And here we are outside Shinagawa Station getting hustled to a yakitori restaurant - can you see how tiny this street is? We battled the jet lag and powered through 3 hours at the airport of exchanging currency, shipping bags to Mihara (our next destination where Dean's aunt lives), and exchanging JR passes before riding 1 hour on a train to our hotel. Drew and I were amazed that Japan is so technologically advanced, but it still took an hour to get 5 train passes....the clerk did lots of hand-writing, stamping, stapling, signing, tearing and re-stapling, etc. Contrast that with the restaurant, where we rang a doorbell at the table and a waiter appeared with a tiny handheld computer to enter our order. Huh...
So I was up today at 4 am as expected, and we leave for Mihara at 9:30 to stay with Dean's family a couple of days. The Rosetta Stone was fantastic (I didn't quite finish the second disc - had a couple of hours left, dangit), but they talk WAY too fast for me to understand much of anything here. Lucas and I bought a drink and snack in the train station, and the lady had to show me the calculator before I could understand our total. Lucas saved the situation with a hearty "Arigato," though. Back to the Easy Japanese book till everybody else wakes up...
4 comments:
Thanks for the updates - fascinating - I am living vicariously through you!! I love your magazine blog post! Also, I found getting around Tokyo, although technologically advanced, to be somewhat exhausting.
Have fun and looking forward to more adventures. BTW, bloglovin won't let me post comments (still) so I just go directly to your website. . .I must be doing something wrong!
Have fun!
COOL!!!!!! Lucas is one smart kid ;) I bet if you ask them to slow down when they are talking, they will. They will probably be very flattered that you are attempting their language!
Robbie
Pam, you're right - exhausting is the word! The first 48 hours here was just planes, trains, and automobiles, and Drew said, "So far we've been here 2 days and we haven't really done anything." And I have no knowledge of Bloglovin - is that where you are now?
You're right, Robbie. I think I'm failing miserably and they keep saying how jouzo I am - means skilled - but I think they're just being nice. It's fun to try, though!
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