It’s Wednesday, and we have a reservation for 12.30pm downtown – let’s GO fam!
10am we start hearing weird announcements being made over loudspeakers in the community, we can hear them but not understand them. Then, at 10.03am, ALL our phones go crazy. There are multiple Emergency Notifications on each phone, it’s loud and it’s scary, but our street is quiet, nobody is about, nothing is stirring. A little bit of googling tells me this is a planned drill (and thankfully, the notifications included the words DRILL in English, amidst all the Japanese writing), and it soon ends. Work resumes next door (they’ve been tearing down the old factory building on the other side of our fence, it’s been a LOUD three weeks), so we know the world still turns.
At around 10.30am, Joe heads downtown to continue his hunt for glasses, sans impatient girls. That means the girls and I have less than one hour to finish up school for the day, brush teeth, get dressed… By 11.30am we are out the door and on our way downtown. We didn’t have any lunch yet, so grabbed a piece of fried chicken from Family Mart to nibble on while we speedwalked to the train station. We were on our way to meet Joe at the… ANIMEAL CAFE! (Yes, that’s how they spell it.) Maylin’s birthday wish was to meet a capybara, and luckily, one lives at this animal café!
We purchased 60 minutes of animal time, which includes a beverage for each human (it’s a café, after all) and snacks for the animals on the 2nd floor. We had to watch a video (in English) about how to feed the animals, not to startle them, not to pet them, etc. Lots of rules, which the Japanese love and follow. I would not like to work here and have to bark at disrespectful visitors all day. Do not pick the animals up, respect their space, let them come to you, do not chase them, etc…
The second floor housed the capybara, several noisy birds, three ducks, a large black rabbit, several guinea pigs, iguana, snakes, etc. Because this was the first floor we visited, and we only had 20 minutes, I had to rush my crew through this experience. Time flies when you get to spend time with animals!
The capybara roamed the area and came over to visit with the girls before we left the room.
These curious creatures would all climb up on the side of their baskets to reach us and the snacks. They were so cute and looked very soft, however – don’t touch these ones, they can bite!
After 20 minutes downstairs, we climbed the stairs to the Big Dog floor. There were 8 large type dogs running around, a little noise when we arrived, but overall, the dogs were playing with each other. Because the rules are not to chase or invade the dogs’ space, we sat down on benches and stools provided and got to pet whomever decided to visit us, which wasn’t many. They wanted to play with eachother more than strangers visiting, imagine that!
My favourite floor was the 6th floor, where the small dogs and cats were hanging out. There’s usually a micro pig in here as well, but not today. The staff member got her dogs to come sit on our laps and took our family picture. Then she took one on her own phone, printed it out on branded paper and drew us a note on the back!
Maylin took Joe back down to the capybara floor, while Téa and I stayed and cuddled this little dachshound, who would not leave my lap. We could have easily stayed another hour!
When our 60 minutes were up, we realized Joe had NOT had fried convenience store chicken, so we needed to find him some food. But first we were on the hunt for washrooms, which are readily available at all malls and subway stations. We were not far from Big Step, the cool and different mall we visited a while back, so we headed there.
After essential business has been dealt with, I ensured Joe had enough energy left over to do “just two games each” at the pin ball arcade. My coin purse has been bursting at the seams because Joe likes to dump his coins in my coin purse (although he now finally has his own as well), so I figured we’d lighten the purse a tiny bit at least. Téa and I started with these ¥10 machines, and then we all moved on to the ¥100 ones.
Of course I had to play Avatar again and challenged Joe to beat my score. I love playing games I know I’ll win!
By now it’s almost 3pm, the girls and I have had a small piece of chicken for lunch, and Joe has had nothing. I suggest we find some food, and Joe takes that to mean we’re all ready for a sit down meal. So that’s what we did! We were craving meat, especially after all the BBQ and skewers being cooked along the shopping alleys, in an attempt to lure us hungry travellers in. We found a gyukatsu restaurant and headed in.
This restaurant served crunchy fried beef (several different cuts, tongue included) in sets with rice, miso soup, curry sauce, onsen egg, tea and cabbage. The girls shared a sirloin set, I had a tenderloin set, and Joe got the Japanese beef set, the one that melts in your mouth, teeth not required. The restaurant cooks the meat to medium rare, and then they light burners with tiny cast iron plates on top for you to finish cooking the meat to your personal preferred doneness.
When we emerged from our meal, it had started to drizzle, so we browsed the business tower we had eaten in before heading outside.
We were done downtown, not really up for another after dark adventure, so we ducked into the subway system to go home. But we had a stop to make! Joe had decided Maylin’s birthday cake would be from Mister Donut, so we stopped at one we came across. They didn’t have cakes at this particular one, but we decided a donut each would be the perfect ending to a great day.
Once on the subway, it was decided Joe and Téa would take the subway further and then bus to our grocery store, while Maylin and I would carry the donuts home from our regular stop. It was raining harder now, but thank goodness the sturdy cardboard box held up, and the donuts were safe! Joe made a delicous curry for a late dinner, and we all enjoyed our donuts for dessert. They did however make us miss Canadian donuts, as these were… different. And yes, Joe has two on his plate, as his draw to Mister Donut was the mochi donut. We all shared the one that reminds me of a baby’s teething ring, although Joe ate the rest of everyone’s donuts, we were too full and not loving our donuts this evening…
We ended the night with watching The Secret World of Arietty, another super cute Ghibli movie. If you have suggestions as to which one we should watch next, please comment below!