A Charming Day at Shinagawa Aquarium

The Shonan ladies took us to Shinagawa Aquarium this month. Aquariums aren't really my thing -- if a renegade dolphin ever decides to leap into the audience rather than through a hoop, I am 100 percent certain he'll land on me -- but I how could I turn down a chance to spend time with my Shonan pals?

To be perfectly honest, on the days leading up to this event I was so caught up with thoughts of renegade dolphins and shark tanks exploding in my face that I never stopped to think about what else I would encounter at a Japanese aquarium:  Japanese schoolchildren.
 

The yellow backpack kids nabbed the center seats.

The pink hat kids had to settle for the side sections.

It's beginning to feel a lot like Christmas.

Scuba Santa feeds big flat fish while I pretend the kids and I are watching a cartoon.

Charms are not just for cell phones

A pink backpack charm on a yellow backpack - how charming!

Shinagawa Aquarium is an easy train ride from Yokosuka.  We took an express train to Keikyu Kamata then rode a local train until the fourth stop.  The aquarium is located in a lovely park two blocks from the station.  The park merits further exploration but I think I'll wait until the spring for that.

Ikebana Visits the American Embassy

This month's Ikebana program was more scintillating than usual. You can chalk this up to "location, location, location." We took our show on the road and visited the Tokyo residence of the U.S. Ambassador to Japan.

The back yard.  Pool is behind the hedge on the left.

Susie Roos, the wife of the current ambassador, told us this house is one of the U.S. Department of State's premier properties. It was built during the Great Depression at considerable cost to American taxpayers since most of the construction materials were imported from the United States and since there were only about 15 taxpayers in total at the height of the Depression (estimate mine).  The house was renovated in the mid-90s during Walter Mondale's tenure as U.S. Ambassador to Japan.

Lunch on the patio

The only other time I've visited the embassy residence was for a Fourth of July party, a rather boisterous, evening event hosted by the previous ambassador. Seeing the house in daylight for the first time, the architecture struck me as a tad more Spanish than North American. My Puerto Rican friend Carmen agreed which is sufficient validation for me.

Mrs. Roos told us about the State Department's "Art in the Embassies" program and invited us to view the art currently on display on the first floor. So we did.



Morinaga and Nagisaki chat in the shade of Yoko Ono's installation

The works currently on display are all by Japanese artists who have lived in the U.S.  Yoko Ono, for instance, installed this potted tree and dashed off a bi-lingual invitation that hangs on an adjacent wall.  Some of us took Yoko-san up on her invitation by writing our wishes for Tokyo on little white cards and then hanging them on the tree.


Several of us were arrested (in Kafka's sense) by a kimono displayed in the drawing room.  American warplanes were printed along the shoulders and GIs floated in parachutes down the back to the floor.  Someone said the artist's intent was to depict the harmonious relationship that exists in Okinawa between the U.S. military forces and the native population.  I'd like to meet that artist.  He seems to have a nice sense of humor.

Otsuka-san, Ando-san, and Kaji-san in the drawing room

The questionable arrangement

A few of the Japanese ladies rolled their eyes ever-so-politely, shook their heads sadly, and quietly tut-tutted when they spotted the flower arrangement in the center of the drawing room.  This was an educational moment for me.  I learned that one should never be able to see the little metal prongs that hold the flower stems in place.  Duly noted. 

After we feasted our eyes on the art and furniture, three of our members assembled Ikebana arrangements while marimba music played softly in the background. This was more exciting than it sounds. There was something of a competitive, beat-the-clock energy in that room. The ladies represent three different schools of Ikebana. The lady on the left finished first and the lady on the right managed to finish just as the music ended.

The marimba player then took center stage for twenty minutes. The program was running late by then and all the growling stomachs made it hard to hear the music. Fortunately, yours truly was seated right next to the dessert table. I amused myself for the first 15 minutes of the concert by taking pictures of the treats. For the last five minutes I sampled the coconut, strawberry, and chocolate cupcakes. The coconuts were especially tasty.

(Truth be told, I was not a good sport about the marimba player, mainly because I fail to see a connection between that instrument and the United States. I was all for hiring the high school choir - what a thrill for those teenagers - or a banjo player to entertain us, but those ideas weren't popular with my fellow board members. I might have been more amenable to marimba music had anyone mentioned the Latin-flavored architecture.  Then again, probably not.)

Denise, Cheryl, and Carmen with their new friends

Ambassador Roos joined us for a few minutes.  That was nice.

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.)

Bags, Balls, Bunnies, and Subliminal Messages in Asakusabashi

Tokyo's Street of Dolls in Asakusabashi is a mere sixty-six minutes from Yokosuka. You can hop on a train just before 9:00 and waltz into the eight-story paper store just two or three minutes after the shop opens at 10:00. Why don't I go there more often?

The merchants are gearing up for the Year of the Rabbit so we saw lots of bunnies in the doll shop windows and a few sad tigers in the sales bins.  Sakura Horikiri, a three-story craft supply store hidden away on a side street across from the paper store, had bunnies hopping across washi paper in every color of the rainbow and kits for crafty people who want to hang bunnies on their walls or dangle them from their cell phones.  Reminding myself that I still haven't done anything with the washi paper and craft kits I bought the last two times I visited Sakura Horikiri, I bought just a few rolls of paper. 

Self-control?  Not hardly, but credit me with a bit of progress in the deferred gratification department.  Sakura Horikiri is bringing a few truckloads of craft supplies and paper to Yokosuka next week.  Why lug the stuff home on the train when a quick sprint across Route 16 is an option?

 As we were wandering up that little side street toward Sakura Horikiri, Mary Beth and Sue -- I am still working on appropriate nicknames -- started rummaging through a sales bin outside a little shop on the left. They spotted wooden kimekomi forms in the shape of tigers. Could there be balls inside?  Be still my heart.  I have searched high and low for wooden balls since February when the Ikebana ladies showed me how easy it is to cover these balls with fabric. Many stores offer styrofoam balls but they don't appeal to me, i.e., I'm pretty sure the end result would be a table covered with styrofoam crumbs.


Wooden kimekomi balls and holiday treat bags

We ventured into the shop and, lo and behold, spotted wooden balls. Four different sizes of wooden balls, to be exact! But if you are in the market for wooden balls, you might want to wait a week or so before you hop a plane or train to Tokyo. The shop will need that long to restock its shelves.


We hit the paper store on our way back to the subway. Gleefully clutching my wooden balls, I skipped down aisle after aisle of school supplies and paper products until a display of notebooks stopped me in my tracks.

Have you ever heard a notebook try to clear its throat? Trust me, it's not a pleasant sound. "Ahem! What's with the balls? Weren't you supposed to be finding Christmas trinkets for a couple of dozen great-nieces and -nephews today? The generation that's multiplying like rabbits?"

"What can I do? I've squandered most of my yen on wooden balls!" I wailed as Japanese shoppers cast wary (albeit excruciatingly polite) glances in the direction of the gaijin lady who seemed to be conversing with a notebook.

"Make this the Year of the Japanese Treats," advised the notebook. "And don't even think of reaching for the small treat bags.  You have enough yen left to buy the larger bags." Hai.

Welkom to My Children's Distant Relatives

Dank U wel for stopping by. I haven't a clue why so many Netherlanders have visited my blog in the past couple of months but I am thrilled nonetheless. My two oldest children, you see, are three-eighths Dutch and are saddled with a surname that translates to "keeper of the dyke". Their great-great-grandfather was your Queen's tailor before emigrating to the United States. De wereld is zo klein! De wereld, mijn dorp!

Yes, it really is a small world. The Netherlands and Japan enjoyed a friendship long before Commodore Matthew Perry sailed into Tokyo Bay. This relationship is described in David Mitchell's book, The Thousand Autumns of Jacob de Zoet, which I recommend to anyone interested in history.

You would probably feel even more at home in Japan than I do. Your ancestors brought tulips here and many of the rivers, especially in urban areas, have concrete banks that make them look more like canals than rivers. I have not yet spied a windmill but that doesn't mean there aren't any.

Although I've never visited the Netherlands corporeally, my imagination has taken me to your lovely country often thanks to authors like Mary Mapes Dodge, John Irving, Jeffrey Lent, and someone else whose name escapes me and I'm too lazy to thumb through my reading log this morning. In my dreams I've raced down your frozen canals on silver skates more nights than I can count.

Zo, dank U wel.

I'm Going to Make a Saturday Evening Post Quilt When I Grow Up

My Japanese friends take lots of classes.  Some study flower arranging (Ikebana), Ishii likes sashiko, and three of them -- Otsuka, Shinagawa, and Togo -- are drawn to quilting.  Last weekend I went to the Yokosuka Culture Hall to see the quilters' annual exhibit.  It was amazing.

The students were tasked with creating quilt versions of magazine covers by an incredible Japanese illustrator, Rokuro Taniuchi (1921-1981).  Taniuchi produced more than 1,000 covers for Shincho, a weekly magazine published in Yokosuka, and much of his work now belongs to the Yokosuka Art Museum.  His work is whimsical.  I foresee a trip to the Yokosuka Art Museum in my future.

Shinagawa appliqued the child's shadow on her quilt.

Those are little devils (oni) hanging on that tree.

The Taniuchi quilts were the focal point of the exhibit but there were other interesting pieces in the back of the gallery.  I especially liked what my friends came up with when their teacher tasked them with making quilt squares featuring houses.


Otsuka-san made the dark blue house on the lower right (left). She enrolled in the quilting class after I took up knitting and, yes, my one pair of mittens and three mufflers seem paltry compared to what she's managed to produce during our respective novitiates. The standard house pattern she chose reminds me of the little wooden houses I've been collecting since Matt was a baby.

Togo-san made the two squares in the upper half of the picture at right. She has a penchant for Hawaiian fabric. I think she's been taking the class for about a year longer than Otsuka, hence the addition of driveways.

Shinagawa-san created the four squares shown above. These squares depict her brother's house viewed from the four different points of the compass during the four seasons of the year. How clever is that? She plans to present these squares to her brother when the exhibit ends. If any of my brothers desire a similar gift from a sister, they will have to move to a teepee or log cabin first.

The two major pieces pictured above were fashioned by a friend of my friends. Her name is Yumiko, her husband is a retired Japanese naval officer, and she taught my Oakleaf friends calligraphy a few years ago. Meeting and chatting with Yumiko was a highlight of my day and probably year as well.

Yumiko is a talented calligrapher and quilter but she told me that classical Japanese literature is her greatest passion. She belongs to a group that studies the classics and produces a journal twice a year. The most recent issue of this journal includes an article she wrote about famous literary sites she visited in Shiga Prefecture near Kyoto. There are a dozen or so photographs accompanying the article and Yumiko decided to use three of those photographs as templates for quilt squares while her classmates were stitching together houses. The teacher not only approved this project but gave Yumiko an obi to use for a background. The finished product is on the right in the picture above.

Please note the orange tiger square in the lower left corner of the picture.  Shinagawa-san made that and used one of her father's neckties as the border.  Stuff like this makes my sentimental heart sing.

Maybe you can see the orange tiger square better in this picture I took of Yumiko standing next to the Tale of the Genji quilt she made a few years ago. The Tale of the Genji, as you probably know, is the pinnacle of Japanese classical literature. Yumiko's quilt depicts her vision of a scene wherein the hero is strumming his feelings to his wife who has just chopped off all her hair in anticipation of becoming a nun.

Or that's how I understood what Yumiko was telling me. Looks like I ought to tackle The Tale of the Genji, assuming I ever get to the end of Ulysses . . .

Yumiko made this Compass Quilt for her son, to help him find direction in his life.

Yumiko gave me a copy of her journal article as I was exiting the quilt show.  Yesterday I shared the article with Dr. T.  He was duly impressed and pulled out his trusty Atlas to show me the location of Shiga Prefecture.  Now I sense two trips in my future:  the Yokosuka Art Museum and Shiga prefecture.

Sadako and the One Hundred Kimekomi Balls

Tadodai House was the location and the Japanese ladies the hostesses for the first of this year's four At Large events.  The At Large group includes the usual cast of characters plus another 15 Americans and a half dozen Japanese who don't attend the semi-monthly gatherings.

The first order of business whenever the Japanese ladies host is the Group Picture.  We take group pictures at American At Large parties too but we are not nearly as well organized as our friends.  For one thing, a professional Japanese Self-Defense Force photographer is on hand at their parties.  Here he is lining us up on the risers.  While I can't swear to this, I think he is saying, "Can someone please tell that Mimi person to stop chatting with her neighbor so I can complete my assignment?"  For another thing, we each receive a 5x7 copy of the photograph in a nice paper wrapper when we exit the Japanese parties.  This is roughly five weeks faster than we Americans manage to produce and distribute pictures.

Back in August when we met with the Japanese JAW board members to put together our schedule, they asked us if there was anything in particular the American ladies might enjoy doing this year. Weather Explorer, bless her heart, promptly suggested a Kimekomi workshop. Weather Explorer had such a great time making that kimekomi ball when I dragged her to the Ikebana session last February that she's been taking kimekomi classes at a local community center ever since. We did not know this at the time but her teacher is a former JAW member as she is married to a retired Japanese naval officer.

There was a blue butterfly sticker in my name badge so I headed to the blue butterfly table. These stickers are essential for assuring that the American and Japanese ladies mix and mingle.

"Good Lord, look how organized they are!" remarked a new American member when she saw the supplies arranged on our table.

"You don't know the half of it," an older American informed her. "Notice, please, that the stickers were not randomly affixed. They seem to have taken extra care to divide up the obnoxious middle-aged American ladies so that no one here will have to endure sitting with more than one of them. I'm blue, Mimi is pink, Denise is green, and Lydia is red."

"Oh, I don't think you are the least bit obnoxious."

"That's because you've only known me for five minutes."

The Lady Formerly Known as KSheera Starts Working

The young lady seated herself across from me. She can't say I didn't warn her, right?

"Someone inserted an apostrophy on my name badge. This happened at Ikebana also. Do you know how can I get this fixed?"

"Your name is spelled KSheera and not K'Sheera?" She nodded while applying glue along a seam of her ball, leading me to suspect she can also walk and chew gum at the same time. I waited until she set the knife tool aside and started smoothing her fabric. "That would be my fault on both counts. A crumb of mushroom-shaped cookie must have dropped between the K and S on your membership forms when I was transcribing them. I hope you will not mind going by K'Sheera from now until June because I know the Japanese ladies who created your name badges for both Ikebana and JAW spent hours devising a way to communicate that apostrophe in a language that does not contain that punctuation mark."

"Oh, I understand. That's okay." She is very sweet. The K is silent. (There's another potential epitaph, kids. In your dreams.)


The Author Affixes a Loop.  Note Sharp Tool.

Blue Butterly Balls Minus One.  I'm Still Affixing That Loop.

A Typical Tadodai House Buffet with Four Varieties of Rice

Yuuko and I are flanking Sadako, the kimekomi sensei. Sadako made her blouse and matching purse from a kimono that belonged to her mother.

Upon being introduced to Sadako, I was struck by her name. "Isn't your name the same as little girl from Hiroshima in the story of the one thousand cranes?" "Maybe. I think so."

Over the course of the next three days, I asked four or five of my Japanese friends whether the girl in that story is named Sadako. They all shrugged their shoulders. I do believe I might have accidentally stumbled upon some sort of previously undiscovered cultural gulf. You see, the girl in the story is named Sadako. I checked. Her name is as familiar to me as Cherry Ames, Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm, Freddie and Flossie Bobbsey, and Nancy Drew. While I'd be hard-pressed to name the author who created most of those characters in the final round of Jeopardy!, the characters themselves have stuck with me for nearly fifty years. But I think the opposite might be true on this side of the world.

The Pied Piper of Sankei-en Chrysanthemum Festival

The weather could not have been finer on Culture Day. There was tinge of autumn in the crisp, clear air and a few wispy clouds floated across an azure sky.

The guidebooks say you can get to Sankei-en Garden either by car or by catching a bus at the Yokohama train station. They don't mention that the Negishi station is just a 15-minute hike from the garden's rear entrance. This is Ishii's preferred route and one I'm happy to share with my friends.

"How fast can you walk, Olga? We'll want to stay about half a block ahead of everyone else in case they start grousing about the distance. This is a technique I've honed leading my husband and children on little adventures over the past quarter century."

A pottery exhibition just outside the garden's back gate was our reward for following Ishii's route.  The traditional routes would have denied us this experience.

Handing us clipboards and pens, a vivacious young lady instructed us through pantomine to view the pottery on display in a nearby shed and then vote for our three favorite entries.  When we deposited our ballots in the box, a lady rattled a bag in our faces.  We each reached into the bag and pulled out a crystal.  Those who nabbed blue crystals were invited to select a free chopstick holder.  At least one of us did not win a prize.  Her lower lip might have shifted to pout position for a split second before she recalled her manners and her vow to conduct herself with dignity in honor of Emperor Meiji's birthday. 

Maybe it's just that I associate chrysanthemums with some of my least favorite memories -- try executing a Russian jump with a giant mum pinned to YOUR chest -- but this year's festival didn't do much for me.  It seemed like a pale imitation of last year's event, with only half as many entries in the jumbo categories and even fewer of those clever bonsai scenes. 

But don't get me wrong.  Festival aside, clambering through the historical farm house and watching the old guys toss bread crumbs to the turtles and carp was more than enough fun for me.  And I stumbled upon a gallery where breathtaking photographs unveiled aspects of the garden in different seasons.



Ise-giku?  Perhaps.



A fairly incredible bi-colored Mino-giku

Kudamono - four feet tall with an eight-inch span

The bonsai displays are crowd-pleasers.  I like the swans.

Someone once said, "If you've seen one chrysanthemum festival, you've seen them all."  I guess I'll find out for sure next week when I go to Tokyo to check out the festival at Shinjuku Gyoen.

A Few October Crumbs

November 3 is a national holiday in Japan.  This holiday was originally called Meiji-setsu and commemorated the birthday of Emperor Meiji .  In 1948 the holiday was renamed Culture Day to commemorate the Constitution announced on November 3, 1946.  Today is when Japanese citizens celebrate peace and freedom and promote culture. 

Ridiculous as it might seem, I'm a bit embarrassed about the role representatives of my beloved nation surely played in renaming another country's national holiday.  So I intend to be on my best behaviour when my friends and I join several thousand other celebrants at the Chrysanthemum Festival at Sankei-en Garden in Yokohama today.  Gosh, there's another potential epitaph:  She had Good Intentions.

I'll let you know how it goes.  In the meantime, I have a few more pictures (and impressions) from October to upload before chrysanthemums in every size, color, and form take possession of my camera.

My extreme canine phobia did not stop me from looking on in mild amusement, albeit from a safe distance, during the Dog Wars of October 2010. A childless and petless senior dual military couple (SDMC) blew the whistle on their neighbors for exceeding the maximum number of two (2) dogs allowed in base housing. The neighbors were providing temporary post-operative care for a "pound puppy" in addition to their own two dogs. The SDMC requested their neighbors be evicted from base housing. The commanding officer of the base ruled in favor of the dog.

In the two weeks since the ruling was issued, I have learned to look both ways before opening my front gate and sprinting the ten feet to my carport. Suddenly every Tom, Dick, and Harry is tangled up in three leashes rather than just one or two. (No, I was not as close to these dogs as it my judicious use of cropping might make it appear.)

A particularly ferocious specimen

The Ancient Mariner is flanked by Carol and Marlene in this picture. Marlene is from my hometown (Jackson, Michigan) and was in Japan to meet her six-week old grandson. Meeting her at Starbucks was what I imagine a blind date is like, except I knew she was from Jackson the minute I walked through the door. Mike and Carol found us there when they took a break from moving the last three boxes of Carol's bath products to my foyer. Carol moved back to the States the next day, leaving us her gas grill, firepit, the aforementioned bath products, enough alcohol to stock a small pub, and a power of attorney to sell her car. Thanks, Carol. Fair winds and following seas.

Two new flavors of my favorite ice cream bonbons arrived in convenience stores last month: dulce de leche and what I think might be strawberry cheesecake. So far I've only tasted the former. Yes, I'm worried about me too.

The Knit Wits among you will be interested to see that Betty is still following her mantra, "Another Month, Another Hair Color."  Black was a natural (!?) choice for October because Star Trek's Spock was her Halloween persona.