A Postard: The Daiei and KitKats

"I grew less and less interested in explanations, because the mere moment seemed enough in itself; where I'd written 40 pages after my first two weeks here, and then 338 pages after a year, now I found I could barely write a postcard about Japan, if you'd asked me."

The author Pico Iyer wrote the above for an essay in the Washington Post, describing his time living and writing in Japan.  While I am in no way comparable to a published author, this rings completely true for me. We are coming up on the anniversary of our arrival in Japan, and I have written very little about living here. Before we moved here, I was sure I'd write a metric ton of posts about all our adventures. And while the adventures have been many, and the posts have been relatively few. It would be easy and somewhat true if I attibute this to a lack of time, but it wouldn't be the whole story.

The truth is that Japan is really hard to write about. At first, because everything is so different. The light switches are horizontal instead of vertical. You can choose two different intensities of "flush" on the toilet. Daily life immediately becomes something to figure out at every turn, and you find yourself deciphering the rules of even the simplest interactions with things. Parking meters, grocery carts, credit cards, escalators, and the direction that you walk are all subtly or completely different. And these are just the things, this is to say nothing of attempting to interact with actual people in a language that you barely speak and cannot read that happens to have very different cultural rules of behavior.

That was then, and this is now. I think I've been here long enough now that I"m no longer totally overwhelmed. At least most of the time. So while I will not be writing any books, I think I can manage a few postcards about daily life.

If you ask my children what their favorite place is in all of Japan, they will tell you it's the Daiei (die ay).  This is basically the equivalent of saying "Target" in America. Which, honestly, strikes me as completely reasonable because I was really super excited to visit Target when we went back to America.

In all its glory! Notice that everyone backs into their parking spaces in Japan.

 It's fairly standard at first. A grocery store, clothes, housewares...

 Sneakers and socks.

 

 

 

 

 

And an arcade. Which is sort of odd for America, where sometimes a Walmart will have a Family Fun Room (!!!) with two or three broken games, a rigged UFO catcher, and a miserable looking ride on animal/car.  Not so here, not so: the Japanese are serious about arcades. They are everywhere, and totally awesome. (Note: Some of the pictures below are from previous visits, because we go roughly once every two weeks.)

We see your little hobby horse, America, and raise you a bullet train and motorcycle.

A small selection of the games.

 As if the arcade was not cool enough, there is also a playspace.

Rushing towards the playspace, in case it disappears in the ten seconds it would take to walk.

 The playspace has a climbing gym with a ball pit. And there are rides, which are free. And there are swings and random giant inflatable things to play in and you can catch fish (why? for what?) and a large selection of toys, and basically it's a child's paradise for about two dollars every fifteen minutes.

Addie's favorite thing by far. 

Graydon's favorite thing in our early visits. 

...and also in our later visits.

The ball pit

 It must be said that is is also a parent paradise, so I never mind letting the children take a play break. There are really not enough massaging pieces of furniture in my life. It is not uncommon to see these chairs full of people taking naps. I don't get quite that relaxed, but I do enjoy flipping through Japanese magazines whilst being gently pummeled.

The free massage chairs facing the play area.

The reading materials including a large manga selection.

 This is one of our usual places to run errands, which makes me happy not only because of the massage chairs, but also because one of the best different things about Japan is flavored Kit Kats. And they usually have a decent seasonal selection in the grocery store.

Mint chocolate chip cookie, courtesy of my friend Jessica.

 And my personal favorite so far:

Toasted Lemon Cheesecake. Yes, you are meant to toast them though only after freezing them first. I found this out the hard way after melting a few unfrozen sticks. Illiteracy kills, y'all.

I may or may not have joined a Facebook group dedicated to hunting down different varieties of KitKats. I am only slightly ashamed of this.

Have I ever mentioned how much I love it here? I do. As postcards so often say "Wish you were here!" I might even break you off a piece of that KitKat bar.