"Panda"monium, Fish Markets, and Nabe

Goooooood Morning! Well, to those in the states anyway. Right now in Tokyo it's about 10:30 p.m. and I'm just about to get into bed. But it's been a few days since my last post, and living the Tokyo life is obviously what you all want to be reading about ;)

SO.

Things have been fairly chill this weekend on the 36th floor in the Severson apartment. We took a day off from being tourists and had a lazy day in the house on Friday. I did get the chance to go to the international grocery store called Nissin World Delicatessen with Mom. This one was different from the local supermarkets because everything is actually in English! Don't take it for granted, people. It's tough shopping when you have no idea what the heck you are buying. They even sell this Biscoff Cookie Spread that I highly recommend everyone try. The store is great because they also take American money. On the subject of money, I'm amazed seeing Mom and Dad pay for things with Yen because the coins and bills are a little different than American money, but they make it look easy. Thankfully the Yen's ratio is 100:1 with the U.S. dollar, so 100 yen is equivalent to $1 USD, making it a little easier to convert in my head. I'd make the Yen sign, but my laptop won't let me :/

Mom, Tanner, Caitlin, and I made a trip up to Yokohama on a fairly rainy day. We took a walk through Chinatown where every corner literally has a store full of just Panda stuff. And it's all so adorable! There were panda slippers, magnets, keychains, aprons, purses, hats, and lots more. We each came home with a little panda souvenir that day because really, who can say no to adorable panda gear? 

See??? Panda Shops.

The highlight of the day had to be the fish pedicures we got there. It tickles for the first minute or two, especially when you're not used to having little creatures nibble at the bottoms of your feet. My feet and hands felt awesome afterwards, and I honestly wish I could have stayed longer than the scheduled 20 minutes. It may be illegal in the U.S. to do pedicures like these, but if you ever travel to a country that does them, I highly recommend giving it a try. 

That night we also made Nabe (nah-bay) which is basically taking a broth and boiling it, and then cooking whatever meat and vegetables and noodles you want in it. Seriously, it was delicious!

Yesterday we met up with Mom and Dad's Japanese tutor named Hirotesan who is this sweet, retired man. We met up with him in Tsukiji where the largest fish market is located. Let me tell you, this place was CROWDED. We were being shoved left and right while walking down the street with all of the restaurants and food stands. We got to sample some candied fruits and different kinds of beans while we walked. I highly recommend the dried mangoes, pineapples, and cherries. They were delicious. The dried ginger was not my favorite though. I wanted to react the way Buddy the Elf does with Fruit Spray perfume when I put that candied ginger in my mouth.

Walking through the fish market was interesting and definitely not for the weak stomached. It was still fairly crowded with narrow spaces to walk through. If you're getting shoved, you're going to be shoved into iced crates with dead fish on them,no joke! It almost happened to me. We watched a humongous tuna fish get sliced and quartered and packaged up. That was cool. The market definitely reeked of fish, which was expected. While it was kind of gross to see everything there, I'm going to leave out details that personally grossed me out. It was still a cool experience to go there and see the fishing industry in Tokyo. Here's a view of the fish market from the hospital next door.

Yes, that's my phone in the reflection. I'm not a photographer haha

Later that day the Severson family did a puzzle, ordered some pizza, and stayed in for the night to watch Hachi, since we went to see the statue a few days earlier. Guys, Hachi is such a good movie. You all need to drop what you are doing and go watch it now. It's on Netflix. I guarantee that you will cry. I totally did and I'm not embarrassed to tell you that. I really did love the movie though. 

Mom also made some really good homemade Cafe Rio Sweet Pork Burritos with cilantro lime rice, cilantro lime Ranch dressing, guacamole, and pico de gallo. All completely homemade and all completely delicious. We had the YSAs in the Tokyo South 1st and 2nd Wards over for dinner/FHE tonight, which was tons of fun. These people are a blast! International friends are the best :) 

That's about it so far. Sorry for taking a few days to post an update. Here are some random pictures of us riding the subway. Yes, I'm totally yawning in the picture. Riding the subway makes you pretty sleepy!

International Christmas!

Merry Christmas! Celebrating Christmas this year has been a little different for the Seversons here in Tokyo, mainly because Christmas is just like any other day to the Japanese. Our family was still able to gather together and celebrate the birth of our Savior. 

I've missed a day of blogging, so I'll catch you up on that before describing our Christmas day.

Yesterday we began with a Google Hangout with Michael and Jenny and Eric and Claire. Sadly, we missed Tyler and Meagan, but when you get the chance to go out without the kids, you've gotta take it! After our chat we went out to the city, specifically to Shibuya and Roppongi. We rode the subway out to see Hachiko. Hachiko is a statue of a dog, based off of an actual dog remembered for his remarkable loyalty to his owner, even many years after his owner's death. There's a movie on it and everything. Feel free to read more about him here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hachikō 

Hachiko is right next to Shibuya Crossing, which is the busiest pedestrian crosswalk in the world. Obviously we had to walk through it! We weren't there during the busiest time of day, but there were still a lot of people there. Check out the video below and see if you can find us! I apologize that the quality is pretty poor.

After walking around Shibuya for a while, we decided to make our way to Roppongi, which is considered a rich area of Tokyo, and also as an active night club scene. There we got sushi that came around on a conveyor belt, which was soooo good! We tried lots of varieties of sushi, all which were delicious :)

I should also mention that in Roppongi there is this really scary looking spider statue.

Sushi filled us up pretty well for the day, so by the time dinner came around we were all just feeling like a little snacking. Christmas Eve dinner ended up being crackers with meat and cheese, but it seemed to be the perfect Christmas Eve dinner as we sat together and watched It's a Wonderful Life.

As for our Christmas day, we opened up a couple of presents and got lots of Japanese goodies in the stockings.

Mom and I walked up to a market about a 5 minutes from the apartment to grab a few items for tonight's dinner. It was strange to do shopping when all of the labels are in a different language, but Mom seems to kind of have an idea of what she needs and what things are, so I just followed her around. After we got back the family walked to Tokyo Tower, which is about 20 minutes away. We walked through Shibakoen on our way there, and some of the trees still had color on them. 

We didn't go up in Tokyo Tower, since apparently it give you about the same view that my parents have in their apartment, but walking around it was enjoyable enough. Here are some great pictures of Dad with the mascot of the Tokyo Tower

Afterwards the parental units trusted Caitlin and I enough to go explore Tokyo by ourselves for a little bit. Thankfully we didn't get lost, but Mom and Dad's apartment building is really easy to see around the city, so it wasn't very hard to find our way back.

Now we've had a very yummy roast beef and mashed potato dinner, talked with Grandma and Grandpa who are serving their mission in Russia, and are watching A Christmas Story. Meanwhile everyone back home is just about to start their Christmas day! May it be merry and bright! 

Merry Christmas from (part of) the Seversons!

Day #2 in Tokyo

Today was a holiday is Japan since it’s the Emperor’s birthday. As a family we went out and ventured into the city! We specifically went to Harajuku, which is a district of Tokyo, and visited the Meiji Shrine, Yoyogi Park, and Takeshita Street. Everyone in Tokyo usually takes the subway or the train to get around, so our outing began with about a 5 minute walk to the subway. We've been pretty lucky not having to deal with the big crowds that usually come with being in the subway, but we've also only been here for about two days now, so I’m sure we’ll encounter it soon. The main difference I've felt here is that everything tends to be on the left side rather than the right. Even on the escalators you stand to the left so that others can pass you on the right. There is definitely order nearly everywhere you go in Japan.

We started off with Yoyogi Park, which is about the equivalent to Central Park in New York. When we walked in there was a large group of people all dressed as Santas and reindeers cleaning the park. We had the chance to get a picture with the Christmas Bear there, which was quite the experience. We couldn't catch what his name was, but it sounded a lot like Tanner, so we gave my little sister, Tanner, a hard time about it haha.

As we kept walking, a girl started holding a “Free Hugs” sign, which people just all came rushing to. Everyone would hug her and then take a selfie with her. It was fun to see. Caitlin even went up and got a hug from her!

After walking through the park we got some baby castellas, which are basically a popular Japanese festival sponge cake made with flour, eggs, and starch syrup. So they’re like a mini fluffy pancake and they are good.

Then we went to Meiji Shrine, which is one of the bigger and more popular shrines here. The Japanese take New Year’s Eve here very seriously and always visit a shrine to ring the bell, pay their respects and say a prayer to bring them luck and prosperity for the new year. The Meiji Shrine has at least one million people come to it on New Year’s Eve, so the shrine will be packed from beginning to end. When we reached where offerings are thrown in and prayers are said, we each got to wash our hands and mouth, which cleanses you for saying your prayers. There is also a wall that has prayers listed on it.  

Inside of the shrine is a park that you can go and feed the birds there with peanuts. You have to whistle and call out to the birds to get their attention and get them to come sit on your hand. It was a tough process at first, but after a while we had tons of birds there. Just make sure you hold onto your peanut because they will take it right from your hand if you don’t hold it tight enough!

Afterwards we walked around Takeshita Street, which is a long street of shopping centers. It’s hilarious seeing how many sweaters have been wrongly translated into English in these stores. Take for example this shirt. It says "I will either find a way" and this isn't the only poorly translated shirt I saw today.

Oh yeah and they had these sweet purses. Anyone want one as a souvenir?? Haha

My favorite is the cat with its tongue sticking out. Caitlin and I are pretty sure we’ll have to come shop there another day when it isn’t as crowded.

Crepes are pretty popular in Japan, so we had to stop and get some for lunch. They are on every corner in the busiest parts of town. They don’t have nutella in them at all, but they fill them with ice cream, fruit, cheesecake, and basically anything else you could think of.

Oh yeah, and fun fact: The crows here are HUGE. Like, scary huge. They frighten me.

Japan Day #1

      The last 48 hours have been incredibly long with traveling and jet lag, but they have been extremely worthwhile. Even as I write at the moment I am struggling with jet lag. My urges to sleep throughout the day haven’t been as bad as I had assumed they would be, but it’s now about 8 p.m. in Tokyo (4 a.m. in Utah) and my eyes are having a hard time staying open. Thankfully I’ll get to sleep in just a little bit.

      Our trip to Tokyo started with one of the worst flights I’ve been on, and it was the shorter of the two flights I would have to take to get to Japan. In case you don’t know this about me, I don’t really enjoy flying that much. I love traveling, but getting to my destination is the one part that I dread. So you can imagine my horror when I learned that I’d have to spend 10+ hours on a plane flying over the ocean. I was not looking forward to it in the slightest. I’m also really prone to motion sickness, so when turbulence hits (Delta likes calls it “rough air”) I tend to start feeling pretty sick. Our two hour flight to Seattle had awful turbulence, so I was just spending my time trying to not puke in a paper bag. Add only getting three hours of sleep the night before to the equation and you get a sick and emotional Courtney. Thankfully we had a long enough layover to let me walk around and eat a little food to get me going again. Our next flight was long, but they serve you food and let you watch movies and stuff, so while it felt like forever, it was a lot better of a flight. I usually don’t sleep well while traveling, so I didn’t sleep much on the flight there, but I am definitely making myself sleep on the flight back home in a couple weeks.

     When we landed at the Haneda Tokyo Airport it was about 11:30 p.m. Saturday night, meaning that in our whole travel time we had left on Friday, skipped all of Saturday, and went right into Sunday. I had also been awake for 24 hours by this point so I was definitely ready for bed. Caitlin, Tanner, and I went through Customs (now I finally have something in my passport!) and met up with Mom and Dad. We caught the last train for the night and took a taxi home. And then I finally got to sleep!

     Waking up the next morning was pretty rough, and then Dad told us we weren't allowed to sleep at all until bedtime to help get over the jet lag. Thankfully my jet lag hasn't been too bad though! Mom drove us to church, which was quite an experience because they drive on the left side of the road, making right and left turns really confusing. After church we walked down the street to a nearby park (“koen” in Japanese). The parks in Japan are really about walking trails and ponds rather than being all manicured and perfect like we have them in America.

     Later that day Caitlin, Tanner, and I had the chance to go eat dinner with the Young Single Adults in the stake, which was an awesome experience. They taught us difference Japanese phrases, and a few of them are in a J-Pop genre band that is pretty well known here! One of the phrases I learned was “ee-kay-men.” Obviously that’s not how you spell it, but since I don’t know actual Japanese, we’ll stick with phonetics. It means “ridiculously handsome” – a phrase that I’ll be saving to say to you, Nick ;)

     Also, as a random side note, their toilets here are top notch. They automatically lift the lid and the seat (if needed), warm the seat, flush, and close the lid for you. Dad jokingly says he’s made it a goal to go the whole two years without having to touch a toilet.