SUSANNE SENSEI: The Shi

After spending about two and half weeks in the greater Gobo area, I was starting to get cabin fever. Shirahama was great and I was enjoying meeting all of the ALTs but I wanted to go shopping, have a Starbucks and hang out. So, I grabbed fellow ALT Sarah and we went off to explore the big city, Wakayama one evening. I had checked the Starbucks website and found that there was a store out in a mall called Garden Park. After checking their website, it looked like I hit pay dirt because one of my favourite Japanese chains, Muji, has a location there, too! The local train costs about 1000 yen and takes an hour to get up to the shi. Then, we had to navigate the bus system and eventually we found ourselves at Garden Park. Unfortunately for Sarah, there were no stores for clothes and swimsuit shopping but we both enjoyed our Starbucks and browsing Muji's food section. On our way back to the train, we stopped for food at this great little Indian restaurant run by a family from Pakistan. It is in a really convenient location and I definitely glad to see that I could still enjoy some international cuisine in Wakayama. Even as we get more settled into our rural lifestyles, it's nice to know there is a city to escape to every once in a while.