A non-stressful day. I love those days! I'm pretty sure everyone's vacation should be as wonderful as this.
After breakfast I played the piano, chatted with okaasan, and we made plans for our Fuji tour tomorrow...actually I wasn't really part of the planning. I was playing on the computer. But, when asked if I wanted to either go to an onsen (Japanese bathing house) or take a lesson on making soba noodles from scratch I chose the latter since I've been to onsen already. (See previous blogs from May)
The only item on today's dockett was to get my hair cut and boy did that turn out to be an adventure!
Let's get a little background on this story....this is not your ordinary haircut.
First of all, I visit the hair salon approximately once per year. Yep, that's me, saving money and just letting my hair go through it's annual short-to-long cycle. 2 years ago when I first seriously started thinking about taking a trip to Japan I told my friend, "And I want to get my hair cut in Tokyo and get a Japanese-style cut!" Okay, whatever that means.
Last year I tried something different with my hair and got it permed....loved it. This year since it's grown out quite a bit I decided to re-cut and re-perm it since it served me well all year. Absolutely NO maintenance which is my cup of tea.
I've never actually gotten a professional hair cut by modern standards. I guess that means I've never been charged more than $30...actually that's how much my perm cost last year because it was done by a friend in her kitchen. She was multi-tasking while baking cookies in the oven...yeah. The other times I had it cut in college consisted of me paying $5 or $10 at the local beauty school...you can imagine how my hair turned out at in the end....
We were supposed to take the train into downtown but Otoosan, thoroughly enjoying his first day of vacation, drove us over an hour into town just to drop us off at the salon. On the way there we passed a grocery store that apparently carried quite a bit of imported foods. We stopped and Otoosan blessedly bought me some granola and cooking oats!!! Woohoo!!! I also suggested they try some Hawaiian Kettle chips (Sweet Maui Onion and BBQ). I'm considering it part of a cultural exchange program.
Despite the short detour, we made it to the salon with 9 minutes to spare. I'm not sure how they advertise because I only heard about it through Takae, but the place was inside this little alcove on a back street and downstairs...Nice place, actually. Very nice.
With my translator by my side I filled out the sheet and basically said, "Do whatever looks good as long as it doesn't require me to spend any time on it."
When the hair-stylist came over to take a look at the nest of hair I was prepared for the "your hair is so fine! Wow, I can't believe your perm stayed so well! It's perfect! Wow, that's your natural hair color?!" I've heard it a few times since being in Japan...foreign hair...I would describe it as flat and boring but it's really all about perspective and no one being satisfied with what they were born with, including myself.
In the end he was reluctant to re-perm it because the chemicals used here would probably be different and (he thought) too harsh for my "fine" hair. So, using the perm I already had, he made it into a very nice and Japanese-stylish cut with plenty of layers :)
After breakfast I played the piano, chatted with okaasan, and we made plans for our Fuji tour tomorrow...actually I wasn't really part of the planning. I was playing on the computer. But, when asked if I wanted to either go to an onsen (Japanese bathing house) or take a lesson on making soba noodles from scratch I chose the latter since I've been to onsen already. (See previous blogs from May)
The only item on today's dockett was to get my hair cut and boy did that turn out to be an adventure!
Let's get a little background on this story....this is not your ordinary haircut.
First of all, I visit the hair salon approximately once per year. Yep, that's me, saving money and just letting my hair go through it's annual short-to-long cycle. 2 years ago when I first seriously started thinking about taking a trip to Japan I told my friend, "And I want to get my hair cut in Tokyo and get a Japanese-style cut!" Okay, whatever that means.
Last year I tried something different with my hair and got it permed....loved it. This year since it's grown out quite a bit I decided to re-cut and re-perm it since it served me well all year. Absolutely NO maintenance which is my cup of tea.
I've never actually gotten a professional hair cut by modern standards. I guess that means I've never been charged more than $30...actually that's how much my perm cost last year because it was done by a friend in her kitchen. She was multi-tasking while baking cookies in the oven...yeah. The other times I had it cut in college consisted of me paying $5 or $10 at the local beauty school...you can imagine how my hair turned out at in the end....
We were supposed to take the train into downtown but Otoosan, thoroughly enjoying his first day of vacation, drove us over an hour into town just to drop us off at the salon. On the way there we passed a grocery store that apparently carried quite a bit of imported foods. We stopped and Otoosan blessedly bought me some granola and cooking oats!!! Woohoo!!! I also suggested they try some Hawaiian Kettle chips (Sweet Maui Onion and BBQ). I'm considering it part of a cultural exchange program.
Despite the short detour, we made it to the salon with 9 minutes to spare. I'm not sure how they advertise because I only heard about it through Takae, but the place was inside this little alcove on a back street and downstairs...Nice place, actually. Very nice.
With my translator by my side I filled out the sheet and basically said, "Do whatever looks good as long as it doesn't require me to spend any time on it."
When the hair-stylist came over to take a look at the nest of hair I was prepared for the "your hair is so fine! Wow, I can't believe your perm stayed so well! It's perfect! Wow, that's your natural hair color?!" I've heard it a few times since being in Japan...foreign hair...I would describe it as flat and boring but it's really all about perspective and no one being satisfied with what they were born with, including myself.
In the end he was reluctant to re-perm it because the chemicals used here would probably be different and (he thought) too harsh for my "fine" hair. So, using the perm I already had, he made it into a very nice and Japanese-stylish cut with plenty of layers :)
This was after Erika washed my hair...twice, conditioned it, gave me a scalp massage, a shoulder massage, and we talked (in Japanese) about her trips to Canada and England as part of a homestay program back in the day. Nice girl.
So my haircut was a success and came out cheaper because new people get 20% off...it was around 5,700yen.
We started to head leisurely to the train station, enjoying the slightly cooler evening temperature though the sun hadn't set yet. As we neared the tunnel for the train station we stopped in Starbucks and treated ourselves to frapps.
Swiping our train pass cards at the turn stile Takae suddenly realized---we were on the subway route, not the train! Looking at the map she planned a route to a familiar train station for a transfer and I looked at the map and saw a short cut: Roppongi. It was also a name I saw often on traveler's brochures :) So I suggested it.
Disembarking at the Roppongi subway station we made our way above ground and found a map with a nice walk down the streets to the train station. We got about 10 feet before I got distracted by a really tall building and said aloud, "gee, it would be sweet to go up to the observatory and look at Tokyo from up there." So we did.
Turns out there's also an art museum and an aquarium up there. The tickets to the observatory are only sold with the museum...so we went there too!
It took us forever to walk around the 360 degree observatory because we kept getting caught in the tourist traps and enjoying them!
The first one was innocent enough: A huge fish tank with little Nemos swimming around under the blue and green mood lighting. One could take a picture of the fish and still capture the Tokyo skyline in the background. That's what most people were doing via their smartphones. I had actually brought my camera.
The second trap was a nice big window with a view of Tokyo tower lit up in orange lights in the background. There was a lady standing there and was very willing to take your picture for free. While you were standing there, she also took your picture with a professional camera and after the flash you could walk over to the booth in the corner were they had ALREADY printed your picture and you could chose to buy it or just keep the one on your own camera for free.
I was just gonna bypass it but Takae said we had to at least go look and say thanks but no thanks. Well, turns out the picture they give you also comes with 2 other professional photos of the building and the city (they know your own photos with point-and-shoot cameras from a glass building are crap).
So we got two.
I spent some time trying to get some nice shots of the horizon lights with only marginal results. As we walked around I found the omiyage shop and of course was obliged to buy some since that's what you do here. Takae got some postcards for art inspiration.
Since we were on the picture-hype we certainly couldn't bypass the puriculaa machine. I'm sure you've seen it: the little photo booth with a curtained entrance just big enough for a toilet but instead we cram 4 or 5 people into it and make crazy faces with weird backgrounds and write words on top of the photos with digital pens. This one wasn't that fancy and only let you take 4 pictures, but the background was a nice shot of the Roppongi tower in the nighttime.
As our walk continued we found a really cool gift shop with interesting items; the most impressive to me was a projector for your bathroom (it's also waterproof) that will shine the milky way and over 10,000 stars on the ceiling/walls. Not sure if they're actually arranged in constellations, but even if they were I wouldn't be able to identify them.
Almost all the way around I thought I made it out alive...until we happened upon a restaurant and bar....and I ended up paying 900 yen for a Long Island Iced Tea cocktail. Sadly it's the first time since I've been here that I've been able to find it, hence my willingness to empty my change purse. It was quite a lovely time though, sipping my drink and looking 52 stories above the skyline at the night lights of Tokyo. You can be sure the drink had flowers IN IT and also a large flower as garnish. I love Japan.
Not really having a curfew but wanting to get plenty of sleep before our Fuji tour the next day we decided that we could afford a quick tour of the art museum as long as we didn't stop to read everything.
Well, when you get and art major and a nerd in the same museum it turns out that you read everything. Maybe even twice. So by the time we got out of there and we grabbed teriyaki burgers from McD's and walked to the train station we were late.
We came into town around 11, sheepishly calling okaasan to pick us up from the station. I was deeply invested in a great conversation about a book I was reading called "The 5 Love Languages," and I also encourage each of you to read it.
We quickly headed off to bed, barely able to show off my new hair cut to okaasan and Yuko. I didn't sleep very well.
So my haircut was a success and came out cheaper because new people get 20% off...it was around 5,700yen.
We started to head leisurely to the train station, enjoying the slightly cooler evening temperature though the sun hadn't set yet. As we neared the tunnel for the train station we stopped in Starbucks and treated ourselves to frapps.
Swiping our train pass cards at the turn stile Takae suddenly realized---we were on the subway route, not the train! Looking at the map she planned a route to a familiar train station for a transfer and I looked at the map and saw a short cut: Roppongi. It was also a name I saw often on traveler's brochures :) So I suggested it.
Disembarking at the Roppongi subway station we made our way above ground and found a map with a nice walk down the streets to the train station. We got about 10 feet before I got distracted by a really tall building and said aloud, "gee, it would be sweet to go up to the observatory and look at Tokyo from up there." So we did.
Turns out there's also an art museum and an aquarium up there. The tickets to the observatory are only sold with the museum...so we went there too!
It took us forever to walk around the 360 degree observatory because we kept getting caught in the tourist traps and enjoying them!
The first one was innocent enough: A huge fish tank with little Nemos swimming around under the blue and green mood lighting. One could take a picture of the fish and still capture the Tokyo skyline in the background. That's what most people were doing via their smartphones. I had actually brought my camera.
The second trap was a nice big window with a view of Tokyo tower lit up in orange lights in the background. There was a lady standing there and was very willing to take your picture for free. While you were standing there, she also took your picture with a professional camera and after the flash you could walk over to the booth in the corner were they had ALREADY printed your picture and you could chose to buy it or just keep the one on your own camera for free.
I was just gonna bypass it but Takae said we had to at least go look and say thanks but no thanks. Well, turns out the picture they give you also comes with 2 other professional photos of the building and the city (they know your own photos with point-and-shoot cameras from a glass building are crap).
So we got two.
I spent some time trying to get some nice shots of the horizon lights with only marginal results. As we walked around I found the omiyage shop and of course was obliged to buy some since that's what you do here. Takae got some postcards for art inspiration.
Since we were on the picture-hype we certainly couldn't bypass the puriculaa machine. I'm sure you've seen it: the little photo booth with a curtained entrance just big enough for a toilet but instead we cram 4 or 5 people into it and make crazy faces with weird backgrounds and write words on top of the photos with digital pens. This one wasn't that fancy and only let you take 4 pictures, but the background was a nice shot of the Roppongi tower in the nighttime.
As our walk continued we found a really cool gift shop with interesting items; the most impressive to me was a projector for your bathroom (it's also waterproof) that will shine the milky way and over 10,000 stars on the ceiling/walls. Not sure if they're actually arranged in constellations, but even if they were I wouldn't be able to identify them.
Almost all the way around I thought I made it out alive...until we happened upon a restaurant and bar....and I ended up paying 900 yen for a Long Island Iced Tea cocktail. Sadly it's the first time since I've been here that I've been able to find it, hence my willingness to empty my change purse. It was quite a lovely time though, sipping my drink and looking 52 stories above the skyline at the night lights of Tokyo. You can be sure the drink had flowers IN IT and also a large flower as garnish. I love Japan.
Not really having a curfew but wanting to get plenty of sleep before our Fuji tour the next day we decided that we could afford a quick tour of the art museum as long as we didn't stop to read everything.
Well, when you get and art major and a nerd in the same museum it turns out that you read everything. Maybe even twice. So by the time we got out of there and we grabbed teriyaki burgers from McD's and walked to the train station we were late.
We came into town around 11, sheepishly calling okaasan to pick us up from the station. I was deeply invested in a great conversation about a book I was reading called "The 5 Love Languages," and I also encourage each of you to read it.
We quickly headed off to bed, barely able to show off my new hair cut to okaasan and Yuko. I didn't sleep very well.
Tourist trap...love it.
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