I am Newing - (Osaka part 3)

Yes you are, surprised and/or shouting lady.

We came across her on the way to the Osaka Zoo in Tennoji Park.

I wore my Gorman leopard print coat and was unintentionally zoo-themed.

It was cold out so when J bought this can of hot chocolate from a vending machine the Baby nicked it to have as a hand warmer.

The zoo itself made me sad as some of the animals were in too small enclosures.

What didn't make me sad was watching tiny school children marching all over the place in the cutest uniforms on the planet. I didn't take any photos because I didn't want to be the weird tourist lady taking snaps of kiddies. Let's just say none of the uniform designers were afraid of a tassel or a bow tie, or even a pom pom.

But the best fun? Letting Baby loose in the deserted and dilapidated games pavilion.

In the head of Ampanman.

He may have actually peed his pants laughing when we played whack-a-mole.

This is on the Dotonbori bridge later that evening. I love that flapper, manga girl.

I popped into the Sanrio store to find a birthday present for our niece and found this terrifying Hello Kitty zombie lady. I was backing away slowly as I took this.

This is the first time we've visited Japan pre-christmas and I'm loving all the festive notes (NB- slutty santa girl outfits are very popular).

I think this Christmas Tree plunged into a tank of tropical fish is my favourite recognition of the season so far though. That baby mohawk is pretty tops too.

Textiles and Roadworks (Osaka part 2)

Here's our Japanese postcard view. Layers upon vertical layers woven together like knotted extension cords. Lights, pachinko and bike racks.

The Baby likes to sit on the window sill and rest his forehead on the glass. He looks down and points at things.

Today's outfit. The Bassike relaxed cotton pants and I are such BFFs. With long boots, they work a treat in cooler temperatures. I can hardly bear to wash them.

Speaking of which, here's the gorgeous, space odyssey washer/dryer in our room. It's superior to our old LG clunker at home in every way. I'm not looking forward to trading back.

We went to the monthly flea market at Shitennoji Temple today. Sneakily, I always try to schedule our visits here around the 21st of the month so I can come.

Japanese textiles are my obsession and these piles of second hand kimonos are everywhere. They are so little valued here. Most are around AU $10 and many cheaper than that.

I love them so much. Some of them must only have been worn once and are as pristine as new paper. I think I love the stained ones and rumpled ones even more though.

I take them home and hoard them. They make very elegant dressing gowns.

I bought this giddy geisha for a $1 too. She's rumpled herself. I love her.

If the Baby were a little older I would have bought him this sushi-train set from Toys R Us.

This children's program is good. It stars a cactus and a chair.

Here's the view from the window again. It's 6am and a team of construction workers are just finishing resurfacing the road between McDonalds and the pachinko parlour. During the night I heard what I thought was the sound of garbage trucks, but it turns out was it was these guys working away. By 6.30 they had repainted the pedestrian crossing, cleaned up all their mess and were gone like thieves in the night.

Coming back to Osaka

This is me. Deeply happy. Whiskey, hotel pyjamas and slippers at around 1am last night after we finally made it to our hotel.

The baby was a dream, in a vision, in a ball of awesome on the flight. Just look at him having a nap in the bassinet.

In quiet moments on the plane I read Caitlin Moran's collection of articles 'Moranthology'. She writes in several places about her love of returning to the same places when she travels.

"Over and over, repeat and return. Like a casting stitch done over and over in the same spot - but at slightly different angles. When I go back to these places I can see my ghosts from every previous visit."

"A casting on stitch done in the same place, over and over again, gets stronger. I don't travel to broaden the mind. I return - something completely different."

That.

Our hotel has a brilliant walk in wardrobe in the bedroom with a full length mirror and loads of storage. It's bliss. Good for outfit snaps too. The capsule wardrobe is serving me well so far.

On our first day we just pottered about the place and did some shopping.

I always find men's clothes are so much more interesting here. (These are men's undies in g.u.) They embrace colour and pattern in a way that high street western men's clothes don't seem to be able to do without obnoxious logos and stupid, meaningless numbers.

This wall of boxer briefs was one of three aisles. They were all around $5 Australian dollars.

Meanwhile, I went to the drug store. These places are black holes of awesome. Once I enter I am lost and I don't think I've ever managed to leave empty handed. They take cosmetic products very seriously here (except deodorant - they don't do that at all)

These tights contain "A unique blend of ginger and capsicum (red pepper extract) to warm up your leg's temperature on average by 1.7 degrees celcius."

They also claim to "Mositurise the skin with soothing chamomile extract."

I'll let you know how they go.

I also picked up some Handy Baby Honey Butter. The packet says "Honey essence keeps your lips moisture and makes lips plump like touching the baby."

I couldn't say no to that.

I think Sexy Zone might be the Japanese answer to One Direction. They fulfil the key criteria of looking 12 years old.

I spent a terrible amount on this bunch of grapes while foraging for food for the baby. Aren't they perfect though? They look plastic and are huge.

Grandmas have the best gardens

Just look.

And here. Gorgeous. All the grandparents in my life are green thumbed. I like to assume I will suddenly wake up a talented gardener when I reach years of distinction too.

The Baby loved helping his Great Grandma.

He's been rocking this hat we bought him in Kuranda. So Oz.

Here's an outfit snap from a messy Cairns hotel room. This cotton knit from Seed is such a good colour. Cold acid yellow.

Cairns is full of sweaty backpackers and hippies. It's a scene I would have felt right at home in 10 years ago. Today, less so. It just makes me wish I was in a clean air conditioned room with a tall glass of iced water. 23 year old me would hate me.

A quiet moment and a little 'Night Garden' before bed, all of us plugged into our different bits of tech. I remember using public phones and my Telstra phone card with the 25 digit pin to call home when I first started travelling. It rarely worked. I don't miss those days at all. Devices for everyone, I say.

Tomorrow we fly to Osaka, nearly 8 hours in the air.

On the Atherton Tablelands

We're home from our family hols today. It was such a good time.

I have a whole slew of posts J wouldn't let me publish from the road in case robbers who read blogs knew we were on holidays. It's his first world paranoia.

So now we will have ALL travel snaps ALL the time for a few weeks while I catch up. Possibly interspersed with some Christmas stuff.

The Baby is a brilliant flyer! After all my worry that he would hate it and make me pay, he covered himself in glory on his first plane flight from Brisbane to Cairns.

Before heading to Japan we spent a few days in the Atherton Tablelands with J's grandmother. The Baby is her first great grandchild.

She is a complete duck and lives in Atherton, a few hours out of Cairns. J and I came to stay here a few days after we were married, en route to our honeymoon. I must have been starry eyed with love, because I formed no lasting impression of the place from that trip at all.

I'd forgotten how charming it all was.

We took the Baby to the Crystal Caves in Atherton.

The 'caves' are out the back of a shop and are made of polystyrene painted to look like rock, with crystals and things embedded in them. Sounds a bit crap doesn't it? The earnestness of it all and the fact you get a helmet with a torch and are allowed to TOUCH EVERYTHING means it treads that all important line of naff attractions and manages to be AWESOME.

Especially if you are 1.

After the caves we had lunch and a huge lemon, lime and bitters at the Barron Valley Hotel a few doors down.

This place is country pub perfection. 1930s woodwork and furniture as far as the eye can see and a beautiful pub lunch.

I want these chairs in my house.

Next we drove out to to Lake Barrine, a perfect still pool in a volcanic crater. Just look how gorgeous it is.

This is the view from the cafe.

And the kid's play area in the cafe… inside a fireplace.
I hesitated with a wriggling monkey in my arms for a few moments before deciding this was an inspired idea. We waved to him cheerily on the other side of the bars as we drank our coffee.

We took a slow boat trip around the lake and saw giant eels, turtles and all kinds of water birds. We looked for the giant pythons that live in the rainforest around the lake, but the sun had gone behind a cloud so they weren't out.

The Baby had a Grade A tantrum towards the end of the boat trip but not even this could spoil such a completely perfect day.

Capsule travel wardrobe (North QLD to Japan)

With parenthood and one thing and another it's been forever since we've been away and Japan is our holiday home away from home. The place we keep going back to. This is me in 2009.


And 2010.

Can. Not. Wait. To be back there.

Right now though? I'm about 85% excited and 15% stressed about our first time flying with this one.


There's something about packing a capsule wardrobe for travel however that I find very calming. A combination of clothes with list making, and the anticipation of adventure.


We're travelling to Osaka (cold), via a few days in Cairns (humid and hot). My wardrobe has to be adaptable to both climates (layers), as well as tight enough to leave room in the suitcase for all the Baby's gear (lots).

For 13 days I've packed 15 pieces. This includes two jackets (because I am easily bored) and a jumper for the cooler weather and one pair of shorts (Bassike Relaxed Cotton Pants - so so good) for the tropics. It basically breaks down as 4 x bottoms, 4 x tops, 4 x layering pieces, 3 x outerwear. I think these numbers are a good rule of thumb no matter how long a trip I'm packing for.

Everything layers over everything else so if it is freezing in Osaka I can wear almost everything in my suitcase at once, or just throw on a ponte mini skirt with a t-shirt and sandals in Cairns. If I am organised I will take some outfit pictures while I am gone.

These are all my bags, shoes and accessories.


This is everything.


And then everything packed. These packing cubes are the best invention ever.

My suitcase is still heavy as f**k which is disappointing, but I'm blaming the Baby for this one. I'm expecting him to be pretty high maintenance and have packed accordingly. I could do a whole additional post on things I'm taking for him but I might leave that one until we're home and I can see what worked and what didn't.