Cooling off from the summer heat....

I really love all of the opportunities for cultural observation and participation here in our little city of Meguro! Today was an autumn festival where a mikoshi - a portable Shinto shrine - is carried around neighborhood streets, and the townspeople gladly and genrously throw water on the carriers of the shrine to help cool them off from the summer heat. The boys had a blast, and Christopher jumped right in there to help carry the kids' shrine. Both boys took full advantage of being splashed and doing the splashing of water. When the shrine carriers rested along their route, shopkeepers would come out to offer imbibement of all forms. I had a vodka tonic and a tomato sandwich. It was a lot of fun.

Afterwards, we visited our local shrine to see the festival continuing in the way of chow and games! Apparently my area has a famous octopus ball shop. I bought some since I thought David was starting to like octopus. While that may be correct in normal situations, octopus smothered in a not fully cooked gooey thick batter is not very appetizing. We just pulled out the octopus and left the batter to smother in its own juices.

On another note - I'm thinking of getting a family pet. Some of you may remember my most loved dog - Chaebi - the mame shiba I got for about 10 bucks in Korea. I have mourned him ever since we had to give him away soon after David was born. Anyway, I'm in the land where the shiba inus were created! Pet stores charge upwards of $1000 for the sweet pets (cats even cost about that much). There is an animal rescue shelter in Tokyo, however, so I'm going to try and go that route. The landlord has approved the new addition, so hopefully within the next few weeks I'll have pictures of a new member of our family.