Michelle and I went into Tokyo today. I really wasn't in the mood to go anywhere and even considered calling it off last minute and head back to bed. I am so glad that I didn't call it off.
We met up in Ueno where we really only stayed long enough to find some quick sushi and take a look at a guide book. We found a picture of a pretty bridge in a park so we decided to go and try and find it. It took some doing, and some wrong turns, and some random directions in Japanese, and a very long walk around a very tall wall within which we were positive the park was but we couldn't find an opening in the wall to save our lives. We did finally find and opening after practically circumventing the entire park. As soon as we walked in the gate we both breathed a little sigh and relaxed our shoulders a little bit. It was so green and delightful and so much quieter right away. We had decided that if it were any more than 500 yen entrance that we would jam. It was only 300 and so on we went. It is the oldest promenade park in Tokyo. Construction on it started back in like 1620 something and was completed like 23 years later. It used to be 4 times the current size, unbelievable. We spent like 3 and a half hours or so in there. We'd walk a bit and then sit on a bench and talk, or not. I took a few pictures. We met a cute old lady who came up to us with a bright smile and said 'Good Afternoon' and then continued walking past us saying 'Have a nice day'. We saw her moments later setting down to do some watercolours of the iris fields that we were walking around. She showed us a few pictures and then said 'Have a nice day' and we continued on. She was so sweet. We talked a lot. While sitting on top of the red bridge (the picture of which had originally drew us to find the park) I ventured to ask Michelle (the other one) about her dealings with culture shock because I've been thinking that I'm dealing with it but I wasn't sure. We talked for like the next forty minutes or so about shock and life here and it was so good to hear another person's struggles that so closely resembled mine. We talked about wanting to be independent from the "School Yard" mentality of so many of the other teachers, about being okay with not being friends with everyone, about being labeled by others because we aren't consumed by the school community, about being okay with where we are. I felt utterly refreshed after that talk. We had many good talks throughout the day. We talked about marriage and singleness, traveling, family, work, ideas and our takes on life and friendship. By the time we left the park I realized that I had actually not thought of the next day's classes for the first time in a very long time. I realized that when we were in the station I heard myself laugh, and it had been a long time since I had heard my own real laugh, I don't mean the laugh we give students when they're telling a story and we can't actually figure out what they're saying and so we just go along with the physical cues of when to laugh during the story. We decided that our new motto is, "I just needed to be here", when people ask us why we're in Japan.
We then decided that it was time to start scouting our dinner options. Michelle (the other one) was in the mood for a trendy little area, so we made our way towards Oomatosando, which is just north of Shibuya. At first the main roads just looked like any major street in a large city, but then we found these little side streets that were kind of kitchy and very European in flavour. I found an Aveda! I felt instantly relaxed when I walked in the door and smelled the oh so familiar small of all Aveda shops. We found a cute little upstairs Indian restaurant that we decided to have dinner at. We made complete pigs of ourselves. We had Nan AND Rice with our curry dishes. Soooo much food. We set out to walk off our dinner and find adventure. We found a University campus that we walked around, and got lost on. Then walking down a cute little street we were stopped by these Turkish guys to talk. We ended up going in to his kilm shop and talking with the one guy for at least an hour, if not more. He was pretty cool, and surprisingly enough, younger than us. He looked much older. He went into an expository about flowers and fruit. He was very funny. He had been in a court battle with Ted Turner over CNNasia.com. I guess he was a squatter on the address and Ted wanted it and claimed ownership of it. It was interesting. He was in the Turkish Time magazine because of it. Doesn't Ted own Time? I dunno. Interesting. His friends decided they wanted to some dinner, so the Michelles decided that it was time to start figuring out how to get home. We managed to walk to Shibuya fairly easily and caught the train from there.
I actually feel refreshed after today. The first time I've felt like that after a day off in a very long time. I usually just try to distract myself from the sense of impending doom that wells up within me on my day off. Today, I actually forgot about work. It was quite nice. Something that I wish I could do more often. I will be returning to that park in the future.
