Tsuyu - July 1

We woke up to POURING rain.  It is "tsuyu" (rainy season), after all.  We re-planned our day over breakfast.  I'd had two days of temples and gardens planned.  But, while drizzle is one thing, POURING rain is another.  So we decided on largely indoor venues for the day - Nijo Castle in the morning, then shopping for postcards, souvenirs and gifts in the afternoon.


Nijo Castle was delightful.  I enjoyed taking it in through Julia's eyes, too.  It was, of course, very different from the Castles she's used to in Germany, but also uniquely impressive.  We both loved the paintings and the wood carvings.  At one point she said, "Mom, the floors sound like birds chirping."  I explained that she'd gotten it exactly right.  They are called the "Nightingale Floors" and were designed to sing on purpose, so no one could sneak up on the Shogun.  Eventually we found ourselves walking through the gardens.  The rain had slowed to a light drizzle.  Very Seattle-ish and very okay.  We wandered at length, took lots of pictures, and Julia even gave Mama a photography lesson.  We had redeemed the morning!

We found a major department store for our shopping and took in lunch there as well.  Julia found it extraordinarily comical that we ended up eating at an Italian restaurant in Japan, but it was good.  And while we both love Japanese food, I don't suppose we necessarily have to have it for every meal for a solid month.  Then we shopped until we dropped.  Well, actually we did more gazing and gasping (at the prices) than shopping, but we managed to pick up some post cards and a few small things.  No wonder Japanese tourists the world around go crazing shopping.  Everywhere else is dirt-cheap by comparison!

Before leaving the department store, we picked up some sushi to take back with us, then headed home.  After dinner, we went swimming for an hour or two, then called it a day.  But not before I lost a contact down the drain.  Drat it!  I solicited some plumbing assistance from the hotel staff and a good natured but slightly dim-witted fellow came to my rescue.  I was fairly certain that my contact was in the s-curve part of the pipe as it had gone down with only a small amount of water.  He grinned and nodded, took the pipe apart, then proceeded to slosh all the water from the pipe - not into a basin, but - down the floor drain!  THEN he stuck his finger into the pipe and started feeling around for the contact lens. "Hmmmm," he said cheerfully after a time, "Seems it got washed down the drain!"  No shit.

I hate wearing my glasses.  "Mom," she said, "You should just be glad you HAVE glasses with you and that you can see!"  Okay, okay.  I also hate it when my daughter is more mature than me.

On the bright side, tomorrow's supposed to be better weather and

I'm feeling revved up about those temples and gardens...