The large shopping centres in Roppongi unfortunately seem to be an exclusive enclave of high fashion designer womenswear stores. So, they are extremely boring for me to walk around in, but due to the rain Alice and I still have to run around in them quite often. The street side shops in Tokyo don't have an awning to cover the footpath, so you can't really just wander the streets when it's pouring, or indeed when inordinately sunny. I have a personal theory that this lack of cover is due to earthquake directed building regulations.
In Odaiba there is an amazing place called Venus Fort, and it unashamedly caters only to women. It's built inside a huge featureless concrete box, but when you get inside you discover the faux eighteenth century Italian promenades opening up to a painted-on placid blue sky. The whole interior is a series of these paved streets with two storeys of carved stone facades and softly lit ornate street lamps.
This is a huge fountain in the middle. Unfortunately the pictures don't do the place any justice as it's quite dim inside.
Even the security guards are dressed with Italian police uniforms, complete with berets.
Aqua City and Decks are the other two malls we looked around. Decks has an intriguing place called Muscle Park on the top floor, a kind of amusement park which tests physical skills. There are tandem elements where partners must help each other win, or cooperate somehow. There are commando courses which require extreme body strength to traverse as well as some coordination games with targets and things. The problem with telling you about all this is that we couldn't really participate in any of these pursuits as Alice was with us, so we'll have to go again another day to try them out.
We settled for the baby section of the park, which Alice and I had visited before.
Waiting in line is not as tough on Alice if there are other kids in the line too. Here we see her giving Bek's wallet to random children. The first time I'd taken her to this area the attendant asked me how old she was.
"Fourteen months," I said.
"Oh I'm sorry, she can only use this small, boring, empty part of the massive play area but she can fully view the three year old children having ten times the fun in the other parts," said the attendant in Japanese (maybe).
I tried to make my case, she can walk, I'll watch her, she is quite tall for her age, etc.
Sorry, small, boring section, don't move.
Well, this time we were prepared to get her into the 'dangerous' area. The one containing the ball pit. We decided to use our gaijin powers to intimidate the attendants and let her in. However, this time noone asked the age of any child and kids who could not even walk were allowed into all areas. I have no idea why, maybe lots of people complained, or maybe it was just so much more crowded and with a longer line.
Here's Alice falling in the two-ball-deep ball pit. It was her first time in one, I think. Be careful!
This past Saturday we tried to go swimming with Alice. We knew that lots of pools don't allow any kids to swim in them so we were recommended the Minato city recreation centre. We packed our bag, took the subway and rocked up to the centre's front desk.
"Sorry, the swimming pool is closed, noone can swim"
When will it open again, why is it closed, can Alice swim here?
"How old is she? I'm sorry, only three year olds can swim here."
But, but .... we rang ahead, a Japanese person inquired for us, we were told a sixteen month old could swim here. We bought a baby swim cap.
"Sorry, only three year olds may swim."
At the park, on the slides there is a notice, English and Japanese, only three year olds and above.
It seems three years old is when Japanese babies are allowed to do things, and before then they should just hang around their apartments and poo and cry and whatever else under three year olds do, we don't care, just keep them away from us, noooooooooo.
So, Happy 3rd Birthday Alice.
They grow up so fast, don't they?
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