Tokyo and The Trip that Got Us Here

So we are here.  Tokyo.  I'm surprised to say that it feels like home.  After living in NYC for a few months, I have to admit, Tokyo is clean, beautiful, and oh so efficient.  Before, choosing between NYC and Tokyo seemed easy, but if it weren't for my desire to live near my family, I think I might actually choose to live here...don't tell Jonathan that.

Want to hear the story of our trip?  Ok. 

It started off with Sawyer puking down my back and all over a couch pillow just as we were walking out of the door.  It was as if he had reserved a day's worth of spit-up to protest leaving our lovely NYC apartment.  The fragrant and creamy gripe was almost cheesey and gooey enough to make me change my mind about accompanying Jonathan half way across the world. All of our luggage was loaded into the car, so there was no hope of changing my clothes. Jonathan sopped up the mess on my shirt as much as he could, but I still smelled like baby vomit (a unique, but rank smell).  I prepared myself for the whiffs of stomach acid and sour milk that would surely ruminate off my cheesed shoulder for the rest of our trip. Ahhh…

Jonathan and Sawyer Saying Goodbye to our New York apartment.

But we made it out the door on time.  Apartment cleaned.  Car loaded.  We were excited!

We arrived to the airport without incident, except that I was riding in the very back seat of a Lincoln Navigator driven by a very skilled and very aggressive Chinese driver named Lee.  The fumes from the Holland Tunnel were strong at 8:30 am.  That combined with my breakfast of an unripe peach and the smell of my shoulder left me breathing into a bag with my head between my knees, willing my stomach to secure itself.  I could see that Lee was anxious that I not follow Sawyer's example of protesting his driving by puking in his car.  I obliged, to all of our relief.

After checking our five bags (1. Mine and Sawyer suitcase. 2. Jonathan’s suitcase. 3. Stroller. 4. Sawyer’s bed. 5. Sawyer’s chair—it was all mostly Sawyer’s stuff…he’s very high-maintenance),  we made our way to our gate and then to have a nice sit-down breakfast.  While eating said nice breakfast, my anxiety about flying began to surface—my anxiety usually begins with a moment of magical thinking.   Magical thinking is when crazy people, like me, see signs of their doom in the world around them.  So, I’m eating this nice breakfast with my perfect baby and my wonderful husband, and all I can think is that we are having this nice meal together before we get on the plane because it’s going to crash and burn and this will be our last meal to remember earth by. . . luckily I got over it.  Probably because Sawyer needed me.  Good baby.

The flight was pretty uneventful.  Sawyer did his thing and charmed the people around him with his big gummy smile.  He hardly cried.  He even slept a bit thanks to the flight attendants who set up a little bassinet for him.  He hardly fit in it, but he liked it, and so did we, because it meant that we didn’t have to hold him for 14 hours straight.  For a while now, he has been developing the cute but surely bad habit of acting like he is hungry only to press his face into my b@@b and then fall asleep.  I let him pull this trick on the plane. You know, he’s a baby on a 14 hour flight—he deserves it.

Jonathan and Sawyer watched Rango on the plane.

Sawyer's airplane bassinet.

Once we landed we quickly got through customs and loaded ourselves onto a bus bound for Tokyo.  My head was pounding and Sawyer was making it clear that he was DONE with traveling.  Jonathan, on the other hand, was like a kid in a candy store—so, so happy to be back in his spiritual motherland.  Just as we were pulling into our Tokyo stop, Sawyer nicely book ended our trip with a giant diaper blowout.  So, yea, our trip started with vomit and ended with poop.  I have to say that it could have been a lot worse.

There it is.  A pretty unimpressive story.  I like it that way!

Our Tokyo apartment is perfect!  I’m so happy to not be living in a box.  Please see pics.

Sawyer's first crib.  Don't you love the Japanese!  Look at that little pillow.

Living Room already wrecked with Sawyer's stuff.

In other news, Sawyer is severely jet-lagged. No surprise. He can’t sleep longer than two hours at a time.  This could also be due to the two bottom teeth that have just started to break through his gums.  Poor guy.  It’s also like 100 degrees here and 99 percent humidity. He doesn’t like that either, which makes outdoor activities tough.  Ahhh…. He’ll get used to it soon enough, we hope.