loa_log

[Journal]

Yesterday, my brothers and I set out on a 2.5 hour drive from Kawasaki, Kanagawa to Choshi, Chiba. Our mother had bought a house in Choshi recently to move all of our grandmother’s belongings to after her passing, but since I was in Kagoshima for the past few months it was my first time visiting.

Mom’s new place was a large house at the end of a residential area. The house itself had two parts, an older Japanese style area and a newer Western style area. The Japanese side had four tatami rooms and an older bathroom. The Western side had two floors, including the kitchen, bath, two bathrooms, two rooms downstairs and three rooms upstairs. It seemed too big for one person to be living in part-time, but Mom says it’s so that she can fit all of Grandma’s stuff and her own.

After we got a tour of Mom’s new place, we headed out for lunch at an Italian restaurant nearby. It was one of those family-run businesses that was on the first floor of their home. We parked on the side of the street and walked up from the back entrance. The pastas and pizza were great, but I was surprised at how gorgeous the salad was. It was almost like a bibimbap without the rice and I would definitely go back even just for the salad. (I don’t think my pictures do the food justice…I blame the lighting.)

We said our goodbyes to Mom and started on our 3 hour drive to Misato, Saitama to see our great aunt and uncle. We gave them the bottle of ice wine that we picked up from Takashimaya, sat down and chatted with them over some drinks (I had an non-alcoholic beer). Although my great aunt has food restrictions due to periodic, unknown pain in her stomach, she went through the trouble of preparing a home-cooked meal for us. I realized later that I didn’t take a group photo that night, but just one of the bonito sashimi we had…we also had some Chinese style tofu, wagyu steak, and side dishes.

Until we were out of college, our great aunt and uncle would give us new years money envelopes, but since we’ve gotten older, they changed the envelopes into surprise presents. This year they got us new wallets. I was still using the wallet that they got me several years ago, but it was getting a little worn down, so what perfect timing!

We finished up our dessert of apples and sweet potato chips, said our farewell and drove another hour back to Kawasaki.

We got to see three family members this day, now to make appointments to see more in the Kanto area. Next up is lunch with our aunt in Yokohama!