M8 (Losing a Kid in Tokyo)

Tokyo is the largest city on Earth. With a population of over 37 million people, it has four times as many people as New York City. (Fun fact: no US city is on the list of top 10 most populated cities. None even comes close.) The metropolitan area covers 8407 square miles. Eight thousand four hundred and seven.

You can see and do practically everything in Tokyo. So far we’ve been to an owl cafe and a fox cafe and more train museums and shops than you can count. The kids spent yesterday at an indoor amusement park complete with roller coasters and a poop museum next door, while I filled my afternoon exploring the many book stores in Jimbocho and having tea at a cafe decorated with French novels that are over 100 years old.

Given the ease with which one can navigate the vast public transportation system, you can get almost anywhere in the massive metropolitan area within a couple of hours. Of course this can be extremely exhilarating, or not. 

A few days ago, there was some interpersonal conflict, and one of the kids ran away. I’m being vague about what happened for their privacy, but they’ve agreed to let me share this.

The conflict (that occurred because the kid didn’t like how I handled a situation) happened near the central exit of Tokyo Station. Tokyo Station is one of the busiest train stations in the world with 14 train lines. Three thousand trains and 1.1 million people go through it daily. It also has a fairly elaborate underground shopping and restaurant district.

It’s not a great place to lose someone.

The kid in question walked away from me and kept walking. I tried catching up to them but the faster I walked, the faster they walked, too. If you’ve ever been to Japan, you know that people tend to be pretty quiet in public, so shouting for the kid to stop would have drawn attention that would have certainly driven them to run. I calmly called their name and asked them to stop, but they didn’t. And then they disappeared into one of the underground passageways. 

Fortunately, as they were getting away from me, I had the presence of mind to yell that I couldn’t catch them but would be waiting for them at the spot where I was standing. At the top of the stairs of exit M8. 

Ren and the other two kids were still in the station buying tickets to a special exhibit, unaware of what had happened. I stood at M8 and tried calling him. When I finally reached him, he was confused. Weren’t we in the station waiting for him to get the tickets? When he finally processed what I was saying, the three of them came to join me at M8. We had the two kids sit there while Ren and I went down to look. We split up, but it only took about ten seconds to realize there was no way we could find someone down there. They could be in any shop or on any number of trains. They could also have resurfaced at another exit and be walking away from us in the city. 

It was hard not to panic. Or cry. 

We decided to have Ren stand looking for them in the station while I waited at M8. The two other kids got on the train back to our lodging. As I waited, I called Ren and asked when we should call the police. In my head I was composing a list of what the kid was wearing and their physical characteristics (calculating their weight and height into kilograms and centimeters), and I was thinking about which recent picture to show the police. Ren thought we should wait to call the police until the other kids confirmed the third kid wasn’t at home. 

I sat on the ledge at M8. My feet dangled like a little kid’s. An older Japanese woman gave me an odd smile. I tried not to think about the possibilities. The missing child doesn’t know the city well and was upset enough that they couldn’t make safe or rational decisions. Maybe they didn’t hear me when I told them where I’d be. Maybe they were upset enough that they would forget where they were. 

And there was no possible way for me to find them. I felt completely helpless. And terrified. Those minutes when I was sitting alone at M8 trying to will that kid back to me felt like the longest minutes of my life. 

And then, after we’d been looking for about 30 minutes, they reappeared at M8. They were above ground and came from a completely different direction than I expected. I hugged the kid and thanked them for coming back. Then we talked about ways to get away and regroup that didn’t include terrifying loved ones. I really think the they didn’t understand how worried we were. 

How do I end this post? I don’t know. I constantly fail as a mom, and then I get up the next day and try again. I guess that’s something.