Distractions, reflections

Since Tamachi station and Mita station are north and east of the hotel where we normally stay, the  morning commutes to the university are a regular walk that way.  I decided to take a roundabout route east and south to look around, on the way to Tamachi station.

The area is called Shinshiba. Looking west, the towers — it’s hard to judge whether they’re offices or apartments — are built up to the edge of the canal.

To these southwest, the pedestrian bridge is painted pink.

I followed the main road to walk south over a bridge.  On subsequent walks, I discovered a Hanamasa supermarket further down this road.  Beyond that, there’s more highrises.

Following the main road, I turned east at the pedestrian crosswalk at the traffic lights.

Ot the souteast corner of the next major intersection, the old location of the Shibaura Institute of Technology has been vacated and not yet replaced with a new tenant.

On my third visit to Tokyo, I’ve become comfortable with navigating from Narita International Airport to my hotel near Tamachi station.  Arrving around 5 p.m. in the evening, here’s what the trip looks like into Terminal 1 (for the Star Alliance carriers).

As with most huge airports, passengers debark from the aircraft to face a long walk to the terminal.

Speedwalks in the terminal make the walk easier.  I passed by thermal monitors on the lookout for fevers, right before the lineups at immigration and luggage carousels.

Exiting the baggage area, my first stop takes me on a turn right.  Since my mobile phone from Canada hasn’t worked in Japan, I order a local mobile phone via ANA Skyweb for pickup, a week before the scheduled flight.

At the end of the terminal, the Ana sky porter had a mobile phone with my name on a list.

Turning around to come back through the centre of the terminal, I passed by the main escalator down to the trains.

There’s another wing of the terminal farther along, but my destination was the ATMs just to the left.

Our family has a pattern — not yet a tradition — of skiing at Blue Mountain on December 24.  On the day before Christmas, the slopes are relatively quiet … and the people working the lodge and lifts aren’t yet stressed out by the holiday crowds that will arrive in the following days.  We haven’t been consistent on this event, because it’s only worth going if snow conditions are good, and pre-Christmas weather is variable.  In 2008, conditions were favorable,and we were on the road as the sun rose.  Since we ski irregularly, we rent equipment at the lodge for the day.  We’re not very practiced in getting dressed in the gear.

As oldsters, Diana and I prefer the tradition of Alpine skiing.  Adam and Noah have been on snowboards in prior years.  Ryan decided to stick with skis, and followed his parents for the first few runs.

Taking the ski lift up is more straightforward for skiiers than snowboarders, who have to release the binding for one foot.  After riding the lift to the top of the hill, Adam and Noah demonstrated the procedure of reattaching snowboard bindings while seated.

Unlike prior trips sunny enough for sunglasses, this day was overcast and cold both in the morning and afternoon.  From a north facing ridge, the clouds were low on the views of Georgian Bay and Collingwood.

Continuing the tour of my relatives in the Bay Area, our group struck out on the Friday afternoon over the bridge to Berkeley, connecting with my niece Nicole as the local tour guide.  A late and leisurely ramen lunch didn’t leave us much time to see the campus.  Without a specific destination, we just wandered.  In comparison to the sprawling campus at Stanford, the Berkeley site seems more compact.  The lush eucalyptus grove indicates a climate cooler and wetter than the south bay.

Although Berkeley has a long history of scholarship into Asia, the Chinese and Japanese collections were  consolidated into the C. V. Starr East Asian Library as a new building only in 2008.

Since Nancy was an east asian studies major some years ago, and then a library studies graduate student, this building was a natural for a peek.

The atrium down the middle of the building provides a feeling of greater openness inside the modern structure.

Since we were in the Bay Area, I arranged for a meeting with a colleague in his office in downtown San Francisco.  We packed out of the hotel to drive into the city, and traffic was lighter than expected.  Thus, we had an hour to see some local sights.  The San Francisco Ferry Building was right down the street.

I’m not sure what I expected to see in a ferry building.  With people passing through on the way to catch a ferry to the other side of the bay, I guess it’s more than a bus terminal, but less than an airport.  Coming through the front door, the hall extended both left and right.  I turned right.

A ferry rider arriving a few minutes early could stop by the artisan bakery for a selection of specialty breads.

Meat has become fashionable again.  A salumeria — cured meat delicatessen — is in keeping with the times.

The refrigerator cases with complete pieces of meat remind us about animal origins.

More than a few of my extended family now lives in California.  After my conference group finished off our mid-afternoon meetings, we drove north to Stanford University for a short tour by my nephew Kevin.  He told us to meet him at the top of the Oval, so we wouldn’t get lost.  We started with a stroll through Memorial Court, noticing the quickly arriving dusk.

The Math Corner of the Main Quadrangle is place where you might expect to find mathematicians and math students.

The main quadrangle is a hub for the campus, designed in the early 1900s.

Geovanni, Stephen and Nancy added to the layout of Rodin’s Burghers of Calais.

This late in the afternoon, Memorial Church was closing.