Playdoh substitute

I don’t quite understand it, but for some reason Playdoh is expensive to buy in Japan. That is, if you can find it. I finally remembered to buy cream of tarter to make a homemade version. It worked wonderfully and the color options are limitless. Next time I’ll try adding glitter. Definitely the way to go.

Recipe:
1 cup of water
1 cup of plain flour
Half cup of salt
2 teaspoons cream of tarter
1 tablespoon of cooking oil
Food coloring, essence, and/or glitter

Mix all ingredients in a saucepan. Cook mixture over a medium flame, stirring constantly, until it starts to solidify and comes away from the side of the pan. Turn out and allow to cool before kneading. (Keeps for several months in an airtight container in the refrigerator.)

Dress up play

Roo’s into dress up play. This last year he’s wore his Optimus Prime transformer costume on many occasions. In prior years, even Halloween and the prospect of candy wasn’t enough to entice him. He still doesn’t give a hoot about his daily wear, but costumes are cool. So, I went a little crazy and purchased a few; fire fighter, medieval warrior, knight, bumblebee the transformer, SWAT police officer. Next on the list, astronaut. The package arrived this past weekend and here is Roo in two of his favorites.

Faces

Today's art from school.....

Food Expo at Big Site

Big Site Convention Center.

Last week one of the Moms from school brought a group of us to a Food Expo. Her husband works in the food packaging industry and had received tickets for admission. Since he knows “ladies like food”, he gave the tickets to his wife for her and her friends. It was a morning full of tasting a wide variety of products including, miso, mochi, caviar, beef, ice cream, ume shu, popcorn, noodles, cake, pickles, plums, donuts and so on. In a convention room full of salary men in suits, us women and one Dad (some with strollers) worked our way through the crowds. We rationalized our presence by thinking “which consumer exercises the most spending power of food products in the home?”. Of course, it’s the Mother! Needless to say, we had fun!

Sake vendor

Pickled plums

Gold leaf sprinkles for anything from steak to waffles.

Super tasty chocolate cake balls.

Nori (seaweed) cups for all your party appetizers.

Mochi (made from rice) dessert.

A sweet treat vendor, Nissei. I imagine this boy and girl are very recognizable to most Americans who eat ice cream cones.

Hawaii Theme

This week Roo’s preschool class shifted their theme of study to Hawaii and Islands. They went to lunch as a class at a restaurant across the street to taste Hawaiian pizza and they learned about volcanoes, complete with experiment. Roo shared the rock he collected from our night trek on Mt. Kilauea in January, as well as donned his Hawaiian Volcanoes National Park explorer hat.

Mercedes & Nyingpo

This week we said goodbye to American visitors, Mercedes Baleda and Venerable Nyingpo, who stayed with us for a week. They were in Tokyo to teach Tibetan Heart Yoga. They are students of Geshe Michael Roach and Lama Christie McNally of Diamond Mountain University. It was wonderful having them in our home. Roo was off school for the week and enjoyed the company. In addition to teaching yoga, Mercedes is a professional singer. Her story and music is on her website, Songs of Mercy. She’s also the Director of Star in the East, an organization that brings East and West, Buddhism & Christianity, together in discussion. At the house, when Roo heard her singing and playing her harmonium, he remarked “that sure if pretty music”. Nyingpo is a Buddhist monk and patient playmate for Roo. He speaks and writes Tibetan and is an amazing teacher. Some of his yoga classes are available on google video. After leaving Japan they were heading to Vietnam, Israel, and eventually, Hong Kong. Hopefully they will come back to Japan, soon!

Ookii

This kanji character is ookii, meaning big. Roo surprised Ryan, our language teacher, and me this past weekend when during our Japanese lesson at the house he announced that he “knows ookii”. He proceeded to draw the character with a decent amount of accuracy. I thought they were singing cute Japanese songs and writing their name in hiragana during the thirty minutes of Japanese time at school. I guess not!

Tokyo Fire Museum

Today Roo and I visited the Tokyo Fire Museum. The entrance is conveniently connected to Yotsuya san chome station. He's fascinated with fire fighters, their gear and equipment, and "rescue missions". Besides the hands on fun for kids, another great thing about the museum is the price for entry, it's free! We'll definitely go again!

Real gear to try on!

Now the Chief's helmet.

Roo admiring the helicopter. After seeing he commented he's going to "go home and make a rescue helicopter out of Lego's".

More gear and a steering wheel to drive and siren to sound.

A helicopter with a video screen playing actual aerial view images.

High Speed Rail

Tonight as I’m reading an article at NPR about Obama’s message to the people calling for high speed rail, I can’t but think, well of course. Living in a country where they’ve practically mastered this approach to transportation, it feels so obvious that America could benefit. Often when people ask me what I like about living in Tokyo, I reply “safety”, or “I don’t have to drive a car”. At times I miss driving or cruising, but I have yet to miss driving to get from point A to point B. Here, train, bus, bike or walking can get you most places on time. In a pinch, a taxi. Never, the frantic stress of wondering how you’re going to get somewhere when your car unexpectedly doesn’t start.

Knees

Soon, we’ll be out of pants for Roo. I’ll need to do some stitching because almost all have ripped knees. It seems to happen with little warning. Like today. When he dressed in the morning his jeans were in tact. As we’re walking away from the house to go to a friends for a play date, I look down and notice his knee is ripped open. That means it happened in the carpeted apartment. How? Last week one day I picked him up from school and noticed his bony knee sticking out of his rough and tough cargo pants. He’s into sliding, jumping, “landing like a ninja” and the ever popular “falling down game” . I don’t make a big deal of it. I want him to play and try out new moves with his body and build confidence. I’m just not sure what I’m going to do in the summer when steamy weather hits Tokyo. At this rate, shorts feel reckless. Knee pads? Arnica gel? Carry bacitracin and bandaids everywhere? Dorky knee socks? Any suggestions?

Today's feature, photos from our play date....

Title: Boy with scuffed knees and Girl on swings

Title: Boy with scuffed knees and Girl, on rock, catching tadpoles

Spring Break School Work

Here Roo is doing work his teachers sent home. They give homework every week. However, it is suppose to be completely up to the child if they want to do it. The intent is to help instill the idea of doing work from school at home, AND create a positive encouraging attitude towards doing the work. If they want to do it (and some kids ask for more), that's great. If not, no big deal. Most often Roo falls in the "not" category. Lately he's been into numbers and maths and likes to comment "2+2+2+2 makes 8". So, practicing writing his numbers was attractive. (Note: Maths in not a typo. Apparently the British and Australians use the plural.)

He has off school this week for spring break so once again, I'll assume my role of boredom buster. We are hosting visitors from the United States that are here to conduct workshops at Sun & Moon yoga. We're all looking forward to having the activity of company and it should be an interesting week.

Hanamatsuri

Easter Sunday Christians celebrate the renewal of life through the resurrection of Christ. Around the same time of year, April 8, Buddhists celebrate Hanamatsuri, a festival celebrating the birth of Buddha about 2500 years ago. We attended a Hanamatsuri, organized by the International Buddhist Congregation of Rissho Kosei-kai. In the ceremony, I participated in the flower and candle offering as one of two representatives from America. People from many countries and faiths were present and all speakers talked of peace, compassion, and living harmoniously in a sometimes difficult world. Roo enjoyed seeing Mommy in a ceremony. Ryan enjoyed the Indian food stall with warm naan. We all loved the taiko drum performances. It was a warm spring day. According to legend, various kinds of flowers and sweet dew rain down from the sky when Shakyamuni Buddha was born in the spring sunshine in the Lumbini Garden (now Nepal). To honor this day, a flower decorated miniature shrine (hanamido) is displayed. Families take turns pouring sweet herb tea (amacha) over the statue of the Infant Buddha. The flowers represent the Lumbini Garden and the sweet tea symbolizes the sweet rain that is said to have come down from the heavens to bathe the body of the newborn baby. The infant Buddha took seven steps, pointed his right hand to the sky and his left hand to the earth and proclaimed “Above and below the heavens, I alone am the World-Honored One.” This is interpreted as a profound view of life, not just for the Shakymuni Buddha, but also each living, precious, irreplaceable person on earth. Unlike many statues of a meditative Buddha who remains seated, the Shakymuni Buddha is most often standing. A posture that reminds that the Buddha is always ready to step forward, anytime, anywhere, and swiftly take actions to aid others. This is the approach to life practicing Buddhists seek for themselves.

The Suginami Daiko drum group performed during the ceremony, and after in the courtyard.

A traditional tea ceremony.

These woman are playing the Koto, the national instrument of Japan. It has13 strings that are strung over 13 movable bridges along the length of the instrument. Players adjust the string pitches by moving these bridges and use three finger picks to pluck the strings.

Lone Sakura

The blossoms are out in full force. Everywhere there are trees to admire. The sidewalks are littered with delicate pink petals, a subtle reminder that the beauty will eventually subside. The tree pictured below is tucked behind a group of buildings on a path less travelled. We, on the other, take this path frequently. This one feels special. As if it's reserved for our eye's and a few other lucky souls.

Country Lunch

Last week Roo’s class had a “country packed lunch” day. Each child brought from home a bento filled with foods typically eaten in their country of nationality. In addition, each made his or her flag. The children discovered their class represents fourteen countries! While they didn’t get to picnic at the park and instead opted for the school to avoid strong wind gusts, they did parade around the neighborhood carrying their flags. It was tough to determine what food to pack for Roo because 1.) he’s picky, 2.) you can’t send peanut butter to school and 3.) cheese pizza doesn’t travel appetizingly in a lunch box. He ended up bringing a plain butter only sandwich, fries, and applesauce.

Rockabilly Roo

Here is Roo on Sunday in Ueno Park moving and grooving. Notice the rockabilly Elvis look-a -likes in the background.

A Sayonara Sail

Last night we attended a sayonara sail for a family from Roo’s preschool who are relocating to New Zealand. The venue was on an old style boat with tatami seating and paper lanterns. The central theme of the Japanese food was of course sakura with many items presented pink; pink rice, pink vegetables, pink mochi, pink dessert. We ate sashimi and tempura and drank Kirin, a tasty Japanese beer. Despite Ryan’s nudging, I managed to sit on the sidelines for the karaoke. While we knew most of the families because they are from Roo’s school, we did meet some new people, which is always fun.

While this isn’t the exact display of the food from last night, the photo in their advertisement matches with few exceptions.

Noriko Sensei (a teacher from the school) singing a popular Japanese love song from the 60‘s. The actual title is “Ue o muite arukō" (上を向いて歩こ)” means “I will walk looking up”. The song reached chart popularity in the west and was randomly given the title “Sukiyaki” because it’s catchy and easy to pronounce. Sukiyaki is a type of food and has nothing to do with the song.

Rikugien Garden's Weeping Cherry Tree

Tuesday, with a fellow Minnesotan, I visited Rikugien Gardens and was pleasantly surprised at the grandeur of the popular weeping cherry tree. So big is this tree, that a wood structure has been erected underneath to support the far reaching branches and their bounty of blossoms. This garden, with it’s paths for strolling, a hill to provide elevation, and a pond for reflection, exemplifies the famous gardens of the Edo period.