Maho and Anthony at 3½ Months
While Anthony and I were in The States this summer, Fumie got a chance to visit with a friend she met while we lived in Cupertino, Yoppu-san, who now lives near Tokyo. She has a son, Maho-kun, who is a week older than Anthony.
During the meeting this summer, Maho-kun sent along a present for Anthony, who got to open it today just before bedtime. Having used phrases like “unbridled joy” too much lately, I'll leave these without captions and let them speak for themselves...
Thanks Maho-kun!
I was a zombie for a couple of days after returning to Kyoto, despite being able to sleep soon after landing. I got a good night's sleep and awoke at 6:30 feeling refreshed. I took the haruka express train home, but soon started feeling tired again. Despite being tired, I didn't sleep much that next evening, waking up at 2:30am and was a zombie for all of yesterday. I was so tired it hurt.
Finally, I slept well last night, and today was much better.
One nice moment the other day was when Fumie pulled out an old classic Japanese kid's game (黒ひげ危機一発) whose name roughly translates to “Blackbeard crisis explosive charge.” (It's sold in The States under the less exciting name of “Pop-up Pirate.”)
To play, you push a little pirate doll into a barrel, then take turns poking the barrel with little swords until you hit the hidden release and the pirate pops out. The game involves no skill whatsoever — just ever-building anticipation — which makes it great for preschoolers.
The following sequence of photos showed Anthony's typical interaction. The captions are my guess at what he's thinking...
Nikon D200 + Nikkor 17-55 f/2.8 @ 22mm — 1/60 sec, f/2.8, ISO 400 — full exif
Hmmmm, Maybe This One?
Nikon D200 + Nikkor 17-55 f/2.8 @ 38mm — 1/90 sec, f/2.8, ISO 400 — full exif
I'm Beside Myself with Excitement!
Nikon D200 + Nikkor 17-55 f/2.8 @ 50mm — 1/90 sec, f/2.8, ISO 400 — full exif
This is a Great Game... I Love You Both So Much!!
(Okay, so maybe that last one isn't what he was thinking 
)
This was all repeated over and over.
Eventually, he paused to check out the instructions....
Nikon D200 + Nikkor 17-55 f/2.8 @ 50mm — 1/60 sec, f/2.8, ISO 400 — full exif
“Reading” the Instructions
It was really enjoyable to see his unabashed joy. In many ways it was similar to how he was when we shot off a model rocket two weeks ago, yet quite different in how he showed it. In any case, it's always wonderful to experience a child's joy. (The “folloups and related posts” section below contains a few more unabashed-joy posts.)
Anthony and I returned home to Japan yesterday after a month at my folks' place in Ohio. The return trip was substantially longer than the flight out, and much more gruleing than last year's return to Kyoto because it included a cross-country leg before the trans-pacific flight.
Our trip started with a 4:00am wake-up-call in Cleveland, Ohio, with us finally walking out of customs/immigration at Kansai International 25 and a half hours later. It was a long journey, but to see Fumie — and to see how Anthony ran to her and jumped into her arms — was certainly worth it.
Nikon D200 + Nikkor 17-55 f/2.8 @ 55mm — 1/50 sec handheld, f/2.8, ISO 800 — map & image data — nearby photos
Tired Boy at 37,000 Feet
(The EXIF data says 34,728 feet, but I believe the airplane's GPS more than my handheld unit.)
It wasn't a good day for United Airlines. Our first flight (Cleveland→Chicago) went fine, but the next flight (Chicago→San Francisco) didn't start smoothly: we boarded half an hour late, and then sat on the ground for an additional two hours while mechanics fixed “a lavatory faucet that won't turn off.” Two hours to turn off a faucet? I don't know which is worse, the thought that that's true, or that that's the best lie they could come up with.
Some time was made up during the flight, so we arrived to San Francisco only two hours late. A lot of people missed connections, but luckily, our layover before the flight to Kansai had been scheduled for three and a half hours, so we still arrived with plenty of time.
Sadly, that didn't matter, as our next flight also boarded 30 minutes late, and like before, we sat while mechanics fixed something (this time in the cockpit). The cockpit must be substantially less complex than a faucet, since it took only an hour to fix.
Once we finally pushed back from the gate, it took forever (29 minutes) before we finally took off. By this time we'd been up for over twelve hours and I was physically and mentally exhausted. Knowing that an 11-hour flight was still ahead only made it worse.
Anthony fell asleep for a bit an hour into the flight, and I took the opportunity to snap a picture of the little sleepyhead.
At about six or seven hours into the flight, I was shocked to notice the seat-back display indicate “time since takeoff: 1:30.” The hour and a half had only felt like six or seven hours. It was a long flight, mentally, physically, and chronologically.
Anthony didn't sleep long that first time, but he did sleep again for about the last three hours of the flight, which was wonderful. I think I fell asleep for about an hour in there somewhere.
We landed at Kansai's new runway (28 Right), which opened earlier this month. The practical effect for us was that instead of taxing for only one minute to get to the gate, we taxied for fourteen long, painful minutes, traveling over six kilometers after actually landing and slowing down.
Immigration, getting our baggage, and clearing customs went pleasantly quickly, and we exited the secure area to find Fumie and her mom waiting, at which point much hugging and kissing ensued.
Fumie handed me a key to a room at the on-airport hotel so that I could rest right away, and took Anthony and the luggage home.
I was showered and asleep before she got halfway there.
Nikon D200 + Nikkor 17-55 f/2.8 @ 55mm — 1/15 sec, f/2.8, ISO 400 — map & image data — nearby photos
Cousins
almost-five-year-old Anthony and 17-month-old Josh
watching the Backyardigans
Anthony and I are heading back to Japan tomorrow, leaving this afternoon to stay at Cleveland's airport hotel because the flight leaves tomorrow at 6am (ugh!).
So, no new posts for the next few days...
Parts of Ohio have been having heavy rain and flooding lately, although where we are it's been sunny and hot for the last few days. We did get pounded with very heavy rains over the weekend and Monday. Yesterday, I happened to notice the effects from those rains in the play sandpile.
When we first arrived a month ago, Dad dumped a few bags of play sand for Anthony to play, but the heavy rains totally flattened the pile....
Nikon D200 + Nikkor 17-55 f/2.8 @ 30mm — 1/125 sec, f/7.1, ISO 400 — map & image data — nearby photos
Sand-Splattered Toys
Each of the bazillion rain drops splashed up a bit of sand when it hit, and sometimes that sand got stuck to where it splashed. Notice the sand-speckled underside of the blue thing in the upper-left of the picture above: the sand splashed a good foot (30cm) up. I was impressed.
Also notice the tubs filled up about four inches, a good indication of the amount of rainfall we had.
Nikon D200 + Nikkor 17-55 f/2.8 @ 55mm — 1/750 sec, f/2.8, ISO 400 — map & image data — nearby photos
Sand-Blasted
I like the low-angle shot above, particularly since I didn't have to get down into the sand to get it because I used a Zigview S2 remote viewer. It's a nice little viewfinder camera/display that I'll write about later, but the short summary is that while it can be helpful, it's not nearly as nice as the product-information page, whose images are fantastically misleading.