Oh. I- Ahahahaha oh, I thought, ohhh. What a hilarious misunderstanding.

Every time I go to Kamakura, a town nearby that is just old and small and traditional enough to be popular for day-tripping Japanese people from Tokyo and that we also love, I feel like I can assess how I'm doing with my cultural assimilation and language acquisition. It was the first place we visited off-base after we arrived and were incredibly overwhelmed and so tired. So as much as we loved it, a lot of it was one big blur at the time. When I went back for my second visit, it went a whole lot better, and every time I've gone back I can measure against previous experiences.

Today was no different. We went to Kamakura and went to the same yakiniku place we went to the first time and we both felt a lot more confident about the situation today. It's our favorite yakiniku restaurant so far, so we will be taking any visitors here.

Then, we went to a store we like for Christmas gifts and I handled the conversation in more Japanese than English than last year and I even wrote the names for the orders in Japanese!

Totally copied this from a note I'd put together while we were on a train, and I definitely need practice, but I still feel really good about this - even if the woman at the shop ultimately corrected how I spelled the fourth name. She understood it all, and that's a win!

Unfortunately, things went a little downhill from there. While we waited for our order at the other shop, we went to a nearby cafe that does really impressive latte art. Much of the art is Disney-themed from what I've seen of friends' visits, the cafe is charmingly decorated, and the music playing was delightful jazzy piano covers of Disney songs.  I ordered Blake's hot chocolate to be decorated with Stitch and my hot caramel milk with Mount Fuji. The waitress confirmed our orders and with a "kashikomarishita" ("of course") was off. Several minutes later (good latte art takes time), Blake's adorable Stitch drink came, followed some minutes later by mine, which wasn't exactly what I expected.

It was super well-done, whatever it was. So, while we sipped our tasty drinks, I read the receipt, which was all in katakana, and tried to decipher what she thought I'd ordered.

What I thought I'd asked for:
フジサン
Fuji-san

Took this photo from Zushi Beach after Typhoon Lan cleared out.

What I got:
フリーザ
Furiiza

Still impressed

Turns out she thought I'd asked for a Dragon Ball character named Frieza, a thing I did not know existed before this afternoon. But now I do! It was an understandable and amusing misunderstanding. Among our friends there is a phrase for the things that get misunderstood by any party or problems on trains or at stores or just the challenges of life in this country - Japan Tax. This was definitely a Japan Tax situation. I'll just have to try this cafe again, and ask for Mount Fuji in English instead. 

It was a lovely afternoon in one of our favorite places, and then we came home for naps and second Thanksgiving, which was also lovely. I do love our little adventures and Blake's extra days off.