Hanging with the Paparazzi at Osaka Castle

We couldn't have asked for better weather during our trip to Osaka. Indeed, the weather was so darn fine that the Ancient Mariner agreed to stroll from Namba to Osaka Castle rather than ride the subway. We popped into the first bakery we passed to fortify ourselves for the five-kilometer hike.

The Tokugawa clan torched the original castle back in the 1600s to eliminate their competition but the city erected a replica watch tower on the vast castle grounds in the 1930s.  There's no charge to enter the grounds but we forked over 200 yen each to access a walled garden area.  This being the fallow period between azaleas and irises, the garden was a bit disappointing until we turned a corner and found ourselves surrounded by dozens of photographers.

The Ancient Mariner enters the ranks of the Japanese paparazzi

"What's on the other side of those hedges?" I asked.

"An old wooden building."

"Oooh. Maybe the Prime Minister is meeting secretly with the Chinese ambassador. Or, better yet, maybe Ken Watanabe is filming a new movie. Try to get closer to the building."

"Careful! You almost knocked over that baby in the hammock."

"That might be a hammock but it's not a baby. It's the biggest camera lens I've ever seen. It's at least five times bigger than my biggest lens."

"Don't even think about it. I've already picked out your Father's Day present."

After chuckling at our antics for a few minutes, a kind gentleman approached us, turned on his camera, and showed us a picture of what the paparazzi were tracking: a colorful Australian bird. Sheesh.

We never did catch a glimpse of that bird but the Ancient Mariner befriended several of its tiny cousins by tossing a few bread crumbs their way.

I seriously doubt we'll be taking up birdwatching in retirement. Stalking Ken Watanabe, however, is still on the list of potential hobbies.

No Need to Add Water or Fertilizer

Public art in Japan, at least the works that grab my attention, tend toward the whimsical. But then I've long favored that old-fashioned typewriter eraser in the Sculpture Garden in Washington, DC, even after my niece Mary made me feel extremely old by asking me what it was.

At any rate, here are a few of my favorite finds to keep you entertained until I get back from Osaka.

Even the bakers are infused with the Public Art spirit here

The caps are separate from the stems and wave gently with every passing breeze

Use a Wire and Eat a Cream Puff . . . or Three

You might think I'm a crafty lady -- the type who whips up a few quilt squares before breakfast and spends her evenings bent over the stove, stirring wood pulp into paper for one-of-a-kind scrapbook pages littered with charming stamped designs and painstaking calligraphy.

Nothing could be further from the truth, which is:  I can't even pronounce the name of the most popular craft store in this part of Japan, let alone do anything useful with most of its products.

Background
Ishii was practicing her English while helping me untangle a rat's nest of yarn a couple weeks back -- this was before I scored the wooden balls in Asakusabashi -- when my glance happened to fall on the kimekome ball I brought home from Tadodai House. ("Glance happened to fall" is my euphemism for what other English language "teachers" here call "lesson plans".)

"Where can I buy one of those two-headed knife tools to finish this second ball? Do they have them at Yuzawaya?" I thought it was a fairly simple question, really, but I'll be the first to admit my spoken sentences tend to be less complete than my written ones. Nouns, verbs, and punctuation marks appear in random order, assuming they appear at all.

Ishii reached across the yarn clump on her lap to pick up a little bundle of gold cord from the coffee table. "This is what you use to cover the seams," she replied. In careful and perfect English.

"I know THAT. But what about the knife tool? Yuzawaya?"

"No. This cord." She gave the little bundle of gold cord a gentle shake, like a patient young mother trying to interest a baby in a rattle or like my brother trying to bribe Mel with a doggie treat. Her face was tense with concentration.

We were down to nouns.

"Knife. Yoo-zah-why-yuh? Kamioooooooka?"

Her face muscles relaxed a bit. "Yoo-zah-why-yuh store?"  I nodded.

"Yes, I think they sell the knives at the Yuzawaya store in Kamiooka. I thought you wondered if you could 'use a wire' in place of the gold cord."

Placing equal stress on all syllables is particularly difficult for people prone to melodramatic inflection. Apparently.

The Field Trip

The Oakleaf knitters meet at my house most Monday mornings.  Cheryl coordinates both the Oakleaf knitters and the base knitting group.  I said, "Hey, Cheryl, let's take the knitters on a field trip to Yuzawaya in Kamiooka some Monday.  We can have lunch and try to find the cream puff shop."

About a dozen of us set off for Kamiooka last Monday morning.  About half were mainly interested in having lunch, five never turn down a chance to buy fabric and/or yarn, and one was looking for a knife tool she might someday use to apply fabric to kimekome balls.

All, it turned out, were interested in tracking down the cream puff shop.  They didn't care that I couldn't quite remember where the shop is located.  There's a lot to be said for friends who will follow you anywhere. 

Regrettably, I was too embarrassed to pull out my camera and snap a picture of the long line of gaijin women following me single-file around the perimeter of the Keikyu department store basement.  (The last time I saw such optimistic faces lined up like that was in the home movie my dad took as we filed down the stairs in age order on Christmas morning circa 1961.  It dawns on me that he must have been feeling a lot of pressure to please on that and other Christmas mornings.  Excuse me while I wallow in a puddle of belated empathy.)

How much pressure was I under?  Enough to ask three clerks for directions.  Yes, brothers and sis, you read that correctly:  I approached three perfect strangers and said "Beard Papa's?" in the most questioning and hopeful tone of voice I could muster.  (See 'melodramatic inflection', above.)  The third clerk actually understood English and was able to point us in the right direction.

Beard Papa's is located between the tobacco shop and department store entrance on the ground floor of the train station, just outside the turnstiles. So now you know and won't have to talk to strangers.

Beard Papa's offered five varieties of cream puff the day we visited:

1. Regular crust, custard filling.
2. Crust studded with brown sugar, custard filling.
3. Crunchy donut crust, custard filling.
4. Regular crust, chestnut filling.
5. Crust studded with brown sugar, chestnut filling.

Not sure I would like the chestnut filling, I settled for one each of the first three options, kicked myself for missing the pumpkin filling offered in October, and vowed to return in December to slake my flavor-of-the-month curiousity.

As I watched the clerks stuff cream puff after cream puff into boxes and sacks for my friends, the thought crossed my mind that Beard Papa's might want to offer me some sort of profit-sharing deal. This, alas, is what comes from cramming five and a half seasons of "The Sopranos" into eight weekends. Shame on me.

Lots of Japanese food service workers wear floor-length aprons. I hope they aren't planning to discard all those puff shell fragments on the tray in the right foreground. Thoughts like that make it hard for me to sleep at night.

(That clicking sound you hear is my sister desperately searching for bargain flights to Japan.)

(Almost) Too Cute to Eat

Reiko ushered me into a wonderful bakery in Kurihama after we hiked through Flower World. I was fixing dinner that night for a family with a new baby, so I decided to get the Hello Kitty and Pikachu buns for the older siblings. Not that I ever need an excuse to buy baked goods . . .

Matt polished off Totoro before I could dream up a way to ship it to Totoro's fans in Norfolk or Peoria. The baker makes cartoon character buns in every size imaginable. I'm searching for an excuse to order a 10" x 12" Totoro. Matt doesn't seem very enthused about a Totoro graduation party so maybe we'll have to plan a special homecoming celebration for the Ancient Mariner.

Yet the bakery was not the day's culinary highlight. That prize goes to the noodle shop in the Kurihama station where Reiko treated me to slurpy ramen, the freshest gyoza that's ever danced across my taste buds before melting in the back of my mouth, and a mango dessert with a pleasant texture somewhere between jello and pudding.

Between slurps, I quizzed Reiko on gyoza sauce. This was a self-serving conversation since the three miniscule sauce packets the department store clerk tucks into my box of gyoza in the department store basement do not begin to cover my 18 dumplings.

Reiko makes her own sauce from three ingredients: soy sauce, vinegar, and rayou. Rayou is a Chinese oil infused with chili peppers. Subsequently I learned that Dr. T dips his gyoza in a homemade sauce concocted from soy sauce, vinegar, and sesame oil.

I'll try making my own sauce soon but not before we polish off the bottled gyoza sauce Reiko found for us in a grocery store. The bottled sauce combines Reiko's recipe with Dr. T's. Yum.

On Zama By Train and Other Good Things

Three trains brought me within four blocks of the back entrance to Camp Zama less than ninety minutes after I left Yokosuka this morning. Since Camp Zama is a U.S. Army Base, and the U.S. Army can give the U.S. Air Force a run for your money when it comes to sprawl, I spent another thirty minutes hiking from the gate to the field where the track meet was being held. This was a good thing. That brisk hike helped me rationalize the sack of bakery products I'd picked up on my way through the train station.

There was ample time to admire the scenery (above), polish off 150 pages in my book, and add another foot to the scarf I'm knitting between Matt's three events: a relay at 9:30 am, the 800 at noon, and the 1500 just before the meet ended at 3:00 pm. I don't know his times but there were more kids behind him on the final stretch than there were at the beginning of each race. This is a good thing.



We don't have a track here in Yokosuka so we have to travel to all the meets. Camp Zama is the closest place Matt's team will compete but that still meant being on the team bus at 5:30 am and not getting home until at 8:00 pm. I can't say I blame him for not wanting to spend Sunday riding a tour bus to experience the Takao-san Fire Walking Ceremony with his mother.

In the Pink on Girls Day

Matt bounded out of bed this morning and survived a long day of classes, track practice, and play rehearsal. Overcome with relief, his mother made dinner for the second night in a row. Feel free to place a bet on how long this dinner streak will last. Cooking is not nearly as addictive as knitting socks.

Speaking of which, those madcap Knitwits deluged me with a round of applause at Starbucks this morning. Either I'm making incredible progress on this sock or they really, really liked the raisin butts I brought for Girls Day. No doubt the latter, but my mentors insist I'll be ready to knit my first heel and something called a gusset after just a few more spins around those skewers.

With that applause ringing in my ears, I skipped off to Yokohama to chat with Dr. T. Enroute I retrieved my umbrella and Mimi's brewery souvenirs from Aoki bakery. A first grader can pantomime "umbrella" but I don't think the same can be said for "bag of Kirin brewery stuff" so I felt quite victorious when one of the clerks climbed up on a chair and pulled the bag off the top of a cabinet. I settled for a half dozen raisin butts in lieu of an Oscar.

Dr. T presented me with Girls Day gifts on behalf of his wife. Those are rice crackers on the left and pastel candies shaped like chocolate chips in the rear. No telling what's in the cute box, but I'll open it tomorrow for the Oakleaf knitters and Reiko.

Dr. T was in teaching mode and did most of the talking today, although I know you might find that hard to swallow. He says the best sake is produced in Niigata and Akita prefectures where superior rice is grown. I've filed that little tidbit away for future reference.

He also mentioned that the green tea he serves me every week is called Sen-cha Gyokuro and is quite famous. Dr. T drinks about a gallon of green tea every day. He prefers his tea at room temperature but pours my portion over ice. Although the FDA remains unconvinced the last I checked, people on this side of the world believe green tea has tremendous medicinal value in guarding against diseases of the heart and brain. Medical researchers are developing a taste for the stuff so maybe the rest of us ought to give it a try.

When I mentioned the Explorers will be heading to Mashiko at the end of the month, Dr. T raced over to one of his three computers and printed out directions. I am hoping this will satisfy Jen O who seemed less than impressed with my advance preparations for the Machida Shrine Sale trip the other day. ("It's somewhere after Zama but before Yokota, Jen. I'm pretty sure we'll see a sign.")

If boredom sets in on the trip to Mashiko, Jen can just turn the map over and skim my copious notes on Japan's eight major pottery towns. Those notes were carefully numbered under Dr. T's watchful eye to coincide with the other map he prepared for us.

He even pulled out a pink highlighter to indicate major bridges. I'm not quite sure what I'll do with this map but it's definitely a keeper.

I felt really guilty accepting his money today -- remind me to pick up a little something for him in Mashiko, okay? -- but I put some of it to excellent use on my way back to Yokosuka. Poking my head in a convenience store, as is my habit, I spotted a new flavor of our favorite cookie.

I am showing remarkable restraint and keeping this box sealed until the Oakleaf knitters arrive tomorrow morning. Is that a mound of brown sugar in the picture? I'll be sure to let you know. In the meantime, you might want to start placing bets on the home-cooked dinner streak. If you get my drift.

Kanazawa-Hakkei: A Loaf of Bread, A Jug of Wine

Aoki is the bakery I pop into just about every week when I pass through Kanazawa-Hakkei after shooting the breeze with Dr. T for two hours. The sign for Cafe Aoki on the second floor has intrigued me for months so Mike and I decided to have lunch there when we were heading up to Yokohama to stock up on wine the other day.

There were two doors at the top of the stairs. The door on the right led into the cafe and the door straight ahead opened into a -- here's that charmed existence again -- wine shop.

After a very nice and surprisingly inexpensive lunch, we ambled into the wine shop and tried about half the free samples on offer before selecting six bottles and stumbling downstairs to the bakery. "You sure were smart to bring the Harris Teeter wine bag." "I know." "You should start carrying it whenever you visit Dr. T so you can bring wine and bread home." "Feel free to call me Omar Khayyam."

This turtle is as big as my fist and tastes more like a cookie than bread.

I call these rolls "raisin butts." I've bought at least 15 raisin butts since I first spotted them three weeks ago but I only kept three for myself.

Flat Stanley at the Yamato Flea Market

Judy, Sheryl, and Valerie arrived in Japan this past summer. They wanted to experience a shrine sale so Flat Stanley and I set our alarm for 5:45 am before we went to bed Friday night. We were on the road by 6:35 am Saturday, bound for the flea market at the Yamato train station. I drove and they paid the tolls, about $11 each way.

"I'm freezing, Aunt Kathy. Will you buy me this jacket and pants?"
"Sorry, Stanley, but I think that outfit is too small for you. Why don't you warm yourself up by running to the other end of the flea market and back? Keep an eye out for flat-bottomed wooden bowls while you're at it."


"I didn't see any flat-bottomed bowls, Aunt Kathy, but I did find these amazing giant albino carrots."
"Ha ha, Stanley. I think those might be Daikon radishes but don't quote me on that."
"Okay. I know how much you hate to be wrong."

"Hello Kitty! What's she doing in Japan?"
"She was born here, silly. Lots of American children are surprised to learn that Sanrio is a Japanese company. Hello Kitty has been making children all around the world smile for at least 40 years."
"Gosh, it's a small world after all"
"Maybe I ought to start calling you Flat Walt."

"Front row seats at the free concert next to the train station! You rock, Aunt Kathy! That boy sure has a great voice."
"I wonder where I can get a tie like that."

"Thanks for buying me this bun shaped like a bear."
"Just don't tell your Aunt Suzi I let you play with your food or she'll want to do the same when she visits and that would be excruciatingly embarrassing."
"Do you think there's a 'surprise' inside the bun?"
"Probably. That's why we're going to 'let' Uncle Mike take the first bite."

"Oh, it's custard. That looks really yummy . . . hey, wait Uncle Mike . . . let me have a bi-. . .No fair! He ate the whole thing."

"Aunt Kathy, I'm sorry I was too cold to wait for the man selling Peko-chan cups to come back to his stall so you could buy some."
"That's okay, honey, I didn't really need those cups. I liked this ceramic Peko-chan better."
"But did you really need this bank, Aunt Kathy? Don't you already have at least six Peko-chan and Poko-chan banks?"
"Yes, but they are plastic and this one is ceramic. Besides, I need lots of banks to store all the wealth I'll be accumulating this year from eating that golden Chestnut and Sweet Potato Paste with the Shonan Ladies the other day."
"Oh, yeah. But why aren't you posting a picture of that gaudy gold candy dish shaped like a crown you bought for the JAW Mardi Gras party next week?"
"Because, Big Mouth, I was thinking it would make an excellent Christmas gift for your Aunt Betsy or Aunt Jane."
"Oops. Sorry."

Exhibition of Sogenkai: A Guest Post by Flat Stanley

I was still giggling about our taxi ride when we entered the big brick building across from the train station. "The Exhibition of Sogenkai is on the third floor," Aunt Kathy proclaimed as she made a beeline for the elevator. We followed an elderly lady into the first elevator that arrived. "Why didn't those five Japanese men get on the elevator with us, Aunt Kathy?" "Maybe because we got on an elevator that's going down rather than up," Aunt Kathy whispered as we watched the elderly lady slowly exit on the basement level. We smiled sheepishly at those five Japanese men, now chuckling politely, when we picked them up on our way back past the first floor.

Whoa! The gallery lobby was teeming with Japanese people when we exited the elevator. Aunt Kathy stuck out like a cherry in a can of fruit cocktail which probably explains why an official-looking lady hustled over to greet us. "Takako?" Aunt Kathy carefully enunciated each syllable. The lady led us to a room off to the right of the foyer and pointed to Takako's painting just as a man began addressing the foyer horde in a loud, professorial tone of voice.

We admired Takako's painting for a few seconds and then Aunt Kathy spotted her friends at the far end of the gallery, across that foyer crammed with 50 people paying rapt attention to the art professor. We saw the official-looking lady tap Takako on the arm and gesture in our direction. We watched Takako approach us. We cringed as she scurried between the lecturer and his audience. Takako hugged Aunt Kathy then tugged her toward the far end of the gallery.

Aunt Kathy looked so funny crossing that foyer. She must have bowed at least 15 times before she reached the center of the room and then she just scuttled the rest of the way with her head bent to her knees like a nonagenarian with extreme osteoporosis. Mary Beth and Mimi were laughing hysterically when Takako left us with them.

Aunt Kathy saw a bench and decided to sit down for a few minutes to recover her dignity. A man wearing a Burberry scarf tapped Aunt Kathy on the arm, gestured at the paintings on the walls around us, then opened his program, raised one eyebrow until it looked like a question mark, and rattled off a string of words. "I don't have the faintest idea what you're saying," Aunt Kathy replied politely.

After the man repeated this exercise three times, Mimi took a crack at it. "He thinks you are an artist and wants to know which paintings are yours." Aunt Kathy reprised her careful pronunciation of "Takako" and the man found Takako's name in his program while I made a mental note: definitely get on Mimi's team if anyone proposes a game of Charades.

"Psst! Aunt Kathy! Will you please take my picture with that nice man and his wife?" The thing is -- and this is totally unfair to Kristen -- I suspect that couple had the distinct impression Aunt Kathy created me. They simply could not believe she is not an artist. "Do I have some sort of crazy Van Gogh glint in my eye?" Ummm, no, but you are starting to resemble Grandma Moses . . .

As you can see, Takako's painting is very lovely, quite green, and positively enormous. We admired it from every possible angle until Mimi's stomach growled a farewell to Takako and we wandered down the street to an Indian restaurant where the waiters were all wearing baggy silk pants and embroidered jackets.

Aunt Kathy was so busy admiring the waiters' clothes and shoveling naan in her mouth that she forgot to order lunch for me but she made up for this oversight by taking me to a bakery on our way back to the train station. Since 2010 is the Year of the Tiger, she bought me this tiger pastry. It looks like a cinnamon roll, doesn't it? Surprise! That dark stuff isn't cinnamon, it's chocolate. Yum.

In summary, riding around the block in a taxicab was a lot of fun and I liked seeing Takako's painting and meeting Aunt Kathy's friends and the man with the Burberry scarf and his cheerful wife, but the best part of the day for me was when Aunt Kathy encouraged me to play with my food. Grrrrrrrrr!

Japanese Holiday, Part I

Kate finally slept through the night. (I'm pretty sure the last time I uttered that sentence was about 26 years and 3 months ago.)

During a brief period of wakefulness on Friday, she met the Shonan Ladies (some of whom are pictured above). "Is this your daughter? She is so BEAUTIFUL!" Did I detect a tone of surprise in those voices?

We went to the Yamato Shrine Sale by train Saturday morning. It's probably a good thing I didn't spot this wig until I was checking out Kate's pictures the next day. And it's probably a good thing we took the train or I might be suffering buyer's remorse over a huge wooden dragon's head that looked like it weighed 500 pounds.

Kate liked the bakery inside the Yamato train station. While she munched daintily on this chocolate muffin, I was busy stuffing an entire loaf of fresh-from-the-oven cheese bread down my throat.

Kate was able to figure out (sort of) how to use my cell phone -- we'd shaken Matt awake before we left Yokosuka for a quick, and rather surly, tutorial on how to turn the phone on -- so she managed to direct Matt and Mike to the Ramen Museum in Yokohama where we enjoyed an early dinner in one of the nine restaurants. I have a hunch Mike and I will get back to the Ramen Museum at least eight times between now and August 2011 so we can try all the restaurants representing regional ramen cuisine. Is ramen cuisine an oxymoron?

You Say Hockey, I Say Hakkei

This is what greets me when I come bounding out of the Kanazawa-hakkei station enroute to Dr. T's office. I am aiming for the Seaside Line near that tall cream-colored building in the background. The red awning on the left shelters customers who always seem to be standing at least two deep to buy yakitori (meat on a stick). I am working up the nerve to get in that line.


Here's a better shot of the 8K-Aoki bakery. Wait just a minute, is that a restaurant on the second floor? Be still my heart.

This is a bicycle corral at the foot of the steps ascending to the Seaside Line. As you can see, baskets are standard equipment on most bikes here. I have never run across a bicycle store in all my wanderings. That's odd.

The bicycle parking facilities at the hospital are a bit more upscale. This might be the staff lot between the hospital (left) and medical school (right) since there are more motorcycles than bicycles parked here. Not a Mercedes or Lexus in sight, though, so I might be wrong.

And here is the lot in front of the hospital. That walkway runs from the hospital lobby to the train station entrance. Yes, the hospital lobby is on the second floor, making access most convenient for mass transit users.

If I understood Reiko correctly, hakkei means eight views. She was comparing Kanazawa-hakkei with neighboring Kanazawa-bunko at the time. I thought I heard her say that these two areas of Kanazawa were so famously competitive that Kanazawa-bunko translates to "Kanazawa rivalry." "Isn't that sort of sad," I opined, "to be saddled with a name like that." "What are you talking about?" asked Reiko (and not for the first time). "Rivalry," I replied. "It doesn't seem fair that one town gets to be called 'eight famous views' and the other gets stuck with 'rivalry.'"

Reiko sighed. "Books. Many books. Li-bra-ry. Home of famous library."

Oh.

Ble Dore: Bread Heaven

Longtime readers will remember Ble Dore, the bakery/restaurant near Hayama featuring fresh-from-the-oven bread and rolls in the world's most charming format: all a person can eat in 90 minutes.





Jen F had never been to Ble Dore. Jen O and I remedied that unconscionable situation today. We gorged on cinnamon bread, croissants, rolls topped with pumpkin seeds, rolls stuffed with cheese, raisin bread, rolls filled with two different kinds of curry, and flaky apple pastries. We ate so much bread I was too full to buy anything in the bakery on our way out the door. Imagine that.
Merely listing what we ate - and I omitted the soup and salads - has me feeling a bit nauseous 12 hours later.

The Jens posed for the benefit of their Stateside friends who've been clamoring for a glimpse of how fashionable junior officer spouses are wearing their hair this season. Tres chic, n'est-ce pas?

Sankeien Garden

Most Americans visit Sankeien Garden within a month or two of arriving in Japan but it took me two years and three months to get there. Procrastination means serendipity this time for I am positive I would not have appreciated the experience half as much without Reiko as my guide.

You would think by now I would know better than to attach American meanings to Japanese concepts. Don't I spend half my waking hours explaining to parents of toddlers that the Anpanman Museum is a playground, toy store, bakery, and just about everything else imaginable other than a museum? Yet I toodled off to Yokohama expecting to spend a pleasant autumn afternoon strolling through a traditional garden and found myself instead in a Japanese version of Henry Ford's Greenfield Village. Sort of.

Substitute Sankei Hara for Henry Ford and the silk industry for automobiles and you have a general idea of the impetus behind this 'garden' which opened to the public in 1906. Preserving historic structures in a natural setting of waterfalls, babbling brooks, and peaceful ponds was Sankei's mission.

Only one of the buildings is open to the public but that alone is worth the trip. This Edo period home of a wealthy farmer was built in the gasshozukuri style, meaning it has a steep roof and audience room. All the pictures I took inside the farmhouse are too blurry to post -- apparently I was shaking with glee at the prospect of clambering up a ladder-like staircase to check out the attic where silkworms conducted the family business -- so you'll just have to come see for yourself.

The nearest train station to Sankeien Garden is the same station (Negishi) Amy, Cathy, and I used when we found the house Craig lived in when he was a little boy but Reiko took me there on a different route, one that involved four trains rather than two plus shortcuts through two shopping arcades and a stroll down a narrow street teeming with restaurants, stores, and people.

We passed at least five bakeries on Reiko's route before I stopped counting. I could easily have spent 20 minutes in each of them but, alas, I had to rush home to dole out Halloween treats. You have not heard the last of those bakeries.