, hence the Long John Silver pose...



In the evening we ate dinner in a huge banqueting hall, rather over-the-top for our party. The happy couple sat at the head of the room, in front of the gold screen, and the 2 families sat in lines facing each other. It's a typical setting for this type of party, but not really very good for getting to know each other I think. H's brother is the youngest of 3 brothers and his wife is the youngest of 3 sisters. All the elder siblings are married and have at least 2 children each, so it was quite a lively get-together. Oh, look, there's H's dad in a grey suit and his mum (only half in the shot) in a black lace dress - I knew it!

In traditional fashion our meal was served on individual tables and brought out little by little, although not in 'courses' in a Western sense. There was sashimi, crab, steak, deep-fried goodies cooked in the room in front of us and all kinds of little dishes of who-knows-what. This photo is of K's meal - I think he got the best deal actually, especially as he got an adult portion of crab from his allergic cousin.

Once the meal was over, the children enjoyed running riot around the room, and I was happy to let H's mum be on T duty for a while...

After taking the waters, it was time for bed. The hotel provided yukata, light-weight cotton kimono for wearing around the hotel and as pyjamas. They even had K-sized ones...

While we were downstairs, the maids laid out the futons for us. H had a headache and soon fell asleep. K and T, however, were very excited and didn't settle for a long time. It was the first time for T to spend the night out of the confines of his cot and he continued to explore the room long after K had fallen asleep. Actually, I fell asleep before him too! I woke up a few times during the night, and found T fast asleep in a completey different place every time. I got up first in the morning, while the other 3 were still asleep, and here's what I saw:

I forgot to take a good picture of the room, but it was big! The screens in the top-right of the photo above opened onto a view of the gardens. It was a corner room and behind me, as I took this picture, was a small seating area in front of windows overlooking the town. There was a full bathroom, a large entranceway to the room, and a whole other small room, which we simply used to put our bags in.

Down on the ground floor there was a small courtyard in the centre of the hotel, where you could sit and dangle your feet in the hot spring water. K and I tried it out after a big breakfast, back in the banqueting hall again.

Everyone went their separate ways after check-out at 10am, but it seemed a shame just to go home. A 20 minute drive brought us to a small aquarium, mainly featuring aquatic life from the 2 nearby lakes. These lakes are actually joined to each other and finally open onto the sea, so the water in them grows increasingly salty as you head east, creating interesting and varied eco-systems.

Both K and T enjoyed looking at the fish, especially in this 'bubble-head' tank!

After lunch we drove further around the lake until we got back to Matsue. I'd heard there was a nice park there for young children so we stopped for an hour and K had a good play, before heading home again once more.

St Patrick's Day Parade

So none of us are Irish, and St Patrick's Day isn't until next weekend.

But that didn't stop us going to Matsue yesterday for the St Patrick's Day Parade and Irish Festival. Actually I went on Saturday night too, to enjoy a few drinks and some live music at 'The Shamrock', an Irish pub set up for just 2 days a year!

Then yesterday the whole family headed out to watch the parade. It was pretty cold and there was even the odd flurry of snow, but we had a good time. We got there early in order to eat our way around the food stalls before the parade began - it's always about food for me. There was everything from Irish broth, quiche and green beer to chicken satay and Thai green curry and we did our best to sample it all. K also enjoyed playing with all these guys who were waiting to walk in the parade...


It's not really a terribly impressive parade, but a bit of fun nonetheless. Led by St Patrick himself (and some boy scouts)...

...there was a marching band (K's favourite part - instruments!), some people juggling and yo-yo-ing, a tin whistle group and more.

The balloon guy surprised me by presenting his heart-on-a-stick to me, not K. I'm very easily pleased :-)

Once the parade had finished, the various music and dance groups performed and were judged(and Vivian's dance crew won, once again!). By then though we were keen to get in out of the cold so we went up to The Shamrock again and had, variously, hot tea, Irish coffee, apple crumble, ham salad, scones and mango juice. Yum!

I drove us back home and on the way all 3 'boys' went to sleep, even when I stopped at the supermarket on the way. Mind you, I fell asleep putting T to bed, and then slept right round to this morning...

Oh, and we did all wear green for the day, but unfortunately it was all hidden away by extra layers of coats. So here we all are! Happy St Patrick's Day!

A busy week

*** Now with photos! ***

Last week I had no classes at all and there was a public holiday but despite that (because of that?), it was A Very Busy Week. Everything of note was photographically documented of course, and I had great intentions of writing in detail about each event. But a whole week has now passed and my complete failure to write about our summer in the UK is haunting me, so here's the brief version.

Last Sunday was the annual festival at the kominkan, our local parish hall equivalent. There were displays of bonsai and matched vegetables, handicrafts and photography, children's calligraphy and paintings. We watched the children's paper aeroplane contest, had some free food and tea and biscuits, won a mini Christmas tree and a box of tissues and had our photos printed onto comical postcards by the Computing for Seniors club. Truly something for everyone! K had a sit in a fire engine and then we came home again, in time for a visit from Yukari and her daughter Yurara, featuring more tea and biscuits and a couple of rounds of Greedy Gorilla.



On Monday K went to school and, for once, I had nothing scheduled while he was out. Somehow though, just looking after T took up most of the day and before I knew it it was time to collect him again. The token non-busy day.

Tuesday started with a walk to the (regular, Japanese) kindergarten to enroll K for next year. Can you believe a year has passed since I was last wondering whether to enroll him or not? The international preschool has been just what we needed this past year but I think that K is ready for kindergarten now; he's keen to go to school for more than two days a week and he's interested in speaking Japanese now too. So we wandered over, signed him up and then played in the playground for a while. In the afternoon H came home early and we all bid a fond farewell to our old car.


After more than 12 years of loyal service, the Pajero Io has gone... And after all that, Vivian came to visit!

Wednesday was another school day since it was their Sports Day. We all met at the park and the children enjoyed various races and games while we Mums photographed madly ;-) It was pretty laid back, not like the Japanese-style Sports Days which are rehearsed to within an inch of their lives and unfold with military precision. K took part in an obstacle race, a running race and a sack race. Oh, and I did that last one too... Then it was time for packed lunches followed by playing in the playground until the Mums had had enough.




We got back in time for Visit From Vivian Part 2 (this time with Noboru too), since K complained that she didn't stay long enough to play with him the day before. In other words, more Greedy Gorilla.

Thursday was Culture Day, a public holiday. We didn't do anything particularly cultural, but we did take K to the local shrine for his 7-5-3 ceremony. It's traditional to take children to be blessed at the ages 3, 5 and 7, usually around the middle of November. We looked into renting a kimono for K for the day but were quoted 30,000 yen! Photographers will let you use one for free if you're having portraits taken afterwards but that can get very expensive too, so in the end we went to Jusco and went the 'modern' (ie practical and cheap) route, buying a suit set for 7,000 yen. As well as a jacket and short trousers it also included a shirt and tie and even braces!

So after our visit to the shrine we went out for lunch (conveyor-belt sushi, K's choice) with H's parents and then it was time to go and pick up the new car! It was the first time I've had a *new* new car and it was all very exciting. We took it for a little spin up to Sakaiminato and had dinner out too.

On Friday I took the boys into town for a 'mini-concert' for preschoolers, which K enjoyed a lot. We joined some other Mums and kids for lunch afterwards and then hit the supermarket.

Saturday brought the end of the lovely weather we'd been having; it's been rainy ever since. In the morning we all went to the library for the annual giving-away-of-old-books free-for-all. We came home with bags and bags of books: picture books, travel guides, craft and sewing books, a few English language novels, some history books and more. There was also story-telling and colouring for the children and bag-making from old book covers. After that it was lunch out and a bit of shopping before coming home to a visit from Hide.

Which brings us round to Sunday. There aren't many places around here to take children to play when the weather's bad. In fact, we could only think of one, so we went there - the Children's Culture Centre. They have a little planetarium so H and K went there first, and then we all watched a little puppet show for a while before heading off for all-you-can-eat pizza. Later in the day I helped out at a Hallowe'en party for a few hours while H had the unenviable task of staying at home with The Boys Who Want Mummy. Still, no-one was screaming when I came home...

Wow, did you really read all that? To think, this was the abridged version! I'd like to add a few photos later but I wouldn't hold your breath... I did it! I actually added some photos! And I finally got around to looking up how to cross things out in Blogger, yeah...

Autumn Days

Autumn is my favourite season. I know some people find the shorter days and cooler weather depressing, but after all that heat and humidity I welcome the end of summer here. Mind you it's not only because of that, because I've always loved autumn, even before coming to Japan.

Right now the weather is just right for me. Clear, sunny days with temperatures in the low to mid 20s, with somewhat cooler nights. Even now in mid-October, there are still times when I'm too hot really. It amuses me when people here are surprised to see me still wearing short-sleeves, in October! They don't base their comments on the actual weather at the time, but purely on the calendar. As in, 'Aren't you cold? It's October!', even if it's 27 degrees... Schools change to winter uniforms at the beginning of October and around town people suddenly start wearing boots and scarves. The other day a woman I know told me she had just changed her cushions from summer ones to winter ones...

Anyway, for me autumn means Hallowe'en, my birthday, Guy Fawkes night... That last one passes me by now unfortunately, but Hallowe'en has been growing in popularity more and more ever since I first came to Japan. I love fancy dress, and the annual foreigner-run Hallowe'en party here is one of the highlights of the local social scene.

at the local shopping centre

our 100yen shop decorations

More typically in Japan, autumn means sports days, culture festivals (November 3rd is Culture Day, a national holiday), autumn foliage and food. There's a saying, shoku-yoku no aki, which literally means 'appetite autumn', pointing out that lots of tasty things are in season now.

If you're a small child, it seems that autumn also involves digging up sweet potatoes. Every kindergarten or primary school around either grows their own or organises a little field trip to harvest some. K (and the rest of us) went up to Daisen with his pre-school last week to dig sweet potatoes (and collect chestnuts), and he also helped H's mum harvest some the other day too. Luckily they make perfect baby food for T, boiled and mashed...

Health and Sports Day

Yesterday was Health and Sports Day, a national holiday in Japan. It was created to commemorate the 1964 Tokyo Olympics and is now held on the second Monday in October each year. There are always lots of sports and physical-activity oriented events, including school sports days, and yesterday morning K and H went to a city-organised event for children aged 3 to 6.

Various activities were set up in the city gym and the children and their parents, in groups, spent 10 minutes on each thing, with lots of adult volunteers there to help hold little hands...


The little boy getting onto the balance beam behind K is Rensei, who was there with his daddy Tomonori, one of H's old school friends. I met Tomonori independently, before I was going out with H, and I later (independently) met Ritsuko, who went on to become his wife. Rensei is just 3 months older than K and now we each have a second little boy, only 2 months apart! There seems to be a certain amount of fate in the 2 families' relationship; maybe we were all destined to be friends...


Anyway, back to the gym...

There was trampolining, rolling on mats and skipping; hula hoops, hopscotch and action songs; various jumping, balancing and ball games...

...and finally, tug-of-war. No sports day in Japan is complete without this one!

Well done boys, you worked hard!

H and K left home at about 8.30 and went for sushi afterwards, getting back here just after 1 o'clock. I stayed home with T and was paralysed with indecision about what to do with the free time! First I took T out into the garden and did some weeding for a while. Then he fell asleep (while I was preparing his morning food...) so I snuck upstairs and tided up my little room (it always seems overly grand to call it an 'office' or 'studio'). There was even time to sit in the engawa with a cup of tea and a magazine before he woke up again. Overall it was both a relaxing and productive morning, my favourite combination.

It did set me thinking though... What did I do with my time when K was a little baby? Unlike now, I didn't have a blog, Facebook account or online shop (recently restocked!), I was only teaching one class a week (admittedly, only 2 at the moment now) and, oh, I didn't have a 3 year old running around, demanding attention and waking up sleeping babies... And yet somehow I felt busy then too. I suppose it's that old thing of work expanding to fit the time available...

Toy Kingdom

H went back to work on Monday, after nearly 5 months of paternity leave. He didn't seem to find it too hard to get back into the working routine; I suspect that he'd had enough of being at home with his nagging wife...

Anyway, last Wednesday we decided to make the most of our work-free weekdays, and went to Toy Kingdom in Okayama for the day. It's a fair way from here, over 2 hours on the expressway, but the boys were really good in the car and it was definitely worth the drive. The park was open from 10 to 5; we were there from 10.20 until it closed!

Like our trip to a closer amusement park back in May, there was hardly anybody there. As it was a weekday and not the summer holidays, parking was not a problem..

All 4 of us went on the Big Wheel and admired the view of the Seto Inland Sea and its lovely cone-shaped islands. We also had a good view of the empty car park and the deserted park itself. See if you can spot a single person..

Entry to the park was 700yen for adults and 500yen for children. This included entrance to lots of different play areas including Wooden Toy House...

... Story Book House, Game House (I had fun playing Pop Up Pirate) and Train House. If he hadn't already seen what else there was in the park, I think that K would have happily spent all day just playing with the trains...


It was a lovely sunny day and a little too hot in the middle of the day, so the air-conditioned Train House was perfect for a couple of little breaks (and breast-feeding stops). K was quite happy to play by himself for a while. Look at all those train-tracks just waiting to be laid out!

There were also lots of ride-on toys to play with freely...

... as well as a sand pit and a whole other area of slides and playground equipment, neither of which we even got to! We didn't make it to the Building Block House either, although we did admire the giant models scattered around the park.

But even with all that on offer for only the park entrance price, we couldn't resist the 'free pass' tickets. The rides in the park cost at least 200yen a time, but an unlimited pass was only 1500yen. With so few people there we didn't have to worry about queuing, and we were able to go on as many rides as we wanted to.

K soon spotted this one, and went on it twice...


Actually, he went on everything twice I think! Of the 17 pay-for rides at the park, there were only 3 which K was too small for. There were several he could go on by himself but he generally preferred to ride with one of us. We worked our way around the park, with H and I taking it turns to go on with K, while the other one waited with T. And then later, we went back and did them again the other way around. H and I are both pretty wimpy when it comes to rollercoasters and the like, so this park suited us all very well :-)


There were lots of classic amusement park rides: teacups and merry-go-round, tiny flume ride and flying elephants. K and I even went on a little rollercoaster, which was just about in my comfort zone! As soon as we set off K cowered into my side and made lots of scared noises, but he later declared it his favourite ride...


H and I both enjoyed driving the go-carts, and the bumper boats. We were, in turn, the only people on them, so there was no-one to actually bump into, but that was probably a good thing.

The free passes also gave us entry to the exhibition hall, which is currently hosting a display on insects; perfect for the boys (of all ages) of the Monkey family! As well as big beetles in cases to look at, there was a big box filled with compost to dig for larvae in, and a little pond to fish for gengorou (predaceous diving beetles).

Finally, we explored the play gym, with its tunnels, slides and ball pool. There seem to be a lot of this kind of play area in the UK now but H and I had just been saying that you don't see them in Japan. But in Toy Kingdom, anything is possible!

We all really enjoyed our day. Another advantage of going when it was so quiet was that H and I could play freely too, with minimal embarrassment. If you are anywhere within a couple of hours of Okayama and have a young child or two to entertain (or a couple in their 30s...), I would heartily recommend it!