Tokyo: Wednesday, 11/6
Another day of just me and the kids. Today I took us on a walk to Roppongi, with the goal of going to the Mori Art Museum. On the way, we stumbled on a beautiful park and explored for a while. I saw Japanese daycare workers arrive with two pink laundry carts full of toddlers. We eventually reached the Roppongi Hills complex, presided over by a Louise Bourgeois spider, but it was such a gorgeous day that we decided not to do the museum after all. Instead, we found Robot Park, where the kids played for a bit.
Then we headed to the Harry the Hedgehog Cafe. We did not have an easy time finding it. Even though I have GPS on my phone, and I am 100% dependent on it to get me anywhere in Tokyo, sometimes it is still hard to navigate Tokyo’s warren of streets. We wandered and wandered, doubled back, changed direction. We were all very hungry, but I couldn’t really find a good place for lunch. We bought snacks at a 7-11. Finally we did find the hedgehog cafe, and got to hold and pet hedgehogs and hamsters. That was pretty fun.
What wasn’t that fun was realizing at that point that my phone had 7% battery left, and--if it died--I’d have absolutely no way of getting us back to the hotel. There were some tense moments as we wound through the streets of Roppongi. Once we got to the main street where our hotel is, I could relax. We were still hungry, though, so I decided we’d go into a very casual counter-service place, which I realized too late had zero English whatsoever. We ordered from a vending machine, doing our best to determine what things were from faded pictures on the buttons. I ordered at random. Though I’d managed to order us a more or less innocuous udon soup, it was not too good. Lunch fail.
We took a break at the hotel. Greta did the nebulizer. I huddled under a blanket. I was not doing too well. Nonetheless, the rest of the day was ahead. So I led us out on what turned out to be an insanely long walk to Nikoniko Park, a big playground. It was a great place, with vending-machine ice cream cones, but by the time we walked home around 5pm, I was wiped out. Coughing, shivering. I knew we had to eat something, so we went to the restaurant under our hotel, a place called Nola, and had bowls of clam chowder. I couldn’t walk another step.
Once the girls were in bed, I soaked in our Japanese soaking tub and drank hot tea, and this revived me somewhat. But this was definitely a turning point in my pneumonia-like journey.
Then we headed to the Harry the Hedgehog Cafe. We did not have an easy time finding it. Even though I have GPS on my phone, and I am 100% dependent on it to get me anywhere in Tokyo, sometimes it is still hard to navigate Tokyo’s warren of streets. We wandered and wandered, doubled back, changed direction. We were all very hungry, but I couldn’t really find a good place for lunch. We bought snacks at a 7-11. Finally we did find the hedgehog cafe, and got to hold and pet hedgehogs and hamsters. That was pretty fun.
What wasn’t that fun was realizing at that point that my phone had 7% battery left, and--if it died--I’d have absolutely no way of getting us back to the hotel. There were some tense moments as we wound through the streets of Roppongi. Once we got to the main street where our hotel is, I could relax. We were still hungry, though, so I decided we’d go into a very casual counter-service place, which I realized too late had zero English whatsoever. We ordered from a vending machine, doing our best to determine what things were from faded pictures on the buttons. I ordered at random. Though I’d managed to order us a more or less innocuous udon soup, it was not too good. Lunch fail.
We took a break at the hotel. Greta did the nebulizer. I huddled under a blanket. I was not doing too well. Nonetheless, the rest of the day was ahead. So I led us out on what turned out to be an insanely long walk to Nikoniko Park, a big playground. It was a great place, with vending-machine ice cream cones, but by the time we walked home around 5pm, I was wiped out. Coughing, shivering. I knew we had to eat something, so we went to the restaurant under our hotel, a place called Nola, and had bowls of clam chowder. I couldn’t walk another step.
Once the girls were in bed, I soaked in our Japanese soaking tub and drank hot tea, and this revived me somewhat. But this was definitely a turning point in my pneumonia-like journey.
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