It’s been a few days. The jet lag has taken its toll a wee bit and it is only now that I feel clear headed enough to post again.
Sunday
I think Sunday was the hardest. We attempted a big supermarket shop – by bus, none the less – in the morning; then in the afternoon we took the train out to Kamakura, a hill town south of Yokohama which has lots of temples, a giant buddha, and lots of shops and cafes.
Dan has a preferred supermarket; OK supermarket. Google maps told us the nearest one was a fair way away. But we catch a vey nice air conditioned bus and follow the progress on Dan’s phone and start the shop. Now. I love exploring the food shops and this one was a bit disappointing. Plus, I suppose I have more fun when there isn’t a time or purpose constraint and we had both on this trip.
I *had* started a blog post on Sunday so it seems a shame to waste it. Here is what I wrote:
The wind howled and the rain poured last night and most of this morning. I slept badly and got up early. Dan joined me and we watched a couple of episodes of the Million Yen Women on Netflix before the boys got up. It’s a great wee drama about a novelist and it involves intrigue, murder and I use it as an excuse to learn some Nihongo.
We decided to go to the supermarket. After much Google Mapsing we decided to try for the OK supermarket a twenty five minute bus ride away.
Anyway. Here’s the photos of the shopping trip. Of course, lugging it all back on the bus wasn’t as much fun. And the bus was crowded and not air conditioned. And something leaked onto my leather handbag. But I did have the guilty pleasure of listening-in on a conversation going on in the seats behind me between two older Antipodean ladies. I was a bit annoyed at first because I was trying to record the voice of the bus driver who reminded me of a Goons’ character. I did catch this snippet:
Kamakura
Perhaps not surprisingly, (look at my use of the fronted adverbial, folks), I was not at my best for our afternoon jaunt to Kamakura. By the time we had climbed the steps to the train platform I was feeling totally huge and gallumphing. Being surrounded by these petite things in their stylish clothes that hang from their bony frames does nothing for the self esteem. But I tried to brush off these feelings reminding myself I was knackered and hormonal and European and overweight. Natch.
We had to change trains at Ofuna, where there is another giant buddha that you can see from the train. (We’ve not yet got off the train at Ofuna to explore it ourselves). 
Dan has a favourite decadent Hot Chocolate shop in Kamakura and I wasn’t going to turn him down, feeling as I did. We sat outside and watched kites loop around above the trains station.
We then wandered into Kamakura, bought some kitchen equipment from a department store; Dan let me have some breathing time on my own in a funky cafe – I had a chilled chai latte which was a bit too sweet but I pushed on through! Then we returned home. Of course I have taken some snaps of some interesting food items, thus:
There’s a tiny amount of sakura still on the trees, I’m a little sad we missed it, but hey-ho. The next cultural theme will be the carp windsocks which are part of the Children’s Day celebrations in May, which form part of Golden Week. To be honest, I’m not entirely sure what this is all about but when I do find out more, I will share with you all. You lucky souls.
Finally, we spotted this and I couldn’t resist.
bookwormbird 