Finding Public Washrooms Day

Today was a national holiday, "Peace Memorial Day", for a reason I forget. Obviously something to do with remembering some sort of violent conflict. Since I have paid holidays, I would have preferred it to be on a Wednesday or Friday (my full days), but no such luck. Linda (see the post on rich friends) called last night and invited Michael and I out to eat with them today. We decided to meet at 4:30 at her house.

After doing all the household chores I normally save for Saturday, we decided to go out to explore the community. I had every intention of returning home before going to meet Linda, so I didn't take my cell phone or a set of extra clothes for Michael. As you can probably guess, we didn't end up going back home and I spent the day frantically trying to find public washrooms.

We walked down our 219 steps and turned the other way this time. We found a bunch of hole in the wall restaurants, a 7-11 (of course), a fruit/vegetable stand and a fresh meat stand. I'm pretty sure that only pork is ever sold at these open air (non-refridgerated) meat stands, so maybe I should just call them scary raw pork stands.

We then walked to the playground to let Michael play. He's very sociable and is always trying to play with the other children, but they all seem to be afraid of him, or are just plain mean, so we didn't stay very long. While Michael was playing, I discovered that I could see the raised MRT line through the trees down the hill. It didn't seem very far away, so I took Michael down the hill. Well, once we were at the MRT, Michael wanted to get on. And away we went.

We got off at the new SOGO (big Japanese owned department store) which they built right across the street from the old SOGO and explored every floor via the view from the escalators, which is the only part that Michael has any interest in. The basement had a nice food court, but it was packed solid, so we got lunch at the bakery. They had these cute little rectangular sandwiches, nine to a pack (three each of egg salad, ham, and cucumber/tomato). Each one could be eaten in two or three bites. Michael, however, doesn't eat like a normal person and had lots of fun trying to fit each entire sandwich into his mouth at once. He was the main attraction for all the people waiting to get into Ding Tai Fung (a famous Taiwan dumpling restaurant), with tomato juice spurting out of his mouth and bulging cheeks.

Found a public washroom, and then we got on another train line to the site of the lantern festival the other night. Robert and I had lived in that area and I wanted to see what had changed. We walked and walked some more with a stop at a toy store that sells high quality, very expensive toys, like Thomas trains. Michael played with their demonstration set for about forty-five minutes giving me plenty of time to examine every item in the store and have the saleslady show me how everything worked.

We stopped again for a rest and drink at a 7-11. Then I started to be on the lookout for another washroom. Nothing. Nothing. Nothing. We made another few stops to look in a few pet stores. Michael is convinced that he's getting a puppy for his birthday and he keeps on choosing one out whenever we walk by a pet store. They were very cute, but SO tiny. I'm sure they were nowhere near the age they were supposed to be before being able to leave their mother, and I felt quite sad seeing them in those little cages.

By this time we had been walking for quite awhile and I was getting a little frantic. There weren't even any children's clothing stores around for me to buy Michael extra clothes should he have an accident. We finally got to the alley that is a wet market (ie. fresh produce and meat) by day and night market by night (surprise, surprise). There were lots of great things to look at, but I had a one track mind, and finally found a sign pointing down this dark, narrow, smelly alley to washrooms. I hoped that no muggers were around and plunged into the darkness. It was gross, but Michael went and we ran out.

I looked at my watch to see how much time we had left to explore the market before heading to Linda's and was astonished to see that it was 4:25. I quickly hailed a taxi and looked through my purse for the guidebook Robert had made me that had her address written in Chinese. No guidebook. Oops, forgot it at home - along with everything else. So, I pull out my map, because I had completely forgotten the name of the street near her house. I find it and hope my Chinese is understandable as I tell the driver the intersection by her house. He must have understood, because we got there just fine, but he didn't trust me to know my numbers yet (a safe assumption), because he said "ninety" when we arrived. Now, the fare is prominently displayed in the cab, so I already knew what it was, but appreciated his effort all the same.

Arrived at Linda's ten minutes late. I had to carry Michael the last block because he was so tired, he kept tripping over his feet. Rang the bell. No answer. Waited a few minutes. Finally, Sara came out to let us in. Linda didn't even arrive until twenty-five minutes later. I needn't have worried about being late. Michael got his second wind and was totally hyper. I was hoping that he would still be quiet tired for the restaurant, but nope.

Linda decided to take us to the new SOGO. I didn't tell her that we were there just that morning. We had dinner in one of the fancy restaurants on the top floor, and Michael wasn't too bad. Harris wasn't feeling well, and Sara is always quiet, so Linda and I had to maintain the conversation.

We then went to the sixth floor where they had a bookstore. Michael found a few demonstration English books (most books are shrink wrapped so you can't read them in the store) and we read those for awhile and then said goodbye and went home. Michael really wanted to go back to Harris' house because he had an electric train set, and started to cry. Linda felt bad and promised to invite us over again soon. By the time we got on the train, he had forgotten all about it. Such is life with a three year old.