Cruising the Coast

I finished my Monday afternoon meeting and called the trip a wrap. My plane didn’t leave until late Tuesday afternoon. In the morning, I went to T/CAT, checked in with the airline and left my baggage, feeling considerably freer. My train pass was still valid. Why wait at Narita? I may as well spend my final hours in Japan somewhere besides an airport.
I had heard of a beach to the south an hour or so. I made it to the JR station and took a train to Kamakura. Following the exiting stream of people, I walked to the beach. As I had hoped, it looked a happy place. More than the umbrellas I had expected, there were tall and colorful banners blowing in the wind. The day was bright. After the concrete jungle of the nation’s capital, I was delighted to be at the beach!
Entering a restaurant, I went up to an outdoor deck overlooking the long stretch of sand, people, and colorful fabrics. I’d have to leave in about an hour and a half. No matter; I was just glad to see the ocean — and to see the Japanese having fun.
There were families, as I expected. I’m not sure why I was surprised by the many groups of young people hanging out. Were the beaches in the U.S. more filled with families than groups of young adults? Or was I witnessing the Japanese sense of doing everything together? Once again in a state of confusion, I felt surprisingly relaxed. I was getting used to it.
In the upstairs restroom, I made a startling discovery. Always on the lookout for unusual or unique design, especially in little everyday things, I studied this new contestant with great interest. It could be operated with one hand! A spring-loaded, levered stem on each end would bend up and clear when one lifted the old toilet paper cylinder. A new roll could be introduced from below, itself lifting the side stems until they sprang back into the center of the cylinders. All this could be accomplished with one pass of the new roll. Brilliant!
In the U.S., I’d always considered it a stupid struggle to remove the center bar in a toilet paper holder. Often the two pieces would fly apart, pushed by the spring. In any case, it took two hands to replace the contraption. Moreover, it lacked elegance.
Before me was a well-designed piece of home gear. Efficient, easy and – if not exactly elegant – then at least sophisticated. It even had a curved plate on top that covered the roll, but swung out of the way during the swap. Beat the heck out of its American counterpart. Well done!
Returning to Tokyo, I spend an hour wandering through shops. I took a fancy to some aprons and eventually chose one I hoped Annie would like. It was dark blue and had some Kanji and Hiragana on the front. I guessed it said something like, “Soup’s on!” If not that, then “Peace to all who eat this food.” Until I found someone to translate for me, I decided to tell Annie that the words meant, “Cook who makes marvelous food in kitchen.”