Monday, May 28th .....

We were still tired when we woke up this morning. We had thought we might have a quiet trip on the train to Shikoku but there was a message from Mai, one of Marilyn’s girls who had spent some time in the Boarding House at Grammar. Marilyn had let her know that we were in town and Mai was keen to meet her for lunch.

We had to collect our Japan Rail Passes and I wanted to check out one of the busiest stations in the world. This is where they employ people to push passengers into the trains at peak hour. The station itself is massive – true modern brutalism at its best. Even in the nicely-decorated waiting areas there are massive beams with great arrays of rivets, all making some kind of statement. I hope the statement is ‘Be confident, we are strong’ because our trains leave from level 4 of the station building. That means there are huge, heavy trains rumbling across the heads of all the people down below. It hasn’t collapsed yet so I suppose that is comforting.

Mai arrived on time (Marilyn always expected punctuality) and they went off to have a posh lunch somewhere while I filled in time exploring the myriad of little laneways running off the main avenues of the underground mall. Following my nose, I stumbled across a passageway which took me into the next mall which had its own set of shops, theatres and restaurants. It is certainly amazing (I imagine there’s a pun there somewhere but I can’t be bothered changing the wording).

Marilyn came back from her lunch quite elated and we went out to get some food for dinner – bento boxes and wine from the Hanshin Department Store, with the prospect of some macaroons from a tiny hole in the wall we had passed on the way to the mall. In the auditorium I mentioned earlier we noticed a few older citizens setting up to play their accordions. A nice picture, I thought, and mimed ‘Can I take your picture?’ No problem and they arranged themselves to play individual pieces and to have individual photographs. One of them who said we could call him Tommy sat with us and explained what was happening. We sat for a while listening to Russian, Japanese and French songs. A couple of other people wandered by and Tommy called out to them, ‘Dozo, Dozo, meaning Please take a seat.

It seems they are from the Kobe School of Accordion Playing, or some such and meet in this place once a month. They have a range of abilities. One old fellow has been playing for years and you can tell, the only woman player who was there is a beginner. When they heard we were from Tasmania, one of them asked whether we came from Hobart. He had never been there but he knew what the capital was and that we had Tassie Devils.

We missed out on the macaroons but we didn’t need them – maybe another day. And we never got to Shikoku – maybe tomorrow