Wednesday, Dec. 9th from Tokyo

Great day to get Ama out of the Minami Azabu Roppongi hood and deeper into the city. So Chloe, Carl, Maja and I caught a taxi and headed for the Tokyo Metropolitan Children's Museum in Shibuya. Our driver missed the mark by a block but got out in his black suit, white shirt and gloves and ran down the street to find out exactly where it was and ran back bowing, turned off the meter and took us two blocks closer. (It still cost more than a ride from Antigua to the Guatemala City Airport, la Aurora, but hey, this is Tokyo!) We had wanted to go to the National Children's Castle but read that it does not open until 12:30 on weekdays--a little too late for napping two year olds.

The Museum was just fine instead and Carl and Chloe seemed to like the music room on the fourth floor best. I loved the dragon on the wall and watching them discover all the sounds the instruments there make--I think Carl will be the more serious musician and Chloe, of course, the dancer. We also went to the craft area but the lady cutting the origami pieces spoke a language we don't have yet so we need more practice before we can go back and make swans. From the museum we called Daddy whose office building is near-by and he met us for lunch on the 8th floor of a huge department store with at least 6 restaurant options from pure sushi to Italian. We choose the more "regular" noodle house for today as C & C are getting very good at slurping in all the correct ways and Chloe even knew we were to serve them with chop sticks. What fun and quite delicious indeed, tho Ama has something to learn about the slurping part.

Daddy went back to work and the rest of us hailed another taxi--something both kids know the arm in the air signal for already--and headed home for nap time. Yum. And Brenda just rang the doorbell. Brenda is a lovely Philipina woman who may start working with the Smiths in January. She's come today to fix us dinner and meet Adamsan to see if he approves. Something tells me Maja is already hooked when Brenda, who speaks excellent English, some Japanese and knows many Spanish words given they use them with a different grammar in the Philipines, mentioned that she LOVES to cook, iron and take care of little children. She even offers cooking classes on Saturday mornings at a Montessori School nearby so I think Carl will be a chef before he graduates from kindergarten--especially if Brenda comes on board here.

So, enough of this new blogging thing for today. Let me see if I can add some photos to make it even better!