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| Asami, Ohta, Tom and Matt |
Today we had been invited to Kobe to have an early dinner with the Moriwakis. We decided to get our usual train into Kobe and do some shopping (still on the look out for clothes for Tom and Matt) before heading up to Rokkomichi and Hiromi's apartment.
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| On the train |
Since we have been in Japan, Asami, an old student of Matt's had got in touch via Facebook - turns out that she lives in Shin Kobe. Matt quickly got in touch with her yesterday to see if she would be free to meet up today - she was (if her baby wasn't asleep). We got there and there she was, so we had a coffee with her and her 15 month old son, Ohta. Both mother and baby were really nice. Actually Ohta was an absolute gem - he was very happy to be handled by someone else and very generous with his waves and smiles. Asami was also lovely and her English really really good, all of which lead to a very pleasant morning. We had a coffee and then Asami led us to a child friendly part of a shopping mall - complete with a train to climb on, a slide and many electronic sit-on games, including a shinkansen that moved round a track. Both boys were in their element and enjoyed themselves. They even had a go on the Shinkansen - Tom driving with Asami and Ohta behind him. It was all smiles and giggles and we were sorry when we had to say goodbye.
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| On board the shinkansen |
We headed into Sannomiya (the central shopping district of Kobe) via the underground (it was raining today) and walked down a covered shopping street looking out for kiddies clothes shops. Other than Gap Kids (very little in his size plus we have Gap at home) and a mega expensive store where t-shirts were £50 each, we drew a blank. Oh well, we decided to go for a quick small lunch instead so headed to Osho (one of Matt's old favourite fast food restaurants) for Gyoza and tempura ebi. We then headed to Motomachi station and got the train up to Rokkomichi.
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| Asleep on a futon |
We had a look round the station area at Rokkomichi, but once again couldn't find any children's clothes stores - where on earth do people buy their children clothes? We gave up and got the bus to Hiromi's apartment. When we got there, Tom went completely nuts - full of life and very very excited to see Hiromi and Kyoko. He was literally bouncing around. Hiromi had got out a small futon for Tom so he could have a lie down there. There was no way he was going to calm down and sleep, but when we asked him if he wanted a sleep, he said yes. We were all shocked. So we lay out the futon, got his nee-naw and music box and left him to it. He slept! (I will never fully understand him!)
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| Lots of tickles |
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| A pile of loonies |
After about 1.5 hours he woke up happy and joined us round the table, and Hiromi prepared Shabu Shabu - this was at my request - she asked me what Japanese food I wanted her to cook me and I remembered she made this for us once before and loved it. Basically you have a pot of boiling water in the middle of the table and cook things in it: pork, tofu, mizuna, Chinese leaves, noodles etc. Nothing takes long to cook as it is all chopped or sliced thinly. You then dip the food in either sesame sauce or a vinegary soy sauce. It is really tasty and pretty healthy too.
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| The madness continues |
Tom seemed to like it all as well - eating everything he was given until he got into trouble with some noodles (the noodles were made from potato and were hard to bite through) which put him off for a while, but he did get back into it and enjoyed himself. I was so pleased as he ate really badly when we saw Hiromi last weekend. One by one we filled up until we were all bursting at the seams. Tom had another little incident where he bumped his cheek against a chair, not to worry though, he was given one of Hiromi's special ice creams and then he was fine. We were then treated to a slice of one of Kyoko's chocolate brownies before admitting defeat and calling it a day. Oh, and during the meal Tom learnt 2 new words: delicious and oishii (same word in two different languages). If we stayed here much longer I think he would pick up the language no problem.
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| Touch your nose... |
Tom, fired up with food, then went completely loopy, as did Kyoko! She had been pretending she was a dog throughout dinner and now Tom wanted to play with the dog. Let's just say it was very mad for a good half hour. I'm not sure who was worse, Hiromi joined in the madness too!
Just then we noticed the time, it was 6.30! How on earth had that happened? We had been there over 4 hours - it felt like 2! We had to say hasty goodbyes and get the bus back to the station and then 2 trains to Nishi Akashi and the Shinkansen home. Tom went straight to bed.
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| Happy days |
Thanks so much to Hiromi and Kyoko (or He-moaney and Kyo-keyo as Tom calls them) we all had a really lovely time with you, we think Tom will definitely remember you. Please do contact us next time you are in England x
Off to Kyushu for a night tomorrow, so it may be Thursday before there's another blog post.
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