Rainy day

For a big rainstorm yesterday, Lucinda and Arno were kitted out in Japanese style yesterday, with Hello Kitty and Shinkansen raincoats and ubiquitous clear-plastic umbrellas.

Blaine's latest... and Japan's big election

The Japanese rejected the Liberal Democratic Party after 54 yrs in power, and replaced it with the Democratic Party of Japan (DPJ).

The new ruling party brings some needed fresh faces and more women into the government. And to encourage child-bearing, the party has promised to make childcare much more widely available and to send monthly $250 checks to families for each child. (Turns out that we're eligible because we're also paying high Japanese taxes, so we won't complain.)

But do Japanese voters really want change? And is dramatic change really possible in this stable - and some might say ossified - society? Stay tuned. Should be interesting.

Arno's recent developments

Arno started his pre-K year at Willowbrook on Thursday. He is again in Willowbrook's dual-language program, and this year he's in "Take" (Bamboo) class, which is mixed with younger "Takenokko" (Bamboo Shoots) students.

Arno is very proud to be an older student, especially one who does not cry when his mother leaves the classroom and shows the ropes to his classmates. He's also very conscious of the privileges of being in the older group from his experience last year, as a younger student in the Sakura/Sakuranbo class. For example:

Every morning on the sign-in sheet, older (Take) students (age 4-5) write their first and last names while younger (Takenokko) students (age 3-4) write only first names. On Day 1 of school, which was a Japanese day, Arno waited for me to produce Blaine's WashPost business card so he could copy the katakana for "Harden." (he learned "Arno" in katakana last year.) This morning, he quite nicely wrote "Harden" in English for the first time.

The summer has also proven to be an effective transition time in other areas. Most crucially, Arno has given up his stroller - big news around our house! Last spring, he whined incessantly when we made him walk to Willowbrook, about 1/4 mile away. Since our return to Tokyo, the stroller is stashed in the garage and he walks most places without complaint. (We also take him places on our "mom-bike," with a seat on the back, but we don't mind that.)

This afternoon, Arno walked from our house to pick up Lucinda at Nishimachi, which is perhaps a 1/2 mile, and then to Tokyo Midtown, which is close to a mile. No wonder he is sleeping well. When I tell him he has to walk somewhere, he likes to say, "That's not very far at all!"

To finish off the week, Arno - who rarely tries new foods and particularly avoids eating most fresh fruit - sampled pear and peach tonight for the first time. I admit it: I bribed him. We had the season's first pears and some ripe peaches, and I offered him 200 yen for a bowl of each as a "fruit allowance." Timing is everything. He wants to buy a particular toy, which costs 200 yen. Now he can buy 2 of them.

Summer festival

Friday night was our third time going to the annual Noryo Matsuri, or Summer Festival, in Azabu Juban, and it's definitely less exotic than it was for us in 2007, when we were fresh off the plane, or last year, when we were more excited about surfing along in the crowds. Having said that, here are some new favorite photos from our evening.

Above, one of my favorite photos from Japan, because it's hard to capture the artificiality of Japanese fashion.

Lucinda and Arno dressed for the occasion:


Kimonos and crowds:


Shown from the back, a fan tucked into a sash (obi) holding a man's yukata (cotton kimono) together. The fan is printed with this year's festival poster design.



And fruit with a colorful candy coating, cooling on a huge block of ice. Friends of Lucinda and Arno bought some and found, to their disappointment, that their fruits were ume, or sour plums. (Top left in photo)


After a long walk home, Lucinda declared that she doesn't want to go next year because she played three games of chance and was rewarded only with the cheapest and worst toys.

Lobsters, ahoy

At the fish market, I was struck by a sudden inspiration to buy Canadian lobsters. Three of them, as it turned out, for 1500 yen ($15) each, which seemed to me to be an incredible bargain.

Lobsters being packed at Tsukiji:


Lobsters hanging out in our kitchen:


Lobsters after a hot bath:

Back in Tokyo

Last Sunday aftenroon, on the bus from Narita to our neighborhood, I was so happy to see Tokyo again. Of course we enjoyed almost 6 weeks in the US, but it's very exciting to come back here for what is effectively our junior year abroad.

The next morning (Monday), I celebrated by taking the children to the Tsukiji Fish Market for the daily tuna auction. It's the ultimate touristy thing to on your first morning after a flight from the US, when you wake up around 4 a.m. But I hadn't seen it before, though Blaine has. Lucinda, Arno and I arrived at the market at 5:30 a.m. and weren't too far back in the long line waiting for the auction.


Visitors walk on a fairly narrow path through the middle of the auction warehouse, where massive frozen submarine-shaped tuna are laid out for examination. Wholesale buyers cut a piece out of the tail and look closely with flashlights. For what? I have no idea.

One side of the room:


Other side of the room, with even bigger fish:


Man with flashlight looking at tuna:


After our auction visit, we walked around the market a little - we'd been there before - and then considered the final step in our touristy plan: to have sushi for breakfast. I had no idea where to go, so Lucinda told me how to say "sushi breakfast" in Japanese and I stopped a well-dressed man in his 50s, but clearly not a laborer, who was wearing tall black rubber boots (a sign of someone in the know at Tsukiji).

"Sushi breakfast?," I said, in what must have been appalling Japanese. I expected him to vaguely point me in some direction, but he briefly looked us over, took pity on us, and beckoned for us to follow him. Then he set off at a clip with us trailing like ducklings, fending off trucks and mechanized carts as he walked for several minutes and several blocks. An astonishing generosity toward tourists.

When we reached the outside market section, with small restaurants and produce shops, where he greeted several shopkeepers, grinned and pointed his thumb at us, saying something I guessed was the equivalent of "I'm taking them to find sushi for breakfast!" The first place on his list was closed, so he kept walking until he stuck his head into English-friendly restaurant #3, established that a "sushi breakfast" was available - and waved us into the door. I thanked him, and he strode off. Here's the place:


I ordered, yes, a sushi breakfast of 8 pieces and miso soup for Lucinda, who told the waiter in Japanese that she didn't want wasabi, plus sea urchin and ama-ebi sweet shrimp for me. (Arno ate some milk-caramel biscuits I'd bought earlier.) Lucinda then consumed her first serious raw-sushi meal, when the fish wasn't masked in, say, a California roll. She proudly ate scallop and fatty tuna and yellowtail and amberjack, plus crab and shrimp - and said she liked it.

Arno photographed the meal:


And his own breakfast:


And his shoes:

Oedipus Rex

This morning, at Top Pot, the coolest donut shop in Seattle:

Arno: "Mommy, will you or Daddy die first?"
Me: "I don't know, Arno. Why?"
Arno: "I want Daddy to die first."
Blaine: "Why's that, Arno?"
Arno: "I love Mommy."

Maybe it had something to do with my agreeing to take him to Target to look for Bakugan battle brawler balls.

In the US

"Jessica in Tokyo" has gone silent for several weeks because we're in the US on vacation. But I'll be back and posting shortly.