Day 15 in Japan – And on the 7th day He Rested

Today was a bit of a rest day for Sam and I – didn’t cover any new territory or challenge ourselves too much. We were mostly very domestic and cleaned the house, and did the grocery shopping and caught up on some Facebooking and a few emails before I got bored and decided that we needed to go for a walk to find some presents for people back home. We wandered down to the Okubo shops (south of the train station here there are a few big department stores called Vivre and SATY in a big complex called My Cal Akashi) and spent a few hours trawling for things that are shippable to Australia without too much success. Got a kick ass present for Liam (which MAY make it back to Australia if I can convince myself to part with it before he finishes his HSC), and found some last baby bits for Adam and Mel (shhh, it’s a surprise), but unfortunately didn’t find anything for the two people I was looking for – Mum and Lovey. On the way through the shops we stopped to see some elementary school dance troupes from the local gym performing some very cute dances (the local gym here is Konami Sports Centre, for anyone with an interest in video games), Sam tried Japanese KFC, and we found an Indian restaurant that I am excited to try out one day soon.

We ended up walking a little further than we expected, and realised we were in the area of the furniture shop that we visited to the other day. Decided to head on in and picked up a double futon that turns into a couch, so there is now officially somewhere for visitors to sleep *coughhintcough*. We then had to walk the 30 mins back to our house dragging the huge futon. Poor old Sam ended up carrying it most of the way in the heat. I even left him standing on the street for a little while because I saw an interesting (air-conditioned) craft shop. I bought him a vending machine coffee or being so good, and we had a nice rest on our new couch when we got home. Spent the evening planning the weeks meals, chatting to Mum and Lovey on the phone and singing “Defying Gravity” really loud over and over again. I think we’ll probably get to meet our neighbours soon if I keep that up.

Food highlight of the day: “Nature” donuts – right near Okubo station there is a donut store that sells handmade donuts. I got a cinammon sugar donut and Sam bout a caramel covered one. They were really delicious, and it was nice to eat a donut and actually tell the processes that had gone into making it – the caramel donut actually tasted like real brown sugar caramel, not caramel flavoured icing.