Saturday passed with not much going on – I stayed home and did all the weekend chores at once. Since Kuniko was at work all day I just puttered around the house and cooked some dinner (zucchini bacon casserole) for when she got home.
Sunday she was back off to work and I took the opportunity to go hiking with Antoine in Kobe. On the way to Kobe I got a cryptic message from Antoine asking if it was OK to bring a special guest, and I said sure.
When I arrived there I was surprised to see that he had brought along his (ex?) girlfriend Miwako. It was nice to see her, and I was a little surprised that they were still hanging out together. Apparently breaking up is a little hard to do.
Despite some initial awkwardness once we hit the trail and everyone was sweating things settled down. Antoine and Miwako still have some unresolved issues I think, and maybe they wanted to be around a third party to lighten things up.
We hiked to the lake in the mountains above Shin-Kobe, alternating between following and leading a big pack of YMCA youths and volunteers. After about an hour long hike in the heat (it’s getting humid lately) we decided to pack it in and head back to Kitano to have some lunch and cold beer.
We ended up eating at a French cafe in Kitano. It was a nice light lunch and the cafe was staffed by about half and half Japanese and French people. The owner was French, and he made a big production about scolding our server because he couldn’t understand what she wrote on our bill. She had written in English, probably because she is studying it and wanted us to be able to read it, but the owner was kind of jerk to her and so I wasn’t that impressed. I’ll skip that place next time.
We did some shopping in Sannomiya and then walked to Kobe Harborland to wander around and sightsee. Antoine and Miwako were getting along really well and I think having me around was defusing some tension between them – they didn’t really want me to leave. After a couple hours of walking around we sat on the patio of Mosaic in Harborland and had more beer. It was a really slow paced Sunday and I was really happy to get out of the house and just relax.
We finally went our separate ways around five in the evening, and I beat Kuniko home by about 20 minutes. She made dinner tonight – nikujaga and “german potatoes”. They were both really good but they barely put a dent in the pile of potatoes that we got from her folks last weekend.
After dinner we went to K’s electronics so that I could but a printer (also scans and copies!) and then went to the Kageyama residence for a little Happy Father’s day gift giving.
We stopped in Ito Yokado on the way home and we didn’t really get to bed until after midnight. It was a really busy day, and tomorrow is Monday. Must get some sleep…
