We decided not to wait to move into our new house, and left the luxurious, wonderfully air-conditioned, fully staffed Cerulean Tower Tokyu Hotel after just one night. Blaine's colleague, Ako, met us in the lobby and we crammed our 8 suitcases and 2 carseats into 2 taxis for the 10 minute ride from Shibuya ward to our house in Minato ward.
The kids were thrilled to see the red mailbox with the name "HARDEN" on it - probably put there by Ako, who thinks of everything. They raced inside - into stifling 100-degree (probably) heat because the "aircon" wasn't on. Blaine and I squabbled about whether it was better to open the windows to cool things off slightly (it was marginally cooler outside) or to keep them closed until the aircon did its magic. Nothing much worked until I set the thermostat on a spoiled 18-degrees with the fan on "quickly". By then the kids had stripped down to underwear and Arno's face was the color of a medium-rare slice of lamb.
Blaine met w/the real estate lady, the representative of the homeowner, the security man and some other guy whose job I never learned (the internet hookup guy?). I made the kids' beds w/our rented sheets, handed out ice water and felt stressed out by having so many people in the house. It was hard to behave normally. Finally got the kids settled for nap/quiet time, I took a nap myself and felt much better.
Next up, grocery shopping at the nearby, overpriced, "gaijin" (foreigner) grocery known as "National Azabu Supermarket" - where you can easily spend $10 for a hunk of gruyere and $5 for a tiny box of Raisin Bran. At first it was similarly overwhelming - what if I bought the wrong thing? Reality set in: Tide or Purex? Charmin or Kleenex? Every product was described by a small sticker in English. I relaxed and reminded myself that this was one reason to move here: to test the unknown and the known, even at the supermarket.
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