Squat Toilet! I've Truly Experienced this Place!

Last full day of our trip.  We are ready to go home.  We have been video chatting with the kids, which has been awesome. But they still fight about who is getting the most screen time or pushing each other or making faces at themselves in the screen.  Ah....yes, still kids I guess.

Anyway, we had breakfast and headed out to Sensi-ju, an ancient Buddhist temple located in Asakusa, Tokyo, Japan. It is Tokyo's oldest temple, and one of its most significant. (I borrowed that description from Wikipedia).   


On the subway, there was this ad.  And I had to take a picture for my sister.  Because I just could picture all these jokes we would have made.  It looks like Will Ferrell in Anchorman?

Made it to the temple.  It was so crowded.  Like so busy!!!

A marketplace outside that had much more 'family friendly' souvenirs. Phew!  

We got one of these woodblock prints. It shows the process of each colour here. 

This was off to the side. It's the Sky Tree. Tallest in Tokyo.  We didn't go up, but sounds like a great view. 

Was looking at the pretty fish and then this huge fish swims by!  I swear I heard the theme to Jaws play!

These lanterns had drawings from children on all 4 sides.  Would have looked pretty at night. 

Saw alot of scarecrows when we travelled out to Hakone.  But couldn't get a good picture. Here is one. 

Left the temple and saw the rickshaw

Pretty sure that guy is a sumo wrestler. 

And find this really angry chicken!!

We we're heading to the Shitamachi museum and this huge area with this huge plant was across from it. Weird....

Got an English tour.  It was a good tour. He told us how families used to keep all their stuff in this type of container so they could grab it quickly in the event of a fire. 

With such small quarters, all the space is used.  This stairway has sliding cupboards in each step. 

Old material that had been washed so much was soft enough to use for baby diapers.  One wraps from the back and up under and the other wraps around the waist.  He said he wore this type of diaper when he was a baby.

Again, using all the space you had, floorboards come up for storage underneath. 

He showed us the old squat toilet. And ended the tour telling us they had a squat toilet for anyone interested. 

So, I tried it!!!  Not the wood one.  The more toilet bowl looking one.  

Not sure how to use it?  No worries.  There are pictures!!

We head across to the huge rhubarb looking plants when we are done. I love that this sign warns against feeding the birds AND cats. I didn't see any cats....

Started to rain and we didn't bring our umbrella.  So we find shelter. We want to find a certain souvenir, but are having trouble.  We take this time to look online for help. 

Remember I said the translation can be off sometimes?  This bus advertises 'non step service'

We found the shop we wanted. Can't post souvenirs till we get home and give to the kids.  But the shop owner said around the corner was where they were building the stadium for the 2020 Olympics.  So we walked over.  But on the way we found these cool trees 

Baseball is pretty big here.  We walked past the stadium. 

There's the construction sight. We can say we were there!

Lots of these around 

Ok. I saw this everywhere.  Still don't know what it's for.  But I started convincing myself that I was going to be involved in some mystery or crime and this would show up as a clue.  Perhaps I've watched too many mysteries?

I asked Dave to stand in the shower (fully dressed) to show how tough it can be being taller.  To be fair. I had some difficulty as well. But Dave had to kneel to shave in front of the mirror...so I won't complain. 

He looks super impressed eh?  He actually has something wrong with his eye here. It was weird.  There was like a bubble in it. But he is fine now.