A quick trip to Asia

Dan and the kids humored me yesterday by beginning our day in the Japantown section of SF.  We took a bus to the Japan Center (we are beginning to figure out the mass transit here) and it felt like I stepped into Japan.  The street signs and store signage are written in both Japanese and English.  This is the Peace Plaza of the Japan Center.

I introduced the kids to Daiso, the Japanese version of the dollar store, where we bought entirely too many cute items at very cheap prices.  I stocked up on a few food items I hadn't seen in 20 years.  Shrimp chips, yum!  We had lunch at Mifune, a real Japanese restaurant.  I have never eaten such authentic Japanese food in the States. It was wonderful.  The kids' food even arrived in a bullet train.  

After lunch, we boarded a bus to Chinatown.  It was interesting to go to both Asian areas back-to-back so the kids could really see the differences between the two cultures. The gateway is beautiful.  There are statues of lions guarding the gate, which was interesting for Sidney and Lyndon to see.  Sidney read the book Where the Mountain Meets the Moon this summer, and Lyndon is currently reading it.  It is set in China and the lion statues guarding a city gate play a prominent role in the plot.  

After a little monkeying around...

we headed to the Golden Gate Fortune Cookie factory.  It was hard to find, as it is tucked into a tiny alleyway.  We anticipated an actual factory with lots of machines and people.  Instead, the factory was staffed by 5 people -- 2 taking orders and 3 operating one machine each. It was fascinating to watch them crank out fortune cookies so quickly with so few people in such a small space. 

After the factory, I had planned to take everyone to a Chinese temple, but discovered that it had just closed.  I am not having much luck with the church tours.  Instead, we wandered up a less touristy area and saw the food markets the residents use with many foreign ingredients to us.  We also happened upon another playground.  We let the kids play for a bit.  It was interesting that the kids never noticed that they were almost the only ones speaking English on the playground.  Jack made a friend, of course.  

We also found a pretty mural on the way home from the playground.

After our day of Asian exploration, we made a quick trip to Europe for dinner.  Le Central, the oldest French brasserie in SF, was our choice for dinner.  It felt like we had time-traveled back to last summer with very authentic food. There are several French cafes in a row and the waiter explained that the French Embassy was previously located a block or so from this section of town.  

Today, we may attempt a trip to Stanford.  We shall see...