Japan - Day 8 - Ebisu Garden Place and the Caterpillar Scare

Sunday was also spent with oniichan. He brought me to Yebisu Garden Place, which used to be a brewery for Ebisu beer. I had omu raisu (omelette rice) for lunch and then after that we went shopping for plants. He suddenly had this obsession with getting plants for his home. Anyway we went to a florist and were looking at all the nice plants, examining potential buys for withered leaves etc etc. So anyway he wanted this particular plant and asked me to pick it up. I saw that one of the leaves had a big portion of it gone. I was just thinking to myself that hey, something big must've eaten that up. So I wanted to turn the leaf over to have a better look, when I touched something furry. Next thought: Hey if this plant has smooth leaves, what am I touching that is remarkably furry? Wah then I saw this huge, fat, furry, writhing caterpillar. Got scared out of my wits! I kinda screamed la -sheepish look- I'm fine with creepy crawlies as long as I'm not in CONTACT with them. Man oh man. The japanese ladies around us started laughing at me and telling me in Japanese that this is gonna become a butterfly you know? Ok ok yes I knew that... So in morbid fascination I started looking at the thing closely... And there was a dark green thing moving at one end of its body. I was wondering whether that was the head? When suddenly the thing *dropped off* ... I screamed again. I thought the thing was now decapitated, which wasn't actually the case. It was caterpillar poop. Who would've known its dark green? It does make sense though... all that chlorophyll.

Pictures pictures!


Florist shop.


The caterpillar. Check out the texture of its body and those hairs! The poor half-eaten leaf... this thing can really eat.


Caterpillar poop! Dark green some more.