2018 Japan Vacation, Day 8 - More Pokémon, Shibuya, Harajuku

We awoke to find that the typhoon had made landfall overnight south of Tokyo. The brunt of the typhoon was in Hiroshima which had suffered severe flooding just weeks ago.

The evening before, the winds of the typhoon cooled things off. But this morning it had already gotten hot and humid again. We had a sweaty walk to the train station. A couple days earlier, we learned about cooling wipes that clean away sweat while also giving an instant icy-cool refreshing feel. I thought it was great for these sweltering days but Kai was already too crabby from the heat to appreciate it.

My wife had plans to meet friends so this would be a guys-only day. Though we did take the subway together for a few stops until my wife got off at her stop.

We are finally used to the time change but Kai hasn't been getting as much sleep as he gets as home so he was feeling tired on the train and napped against Mom until she got off.

We were on two trains for about an hour before we got to our first destination of the day - yet another Pokémon Center. Kai had researched and found out that there was a new Pokémon Center on the other side of the city that we had never been to before. Called "DX" for deluxe, Kai was looking forward to seeing if there were any different Pokémon here.

He scanned the shelves.

The Pokémon Centers all have the mostly same selection, but this one did have some different special edition Pikachus.

Kai was not interested in collecting different Pikachus. He was looking for different Pokémon and did find a couple that he did not see at the other stores.

We then went to Shibuya to walk around and see the area.

Kai got upset when we came out of the large train station on the wrong side and needed a few minutes to get our bearings. I lost the internet connection on my phone and couldn't access Google maps for a few minutes. It wasn't a big deal but with Kai, little things often turn into big things. He got angry and complained about the heat and the walk, saying he wanted to go home. As we had spent much of the morning going to the other side of town for his Pokémon, it upset me that he couldn't tolerate something that someone other than he wanted to do. When he gets like this, it takes all the fun out of the life (at least for the moment). I know that it is part of his autism that he has high anxiety that can flare up in unfamiliar places especially, but it frustrates me that he expresses it in the most negative and harsh way.

It was lunchtime and we found a sushi restaurant to eat and to cool off, both literally and emotionally.

It was very tasty sushi!

Per usual, Kai only wanted tako (octopus), along with miso soup.

By the time we finished lunch, we were ready to resume our sightseeing. First we went to the famous Shibuya crossing intersection (which is hard to capture in a photograph taken at street level).

Next we took the subway one stop to Harajuku, renown for its bustling shops and fashion scene.

Takeshita Street is at the center of Harajuku's activities and it was packed full of people today.

There are many places on Takeshita to get snacks. We went to Long! Longer!! Longest!!! which sells an assortment of long snacks.

They have long ice cream, churros, fried potatoes, and, as seen in the photo below, cotton candy.

Kai actually got the one item that was not very long, rainbow ice cream.

I got a frozen rainbow which is basically a long popsicle.

After that, we were ready for more walking. We hopped a train to Shinjuku and went to find a particular souvenir for family back home.

By late afternoon, we were ready to head home. We rested a bit and then it was time to head out to dinner, a yakiniku restaurant where we cooked our own beef.

I love the cook-your-own dinner places in Japan as they make the meal so much fun.

Kai loves meat, so he enjoyed it, too.

By the time we walked home from dinner, according to my smartphone, we walked more today than on any day of this vacation so far. No wonder I felt so tired!

Tomorrow, we fly out to Okinawa.

Kai's Latest Creation - Porygon Z

For Kai's latest project, he wanted to make a Pokémon, Porygon Z.

He pulled up a picture of the character on the iPad, and cut out pieces of blue and pink felt. He does not use a template.

This was his most challenging creation yet as there were different pieces that had to come together.

He did get frustrated at times when he was working on the most difficult parts.

But mostly he stuck with it.

He glued on the eyes but all the remaining parts were sewn. Mom helped just a little bit when Kai was trying to connect the head to the body, but otherwise he did it all himself including connecting the arms and beak to the body.

He was pleased with the results.

So was I!

We Made a Pokémon Dinner

We made Pikachu and other Pokémon for dinner this evening.

But first...

We had a busy Sunday. The weather here in the Chicago area is still unseasonably cool, but thought it was time to do some spring planting of annuals. Here we are at the gravesite of Kai's biological father, my wife's late first husband.

As Kai is now a teenager, we're trying to prepare him to be more independent, and so we're having him do more things. On this day, we had him help plant the flowers both at the cemetery and back home.

Between all the planting of flowers, we made a quick trip to the mall where Kai could Walk around an play Pokémon Go.

Later in the day we made an activity out of making dinner together.

Kai had found a Pokémon cookbook at our library last week and we decided to make a Pokémon dinner together.

First we would make a Pikachu cake for dessert.

My wife had gathered all of the ingredients and Kai stirred some of it together for a later stage.

The base of the cake is castella, a Japanese sponge cake, that my wife got from a Japanese grocery store. I cut the castella into the shape of Pikachu's head.

My wife made whipped cream and spread it over the castella.

Kai then put a layer of cut strawberries on top of the whipped cream, then we put on another layer of castella over that. My wife spread more whipped cream over the top layer of the cake.

Kai crumbled up the extra parts of the cake that I had earlier cut away when I shaped Pikachu's head. We spread the crumbles over the whipped cream to give the cake the fuzzy yellow texture of Pikachu.

I had earlier trimmed off the brown top and bottom edges of the castella. We used those parts to cut out the eyes, tips of the ears, and Pikachu's mouth which Kai added on top.

Finally, he added strawberries to give Pikachu his red cheeks.

We were happy how it came out!

Next we made the main meal for our dinner. Omurice is a Japanese dish that is sort of a combination of fried rice and omelette.

My wife had cooked the rice and prepared the ingredients. Kai here is stirring together mixed vegetables, slices of weiner, rice, diced onions, and ketchup.

I whipped up eggs with milk, then microwaved it for a minute and put it in the middle of the rice. My wife had hard boiled quail eggs which Kai cut up and put on top of the scrambled egg as the Pokémon's eyes. In the following photo, Kai is cutting out sheets of seaweed to further decorate Psyduck's face.

We used mozzarella cheese for the bill, and here you see the finished product.

We had to make three omurice Pokémon as each one is for one individual. We were getting hungry so we did not stop to take many pictures. :) But here you see the final products. In addition to Psyduck, we made Pikachu and a Pokémon that looked like a sunflower (whose name I have forgotten).

It was a fun family activity. And everything tasted good, too. The Pikachu cake was particularly delicious.

Hope you had a nice weekend, too.

The Hunt for Pokémon

Kai is still very much into playing Pokémon GO, but hadn't had as much chance to catch Pokémon since we returned from Japan. In Pokémon GO, the most Pokémon are found in urban areas (which is why we found so many in Tokyo) whereas we live in the suburbs. So, on this last week of summer break, we thought it would be fun if my wife brought Kai to downtown Chicago where he and I could go hunting for Pokémon after I got off work.

They came down late Wednesday afternoon, and I met them in Millennium Park, not far from my office.

It was a hot day, and after walking from the train station catching some Pokémon along the way, Kai was enjoying a very refreshing splash in The Crown Fountain.

Though calling it a "splash" is a dramatic understatement. Kai enjoyed standing directly under the pouring water...

...which meant that he got drenched. He loved it!

After the splashing, I had planned that we would walk around and look for more Pokémon, but it started to rain severely. Not that Kai would mind as he was already soaking wet, but my wife and I wanted to get indoors.

We found refuge at the Shake Shack, and had dinner. My wife and I had burgers while Kai had a hot dog, and we all had their famous milk shakes. Though when it comes to food, I often dig right in to eat and forget to take the picture until there's hardly any food left on the table. :)

The rain thankfully ended just as we finished eating, so we were able to walk to the train station and catch a few more Pokémon along the way. But we didn't catch as many as we had hoped.

So, today, I took Kai back downtown for the hunt for more Pokémon. This time we went to Chicago's Museum Campus along the shores of Lake Michigan.

We parked near Soldier Field.

We walked by the Field Museum.

And on to the Shedd Aquarium.

We were catching Pokémon all along the way as we walked.

It was a fabulous day, sunny with pleasant temperatures in the low 70s. We had a great view of the beautiful Chicago skyline.

While Kai had great fun catching a lot of Pokémon. We found the most near the Adler Planetarium.

We caught so many Pokémon that Kai ran out of Poké balls, which are needed to catch the Pokémon.

We had lunch in the park before heading back home. Lunch was Chicago hot dogs, of course.

It was a really nice way to spend a stress-free Sunday.

School starts on Tuesday. Back to reality.