Japan 2009- Tuesday, April 28

When we decided to take a couple days in San Francisco to recuperate on our way back to the east coast of the US, I was worried that I might feel bad about not being HOME YET after all of our travels. As it turns out, it really was a good decision. Not only didn’t we go through customs after being up more than 24 hours, as happened last time (aka: hell), but it all still feels vacationy, in a woozy sort of way.

After worrying about sleeping last night, & waking up at 4:45 am... I fell right back to sleep & slept until 10:00, & Brendan did, too :) Charlie had to get us up so we wouldn’t miss our one day in SF! So after barely making it down to the restaurant while they still served breakfast, we called a taxi & headed into town. Our plan was to visit the Zeum, a wonderful interactive kids’ museum near the Moscone Center that we spent some days at when we were in SF 4 years ago. The taxi driver turned out to be a non-US medical school grad, driving a taxi until he can get into residency here, so he & Charlie discussed programmes on the way in. He dropped us off near the SF Museum of Modern Art- which turned out to be a good thing, because when we got to the Zeum it was closed :( We decided to go back to the art museum & see that instead.

Brendan was really disappointed about the Zeum, so it took him a while to process. I was feeling very woozy from jet lag & was happy to sit with him for a while. He & I ended up in the cafe with delicious soy lattes while Charlie checked things out for us. By the time he came back, we felt much better & were ready to see some neat stuff- including an installation of plastic poodles spray-painted black, in concentric rings around a plastic baby. Whoa, but fun.

We were ready to go back to the hotel afterwards, not feeling hungry enough to find somewhere to eat, so we called our taxi-driver for the ride back to the hotel. Charlie & Brendan went for a swim (after Brendan had a computer session) & I put yesterday’s blog post up. Then we caught a trolley bus that circulates through the hotels & into downtown Burlingame (& is free) to go find dinner. We did end up having Japanese :), which was nostalgic & yummy. We stopped by a candy store that happened to be featuring: Japanese erasers in cute shapes (some of which I have at home, because they really are cute :). We stocked up on sweets for the plane instead, & headed for the trolley stop for the ride back.

Now, I am the only one up, but not for long. We have to be up at 5:00-ish to catch our plane back home. To be honest, after the hop across the Pacific to & from Japan, the flight from SF doesn’t seem so daunting any more :) We’ve had a great trip, but it’s time to go home!