Posted by Jess and Ella
27 February 2011

Yesterday we went to the Tama Zoological Gardens.  Tama Zoo is about an hour west of Tokyo and it took 4 trains to get there!  The last train had animals that live at the zoo painted on it.




When we got to the zoo, we stopped to take a picture with the big elephant and then planned our day.



We went to see the cranes first and then stopped near the small animal area and got to play with GUINEA PIGS!

Rhinos

Sleeping Kangaroos

Growling Emus

Sleepy Koalas

Watchful Snow Leopards

A Restless Elephant

Lounging Orangutans

and Tigers Getting a Tan

We took the zoo shuttle back to the entrance to the zoo and bought a few things to add to our picnic lunch.  We ate lunch, refreshed and headed out to the African Animals.  On this side of the zoo we saw...

Lots of Lions - including a Mom and 4 cubs

some smaller elephants

Many Giraffes!

A Savannah with Pelicans, Giraffes, Zebras, Antelope, and Ostrich

After visiting with the Chimpanzees, we headed to the last part of the zoo - the insectarium and butterfly garden.  These are not Momma's favorite places to be, so I did go in some of the areas, but mostly it was just Daddy, Ella and Abby.

caterpillars in their cocoons

Ella says the butterfly garden was hot and a boy had one land right on his finger.


The zoo was pretty big and very hilly - it was quite a hike for the day and we traded off with the girls in the stroller and being carried in the zoo.  Its the best zoo we've been to here yet and the girls really liked it.  I am sure Ella is going to be a veterinarian when she is older.  That girl is crazy about animals.  The only disappointing part of the day is that the zoo has a Lion Bus that takes you through the large lion den and the bus has food on it for the lions.  Its not expensive to do and we've heard great reviews, but unfortunately the bus was not running yesterday.  Hopefully next time!

We stopped throughout the day for some photo opportunities too so thought I would share those here.










Everyone was pretty tired for the ride home...




We stopped for dinner and then headed home.  The girls were in bed pretty early after such a busy day.  And Jay and I were too!

Ella says:
WE HAD FUN LOOKING AT THE BUGS AND BUTTERFLIES.  WHEN WE WENT INSIDE BY THE BUTTERFLIES IT WAS VERY HOT HOT HOT.

Kanpai!
Jess and Ella

Posted by Jess
14 February 2011




It's Valentine's Day and although I'm away from my valentine because I'm traveling, I will be joining a colleague for an "Anti-Valentine's Day" celebration in Switzerland.  We might stage a big lovers quarrel or have him propose to me and I'll say no.  Something fun to get the French-Swiss talking about those crazy foreigners!

Anyway, thought I'd do a quick post about Valentine's Day celebrations here in Japan.   On Valentine's Day, women give men chocolates or gifts.  They give these to the men that they love and then also give chocolates to their male co-workers - these are called giri-choco, or "chocolates of obligation".  Men do not (traditionally) give women gifts on Valentine's Day.  There is a recent trend for girls to give their friends chocolate as well. 

However, men do reciprocate the gift on White Day, which is March 14th.  That's when the whole thing is reversed.  Women who gave the men chocolates or gifts get something in return and female co-workers get giri-choco.

I left some chocolate at the office before the weekend and hope for some good stuff in return on White Day.

Ella's school did valentines today too.  She wrote out all the names herself and signed all the cards - since there's only 9 other kids and 2 teachers.  Next year in a Kindergarten of 25 kids or so, I think we'll have to do it in shifts so her hand doesn't cramp up!


We celebrated as a family on Friday night last week with a family dinner to a local Italian restaurant - To The Herbs.  All was looking good as they had a kids' menu and a menu in English, plus wine by the glass.  Too bad the kids menu wasn't in English though because I thought I was ordering plain pasta and got pasta with shrimp sauce for the girls.  Oh my.  We ordered a new pasta dish for Ella knowing the revolt that would happen if we tried to give her something that smelled fishy, but thought Abby would eat it.  No such luck.  Two bites and she was out.  Not only that, when we had plain spaghetti noodles for her later she refused to eat those two.  Stubborn little girl!  They both enjoyed the ice cream that came with their meals though and neither one had any problems gobbling that up.    Here are some photos from our family Valentine's Day dinner. 

Giving Mommy and Daddy the Valentines she made in school

Asked Ella to take a picture of Jason and I.  Abby wanted to be in it too - we now have like 30 outtakes from trying to get that shot.  And note, none posted here.

And lastly...My Funny Valentines that I'm missing very much today!  (complete with Ella purposefully doing a 'Pirate Smile')



Happy Valentine's Day to all of you!

Kanpai!
Jess

Posted by Jess
12 February 2011

After dropping Ella off at school today, Jason, Abby and I headed to Asakusa Shrine and Senso-ji Temple.  Asakusa is an area of Tokyo about a 35 minute train ride from our house.  It's a pretty big attraction here that we hadn't visited yet so even though the weather was not all that great today (as you'll see in the pictures!) we made the trip anyway.

Senso-ji temple is the oldest and most popular temple of Tokyo, dating back to 628.  History says that two brothers were fishing in the area and caught a statue of Kannon.  They put the statue back in the river but it kept finding its way to them, so they built a temple to honor her.  The statue is still there but not viewable to the public. 

The area is pretty commercial with a large shopping street leading up to the shrine.  There are small shops selling souvenirs, toys, purses, packaged cakes and cookies - classic tourist trap items!  With the wet snow coming down, we didn't stay very long. 

"Thunder" Gate

shopping street

some lovely weather we're having, isn't it?

ceiling mural

ceiling mural

 On our way back to the train station, we found a little line of people waiting to buy something from a food stand.  After looking in, we found that it was a stand selling fish-shaped waffles with fillings.  Filling choices were strawberry cream cheese, chocolate, red bean paste and chestnut, sweet potato and custard with a few others.   We decided to give one a try and bought the custard one.




After letting Abby try a bite, we realized we weren't getting it back...










So Jay went back and bought one more.  This time Strawberry Cream Cheese.  :)



All said, we were there about an hour I think.  There were a few other things to look at in the area but we were cold and wet so we headed inside to warm up!

Kanpai!
Jess