Jan. 14, 2012 - First swim meet and Kim

Today we really missed having a car.  We haven't missed it too much up to now, even when lugging multiple bags of groceries home (okay, maybe we miss it then).  But today, we really missed it.  Greer had a swim meet at ASIJ this morning, and she was supposed to be there at 8:00 am.  Now our swim buddies in Houston are thinking, "What's the problem?  That seems like a pretty late arrival time to us."  Yes, and we would agree, if we had a car.  If we had a car, it would be just over a 30-minute drive to school.  But without the car.....  If you read Tuesday's post, you know it took Greer and me over two hours to make it to school.  Now, luckily, we figured out all the pitfalls that day, thus enabling us to leave the house only an hour and a half before we needed to be at school.  Definitely, we were missing our car as we headed out the door at 6:30 am.

If anybody was wondering what the trains were like early on a Saturday morning, they are still crowded.  We left our house shortly after 6:30, so it was well before 7:00 am when we caught our first train (of three).  The train was crowded enough that none of the four of us had seats.  We tried to unobtrusively take a picture, but it didn't work.  It's so quiet on the trains (all the time) that the click of the camera is too obvious.

Our first meet was a short one.  Normally the meets are middle school and high school together.  But this weekend our high school team was away in the Philippines at a meet, so it was just middle school.  The meet actually took less time than our travel there and back.  (I don't know if that says more about the length of the meet, or more about our travel time.)  However, my understanding is that we are in for a much longer day next Saturday.

Greer doesn't pick what she swims in the meets; the coach picks the races for every swimmer.  He can enter only 4 swimmers in each event who will be swimming for points, but he can enter other swimmers as exhibition swimmers.  Earlier in the week, he did not know if he would be putting Greer on any relay teams, but she ended up swimming butterfly on the C medley team.  The Mustangs also fielded 6 relay teams for the freestyle relay, and Greer swam on the C team there as well.

Our swim team buddies from Houston (both Stingrays and ESA) would be surprised by how differently these meets are run.  There were no heat sheets.  We did not know the order of events or even what events there were.  Greer's individual events were the 100 IM, the 50 fly, and the 100 backstroke, but we don't know if those were all exhibition events (she is just in 6th grade, after all), or if she was swimming for points in any of those.  Greer kept coming to us to ask us questions, and we kept pointing out to her that of all the people in the swimming pool area, we probably knew less than anybody else. 

We do know that she looked good and had some good times (compared to her Houston times), though we haven't seen any overall results.  I don't think we should be looking for results to be posted to the website.  Probably the coach just has them handwritten somewhere.  (Drew says I'm exaggerating; the results are definitely in the computer; they just must be top-secret.)

Here are some pictures from the meet:

Team suits were ordered back when the season started in December, so we weren't able to get her one of those, but we were able to get her a Mustangs swim cap.  I should have taken some pictures of Cooper playing on his iPhone, but trying to remember to look up and cheer his sister when it was her turn to swim.

Today we also got to see Drew's old friend Kim Choate.  Kim and Drew were in the same research group in graduate school (Kim was a few years ahead of Drew), and he and Drew have been friends since.  After graduation, Kim got a job with GE, and eventually he was transferred to Japan.  He lived in Tokyo for 7 or 8 years, a few of them not too far from where our apartment is.  He and his wife have been back in the States for a number of years now, but he just happened to be in the area on a business trip.  He came out to ASIJ during the swim meet and got to see a few of Greer's races.  The three of us thought it was funny that he had to come all the way to Japan to see Greer swim.

After the meet, we headed back to our apartment.  At our subway station, Kim showed us a grocery store down a side street on the other side of the station, which gives us an option besides the store in the station itself.  Greer showered, we showed Kim our place, and then we headed out for a late lunch.  Kim took us to Kua 'Aina (pronounced “Koo-a eye-na”).  This restaurant originated in Hawaii, but now there are several in Tokyo.  We thought the burgers were yummy! 

We then spent the rest of the day walking around Shibuya with Kim while he pointed out various stores and gave us tips on the area.  It definitely would be handy if he still lived around here.  By 8:00 Greer and Cooper were dragging (the day had started quite early, and they'd been on the go for all of it).  I took them back the apartment while Drew and Kim went out to dinner.  They went to a Korean barbecue place, which we'll tell you about when the whole family has a chance to go.

Jan.12, 2012 - Maybe I'd rather walk

Today I was meeting a group of Exxon spouses at Viron (basically a French bakery with lots of high-calorie bread) near the Shibuya station.  We were meeting at 9:30 at the restaurant, so somebody suggested we meet near the statue of Hachiko by exit 6 (the subway stations have numerous exits) at 9:15 and walk there together.  There were about 8 of us going, and half are new to Tokyo, while the other half arrived in August/September.  It's handy to have a group of people you can go to with questions. 

I walked to my subway station and joined the already sizable crowd waiting on the subway platform.  I thought the size of the crowd meant that the subway must be coming soon.  However, while I'm sure it did come pretty soon after I arrived, by the that time, the crowd had more than doubled, possibly tripled.  Our station is station #1 on the Chiyoda line, so sometimes trains are empty when they pull in, and sometimes they're coming in from the suburbs and may already have a lot of people.  (We haven't figured out how to tell which is coming when yet.)  The particular train I got that morning was empty, so we all managed to fit on.  I was towards the front of the crowd, so I actually got a seat.  However, once everybody was on the train, it seemed way too claustrophobic in a seat, so I got up and moved back toward the door.  Increasing the claustrophobic feeling on a crowded train is that the trains always seem so warm.  Two stops later it was time for me to push my way out.  A small number of people exited the train when I did, but a much larger number of people took our places.  When I looked back at the train, I couldn't believe how crowded it seemed.  I wish I had thought to take a picture.  I saw one of the subway workers with the white gloves who help to push commuters onto crowded trains on the platform.  I don't know if he actually had to do any pushing this time because I didn't see him in action.  May I never be on a train that is having more people pushed onto it.  I had to take one more train to reach Shibuya station.  The train I got on was crowded, but not totally unbearable.  When I exited, again more people got on the train than got off.  I wasn't going all the way to the center of Tokyo, which helped.  My understanding is that the morning "rush hour" on the trains is from about 7:30 am to 9:30 am.  Trains are crowded at most other times, but "rush hour" brings it to a whole new level.  I really did not like riding on the train when it was that crowded.  Next time I'm going to check how far it is and think about walking.  Of course, that opens up so many more possibilities for getting lost.

If you've read other entries about finding things, then it should come as no surprise that I was unable to find the statue of Hachiko.  Here's a picture of Hachiko (that I took later):

For one thing, it would have helped if I had googled Hachiko ahead of time so that I would have known what I was looking for.  Hachiko was a faithful Akita who met his owner at the station after work every day, and he continued going to the station and waiting every day for years after the owner had died.   The Hachiko exit is a popular meeting spot.  Unfortunately for me, the Hachiko exit is NOT exit 6, hence my difficulty.  (Somehow, the rest of the group was already familiar with Hachiko and so weren't thrown off by the wrong exit.) 

However, I did eventually find my way to Viron and met up with the group.  I enjoyed my high-calorie bread, yet another reason it would have been better to walk than take the train.

Speaking of high-calorie items, we had another Domino's night.  We had received this coupon with a previous order:

(Remember, we do our ordering online to avoid the language barrier.) Drew actually figured out how to redeem the coupon! It was worth 1,000 yen off our order! (He wanted to make sure I included this in the blog.)


Greer had her A day today and wanted to write about it:
Hi! Today I had an A day (You learned about it in yesterday's post) and my first day in P. E. and Science. My P.E. teacher, Mrs.Vriend (Pronounced Mrs.Friend), had us play field hockey which I found I was very good at compared to the other boys and girls. After P.E. I had science with Mr.Hoskins who is strict but has a very joking manner. Example, he said, "If you don't answer this question right, I will personally move you back to the third grade!" Of course he was joking.
After Science I had lunch! I was famished. Zoe and I met at the 2nd pillar before the luch doors (Yes, we already meet somewhere so we can make sure we know where each other is sitting). We both got spaghetti after I helped her buy lunch tickets. Then we went to the Kiosk together to get a frozen treat. While we were eating it., we went to our lockers and got our backpacks with 15 minutes to spare. Then we headed to LA/SS where we talked to Mrs.Erwin about our personal assignment. And guess what? She is already mine and Zoe's favorite teacher! After that, it was the usual study center then a swim practice. At swim (which is very easy, by the way) we don't have a specific time to complete the set in and there are basically no sets. Very lax compared to ESA (my competitive year around swim team in Houston). We only did 25s, 50s, and the occasional 100. I know, Grace! A real shocker! I still can't get over how easy it is. Oh, by the way, I still don't know my way home. :(


Japanese word of the day:  asagohan  (click to hear pronunciation) means "breakfast"

Jan. 11, 2012 - Greer's first day

Greer's going to write about her first day of school, but first, I'll share a picture from my trip to the grocery store today.

I don't know if you can see the labels in the picture clearly enough.  Have I found the oils, the vinegars, or neither?  I wish I knew.....

    

     Hi! I am going to tell you about my first day. . . So at 6 o'clock, we woke up got ready for the day and all that. I know that some of you would dislike your mom or dad walking you to your bus stop everyday for the first week, but without them, I would need to start walking to my bus stop at 5:30 in order to find my way! After boarding the 30 minute bus ride I fiddled around with my iphone. When I arrived at school, I had no idea how to get to the office from the buses. So, I asked a nice 7th grader named Alice if she could help me find my way. After I arrived at the office, Zoe and I got our schedules printed. Zoe is a new kid like me and I could tell we were going to be friends right away!

We walked together to our homerooms and then departed. Some nice kid named Diva in my Home room walked me to beginners band after home room. Mr.Wanless, my band teacher, made me feel right at home. Lucky for me, I knew two of the percussionists, Connor (my peer guide) and Julie (someone on my swim team). They helped me with the xylophone, but guess what? It is set up exactly like a piano so it was very easy to learn. After that I had art! Yeah! We worked on drawing Mona Lisa upside down and working on twine figures. Since me and Zoe had art together, we headed off to Mrs. Harvey's class for math. We worked on average . . . wait, she did not tell us specifically what we were working on. She just told us write about average. As we were going over it, it sounded like maybe clothing size. After math we had lunch (finally)! Instead of a lunch account, you use lunch tickets which you can purchase from a machine at the kiosk. Steps to getting your lunch:

     1. Grab a tray and silver ware.

     2. Tell the lunch lady what you want (Spaghetti, soup, chicken nuggets, clementine, etc.)

     3. When she hands you food, pay with a lunch ticket. Usually a 550 ticket is best so you can get a main meal and side/fruit with one ticket and you don't get change or you don't have to pay with multiple tickets.

     4. Eat lunch

     5. Put your tray in a stack, scrape your left overs into food trash, pile up your plates.

After lunch, we had LA/SS (Language Arts and Social Studies) with Mrs.Erwin. So far, mine and Zoe's favorite teacher is Mrs.Erwin! She is sooooooo nice and made sure we understood everything and she told us about stuff we would be doing! She got us started on DLR's and weekly vocab. Since Zoe and I did not know how to do much on the computer, she sent us down to Mr.Erwin and Mrs.Kim (Technology teachers) to learn more about how to use our computers (by the way, we get pcs this year and next year we get macs). After LA/SS, I went to study center and typing skills to improve my typing. After last period, I boarded the bus home.

     Some of you might have some questions so I am going to try to answer some possible questions.

Math, LA/SS, and Science have 2 periods each.

I did not have science or P.E. today because there are 2 different types of days, a A day and a B day.

Every day I have LA/SS.

There is a late bus which I take on days I have swim practice.

And no, I still can't find my way to the bus stop.

Japanese word of the day:  hirugohan  (click to hear pronunciation) means "lunch"

Jan. 10, 2012 - Where's the school again?

Today Greer got to sleep in.  Cooper, of course, said that was not fair.  She doesn't start classes until Wednesday.  I walked Cooper to the bus stop and then at 7:30 woke Greer up.  She had requested the wake-up so that maybe she could call a few of her friends.  After waking her up (and having a conversation with her), I went about my business.  Finally saw her when the phone rang a little before 9:00 (her counselor with the good news about band).  She'd gone back to sleep and didn't even remember talking to me.

Although she didn't have classes, there were swim team pictures today, for which she wanted to be there.  That meant she and I had to take the train to her school, unless we wanted to take the bus at 7:08 and hang out at school the entire day.  In retrospect, that may have been the better plan. 

She and I hung out at the apartment for the morning, playing Words with Friends against each other (and friends from the U.S.).  We had been told by somebody in Admissions who lives near us to allow an hour and 20 minutes to get there by train (as opposed to the 30+ minutes on the school bus).  School dismisses at 2:37, so Greer and I planned to leave the apartment at 12:30, after lunch.  Over 2 hours - should be plenty of time, right?  Not quite.

We left the apartment on time and walked to our station.  Took the subway to Shinjuku station, where we had to change to a rapid train.  Here is where we made our first mistake.  I thought I was pretty careful about which train we boarded, but I guess I wasn't careful enough.  I realized the possibility we were on the wrong train when I heard them call the station before ours.  Hmm, had we made enough stops up to that point?  But I couldn't be sure until the next stop, which was four stops after the one we had wanted.  Yep, we'd gotten on TOO rapid of a train.  Greer thought maybe we could walk back to the correct station.  (I gave her the short answer - No.)  We found the correct platform for the train to take us back to the station we wanted, but before we boarded, I asked various strangers if they spoke English so I could double-check.  Yes, we were in the right place.  Got off at the right station, exited that line, found the next line to take, boarded the right train, got off at the right place.  Here is where we made our second and more time-consuming mistake.  The map provided by the school tells you to cross the train tracks and turn left at a fruit stand.  In the process of exiting the station, we crossed the tracks.  As we exited, we saw a fruit stand in front of us, so we turned left and tried to follow the map.  Well, after walking about 10 minutes (it's supposed to be less than a 10-minute walk), we realized something was wrong.  Turns out that crossing the tracks while exiting the station was not the crossing the tracks that was meant on the map.  We were supposed to exit the station and then RE-cross the tracks.  There was another fruit stand at that point that was the one intended on the map.  I do not think this was solely the fault of the mapreaders.  I believe the mapmakers share some of the blame here.  Anyway, by way of asking various strangers where Tama Station was (they didn't speak English, so they didn't understand my question about American School in Japan, but they understood enough to point us in the direction of Tama station), and by Greer figuring out how to use the map on her iPhone, we eventually found the school, after turning a 10-minute walk into a 40-minute walk.  Greer made it to swim practice and pictures and I made it to Cooper's classroom, albeit somewhat breathlessly, just as it turned 2:37.  (I had been afraid he would forget I was coming and would get on the regular bus instead of waiting with us for the late bus.)  Hey, at least now we know the way!

I realized that the problems with Greer's schedule kept me from talking much about Cooper's first day.  So today I tried to get him to share some things to include in the blog.  First, he's made some friends: Harry, who's also new, Matthew, who rides our bus, and Sean.  Today was his first day of Japanese class (he'll have it every other day).  When I asked him about it, his answer was, "She said a lot of words I didn't understand."  Informative, isn't he?  For homework, he has to go to her website and listen to two songs (while reading the lyrics) several times; one song has various greetings and the other song is the months of the year.  His new school has more recess time than SWE, which he definitely liked.  He has a long recess after lunch and two other shorter recesses.


Cooper's picking the word of the day today, from his Japanese homework.
Japanese word of the day:  Ichigatsu  (click to hear pronunciation) means "January"

Jan. 9, 2012 - First Day of School

Today was our first day at the American School in Japan.  Earlier start than the kids are used to - their bus picks them up at 7:08.  All students at ASIJ, elementary, middle, and high, have the same start and end times and ride the same bus.  The same bus thing was handy since our across-the-way neighbor is a ninth grader at ASIJ and walked with us to the bus stop this morning.  Drew and I rode the bus with the kids to attend the New Family Orientation.  Greer and Cooper sat down together, but the seats were a little small for me and Drew to share, so we made them split up and each one sit with one of us.  So embarrassing - to have to sit with your parent!
As soon as we got to school, Cooper was whisked off to his classroom.  We didn't realize we could go with him, so we had to wait until later in the day to meet his teacher.  Then they gathered the middle school students together and took them off for a technology orientation - they give them laptops for schoolwork.  I'm not sure what happened with the high school students - I wasn't really paying attention to them.  Then our orientation started.  We met lots of people, there was lots of talking (transportation, health center, activities, etc.)  We got to meet the principals of the various divisions as well as the other new parents.  We had invidual appointments with the kids' counselors.  These appointments were scheduled throughout the day, so depending on when your appointment(s) were, you might miss other stuff.  For example, we missed the president of the PTA talking, but that was okay since I'm NOT volunteering this year. :)

The appointment with Cooper's counselor went smoothly, but after all, it's elementary school.  He wasn't with us since he was in his class for a regular day of school today.  Greer's appointment did not go as well.  She was with us since she doesn't start classes until Wednesday (they need Tuesday to get all the middle-schoolers' schedules ready).  She was with us for part of the day and the other part of the day she was with peer helpers or at the tech orientation or getting her locker or something similar.  We got two disappointing pieces of news during the appointment.  First, the kids in 6th grade strings have a year playing their instruments before they start 6th grade strings.  Greer was going to meet with the strings teacher later in the day, but it didn't sound promising for her continuing the cello at school since she didn't start until this current school year.  Second, and this was the big one, they weren't going to be able to place her in a Japanese class.  We thought they would do some kind of mid-year accommodation for their new students, but they only do that in elementary school.  So she will not be able to take Japanese at school until next year.  Of the four of us, she was the most excited to learn and she knows the most words already.

Now, for how we dealt with those two disappointments.  Greer did meet with the cello teacher and when she looked at the music they were working on, she decided it was much harder than what she'd been doing.  They have to take a music class, and the other choices were band and choir.  She definitely did not want to do choir, so she chose percussion in band.  She figured it would help with piano.  However, then we were told by the counselor that there'd probably be a problem since the kids had already been playing their instruments for several months.  She knew how upset Greer was and she promised she would talk to the band teacher.  She called us with the good news the following morning - the band teacher was happy to have her and said the other percussion students would help her catch up.  The strings teacher was also willing to have her if we would be getting private lessons for her.  However, Greer decided that was a lot of pressure, so she chose band.  She still wants to get cello lessons so that she can join strings next year at school.  As for Japanese, we're going to be following up with Exxon to see if we can arrange some lessons for Greer.  We're pretty sure it's going to work out.

On a positive note, Greer joined the middle school swim team.  We didn't know if she'd be able to join since their season started the beginning of December, but she met with the swim coach at some point during the day.  He was happy to be getting a good backstroker and invited her to practice after school that day.  We all went (and Cooper didn't even complain much since he had his iPhone :) ).  She hasn't been swimming since the end of November, but she did well!  They have a meet this Saturday, and the coach is definitely going to have her swim backstroke.  She's happy to be able to swim for her school!

ASIJ runs late buses with modified routes to accommodate after-school activities.  So the four of us caught the late bus at 4:30 and got off at the stop we'd been told.  Now this was of course not the stop where we'd caught the bus this morning, and we had only a general idea of the direction of our apartment.  But after much fiddling around with iPhones, we were able to map out a route home and made it safely there a mere 2 hours later (just kidding).


Japanese word of the day:  gakko  (click to hear pronunciation) means "school"
I also saw the spellings "gakkou," "gakkoo," and "gakou."  Maybe all are acceptable since the Japanese word would actually consist of characters (which I'm still pretty far from learning).  Despite the uncertainty, Greer and I felt strongly that "school" needed to be the word of the day.  Once we start lessons, we'll have somebody to consult. :)

Jan. 7, 2012 - Target!

Yep, we found Target.  Well, eventually we found Target.  It's not exactly Target, but it'll do.  It's missing some of Target's stuff and some of Target's selection, but it has a lot of stuff Target doesn't have.  When we had been with the TGA person on apartment move-in day, she pointed out a store called Tokyu Hands.  From her description, it sounded like a good store to know.  Here's a link to the floor guide of the Shibuya Tokyu Hands so you can see what I mean.

But before we headed out to the store, today was the day our air shipment came!  It was almost like Christmas!  We didn't remember what we had packed in those four boxes, but there were definitely some things we were hoping for.  Maybe we'd put shower curtains in there?  Maybe more hangers?  Maybe Drew's bolster (that he puts under his legs when sleeping to help his back)?  What other useful items might we have put in there?.......  Turns out not much.  I don't think we did a particularly good job packing for this move.  Might have something to do with the short amount of time we did it in.

Headed out after lunch (where we ate our noodle soup bowls from Softbank, using our chopsticks from Softbank - definitely made it seem like we got the cell phones at a discount :) ) to find Tokyu Hands.  A picture of Greer and Cooper eating their lunch, practicing with their chopsticks:

Shibuya, besides being the name of our ward, is also the name of the shopping district around Shibuya Station.  We didn't know exactly where Tokyu Hands was located, just that it was in the Shibuya shopping district.  We took the subway to Shibuya station and then Drew whipped out his new iPhone to try out the GPS.  Seemed like a good idea, but the iPhone did not want us to go in the direction I wanted us to head.  Now, I'm somewhat directionally challenged and I'm not much of a shopper, so Drew had no reason to go in my direction.  But I think I really wanted to find this store.  After using the GPS for quite awhile, going pretty far from Shibuya station, going in some circles, finally deciding the pin we were searching for was probably some office for Tokyu Hands, we went in the direction I wanted to go.  And we found it!  I have to tease Drew a little here since it's not very often my sense of direction is better than his.  But of course, he wasn't really using his sense of direction.  He was using his iPhone.  Remember, it's just a tool. :)   (And I won't mention the first time we went to the grocery store, when Drew had us going the wrong way and I got us back on track.)

We didn't find everything we were looking for, but we found a lot of it, like a shower curtain, more hangers, and a bolster for Drew (you know, those items we were hoping were in the air shipment :) ).  We managed to spend a lot of yen.  Definitely a handy store to which I will return.  Again, the kids were real troupers.  No complaining while we searched and searched for the store.  And while we were in the store, investigating several, though not all, of its departments, only mild complaining.  And we didn't even end up buying anything specifically for them - but Greer does have her eye on a number of items.

Japanese word of the day:  mise  (click to hear pronunciation) means "shop/store"

Jan. 6, 2012 - Are we sure we really want cell phones?

Two language barrier issues from the previous days:  On Wednesday, when we were at Joypolis, the first activity/ride Cooper picked was virtual reality hang-gliding.  As we got close to the front of the line, one of the operators checked if we needed the English instructions.  We read those and were ready to go.  However, when Cooper and Greer got on, the ride operator, who was talking just to them and was the one who had given us the English sheet, went through her whole regular spiel in Japanese, asking "okay?" at the end.  The ride operator for me and Drew just showed us where the emergency stop button was and then asked "okay?"  The second instance was all about avoiding the barrier.  You may have wondered how we managed to order from Domino's the previous night.  Online ordering!

We have a lot of shopping ahead of us today.  There's the grocery store, cell phones, and what I think might be the Japanese Target (that would be a KEY discovery).  Since I'm writing this at the end of the day, here's a spoiler alert: that was too long of a list.  Who knew?

First we were delayed by the light bulb guy.  We had no idea he was coming this morning.  When we did the apartment inspection yesterday, we pointed out a few light bulbs that needed changing (seemed reasonable to have all working light bulbs at move-in time).  When he came this morning, we had a few others to point out to him that we had since noticed.  Unfortunately, he and Drew were unable to communicate.  He didn't speak any English, and Drew's list of Japanese words is smaller, I think, than the list of our words of the day to this point.  They ended up calling the apartment management company to interpret.  By the time we were ready to head out, it was lunchtime, yet another delay.  If we only didn't have to eat.

Finally, the grocery store.  THIS IS GOING TO BE A CHALLENGE.  The produce section I could handle.  I knew what most of the stuff was.  Even if I didn't know what it was (and there were a lot of vegetables I didn't know - but that's true at a U.S. store for me, too), I AT LEAST knew it was a vegetable.  For the rest of the store, I didn't know what a lot of stuff was OR what I was supposed to do with it.  Greer brought me a packet of something she wanted to make.  I told her that was great, but I couldn't read the directions.  I have a little cheat sheet from TGA with the Japanese characters for some grocery shopping words, which helped some.  I needed some detergent for washing dishes and for the dishwasher.  I had the characters for "washing dishes" and "for the dishwasher," but there were lots of other characters in the string on the packaging.  So I THINK I bought the two detergents I needed, but maybe it said "this detergent is for anything BUT the dishwasher."  I know what milk I'm buying.  This is a picture of my brand:

Maybe it's the worst milk in the store, but at least I can see that I bought lowfat milk and nonfat milk.  I think Cooper's out of luck on lactose-free milk.  Maybe he's outgrown his lactose intolerance.  We're going to be testing that.  Otherwise, I guess it's soy milk for him.  If I can figure out which one the soy milk is.  I asked Whitney, the Exxon wife I met last week, what she cooked for dinner.  She said she cooked all the same stuff she cooked in the U.S.  Maybe she does a lot of shopping at the international market?  Or maybe she's better at figuring out things that are close in the grocery store?  It's not just a question of figuring out the packaging so I can buy similar stuff to what I bought in the U.S.  The similar stuff, as far as I can tell, just isn't there.  I have no idea what I'm going to cook for dinner.  I suppose it would help if I were more of a cook.  Finally, we were ready to check out.  As the cashier rang up our items, I loaded them into our backpacks and other shopping bags.  We paid her the total, 16, 202 yen, which is fewer groceries than you might think.  She was getting ready to finalize the sale when she realized she was about to overcharge us.  She was VERY apologetic as she handed us back 2 yen, which, as near as we could tell, was a rebate for using our own bags.  Hmm, 2 yen.  Several more trips to the grocery store using my own bags and I could buy....nothing. :)   Then it was time for the hike home.  Here's a picture of us in front of our apartment door:

Unloaded the groceries, and it was time to head back out, this time for cell phones.  The kids have been asking, pretty much since we arrived in Tokyo, when they were getting their cell phones.  Also, what kind of phone were they getting?  Asking non-stop, the way kids do (at least, the way my two persistent children do, ALL THE TIME).  From the time we arrived at the store to the time we left with our phones was a total of over 4 hours!  I KNEW we didn't want new cell phones. :)   First, we had to wait for an English-speaking staff person (we had gone to a branch of SoftBank that we knew had English-speaking staff people).  While we waited, Drew, Greer, and Cooper played with the iPhones on display:

I read my book and started mourning my old phone.  Greer asked if I checked to see if a museum would want it.  Then we met with the staff person and decided what phones we were getting, etc.  Greer wants me to be sure to point out that the phones are iPhone 4S's.  He said he would try to get another person to assist him, but that he would try to work very quickly and have the phones ready in an hour and a half (!).  Exactly how good were my kids capable of being?  I made sure Drew had the papers he needed and the kids and I headed out the door and down Omotesandō street.  Most of the stores on this street were not for us (Chanel, Dior, etc, though there was also a GAP), but there was a souvenir shop with its building in the shape of a pagoda that was perfect for us.  Finally, the kids were allowed to spend some money.  Cooper picked a letter opener that was a mini ninja sword and Greer picked a fan with a tiger on it.  After spending considerable time in the store, we headed back to check on Drew.  Still waiting..... So then the four of us went to dinner, and finally got an email during dessert that the phones were ready.  Headed back, but "ready" didn't mean "really ready."  It was still another 20-30 minutes before we were out the door.  After four hours shopping for cell phones, that was it for us.  Time to head home, though we did get some nice parting gifts (including four sets of chopsticks with their logo and four noodle soup bowls, which dramatically increased the number of our eating utensils and our store of food) from Softbank.

Japanese word of the day:  hashi  (click to hear pronunciation) means "chopsticks"