Aquarium – a dad’s version

Sachan left out a few tidbits and took her version of the aquarium trip in a slightly different direction than I would have.  So you get a double view of  our aquarium trip.

I can navigate the extensive and poorly marked nooks and crannies of Ikebukuro station.  I can march a small band of travelers to and through its shops and stores.  I can find the interconnected cluster of skyscrapers called Sun City.  What I can not do is take information from a Japanese web site (for example, the Sun City Aquarium) and glean from its description of its first and second floor markings that neither half of the aquarium’s facilities are outside nor that the aquarium is located on the roof of the last building in the cluster.  (Just a note, the last time I checked, 1 and 2 are used to denote floors that are close to the ground; NOT ten stories above it.)

So I get mom and Sachan to Ikebukuro.  I lead them in an amazingly straight path through nearly five blocks of underground tunnels.  We surface and I lead them, in a B-line, through the outdoor shopping streets to the Sun City complex.  We again head underground, and after  another four blocks we climb a set of stairs entering a mall and start following the signs for the Aquarium.  The signs appear to be leading me up, but I have done my research.   The web site clearly (although it was one of those Japanese only websites, so me using the word clearly is, well, clearly inaccurate) stated that the aquarium was on the first and second floor.

By the time I reached the third floor of this mall I knew I needed help and headed to an information counter.  Ever read  Gogol’s The Inspector General?  There are two characters in this book that have always been dear to my heart: the bumbling and idiotic Dobchinsky and Bobchinsky.  They epitomize  ineffectiveness.  Wanna guess who was waiting for me at the information counter?  Yep, Bobchinsky-san and Dobchinsky-san.  Bobchinsky-san’s eyes popped out of his head as soon as I walked up.  I have mentioned in other tales that this happens from time to time: situations where it really doesn’t matter how poorly I speak Japanese.  There are those people who are so nervous about what a non-Japanese person might say or ask that they forget to actually try to listen.  Poor Bob-san, he was in bad shape from the start.  I let him catch his breath and put his eyes back in his head.  Then I slowly and clearly asked where the aquarium was.  I was so amused by Bob-san though that it didn’t dawn on me until I started to speak, that I wasn’t exactly one hundred percent sure what  aquarium was in Japanese.  In such situations, I resort to katakana and hope and pray the person I am talking to has heard the word butchered in this way.  So I said, after a slight bow, “Sumimasen, ah-kwah-ri-oh-mu wa doko desu ka?”  (Literally, excuse me, the aquarium is where?) Bobchinsky-san’s eye’s popped out again.  I waited.  I saw his little brain click on as he reached for a mall map.  I knew what he was going to do.  I already had a mall map in my hand and it wasn’t doing me any good.  He was going to do what any wonderfully polite Japanese person will do in such a situation.  They will tell you what they know and send you on your way.  This is their idea of being polite and prevents them from committing the most uncouth of cultural sins:  having to admit they don’t know what you are saying.  I had to cut him off, so I threw him a (fish) bone as I added, “Sakana.”  Sakana is Japanese for fish.  “Sakana wa doko desu ka?”  (I feel that is absolutely necessary that I tell you, my dear reader that upon retelling this story to Pam later that evening, that she burst into uncontrollable laughter at this point.”) This served the double purpose of stopping Bobchinsky in his tracks.  It also gave Dobchinsky-san, who had been quietly playing along on the wing position to jump in and save the day.  Dobchinsky had two things going for her:  she was a she and knew how to use her brain.  “Suizoukan,” she added quickly and with authority.  My  eyes, which had been trained on Bob-san with disdain, flashed with joyful acknowledgment over to Dob-san.  “Hai!” I replied quickly.  Our eyes met, we silently acknowledged that neither one of us was as stupid as Bob.  She launched into a clear and concise explanation of how to get from this very spot UP  to the suizoukan, which we all now knew as the Japanese word for aquarium.

In my best Japanese I told her I understood what she had just told me.  I thanked her profusely in Japanese.  I bowed.  I quickly turned to Bobchinsky-san and gave him my best sarcastic “Domo.”  I turned and left, only to have Sachan say, “Dad, I didn’t know an aquarium was the same as suizoukan.  You should have asked them were the suikoukan is.”

“Thanks Sachan, THAT is information that would have been useful FIVE MINUTES AGO!”  Ok, I didn’t really say that.  Oh but I thought it!

Dobchinsky’s directions were good enough to get us up to the fifth floor and further back into the mall where there were no information counters.  I spied a bored looking Security Guard and sent Sachan running over to ask him where the “Suizooukan” was.  It was clear he was bored and so led us to the very back of the fifth floor, down a narrow hallway…one of those kinds of places where you see dead bodies in crime shows.  Around the next corner was a bank of elevators.  He pushed the button for us, escorted us on when it arrived and rode with us to the tenth floor of the building.  The tenth floor, as it turns out is a partial roof top.  A first floor roof top complete with seals, penguins and a random assortment of fish.  On the other side of the roof is a two story structure containing the main part of the aquarium, oh, excuse me, I meant to say the suizoukan.

And now, to make you feel better about having gone through all of that, here are some pictures of things Sachan didn’t mention in her story.

I recall with great fondness from my scuba diving days the thrill of happening upon a moray eel.  Some of these dudes can have a real nasty disposition.  I noticed that the diver in the tank left this relatively small one (about a meter long) alone.  That big one she did pull out was easily more than two meters long.  Seeing her pull him out and swim with him was nothing short of awe inspiring.

I spent ten minutes trying to catch this clown fish in this sea anemone knowing for sure Sachan would mention it in her story.  Oh well, here you go anyway.  For the record, there were no barracudas in this tank.

What can I say, I am always thinking about food and these shrimp looked mighty tasty!  Wait, did someone say food?

Oh, yummy, yummy, yummy!  It’s a squid!  And look at those eyes!  Oh the better to eat you with.  If you are confused by my infatuation with ika – Japanese for squid, you can check out the Tri-Blog Challenge and stay posted for my lunch of ika while celebrating the cherry blossom festival.