(Day 14) End of Chapter 1

I know I’m beginning to sound redundant, but how is it possible that my trip is almost half over?!? I precisely chose to come for a month so this wouldn’t happen. I guess it would have had to happen at some point, but this seriously bums me out. On the plus side, we’ve totally done enough for an entire trip and I still have many things to experience! Let’s get on with it.

Since today was part of a holiday long weekend, the bullet trains were jammed full of people and thus we were relegated to the 1 PM bullet train back to Tokyo – which wouldn’t have been a problem if we didn’t have to check out by 10 AM. We decided that to kill time we would have a nice, drawn-out breakfast at the UCC restaurant on the corner that we ate at when we first arrived in Kyoto.


Yes! Ice cream for breakfast!

The only problem with our plan to kill time became apparent when the food was brought out within 10 minutes of our arrival. Since we checked out slightly before 10, we were eating at 10:10. So we tried to eat slowly and savour our waters, but the non-smoking section was quite in demand with diners and there were only six tables; it would have been incredibly selfish to stay if we had finished our meals, so we left shortly after 10:30. With no real destination that would accommodate our heavy bags, we headed to the train station and relaxed outside in the sun. People-watching ensued, which is always entertaining. There was one particular person who tickled my fancy more than any other…behold! The Emperor from Star Wars!


You can’t tell me you don’t see the resemblance.

There was also randomly a parade with a marching band to entertain us.



Yes….so…uh…more sitting followed. Eventually (and I’m not quite sure exactly how) time passed and we made our way inside and onto our train. Before I knew it, we were zipping along the countryside once more, Tokyo-bound.







At 4:30-ish, we arrived back in our little ‘hood of Urawa.


Mother, outside the station in Urawa, looking plain and unimpressed that Isetan is behind her.

Maya, her Mother and Chobi were kind enough to pick us up from the station again and I was glad to be back. No more travel for me for a few days at least.

Us ladies decided to head out for some groceries and a bit shopping before dinner, so we headed to Parco and looked at a few shops before heading to Daimaru for the food. In addition to food for supper, I picked up a few necessities of my own…


Heee! Here we have some chips, cookies, more cookies, a few more cookies, some dried strawberries, Karl sticks and oolong tea. I crack me up. I ate it all, too (over the period of 10 days or so).

The Suzuki’s were kind enough to make us dinner that night and we were treated to a feast of shabu-shabu.


Oh drool! It was so delicious. Gochisosamadeshita!!! Hontou. Ah…hontou wa ureshii deshita.

Tomorrow Mother sets sail for Canada and I stay to linger behind…in the luxury area of Tokyo – Ginza. Let’s start the next chapter, ne?