Day 356: Wandering Shimokitazawa — Japanese Curry for Lunch, Italian for Dinner
It was a breezy and cool but beautiful morning. I worked out in the park near the hotel and took this pic as I crossed the Meguro River on my way home.
Today is our last full day in Japan and last outside the US. Well, sort of — we have most of tomorrow in Tokyo before flying to Hawaii at 9pm.
We did homeschool this morning and then headed out around midday to check out Shimokitazawa. We took our now-familiar Yamanote subway line, transferring at Shibuya station then one express train stop out to Shimokitazawa. Even for New Yorkers, who have been to Hong Kong, Beijing and Shanghai this year, the size, complexity and mass of humanity at the Shibuya station is truly stunning.
Shimokitazawa (or Shimokita) is described online as “a hip cultural quarter with a lingering old Tokyo vibe.” It’s apparently the hipster spot where all the “young people” want to live. The streets are narrow and dominated by pedestrians. The shops are all selling vintage stuff including a lot of 80s and 90s American outdoorsy stuff. The Japanese cool kids are all dressing like an NCS sophomore circa 1993. And there are a bunch of restaurants, especially curry joints. We went to a cozy one called Cosmos and had really good seafood curry soup with rice — a perfect winter meal.
Our plan was that I would take the kids to a playground while Margaret wandered unencumbered and then we would switch. It was about a 20 min walk through a neat little neighborhood (nominee for most random spot of the year) to the playground. The kids had a blast on swings, a spinning jungle gym“merry go round” thing and then eventually moving to just play in the dirt. Simple pleasures!
Margaret picked up a vintage sweater dress and then joined us at the playground. By that point the sun was going down and it was getting really chilly so I decided to bail on taking my own personal time in Shimokita and we all walked to a nearby train station and headed back to Shibuya, and then on to Ebisu.
Several weeks ago we booked a 6:30 reservation at a fancy-ish sushi place through our hotel, thinking we would want to celebrate our last night in Tokyo. We arrived in Ebisu around 5:00, hit an arcade for a few minutes then went looking for a place to warm up and have a drink.
We were beckoned into Di Punto, a comfy-looking Italian place by a guy out front. As we sat down Margaret and I both had the same thought: let’s just stay here and ditch the sushi. We had eaten a lot of raw fish already this week, the place we booked was likely too esoteric for the kids and Margaret’s current eating status could be labeled: “tentative pescatarian quickly becoming a vegetarian.” I called the hotel concierge and they cancelled the res, luckily avoiding the $100 / person cancellation fee.
It was the right call. We had pasta, pizza and burrata. I had a staring / no laugh contest with James. He’s remarkably good.
The kids read their books while Margaret and I talked through the shocking fact that we are coming to the end of our international travel.
In general, we continue to feel good about the pending completion of this adventure. But there is a mix of emotions: sadness, amazement, fear and excitement.
It’s definitely sad that this special family time is coming to an end. We’re staying together and moving on to the next stage, more tightly bonded than ever. Thankfully we’re not losing one of these kids to college… yet. Tonight at dinner as we were musing about future travel plans, Margaret said, “Where can we send the kids to college that will be fun for us?” So funny.
We’re amazed we’ve done as much as we have — just thinking back to previous parts of the trip is mind-bending… Rio, Joburg, Cairo, Stockholm, Ulaanbaatar, Sydney, etc. etc… Good gracious, how did we actually do this?
And it’s a little scary and a little exciting to have no home and no jobs in New York. Eeeek! I get a little pitter-patter feeling in my chest just writing that. Lots of newness around the corner.
After dinner we came back to the room and started the bath. Margaret filled it with bath soap and I turned on the jacuzzi jets to get the bubbles really going. Knowing that I planned to get in, Margaret yelled, “first Sullivan in the bath gets a chocolate sundae!” The kids raced to get undressed and then discovered me in the tub.
NSFW!
