pointo caado

"Read it and weep," I said to my husband as I showed him my brand new card. "Can you beat Tower Records?"

"Two words," he said with confidence. "Bic Camera."

Oh! Snap! Trumped by the electronics store again!

Since coming to Tokyo four months ago, we've started to adopt some pretty cool Tokyo traditions.

We now all eat with hashi (chopsticks). (Some of us are better than others.)

We are all learning how to speak Japanese. (Some of us are much better than others.)

We remember to take our shoes off at the door. (Some much, much better than others.)

We bow while talking on the phone. (Ok, that was just me. And, it happened once.)

We sumo wrestle (Ok, that's just our 11-year-old son. He lost his first tournament, but did catch two goldfish with rice paper. So it was a win afterall.).

And, now we are starting to collect store point cards (or pointo caado, as they say here).

It's easy as ichi, ni, san.
1. The clerk of any store: "Fastjapaneseyoucan'tunderstand pointo caado des ka?"
2. You: "Hai."
3. They give you a card!

It's the easiest and most rewarding task I've done in Tokyo. And, now I'm addicted. It doesn't matter if I'm at a supaa (supermarket) or depaato (department store), I will say yes to "....pointo caado des ka?". And, I hoard and value my point cards like a 10-year old with his pokemon deck. "Mr. Donut-san, I choose you!"

"Do you even know how many points you have on the cards?" my husband asked me.
"No," I said.
"Do you know how to redeem your points?"
"No," I said.
"Do you know what prizes you could earn with the points?"
"No," I said.
"You're just excited to answer 'yes' in Japanese, right?"
"Hai," I said.

To be honest, I had tried "moo ichido onegaishimas" (one more time please), but "hai" is soooooo much easier to say....and if I play my cards right I just might get a cool prize. I'm hoping for a "Misdo" (Mister Donut) chef hat.

Yakitori

My friend Cindy recently noted that I blog alot about food.
It's true.
It's really true.
I have never spent so much time thinking about food. How to find it? What is it? Will my kids like it? How much can I carry home? How do I cook it?

After four months of making every variety of stir fry, I decided I needed a few more strategies to help spice up our dinners. First, I decided to watch and learn from local shoppers. I now watch what they put in their grocery handbasket and do the same. The other day I brought home something new.

Of course I can't read the label, so my son has to translate it. "Moyashi," my son said.
"Sounds delicious," I said to my boys as I checked out the package. "Maybe it's some kind of elegant noodle."
"Mom," my son said. "It's Japanese bean sprouts." Crunchy!

My second strategy for success is this: if I find a food or drink that my kids like, I buy multiples of it.

Clearly this "bulk buying" makes the clerk at my small local grocery very nervous. The other day I bought 4 liters of milk (will probably last me 2 days, maybe). I could tell by the look on the clerk's face what he was thinking.
"That American woman is doing it again! She's clearing us out. A few days ago it was chicken. Then the cereal. Now it's the milk. Quick! She's heading for the bean sprouts! Guard the sprouts! Save the sprouts!"

I'm not sure if it's because of my cooking or because our boys just lost their baseball game, but the other night my husband decided it was time to go out for dinner.
"McDonalds?" my youngest son asked. He always asks for McDonalds.
"TGI Fridays?" my 10-year-old asked. He loves their ribs.
"Outback Steakhouse?" my 14-year-old asked. He loves their desserts.
"Yakitori," my husband answered. "We're going to Kichijojo. We're going out for traditional Japanese food."

We were actually doing it.
We were actually going out for our first family Japanese dinner.
No English menu. No Japanese friend to help translate. Just us. And our self confidence. And some yen. And maybe a little international sign language.

"How are we going to order?" I nervously asked my husband. "I only just learned adjectives this morning in my Japanese class. All I can say is: Kono wa chiisai handbag des. This is a small handbag."

"Chicken," my husband said in English to the waitress.
"Hai (Yes, I understand)," the waitress said. Yes!
"Asparagus," my husband said. "Tomato," he added.
"Hai," the friendly waitress said. She understood! We're ordering!
"Kono wa chiisai handbag des," I proudly said. I couldn't help myself.
"Hai," the waitress answered with a smile to my kindergarten sentence. Oh! I love this place.

So, now I have a third strategy-it's called the Mother's Day Wish List. When we find a place that we all like, I add it to my list. This restaurant is now on my list.

My fourth strategy is to put my Mother's Day Wish List on the refrigerator. I will let you know if either of these strategies work.

If not, it's back to bean sprouts.