The Cocktail Glass Collection: The Silver Peso

It's been quite a while since I've added a new photo to my collection of neon bar signs with cocktail glasses, and this one is from several months ago, but, better late than never....

This sign is in front of The Silver Peso, at 450 Magnolia Ave, Larkspur, California. The lettering is custom, but the cocktail glass on top looks fairly generic. 

For more neon cocktail glass signs, use the "Cocktail Glass Collection" search tab to the right side of the feed.

Books I'm Reading: Fierce Poise

I recently finished Fierce Poise, by Alexander Nemerov (Penguin, 2021) about artist Helen Frankenthaler. I've always liked her work. I'm not sure when I first became aware of her, but it may have been seeing a large textile designed by Frankenthaler that used to hang in the lobby of the Winters National Bark (still there as far as I know) in Dayton, Ohio. 

I realized quickly that my familiarity with Frankenthaler was rather superficial. It extended mostly to seeing isolated works in various museums around the world over the years. I actually knew nothing at all about her private life, and Fierce Poise is more about her private life than it is about her art. I had had no idea that she came from a wealthy family, no idea that she had had a long relationship with Clement Greenberg, nor that she had been married to Robert Motherwell. Not sure how I missed that, but I don't think much about the private lives of artists when appreciating their work. That said, the history is always interesting.   

Places I'm Visiting: Japan 2024 – Cherry Blossoms

I've been back in the US for four days now and I have one last post to write about my trip. How could I finish without mentioning the cherry blossoms? The end of my recent trip coincided with the peak of the cherries. While I personally prefer plum blossoms (because of their fragrance), the cherries in full bloom are indeed pretty. Not much else need be said, I imagine. Here I post some cherry blossom photos as well as some photos from the plane ride home. 

I flew out of Haneda Airport this time. I hadn't seen Haneda since 1978. It has changed. It has been expanded and rebuilt. It looks thoroughly modern. It was fun to fly out over the city. When departing for the West Coast of the US from Narita, the flight path takes you almost immediately over the Pacific, which offers little to see from an airplane several miles high in the sky. Approaching San Francisco, the clouds were especially pretty.

Places I'm Visiting: Japan 2024 – Naoshima

On my last couple of days in Japan (I’m back home now), I made a trip to Naoshima, one of Japan’s world-renowned ‘art islands’, I had heard only good things about Naoshima and my expectations were high, although I had had little time to research the place and consequently I didn’t really know what was there beyond a Yayoi Kusama polka-dot pumpkin I had seen pictured by the seaside. There are several museums on the island, so I had imagined rooms full of paintings, prints, drawings, and sculpture, but Naoshima turned out to be something rather different.

If you are a devoted fan of architect Tadao Ando, who designed most of the buildings that comprise the complex of museums and galleries on the small island, you are likely to have a good time. Others may find themselves a bit perplexed. Ando is known for creating geometric spaces with blank walls of grey concrete, and there is a great deal of empty space surrounded by grey concrete in the buildings designed by Ando for Naoshima – buildings treated with what seems like an exaggerated reverence. 

The spaces themselves are considered works of art and visitors are fussily told not to touch the walls, told not to touch the art, told not to wear shoes in some rooms (but not in others), told to get in line and wait their turn. It turns out, though, that there is actually very little art on this art island. The entry fees are steep considering how small the venues are and how little there is to see in them. The sense of being cheated by the fees was frequently palpable. I noticed visitors emerging from buildings with puzzled looks on their faces, their expressions wordlessly asking ‘Is that all?’ 

While the pseudo-sacred architectural spaces are of some interest, the sense of the sacred is ruined by the simultaneous demand that they function as places to display art and the art is not any better served. Signage is poor (see below) and the lighting is appalling from the perspective of viewing art. In many spaces, there is only dim natural light. Often outside light is brought in through thin slots that fail to properly illuminate what art there is, or, in some cases, cause the art to be starkly back-lit and difficult to see for that reason. 

At the Chichu Art Museum, the Monet Room (which houses five large water lily paintings) has been designed along the lines of the rooms displaying the large water lilies at the Musée de l'Orangerie in Paris (designed with Monet’s input), the paintings illuminated by natural light in a room preceded by a vestibule. Monet’s idea was that the outer space would act as a buffer zone between the outside world and the art, allowing visitors to relax and put aside everyday worries temporarily before entering the actual gallery space. The vestibule serves also to help the eyes adjust to the lower light levels inside the gallery area. 

In this case, visitors are abruptly stopped by staff members in front of an unmarked entryway and instructed with gestures to remove their shoes, store them in bins, and then change into slippers. There is no indication of what’s in the gallery. If you don’t already know, you have no idea why you are being stopped and made to change footwear. I entered not knowing what the line was for. The mild anxiety and annoyance caused by the uncertainty would seem to defeat the purpose of the vestibule. The floor is made of patterned concrete. It doesn’t look fragile. It’s not clear why it’s necessary to protect it from shoes. If it’s too fragile to step on with shoes, then it seems a rather badly designed floor – another example of reverence for the architecture working against the intended function of the space. 

Signage is almost non-existent in spaces at many of the venues, not only around the Monet Room at the Chichu Art Museum. What there is is small and discreet. In one building, labels for the art are mounted at navel height and the lettering is tiny and black on a silver background that blends with the grey concrete walls, making the labels hard to find and hard to read without bending over and getting very close.  The attendants offer vague guidance in hushed tones, which also makes for poor communication. It’s no wonder many visitors seemed confused and annoyed. I used to think San Francisco MOMA's redesigned spaces and additions were confusingly laid out and poorly signposted (I still do), but they are vastly easier to navigate than the art spaces on Naoshima. Given that in most contexts the Japanese go way overboard when it comes to signage and giving instructions, the lack of information offered is a bit startling.

The system of buying advance tickets (available in some locations, not others, and often not at the site you're hoping to see) is confusing. By the time you figure out the system, you’re likely to find it’s too late until the following day, as many tickets are timed. A further complication is that there is a two-tiered system with guests of the Benesse House Hotel getting privileged access to venues, parking, and shuttle buses. The effect is more confusion and you feel like a second-class citizen at every turn if you're not a guest. I would have enjoyed staying at the hotel, but it's booked more than a year in advance. 

In all, we visited seven attractions – The Benesse House Museum (which hardly deserves to be called a museum), The Chichu Art Museum (small and with a tiny collection; ‘museum’ again seems a misnomer), the Valley Gallery (a two-day ticket to the Benesse House Museum gives you entry to this gallery as well), The Lee Ufan Museum, The Hiroshi Sugitomo Gallery, The Ando Museum (once again, a tiny space hardly meriting the name ‘museum’), and the Art House Project (a collection of abandoned old houses in the town center that have been partially restored and repurposed as exhibition spaces for various artists. Each one of these attractions charges an entry fee that seems grossly inflated given the paucity of content a ticket buys you access to. 

Perhaps the most interesting was the Hiroshi Sugimoto Gallery, which contained a small selection of large photographs by Sugimoto and included a spacious, attractive café overlooking the ocean that serves tea and a sweet (included in the ticket price). The tables in the café have glass tops supported by extraordinarily large sections of historic trees. After all the blank concrete, the sight of something organic was a relief. Smaller Sugimoto photographs were on display at other locations on the island in addition to the large photographs in the gallery. Some of these were in locations making them virtually impossible to view. There was a group on an exterior wall in an area fenced off, making them unapproachable. Another was hung high on a cliff face, where no viewer can see it except perhaps with binoculars. All in all, there was much baffling about Naoshima, including Yayoi Kusama’s fiberglass polka-dotted pumpkins in two locations by the seashore. I don’t understand why so many people get excited by these, but there were lines of people waiting to take selfies next to or in the pumpkins. 

I don’t mean to suggest that a visit to Naoshima is entirely pointless. I enjoyed the Monets. I enjoyed the Hiroshi Sugimoto Gallery, there were a couple of other spaces of interest among those I visited, but, overall, Naoshima turned out to be a confusing disappointment. 

Places I'm Visiting: Japan 2024 – Mejiro

Finally got a halfway decent photograph of a Japanese White-eye (Zosterops japonicus) on my last day in Japan. I'm back home now, after a little more than three weeks overseas. I still have some final posts from Japan to upload, but too jet lagged to do it today.... Stay tuned. 

Places I'm Visiting: Japan 2024 – Konpira-san and Noodles

Last night I returned from a two-day excursion to Naoshima, one of Japan's so-called "art islands" in Kagawa Prefecture, a two-hour drive to the east from my wife's home island of Iyo-Oshima, with a stop at Konpira-san, a famous shrine known for its hilltop position requiring a climb of 764 steps to the top – sort of. Once at the top, a small sign notes that a smaller, associated shrine sits up by another 400 steps or so. Once there, another discreet sign informs the intrepid of yet another shrine at the very top requiring the mounting of another couple hundred stairs – 1,368 in all. I rarely look at the health apps built in to my iPhone, but the activity piqued my curiosity. According to the phone, the climb was the equivalent of walking to the top of a 62-storey building. 

The first third of the route is lined with souvenir shops. Higher up, the stairs are flanked by stone lanterns and a seemingly endless row of stone steles carved with the names of companies and individuals that have contributed to the shrine over the years, complete with the amounts donated. Cherry trees were coming in to bloom at the shrine, as they are everywhere. Mountain cherries emerging as clouds of pale pink from a background of leafless trees on the hillsides are particularly pretty. It's only at this time of year that their presence is obvious. The rows of cherry trees planted deliberately at shrines and temples, in parks, and along roads are easier to spot when not in bloom. After a night at an attractive little inn called Gamou-ya in the town of Sakaide, we headed for Naoshima.

Kagawa Prefecture might as well be called Udon Prefecture. Shops offering the fat, slick wheat noodles, are everywhere – for consumption on the premises or to take away for preparation at home. The climate in Kagawa Prefecture is said to be good for growing wheat (and we saw many winter wheat fields). The soft local water is supposed to be good for preparing the noodles. Udon would not have been my first choice for breakfast, but the proprietor of Gamou-ya recommended we try a noodle shop a couple of minutes away on foot before departing for the ferry terminal for the trip to Naoshima. When I questioned the idea of noodles for breakfast, he assured me it was the thing to do. 

There was already a line at the shop when we arrived and it had grown to about 70 people by the time we left, but it moved quickly. ¥180 (today about $1.20) buys you a bowl of noodles which you take to a table laid out with all kinds of tempura to choose from (¥120, or about $0.80, a piece). I added a slice of pumpkin tempura and a slice of eggplant to my bowl and from there stepped to a cauldron of hot broth that I ladled onto the noodles and tempura. I topped it off with a spoonful of chopped green onions. The shop is tiny, with barely enough room to complete the course, but the customers navigated it all with ease, as if they'd done it many times – and no doubt they had. A bowl of noodles turned out to be a tasty and filling way to start the day for a mere $2.80 or so. An unusually strong dollar (a dollar buys ¥150 at the moment) makes a lot of things here seem cheap.

I photographed a Pale Thrush (another addition to my life list) on the way up to the shrines above Konpira-san.

Places I'm Visiting: Japan 2024 – Ehime and Oshima

Still in Japan. Thanks again to Jason and Annabelle who have been living in our house and taking care of Eric the cat while I've been away. 

I'm now on Oshima Island, Ehime Prefecture, the little island my wife is from. 'Oshima' means 'big island', but Oshima is quite small. You could drive the perimeter in a little over an hour. This part of Japan is today known mainly for five things I can think of: First, Oshima is the last island in the chain of islands across which bridges have been built to connect Shikoku (the smallest of Japan's four main islands) with Honshu (the largest of the four). Between Oshima and the city of Imabari (on Shikoku) stretches the 4km-long Kurashima Kaikyo Ohashi, the only three-span suspension bridge in the world. The Inland Sea area, dotted with islands, some now connected by the chain of bridges, has become a popular destination for cyclists from around the globe.

Second, Imabari, across from Oshima is a major shipbuilding hub. Imabari Zosen, in Imabari, is Japan's largest shipbuilder and among the half dozen biggest in the world. 

Third, this part of Japan's Inland Sea was the base of the Murakami Kaizoku, an association of seafaring bands that were both pirates and guides active among the islands of the inland Sea between the 12th and 18th centuries. 

Navigation routes through the Inland Sea are among the most dangerous anywhere. The straits between the islands are known for their rapid currents and the whirlpools that form as the tides shift, alternately pushing water from the Inland Sea into the Pacific and pulling water from the Pacific into the Inland Sea as the direction of the tides change four times a day, with short periods of equilibrium in between. The sailors of the Murakami Kaizoku acted as guides, demanding in return a percentage of the value of the goods that passed through the channels in return for their knowledge. With completion of the bridge connection, travelers no longer have to stop on Oshima and many of the small shops that once served visitors and the (now dwindling) population of the island have vanished. There are many empty houses and shops. The population was well over 10,000 in the 1970s. Today it is half that. The town I lived in as a high school exchange student is about 45 minutes to the south of Imabari--likewise left behind by development when road traffic that used to pass through its center was diverted by a modern bypass. 

Finally, aside from shipbuilding, Imabari, across from the island, is known for its towel-making industry, and the island itself is the source of Oshima Ishi, a grey granite prized for building and for headstones, but even the island stone works are not what they once were, hurt by competition from similar, less expensive stone imported from Korea and China (although the locals will tell you that Oshima Ishi is superior). 

On the birdwatching front, since last reporting I've seen at least two new birds, Bull-headed Shrike and Small Collared Plover. I was able to get a nice shot of the latter. 

Places I'm Visiting: Japan 2024 – Tottori

Visiting the Tottori Sand Dunes turned out to be something of a waste of time. It's been pouring with rain all morning and, at the coast, where the dunes are, the wind was fierce. We made a half-hearted attempt to talk a walk on the dunes, but ended up standing in the biting wind, getting slapped in the face by rain for a few minutes and then turning back. We took shelter in the inevitable o-miyage (gift) shop. The 'Tottori Sand Cookies' actually looked pretty good – cream sandwiched between wafers, the name playing on the fact that 'sand' is often used in Japan as shorthand for 'sandwich'.

I couldn't resist buying a bottle of locally produced Cabernet Sauvignon (2017)* out of curiosity. It's probably been sitting in the shop through multiple hot summers, stewing in the heat. It may therefore be in bad shape, but I gave in to temptation also because, coincidentally, the wine was made in a place called Hojyo, which happens to be the name of the (unrelated) town in Ehime Prefecture that I lived in as a high school exchange student on my very first visit to Japan (1977-1978).   

In a shop in the station, while waiting for my next train, I came upon canned hamburgers –  or 'Can-burgs'. My curiosity in this case was not enough to induce me to make a purchase.

Before leaving Kyoto, I came across a vending machine selling nothing but Sriracha sauce. Japan is known for selling just about anything in vending machines – I've seen neckties, underwear, shirts, toothbrushes, razors, hot sake, cold sake, every manner of cold soft drink, but also hot drinks like coffee in cans, sandwiches, cakes, and even porn magazines in roadside or train station vending machines but never hot sauce before. What will they think of next?

*The wine turned out to be OK. It wasn't remarkable, but it was quite acceptable everyday wine. According to the bottle, grapes have been grown in the Hojyo area of Tottori Prefecture since the late Edo Period (the Edo Period ended in 1868) and wine has been made there since around 1945.

Places I'm Visiting: Japan 2024 – Kyoto

I've spent the last two days in Kyoto, but mostly not doing the typical things a tourist does in Kyoto – which is visiting temple after temple after temple and maybe a shrine or two. That said, I did stop at Sanjusangen-do for the first time in nearly fifty years. The first time I saw the place was in 1978. The grounds have been spruced up since then. It now has its own parking lot and a fancy modern entrance. When I first saw the main hall, I think I was pretty much alone. Yesterday I was one of hundreds of visitors. 

Sanjusangen-do is famous for its 1,001 statues of the thousand-armed Kannon, each one carved by hand, each one slightly different. The statues have eleven heads (one large, with ten more small heads on top) and many arms (although not actually 1,000 arms). The life-sized statues are arranged in tiers in the main hall of the complex, which also displays 28 guardian figures, and a large central Kannon figure. The statues of Kannon and the guardian figures all have the designation 'National Treasure', the highest in Japan's system of recognizing important cultural properties. According to Discoverkyoto.com, the thousand-armed Kannon is said to have eleven heads to better see the suffering of mankind, and one thousand arms to save everyone in need. The statues actually have only 42 arms, but each holds a Buddhist symbol or is posed in a symbolic Buddhist gesture (known as a mudra).

The temple was founded in 1164. The main hall with the statues was completed in 1266, rebuilt after an earlier structure burned. 124 of the Kannon statues survived the fire. The remainder there now were created over a 16-year period following the fire. Thus, even the youngest statues are going on 750 years old. 

Sanjusangen-do is known also for the archery contests it hosted for hundreds of years. These are said to have begun around 1606 and at peak drew crowds of thousands to watch sometimes as many as 10,000 or more archers shoot at targets down the length of the building's veranda. These events appear to have petered out in the 1850s, but the tradition has been revived and a couple thousand archers compete in January exhibitions today. 

No photography is allowed in the hall as the statues are considered sacred, but I've reproduced a stock image from the Internet. I also visited the Kyoto National Museum, which had a small but interesting exhibit of Heian Period Buddhist sculptures and painting, but the ceramics and textiles sections of the museum that I would liked to have seen were both closed. 

I walked through a market similar to the one I visited in Kanazawa. Among the many things on offer this time were skewers of sparrows. Many of my friends reading this will know that the 'tori' [bird] in 'yakitori' traditionally was a small songbird, usually some kind of sparrow, but it's rare these days to see actual sparrows on a stick. It was funny to me that the photo used is a photo of a White-throated Sparrow, a bird native to North America. I hope they aren't importing North American sparrows to skewer.  

Before leaving I also walked around the grounds of Miidera, a temple near the house of the friend I was visiting. The temple was pretty in the rain and there were some birds present. I saw a Japanese Pygmy Woodpecker and Oriental Greenfinches, both new to my life list. I heard the distinctive song of the Uguisu (Japanese Bush Warbler) and saw the Brown-eared Bulbuls that seem to be everywhere. I also got.a good look at a Daurian Redstart, one of the birds I saw fleetingly in Tokyo near the Imperial Palace moat. As I was leaving, the temple's mascot (in the form of a bronze bell came walking through the main gate and posed for a picture. The ancient temple gate and the stylized bell figure made of styrofoam created an odd contrast.

On the first day in Kyoto, my son and I had lunch with the college friend we were visiting, dining in a striking building along the Kamo River built in 1926 designed by the American architect William Merrell Vories. According to the Internet, it opened as the Chinese restaurant Toka Saikan in 1945. The building has a richly decorated facade, the oldest continuously operating elevator in Japan, and numerous interior details to look at while enjoying the food. It rained most of the day and it's supposed to rain all day tomorrow again. I'm now in Tottori, hoping to visit the famous Tottori sand dunes tomorrow, but I'm not hopeful they will look like much in the rain. We'll see...

Places I'm Visiting: Japan 2024 – Kanazawa

My son and I arrived last night in Kanazawa from Sado and indulged in another sushi dinner, this time at a place called Ippei sushi, right off the main drag in the Katamachi area. Before heading back to our hotel, we stopped in at a bar called Griffith for a quick drink. The place was deserted on a Friday night at 11:00PM in an entertainment district, which left me wondering how the place survives. The two bartenders seemed happy to have some company. One of them was a talkative fellow who brought out a map and gave us recommendations on things to do in the city. 

In particular, he recommended Kenrokuen, which is said to be one of Japan's three most beautiful public gardens. We spent the afternoon there after visiting the Ohmi Market, which was rather reminiscent of markets I've seen in places like Barcelona but with a greater emphasis on seafood. There were stalls full of sashimi, oysters and other shellfish of all kinds, shrimp, fish, squid, and crab. Crab everywhere – mostly zuwaigani (snow crab) and kegani (horsehair crab). The snow crab was very expensive, ranging in price from about $110 a piece to as much as $160 a piece. The vendors were selling seafood to take home but also for immediate consumption. I was tempted by the oysters...

At Kenrokuen, the moss was spectacular, virtually glowing after recent rains. Plums were in bloom. I saw Brown-eared Bulbuls taking nectar from the plum blossoms as I saw them do near the Palace moat in Tokyo. I also saw Varied Tits, Eastern Great Tits, Long-tailed Tits, and, on the grounds of a shrine near Kanazawa Castle, a pair of Oriental Turtle Doves. We are now in Kyoto, staying with friends for a couple of nights. 

Places I'm Visiting: Japan 2024 – Sado

Aside from seeing the rare Japanese Crested Ibis on Sado, the highlight of our brief stay on the island was the friendly and helpful people. We stayed at a rather quirky bed and breakfast that served no breakfast run by a Mr. Kondo, an audiophile and jazz enthusiast. The downstairs lounge area was essentially a large listening room with vintage audio equipment and the room we stayed in upstairs had its own audio system, film projector, and stacks of LPs, CDs, and DVDs. There was even an outdoor seating area fully equipped with yet another sound system, speakers exposed to the elements but holding their own, that plays jazz 24 hours a day. The neighbors don't seem to mind. 

Mr. Kondo greeted us warmly and showed us how to use everything and what he didn't tell us about we would have had little trouble with as virtually everything was labeled with instructions. The Japanese certainly love to keep everyone informed of the etiquette appropriate to almost every situation. In the bathroom, one sign suggested using the fancy remote-controlled washlet sitting down, another noted that the remote was to be used for flushing but that the seat and covers were to be operated by hand. Still another pointed out that the bathroom light was automatic. There were signs explaining the audio equipment, a sign by the bed asking guests to refrain from moving the beds, and signs explaining the remote control for the overhead lights. Mr. Kondo is quite proud of his beds, pointing out that he has equipped the rooms with Simmons mattresses. A small wooden plaque above the bed I slept in noted that I was using a 'Simmons semi-double'. The best information he gave us was recommending Kinpuku, a nearby yakitori izakaya.

We didn't use any of the audio equipment as we spent most of our time outside, looking for the Ibis or eating at Kinpuku (which we later learned was recently named the best Izakaya in Niigata  Prefecture). 

Kinpuku is an unimposing establishment. You'd easily miss it if you didn't know it was there. Aside from a tiny lantern out front, the only external clue is a little charcoal smoke from the vents and the scent of grilling meat the vents deliver to the surrounding area. We arrived by car, but were told there was no parking lot, so we said we would go back to Mr. Kondo's place and walk back, but one of the guests already at the bar got up and said 'I know a place nearby you can park. Follow me!' We walked a couple of blocks to what turned out to be the man's own house and the bar he runs. We left the car there and walked back. Stepping inside provided not only the prospect of good food but a respite from the snow and wind outside. Kinpuku seats only 12. There were two seats left. Mr. Kondo had told us to go early, as people are frequently turned away or have to wait for a seat sometimes as long as an hour or two. 

The proprietor, Mr. Fukushima, is a jazz guitarist as well as the one-man band that runs the place. He told us he's been grilling skewers of meat over natural charcoal as he does today for 36 years. Jazz was playing over the speakers. He told us that when he first opened, people thought it was strange that he played jazz and often didn't like it, but the customers eventually came around to his way of thinking and he seems to have found a niche. We ate there both of the nights we were on Sado. The first night we tried two locally brewed beers, one a nicely fruity blonde ale, the other an IPA-style beer. On the second night, we drank a well made Muscadet. Many of his customers ordered wine to go with their yakitori. Kinpuku serves wine only by the bottle. My son and Mr. Fukushima had a long conversation about guitar technique on the second of our two nights. Everything was delicious, but the chicken and onion skewers, the tsukudane, and the lightly salted grilled chicken wings were especially good. I also enjoyed the skewers of cherry tomatoes wrapped in very thin pork strips. 

On the first night (March 20), we learned that the man with the bar who let us park our car at his place regularly hosts the practice sessions of a group of local musicians and dancers that do traditional dances during festivals. We were invited to come by after Kinpuku to hear the singing and dancing, the singing accompanied by flutes, shamisen, and drums. I've always thought it strange how much this kind of Japanese music resembles the music of the fife and drum bands that once flourished deep in the Mississippi Delta area. A couple of young women at the bar borrowed flutes and tried to play along. Everybody seemed to know everybody. 

Today (March 22) we took the jetfoil from Sado back to Niigata and there boarded a Shinkansen train to Kanazawa. In the morning, before leaving, we did a quick tour of the Sado gold mine, which, according to the pamphlet I read was the longest continuously run mine in the world, having operated 388 years, from 1601 until 1989. In its peak year, the mine produced about 1,500kg of gold, which I roughly calculate would be worth about $15,000,000 in today's money. The gold was present in seams of quartz. Silver was also mined at the same location. 

Places I'm Visiting: Japan 2024 – Leaving Tokyo

I went back to the National Museum of Modern Art, in Takebashi, where I enjoyed seeing some old favorites, notably a Foujita self-portrait with a cat, and the famous portrait by Ryusei Kishida of his five-year-old daughter Reiko, which I hadn't realized is actually a painting of a painting of the young girl. There was also an exhibition of textile designs going on. I noticed a woman in a kimono looking at a pair of kimono in the show.

Afterwards, I met former work colleagues for lunch. After lunch, we moved on for tea and Oban-yaki (grilled batter filled with sweet bean paste). Walking around Takebashi near the Palace moat, I noticed that almost the entire moat frontage there has been rebuilt since I was last in Japan.

Before leaving Tokyo for Sado, I enjoyed an excellent (and reasonably priced) sushi dinner at Sushiko along with my son and a friend of his. We had to line up and wait outside for about 40 minutes, but it was worth the wait.