The Gucciones in Aizu-Wakamatsu

We started off the weekend with a nutritious breakfast of pancakes and popcorn.  Then after a little playing around the apartment, we took the bus down toward the university.  We had a quick lunch at the local Yoshinoya, and then did some shopping.  First we tried (unsuccessfully) to get new tires and tubes for an old bike that someone lent to Zach.  Then it was off to the supermarket, with its great sushi selection, corn on the cob samples and celery by the stalk.  That, and the cab ride home (See:  Lost in Translation II) was enough excitement for one day.

I found these hot dogs at the supermarket.  Individually wrapped and in packs of five.  But what the heck.  I set out to cook them this weekend, after getting the kids all wound up (“How about some good old American Hot Dogs!”).  I had even scored some yellow mustard.  I opened the first one and realized something was wrong.  There were metal clamps on the ends.  And the casing seemd to be heavy duty plastic.  And the color was like bubblegum.  Just them a friend of Sarah’s came to the door.  She is from Vancouver but speaks English and Japanese.  I brought her the wrapper and asked her “Do you know what this is?”.  She told me it was a sort of hot dog made from fish.  I asked her (hopefully) if kids like them.  She just stared at me.  I was going to microwave them originally, but they seemed like they needed some color. So I though the frying pan would work better.  Well, they weren’t too bad.  I ate two, and Sarah at a half.  Diane and Zach wouldn’t touch one.

After lunch we went downtown, where we saw the statue of Dr. Noguchi, the Nobel prize winning doctor and even ran into a couple of geishas.  Then we went across the street to the amusement arcade / bowling alley.  Gotta love the Hello Kitty bowling balls.

We decided to take a cab home from the grocery store this weekend.  We gave the cab driver a piece of paper with our address (in Japanese) on it, and he started driving.  But I knew at some point we would have to give him some direction.  I got out our “Lingo” pocket translater to refresh my memory on the words “right” and “left”.  “Right” came up “tadashii”, which didn’t sound like what I remembered, but what did I know?  As we drove closer I tried to tell the driver to take a right turn.  “Tadadhii!  Tadashii!” I said.  The driver turned around and saw my hand gestures and turned right.  Same with the next right turn (they happened to be all right turns).  We eventually made it home, or close enough to get to our apartment with our shopping bags.  It was only after I got home that I ran across the translation “migi” for “right hand side”.  I was either telling the driver “Correct!  Correct!” or perhaps telling him that he was a Righteous cab driver.  Or perhaps that I thought my rights were being violated.  I guess it could have been worse.

We decided to explore a bit and try a new restaurant that is just a short walk from the university.  It’s a Japanese place next to a car dealership (Di took some photos of the cute little cars there).  The restaurant has these great menus with pictures of the food as well as wax models of the food out front.  And a good kids menu.  And there is a Yoshinoya right next door if we decide to go casual next time.  Some of the best Japanese food we’ve had in Japan (but not quite as good a Mushishino :^).  On the way back to the University we stopped at a Family Mart, a very clean and very organized little convenience store.  Diane kept taking pictures of things like the exotic ice cream flavors (muscat?  And what is “Japanese Classic”?).  I was there to pay our power bill, something you can do at any convenience store in Japan.  Afterwards, Diane and the kids went back up the hill but stopped at a neighbor’s garden.  They have this big Edward-Scissorhands style duck topiary that the kids really like. Then it was back to the playground.

Right where the bus drops off just behind the University, by the rice fields, is a grove of trees on some sort of hill.  It is tucked away behind some houses, so we had gone past this site many time without noticing the steps and the temple gate.  So one day before lunch we decided to have a look.  There were some huge and noisy birds that almost kept us from going up the stairs.  But at the top was a big open area shaded by huge trees and a small temple at the end.  It was maybe 10 degrees cooler there, too.  I asked a professor I know about this place and he thinks it may be over 1000 years old.  I also asked about the hill, since it seems out of place on the flat rice fields.  He thinks it may be man-made, but he wasn’t sure.  Such temples seem to dot the landscape here.  I did see a carving of a bird on one of the stones.  Perhaps this place has been guarded by birds for a long time.  After our visit to the temple, we walked the block of so down the road and had lunch at the university cafeteria.

We did another trip downtown this weekend to do a little more sightseeing.  Of course, we had to stop by the Saty department store for Hello Kitty popcorn.  But the elaborate machine broke, taking our 200 Yen (approx $2).  After some repairs, we got our popcorn and were on our way.  For lunch we went to a place called Yoshinoya, which is supposed to be the equivalent of McDonald’s in Japan.  But that is not a good comparison.  The food is brought out to you and is mostly rice bowls.  I’ll be back.  In fact, I found another one between home and the university.  Best of all, the kids loved it, too.  Perhaps the best part of the day was finding the small used kimono shop.  All sorts of kimonos and yakuta, many silk.  Next we went to the Medicinal and Herb Gardens, which have been at this site since the 1600s.  It was impressive.  We fed some of the largest koi I’ve ever seen in the pond, then went to this little house on an island.  It’s hard to describe how beautiful it was, but I did take a bunch of pictures.  Everywhere you looked was something interesting.  Like these mushrooms growing on a live pine tree (what are those, Bud? :^)  At the end of the roll are a few of us modeling our new used kimonos.  Oh, one pic of another interestingly named product:  Fine Aroma bread.

Some pics by Diane.  First, the Friday Yakatori Man in the red van.  He’s very popular around here.  It’s become our regular dinner on Friday nights.  On Fridays, Diane, Sarah and Zack take the bus from Matsunaga and meet me for lunch at Gnocchi Gnocchi, a surprisingly good little Italian place across the street from the University.  After lunch, I go back to work and Diane, Sarah and Zach take the bus to the train station and walk over the the Saty department store to get ice cream and shop.  Of course, a stop at Saty always involves visiting one of the talking Hello Kitty popcorn machines.

This group of pictures starts with my walk to work through the rice fields and past what appears to be a turtle crossing.   For lunch I met Diane, Sarah and Zach at this great little pond and garden on the edge of campus.  Then on the way back to campus, we saw a mother duck and a dozen of so babies in the reflecting pool in front on the library.  There is also some pics of Sarah and Zach’s new friends and Diane cooking in our little kitchen.

No pics today.  The rainy season seems to have officially started last night.  I was told by a colleague on the bus (a native of Japan) that it rains the entire month of June.  I pointed out that it was already June 15th and the weather has been fine.  He just smiled. Such is communication here sometimes.   But the rain let up mid-morning and I see some blue sky.  So we’ll see about this ‘rainy season’ stuff.   But the idea of being inside a small apartment with the kids for a month is terrifying (and probably more so for Diane).

I’ve also been looking for restaurants near here with Google Maps.  Actually found a small restuarant just around the corner in Matsunaga after being informed by everyone that there were no restaurants here.  No telling what it’s like, but I’m sure we’ll check it out.  I also found a pizza place near the train station called Pizza-La.  Check out those toppings!  They claim the $30 ‘reasonably priced’ snow crab pizza with crab sauce is ‘popular among kids!’.  We’ll have to check that one out, too.  And found a bunch more places further in town via Google Maps Japan.  For some fun, run some of these web sites through Google Translator.  Our local restaurant seems to be called ‘Hitting Castle’ and features a dish called ‘cooling fox’.

Sunday we decided to see more of Aizu.  So we went down to the train station and talked to our good friends at the Tourist Information booth.  We decided to take the Town Bus to the center of town to shop on Noguchi Street (named for the Nobel Prize winning doctor from Aizu).  Another neat temple was just next to the Nakago department store.  Then just past the castle is a reproduction of a Samurai house.  It wasn’t expecting much, but it turned out to be pretty cool (as you can tell by the number of picture I took).