Baskets of Stones

These were stacked along the train tracks. Not sure why. There are stones scattered along the train tracks. Click on the photo to enlarge it.

P.S. I was further down the line and there were no stones along the track because they were working on it. So these were probably the stones they moved.

Delicious Summer Homework

Part of Little Brother's 8th grade summer homework was to make dinner. He made spaghetti with zucchini, green pepper, eggplant, onions and basil tomato sauce. He also made a salad with cucumber and cherry tomatoes. He had to take a picture, paste it on a paper and write up the recipe. It was due on on September 1 when he went back to school. I'm late posting this.

Wakame Rice--Earthquake Supplies

Today was the anniversary of the Great Kanto Earthquake of 1923. There are disaster drills across the city every year. It is the first day of school after the summer break and students participate in drills.

There are displays of earthquake supplies and equipment in stores. I bought some new packaged food to store in our shed. This is wakame rice. The expiration date is June 2014!

Just pour hot water in . Wait and eat from the package. Check out the labels below for more information about earthquakes and wakame.

Check this post about The Wakame Gatherers a picture book by Holly Thompson and Kazumi Wilds.

Kids Web Japan--September 1 Disaster Prevention Day

End of Summer Sale--Shiso Pepsi

I posted about shiso and shiso Pepsi here. Today, I found some on a sale table at the grocery store. We had it with lunch. Though it's not one of our favorites, it is refreshing. Like the cucumber Pepsi in the summer of 2007.

Today is cold and rainy. A typhoon is supposed to hit Tokyo this afternoon. It is a day for drinking hot green tea.

Re-using

I never noticed these hanging on the side of our neighborhood vegetable stand.

They are silk braids used as borders on tatami mats.

Our vegetable stand man used them to build and reinforce his vegetable stand.

He tied this pole to a tree.

His stand is closed for lunch.

Check out this post to see the braids on tatami.

Birds? Planes?

Look closely or scroll down to the next picture.

Actually, they are butterflies at the end of a butterfly dance. These florescent turquoise butterflies started here in this field. They fluttered around each other before one started flying up into the air. The other one flew circles around it before flying away in the opposite direction.

Train Crossing

The sign warns that there is a train crossing ahead. That is an overpass for cars in the background. Click on the labels below for more about trains.

Tokyo Disney Sea & Disneyland

This is a postcard from the Mediterranean Harbor at Tokyo Disney Sea. It is an amazing place!

Last week, Little Brother and his friends, all age 13, arranged a 2-day trip to Tokyo Disneyland and Disney Sea. They went (with parental permission) to a travel agent and made plans by themselves. They paid for the hotel and the tickets at the travel agent. They went by train and spent the first day at Tokyo Disney Sea. Papa met them at closing time and stayed overnight at one of the hotels with them. Papa dropped them off at Disneyland the next day and went to work. He picked them up and drove them home.

They had a great time. They weren't able to go on the new Monsters Inc. ride because it was so crowded. Little Brother especially liked the current show at Tokyo Disneyland. The castle showers water on the spectators!

Little Jam Jars?

No, they're jars of sorbet. Little Brother's friend's grandmother gave us this box of sorbet as a thank you gift for Papa's help with the trip to Disneyland.

Cold Green Tea

When I first came to Japan over 20 years ago, I wanted to put sugar in my green tea. Papa was horrified.

"We don't do that," he said.

Over the years, things have changed. Green tea latte with milk and sugar is now served in restaurants and sold in cartons and individual cups at convenience stores.

Here is a carton of cold green tea (no milk, no sugar). Usually, we drink cold mugicha in the summer. We also drink cold oolong tea or milk tea or lemon tea. Milk tea is black (western) tea with sugar and milk. Lemon tea is black tea with sugar and lemon.

This was the first time I had tried cold green tea. It was good!

Moon Flower

Our moon flower bloomed yesterday evening. Moon flowers bloom at night.

Lotus

It was a bright and sunny day at Jindai Botanical Gardens. Click on the pictures to enlarge them!

These lotus buds have not bloomed yet. That is a seed pod near the base of one of the buds. The seed pod is located in the center of the lotus flower. The petals have fallen away from this one. Click on the label below to see more photos of lotus. You'll see that I have only gotten one photo of a lotus in bloom. I've been missing their bloom time!

Summer Gourds at Jindai Botanical Gardens

This gourd is so heavy it needs a sling!

This is the name plate for the gourd in the photo above. The first symbol is kanji for dai, tai or ookii which means "big". The rest of the name is written in hiragana and can be transcribed as daruma hyotan (long o).

The name plate says that these gourds are called tsuru kubi hyotan (long o).

Kids Web Japan-- hiragana
Kids Web Japan-- kanji

Another Gourd

This was big.

Kanpyo.

Vehicle

I saw this at Jindai Botanical Gardens today.

You can't tell how big it is

until someone sits in it! Click to enlarge the photo.

Coming Soon-- Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs

This movie may already be showing in the United States, but it's coming to our theater September 19th. It is based on one of Little Brother and Big Sister's favorite books. It will be in 3D.

The top word in red is kumori,"cloud". The word in white is toki doki, "sometimes". Underneath it, the word "meatball" is written in katakana, the script for foreign words.

Check www.kumori-tokidoki.jp

Kids Web Japan-- katakana

Little Brother and I picked up this ad when we went to see Night Museum 2. We enjoyed the movie. It was pretty crowded. It was in English with Japanese subtitles. People laughed a lot especially at the scene with the guard, Brandon, and the scenes with Hank Zakaria.