Favorite snacks and Train

Before we came home from Japan I did have time to go to the grocery store one last time and pick up a few of our favorite things to bring home. 

I got my favorite Choco Pies!  They are very similar to moon pies but they have a more creamy filling instead of marshmallow.  Hi Chews are also very good so i grabbed a bunch of those.  People probably though I was weird because I grabbed all the choco pies off the shelf.  I also want to post about some of the drinks they have in japan.  These are all typical things you would find in vending machines or at the store.  The sweat one is kind of like  a power aid and the calpis soda is like a milky pop.

 

In the picture below I am drinking hot chocolate.  the vending machines also sell hot things.  It was nice when we had to wait in the cold for the train. Similar to the hot chocolate you could even get a warm soup in a bottle.  Those were surprisingly good.

Train and walking were our two biggest forms of transportation in japan so I thought i would post a few pictures.  Above you can see tucker looking out the window while on the train and Tucker waiting for the train.  Penelope is holding on.  It was kind of difficult when we went on longer train rides because everyone is always quiet on the train.  People usually don't talk and when they do they only whisper.  Most people just sit quietly reading or playing with (but not talking on) their phones or ipods.  It was hard to keep the kids quiet.

Midday we had no problems getting a seat but sometimes the trains were more crowded.  The kids and i almost always got a seat but Bob did stand a lot.  There were a couple train rides we went on that were packed.  I never saw anybody pushing people onto the train and we always fit.  There were several times that we were running to get on before the doors shut.  The top left is a picture of a guy using two cell phones at once.  I thought it was funny but you cant really tell in the picture.  The bottom two pictures are of a train station that instantly got packed.  I left the family to walk into the bathroom and when i came out there were so many people I couldn't find them anymore.  A ton of people must have just gotten off a train.

In some ways the trains were more convenient than driving.  We didn't have to find parking spaces or mess with carseats.  They were usually very fast because they didn't wait for traffic or have to follow the streets.  They were less convenient only because you might have to wait up to 15 minutes for the next train to come and you usually can't get as close to where you are actually going meaning you have to walk more.  Another bad thing was that when something happened like the earthquake the trains got shut down which was a huge inconvenience for everyone.