7th April 2002 – email home
This is from my diary from when we first relocated to Japan – pre-blog. Other entries can be found here.
Thought I’d drop you a quick line to let you know what we’ve been up to as we’ve nearly survived for a week now! Helped I’m sure by the very nice hotel (www.centuryhyatt.co.jp). We are on the 21st floor and can see mountains (but not Fuji, we’re looking the wrong way) and lots of other high-rise buildings as we are in Shinjuku, which is the business district – the building next door is the metropolitan government and I don’t know how tall it is but there is an observatory on floor 45! Every morning hundreds of ant-like people stream out of the subway and into it, then they all go back the other way at night.
I’ve been taking advantage of the facilities with a swim and a sauna nearly every day – I could get used to this! Also have been doing some work (I’ll start properly tomorrow, I’ve just been doing little bits here and there) and exploring around. Only on foot during the week as the subway/train system was a bit daunting on my own, but we’ve been out and about this weekend so I’m quite confident I can go further next week. I’m starting yoga on Tuesday with a girl whose husband also works for shell – she is friends with Sara.
We’ve found a house we like. No problems with people coming to stay as every house we have seen as been at least as big as our house in Warrington. You can all come together! Fingers crossed we can have it and can move in quickly as I think we will feel more settled then. It even has a small garden (about 2 sq metres) with a stone lantern and an acer tree. Our air freight is in the country already but I have no idea where the ship is.
We’ve had a nice weekend (weather fantastic, warm and sunny) – yesterday we went to Ueno, which is a different area of Tokyo. We walked around the park (us and every child in Tokyo! There is a zoo in the park that is obviously The place to go on a Saturday) then went exploring the streets, which are narrow and very crowded with market stalls. Lots of bargains to be had although we didn’t buy anything. In the evening we went to Roppongi which is a strange place full of expats, but we were looking for the sports cafe so Cameron could watch Celtic win the league – we found the bar but had to watch Manchester United instead! Horribly expensive, even for Tokyo, so we didn’t stay very long. Then today (after viewing another house) we took the train south, theough Yokohama to Kamakura, which is a seaside town that is stuffed full of temples and shrines. Saw lots of ladies in kimonos and a wedding (you should see what the brides here have to wear!), and a famous tree. Feeling tired and a bit sunburnt now – might have to go for another sauna!