Another holiday gone by

We know we've been delinquent recently bloggers, but we didn't realize how delinquent until we started this posting and saw that the most recent blog we added was about Halloween... oops.  So, as Thanksgiving has now passed, GT has lost to the Bulldogs another year in a row, and we are now certified open water scuba divers, we thought we'd share some pictures from recent weeks and our recent trip to Thailand.

Starting with the first few weeks of November, below are a few of the sights around Tokyo we wanted to share: Mos Burger (which tastes like Krystal or White Castle), dogs in clothes (which is amusingly more common than dogs without clothes), a ninja cutting grass (yep, we found a ninja), a museum of ham (or in this case, prosciutto), and a very odd Cafe Tobacco (never seen one of those before).

Now onto our scuba trip to Thailand.  We spent the week of Thanksgiving in Phuket (pronounced poo-ket) getting our dive certification, laying on the beach, and watching muay thai boxing which turned out to be quite amusing.  Unfortunately, Thailand doesn't really celebrate Thanksgiving, so the closest we could come to a turkey and sweet-potatoe pie was a Burger King burger and fries.  But the Thai food was excellent, and compared to Tokyo prices that we've become somewhat accustomed to, it was super cheap.

During our dives, we saw all kinds of crazy fish and coral, like the scorpion fish, the lion fish, and the ghost pipe fish, some black tip reef sharks, a sea turtle, and a moray eel.  We had one day of classroom lessons and pool instruction learning how to use the equipment, then we took two days of boat trips and to 5 different dive sites.  It really was incredible and we had a great time!  But, now that we've returned from the chaos of Thailand back to Tokyo (where order presides), we're a little sunburnt, a little tired, but scuba certified and very happy.

Happy Halloween

This weekend we decided to get in the Halloween spirit, so we hosted a costume party at our apartment for a few friends.  The party was complete with pirates, disco dancers, pinatas, rednecks, Mickey and Minnie mouse, and even Amelia Earhart.  A good time was had by all.  Hope you enjoy some of our decorations (including a full 3 lbs of spiderwebs, 24 cupcakes, and pigs-in-a-blanket).

Back in the Saddle

   We are back for another post after taking a few weeks off.  One important lesson learned over the past month is not to eat raw chicken in Japan... even if the old lady next to you is eating it.  In short, I went to a chicken restaurant and inadvertently ordered the "raw" option.  Not wanting to make a big scene by sending it back, I decided to eat it, as many other people around me had also ordered the same thing and it did have soy sauce on it.  In my defense the menu said it was "seasoned chicken."  Needless to say, two weeks and a few Cipro tablets later I'm about ten pounds lighter but back to normal.

   In other news... we went exploring last weekend and came across a small fenced in park with a bunch of people hanging out.  Being curious, we decided to take a look.  See the pictures below, but we were not expecting "take your rabbit to the park day."  Sometimes you think this country is weird, then you see a rabbit dressed in a sailor outfit on a leash and all doubt is removed.

   We also took a stroll around the emperor's palace this weekend.  The weather was overcast, which made for good touring weather.  It was actually pretty neat to see such a huge green space in the middle of this bustling city.  The picture below is the imperial palace moat with the Japanese congressional building (called the Diet) in the background.  It's shaped like a pyramid.  We also got a pretty good picture of a statue that some people here made of Tom Cruise from The Last Samurai...

 

Belated with a Good Excuse

First, for those of you who are faithful blog watchers, we want to apologize for being a week behind... we'll put the past two weeks into this posting.  Second... we have a good excuse... it was the first weekend of college football (which, thanks to our slingbox we were able to see a lot of) and we got to see the Yellow Jackets win... twice!

But, to recap the past two weekends, we visited a limited number of places since most of this weekend was spent receiving our shipment of household effects and attempting to find a place for everything.  The best part of our apartment is that we have a full china cabinet, yet no china... so it will become our place for "conversation" pieces as we collect them here in Japan.

The pictures below are just a few we snapped these past two weekends - a building that looks like the Beijing bird's nest architecture, a shot that just screams "you're in downtown Tokyo", a shrine we came across in the middle of an alley and squished between two high-rises, and finally... a car that is deceptively small.  We want to make sure you realize that while this van looks as large as a mini-van in the US, it's really only about 5 1/2 feet long and about 5 1/2 feet tall (yep, it's pretty much the size of a Nissan Cube... and just as ugly).  As you can see, it fits into a Japanese size parking spot (which is small to begin with) and it has room to spare.  I keep hearing threats that a certain someone is going to purchase a tiny box car (or even a vespa with a pizza delivery box on the back) and ship it back to the States for me when all is said and done.  I just hope one doesn't show up in our living room for Christmas... and yes, it would certainly fit in the living room.

Tokyo Hooters

While the East Coast has weathered earthquakes and hurricanes, we here in Tokyo experienced "Friendship Day" and a parade.  First Friendship Day... this is an annual event which brings about 4,000 people onto the U.S. Embassy compound for food, drinks, music and other assorted activities.  It's billed as a way to open up the Embassy to the community and features a number of local vendors with tons of food.  And to my surprise, the girls from Hooters (Tokyo Style) made an appearance.  It actually ended up being a fun event.

On Sunday there was a parade for who knows what on the street right out in front of our church.  We hung around for a little while and got some interesting pictures.  There was even a Metlife blimp covering this parade from the sky, but we still have no idea what the parade was celebrating.

Tokyo Tower and Tourist Faux Pas

Tokyo was rainy over the weekend, which actually cooled things down and allowed us to get out and walk around without nearing heat exhaustion.  On Saturday we took the metro to an area east of where we live and decided to walk back home, exploring as we went.  The first thing we came to was a great park with a huge Buddhist temple, statues, a few stray cats, and some really strange miniature statues.  (An aside:  a few summers ago I was touring a small town in Malaysia and saw, to my surprise, a parade complete with a marching band coming down the street.  I was surprised at how random it seemed and decided to take some pictures.  Well, as the parade went by I realized I had been taking pictures of a funeral procession.)  Ok, back to the miniature statues... after we took a few pictures of these little guys, we figured out that they are most likely grave markers.  Woops!

Next we stopped at Tokyo Tower, which looks to be as big as the Eiffel Tower (only in red and white with cell phone antennas galore) and is complete with a beer garden, an aquarium, and one really strange looking mascot with a band-aid on his head (don't ask why... we don't get it either).  Ok, more next week.

Week Two - Wait, how much?!

At the end of week two, we've finally defeated jet lag and tried a few more restaurants in the neighborhood... many of which we still can't get over the menu prices.  With the current US Dollar to Japanese Yen exchange rate, it's difficult to finish dinner (for just the two of us) under $50... and we're not even venturing into the fancy places.

But, what has really boggled our minds is the price of some fruit we found at a specialty French grocery store.  Now, first we must say that normal fruit at any grocery store isn't going to run you nearly this much, but we guess there's something special about this particular fruit... we just don't want to pay to find out what.  So, if you look at the pictures below, you'll see the cantaloupe for 7,000 Yen (at the current exchange rate of 1 USD to 76 Yen) that's $92!  And the grapes are the same price!!!  That must be some really good fruit!

The other pictures you see are of the Meiji Shrine and one of it's temple doors in the Harajuku neighborhood of Tokyo.  This is the same place we took the picture of the entrance last week, except we ventured past just the entrance this week.  We braved the heat and humidity, saw how beautiful this shrine is, and learned that it is still used today for many wedding ceremony processions.

More to come next week.  :)