moving...

i've been in this space since nico's birth but i think you'll soon agree that we have outgrown it. so, please come visit us in our new space. take care.

secrets...

so, if you haven't figured it out by now, we are hording secrets here. yes, secrets with a nice curvy s on the end.
i have never been really one for secrets but since we are so far away, it is kind of fun to be able to have a secret or two for a while.
believe me, they are good. so good that they consume a lot of our focus these days. so if my posts are sporadic, it is because i am trying to keep my lips sealed for a bit longer. just a bit. because i am discovering the joy of keeping a secret before i share with everyone.

in the meantime, i should be back soon with some summery pictures. mainly of the boys on the hunt for insects. or blowing bubbles. we just returned from an evening trip to the park where jason and i played badminton and nico and sebastian ran around chasing dragonflies. the weather has been very nice these last few days with no rain and the temperatures peaking at a mere 80 degrees F. it is hard to believe tomorrow is august. but it is. and with it exciting things await. like jason's 32nd birthday. 32. he is definitely not what i thought 32 looked like when i was young. he boasts of no grey hairs or wrinkles or stiff joints yet. even from the far distance of my twenties, he looks rather spry and youthful for such an advanced age. and august will also mark the ninth year that i've been hanging out with the old man. nine years, both long and short. full to bursting.

anyway, i will eventually have to let you in on our secrets but in the meantime, you can anticipate and guess your heart out. there is some fun in that as well.

夏休みを始めましょ！

(translation of title: Let's start summer holidays!)


So some of you probably started summer a long time ago. Back in May, right? Well, this weekend is the official kick off of summer in Japan. The beaches are now officially open here on Gotou and will continue to be so for about a month. Not that you can't go when they are not officially open, just don't expect any of the nice amenities like showers, somen noodle stands, or a direct bus stop. The showers and somen we can live without but we like the summer bus routes. Otherwise, you might see us treking many kilometers. Like when we went to Takahama over Golden Week. 45 minutes on a bus then one hour of walking to the beach. But it is a gorgeous beach.



There is a beach within relative walking distance from our house but last year we were a little disappointed with it. As in we don't like to find medical waste and random trash from Australia littering the beach where we want to play. To give poor Mukada beach the benefit of the doubt, we had been having a lot of gale force winds so it was probably not the best day to go to any beach. Also, with the declining population, many of the beaches are ignored for the more popular ones so there is no one there to groom the smaller beaches.

So my mission this summer, since it will be our last on this island, is to find a good beach near us. We scouted out one beach on Saturday but the sea was a little choppy that day so it was hard to judge. We are using this Gotou Tourism website to do a little exploring from home and comparing it with our trusty bus route and schedule website. The top two contenders are currently Ohama Beach
and Hamada Beach, seen here:


Today we were supposed to go to Ohama Beach to celebrate 海の日 (usually translated as Marine Day but since in America we think of another type of Marine, I like to translate it to Sea Day) but the forecast calls for rain so I guess it will have to wait until Saturday. And Sunday. And all the weekends after that.

like walking through a warm bath

it is too hot today. not florida scorching hot but heavily humid. i feel like i am underwater when i step outside. not that inside is much better. unless it is nap time and we indulge our sweaty nicolai in a cool room to doze in.

sorry to be so silent here. everything is good, just busy.
we aren't on the internet that much these days. will be again as school starts up and i go back to my proofreading gig. i should be on more with the writing workshop but i am kinda burned out with it. i think it is just not my thing. but i will stick it out and see it to the end. almost ready to see the start of classes again though with my leave of absence i now have a lot to make up. but it is doable. i am also in the throes of studying for the japanese test that will be in december.

sebastian is an inspiration there as he diligently does his japanese characters (hiragana and now kanji!) every morning and is beginning to read japanese books solo. we help him with english and numbers in the evenings. it is very step by step, maybe only fifteen minutes with each subject, but the daily sessions have made a definite improvement. he'll be reading japanese and english by the fall, i'll wager.

oy vey, as one grandmother we know would put it.
nico is insane. he's a little powerhouse of determination and willfulness and maybe that sounds redundant but if you knew him, you would know that he deserves the overemphasis. he's too smart. like in the, hey, i am smart enough to know all my abcs and be able to count to 30 so i guess i can go outside by myself and see where sebastian and mama went to. in a diaper. and a gross sweaty tee shirt. and rain boots. (we have double locks and he undid both of them, with the help of a chair) jason found him with a helpful local girl on the other side of the bridge. gasp. the river. the road. the cars (read: the taxis). heart attack city. then later that day we go for a family stroll and all the shopkeepers along the main street come out and tell how they saw him walk by their shops. walk by. alone. main street. intersections. driveways. did i mention the taxis? my hair is absolutely white now. mr. independence. he was following me and sebastian to school though that is not where we were (it being a saturday). jason was frantically searching the neighborhood, looking down steep concrete steps. it was when he ran to the river to face one of the dreaded places to search that he saw nico sitting with the girl. and was he upset? no. he explained that he was looking for me and sebastian and that we were going to go get ice cream.
you may wonder, how did jason not know he was gone all that time? nico had been happily building airplanes with his legos and jason stepped away from him for two minutes. one, two. and hearing the kids outside playing, jason assumed that nico went to join them (which he often puts on his boots to try and do). but in the meantime, nico was trotting along in the opposite direction. he knows how to walk on the side of the street, how to look both ways, how to wait for the green signal. but nico. is. too. smart. for. his. own. good.
yikes. anyway, the little devil is waking and it is time to retrieve sebastian from yochien. i'm home after another dentist appointment and jason is subbing for me. so i thought i would share a little snippet of our life with you. now it is your turn. yes, you. how are you?

A Little Bit of Watching=A Lot of Inspiration

Measuring Happiness: A snippet about the glorious kingdom of Bhutan's Gross National Happiness
The Dalai Lama's Shifting Direction + Monks in Exile: A bit about Tibetans in exile. So admirable.
An Inspiring American: Truly awesome man.

6

I want to say how did this happen. How did I end up with this funny, intelligent guy whose head is almost at the towering heights of my shoulders (okay, towering may be an exaggeration)? But I know. I've had a few years of him shifting. Last year, there was only a shadow of the baby left in his cheeks. Now he is pure kid.
Yesterday, Sebastian stood on the school stage for the monthly birthday party and said introduced himself and stated his wishes for the following year. In Japanese. He stumbled a bit (out of stage fright) and his classmates all rushed to assist him, loudly whispering his cues.
We had to read a message to him as his parents but being the teacher as well, I sat it out. Gladly since I would have been a little emotional. Because truly, we are so, so proud of him. He inspires us to hope for lost or forgotten dreams. He teaches us to be patient and compassionate.
So as usual on his birthday, I give thanks.
Happy 6th Birthday, Sebastian Olivier.



(and don't you worry, Nico's in on the love too)

june (a)

good morning. i am sorry the posts here have been so spotty these last few months. we've been busy with work and school and life and haven't had much opportunity for reporting what's happening. that's natural, i think.

this last week we've been sick, nico and i especially. i took a few days off and had for the first time a substitute teacher who i could beg to go in for me: jason. i armed him with lesson plans and taught him the gestures to songs then went back to bed. usually with the lap top so i could work on a season of law and order.

nico was pretty sick and we went to the doctor which was actually the first time since he was an infant so i guess we are lucky. for a grand total of about 13 bucks we saw a lovely, English speaking doctor and got plenty of medication to knock the virus out of his system. he's on the mend now and it is good since we have to go into the city again. for those new visa stickers.

so, we are staying for a bit longer despite the drawbacks. it mainly has to do with the economy. we cannot in good conscious leave a decent position during a recession/depression. it would be foolish. many strange things have been coming out in the news and we have heard the concern of some caring grandparents, but really, compared to the news in america, everything is peaches and cream here.

i'm in a writing workshop. this last week i've been out of the saddle and owe quite a bit of writing and i am not sure when i can make it up. i can say that i don't like writing on short deadlines, that it stunts my creativity. i don't need acres of time but a week doesn't give me enough opportunity to think and write.
anyway, i am sure we'll be back soon with pictures from nagasaki and probably many hydrangea pictures since i'm sweet on them. sorry to be so infrequent but we're trying to get our act together and you will be seeing more of us soon.

take care.

may (c)

So, a lot of news coming from this part of the world so just to reassure you, I thought I would show you where we are. You see the word "FUKUOKA" on the map. Okay, so if you go a little bit under the first "U" in Fukuoka then you'll see a group of small green dots. Our island is the largest of those dots. We are really close to South Korea but luckily South Korea does a good job at blocking the temperamental North. No one here is too worried right now. They are mainly still fretting about the swine flu and if the Ironman Japan Triathlon will take place, and thus bring hundreds of worldly and possibly infected athletes to our sleepy island. Masks are sold out here as people stockpile them or send them to loved ones in cities where the masks can't stay on the shelves longer than a minute. I think it is like living next to any crazy neighbor, you get used to their antics and threats after a while. So, if you were wondering, we're okay for now.

may (b)

the light is grey and changing, stretching into a new day. for nico, as soon as it is not pitch black outside we must get up. luckily it is only me who he insists on joining him, allowing sebastian and jason to sleep until a normal waking hour. nico has a cold and between sneezes sips milk (i know, not the best thing for a cold but that is what he wanted and i don't argue with two year olds at four in the morning) and laughs at grover on sesame street.

it is friday and i am happy as it has been a long teaching week. nothing exactly terrible but just an overall dissatisfaction with the job. that is the way teaching goes; it is very cyclical and i am sure something more inspirational will occur next week to make up for the mundane of this past week. i love my students but feel trapped by the limits of the position, of how much i can accomplish as a foreign language teacher meeting with them between 20 to 60 minutes once a week. the weekend will pass in a flash but it is my time and i savor it. i enjoy racing dinosaurs and doing intensive cleaning, preparing for another five days.

last night we had the first corn of the season. corn here on the island is really popular. it grows all over the place and is a ubiquitous summer food. the boys had already eaten when i came in so when i popped down to the neighborhood store to gather some food for jason's and my dinner, i only picked up two ears. a definite mistake. as soon as they saw what i had, they were jumping up and down in excitement. so a half a piece for each of us. they laughed while they ate it, so thoroughly enjoying such a simple food as blanched corn on the cob. no salt, no butter. just plump yellow and white kernels, freshly shucked. afterwards, they begged for some of the plain yogurt i picked up for breakfast. to have for dessert. simple pleasures.

time is passing so quickly it's a wonder i bother to complain about the long work week. today, being the 22nd of May, brings nico up to two and a half. which means in six more months he'll be three. and of course in less than a month, a certain someone will turn six. six. i'm trying to wrap my head around it. some days he seems up for the job but others makes me wish we could have an extension.
other may happenings include my parents' 47th anniversary, which i missed congratulating them on. so, happy belated congratulations to both of you. (aside to Dad, "I know it isn't easy to put up with Mom but you do it so well". an aside to Mom, "I know it isn't easy to put up with Dad but you do it so well" :) ).
(there is also a sister's birthday coming up but i can only mention it here if i also pass on birthday salutations to my other sister and my brother, both of whom i forgot to wish happy, happy birthday. i think it has something to do with my brain not working so well during the winter. )

it really doesn't feel like may here. the days are mild and the nights are cool. the rainy season is fast approaching and for pedestrians, we have to hope it won't be too bad this year. the good thing is that the rainy season brings on the hydrangeas, my favorite flower. there is one shade of the blossoms that can only be described as perfect dusk.

time to make coffee and breakfast for the sleepers. hope you are all well. take care.

may (a)

Mail Order:

Today we received the goods from a recent shopping trip to Muji. Living disconnected from most everything, we have become regular mail order customers. We figured out early on that for a small fee, it was a lot better to have the store deliver our usually cumbersome order a week later. It absolutely beats trying to haul it on the ferry and back to our abode. Today, in fact we received some much needed bedding (sheets, pillows, pillow cases!), storage units for clothes (which will hopefully solve the difficulty of cramming and uncramming clothes everyday), as well as a new oscillating fan with a nice "mote patroller" as Sebastian calls it (translation: remote control). We are doing what we can to prepare for the upcoming summer. After a harrowing winter, we know better than to face another extreme season unarmed.

I have factored a small monthly allowance into our monthly budget for ordering books from the Japanese Amazon. We have tried to resist this indulgence but we need books. Our other regular place to order from is Tengu, a natural health store that provides us with beans beyond edamame and azuki, as well as tamari for Jason and nutritional yeast for the boys (they call it cheese).

One place I try to avoid shopping at is the Foreign Buyers' Club, as the goods are too tempting (for sentimental, homesick reasons) for the prices they charge. I understand why the prices are so inflated but still, it is hard to justify it. We do our best to make do with what we have and for the most part, we are far from suffering. I was just looking through their online catalog and for fun adding anything that I liked to the cart. The grand total was a stunning amount of yen. Yikes. No, I don't really need Honey Nut Cheerios for roughly 14 bucks. Or that bag of Cape Cod Salt and Vinegar chips (up there with cheese on foods I miss) for 6 dollars.

So the point of this post. Enjoy what you have where you are. And if you are in a place where Salt and Vinegar chips aren't the same price as a movie ticket, pop a bag open and enjoy them for me. And I, in turn, will enjoy something that is here for you. Like Kyushu Shoyu chips (soy sauce) from Calbee. Believe me, it is a fair trade.

Happy Mother's Day

So, we are headed again to Nagasaki this weekend to take care of some immigration related business. This means I won't be here to wish all you lovely mothers a happy, happy Mother's Day. Instead of carnations or a card done up in pastels, I have made a donation to Women for Women International with all of you mothers near and far in mind.

Lately, I have been reading the news in the morning and this means I start every day with more awareness of the dire and tragic circumstances that other women wake up to. Such as the recent attempt of Sri Lankan refugees to flee from warfare to India. I was particularly struck by the part about the mother who managed to save her eight month old son from death by breastfeeding him until her own final hours, a day before the rescue.

Or this disturbing piece on the status of women in Afghanistan.

I am not sharing these with you simply to depress you, though be careful as they aren't exactly going to add a skip to your walk. I share these with you because both of them illustrate how amazing mothers are, how incredibly strong even when all power is stripped away. When I came across Women for Women International, I knew that I had to give what I could because really, as a mother, I am incredibly lucky. My children are safe and healthy and within reach and I am so, so grateful for that.

Happy Mother's Day.
With Much Love,
Me

Call Me Okaasan: A Review

Over my extended spring break last month, I had the opportunity to read the soon to be released Call Me Okaasan: Adventures in Multicultural Mothering, edited by Suzanne Kamata. This book is a collection of personal essays written mainly by expat mothers living around the globe as well as a few by multiculturally-minded mothers. As an expat mother, I have often searched for such a book as the predicament of raising children outside of your home culture and known resources is often isolating and frankly, difficult. As these eloquently written essays illustrate, it is definitely a challenge but within that challenge there is ground for growth as both parents and as humans.

All of the essays share a poignant perspective that captures the triumphs and defeats involved with raising children abroad and at home. The unique situations faced by the different writers such as Saffia Farr’s experience with the antiquated health care in Kyrgyzstan during her first pregnancy (“Dr. Bucket in Bishkek”, page 30) or Devorah Lifshutz’s trials in attempting to raise her children bilingually in Israel (“Promises to Myself”, page 169) allows readers insight into worlds that aren’t described in travel guides. These mothers are on the ground, struggling with controlling in-laws, uncooperative schools, prying neighbors. They witness their children growing into people unimagined at conception, accepting host languages as the dominant form of communication within the home, and allowing themselves to surrender to what it means to be truly bicultural.

Out of all of these excellent essays, the one that hit closest to home for me was Holly Thompson’s “Two Versions of Immersion” (page 113). In it, Thompson described her experience moving, much like we did, with her husband and small children to Japan without too much consideration of what it really means to live here as an expat family. I honestly was very disturbed by this essay because it made me realize the extreme amount of effort and energy involved with bringing children up through the Japanese school system. It’s not that I am lazy: it is just I don’t know how I can manage to learn enough Japanese in order to support my kids in their education. And then the education system that Thompson described fanned my own sparks of concern about the topic. It was interesting that the older child, who had gone to school in the States before moving to Japan, was the one who felt bullied and bored in school. His younger sister, on the other hand, who had started preschool in Japan did not share his problems and thrived in Japanese schools. This made me wonder if it was just a matter of not having a basis for comparison that made life easier for the daughter. In the end, it seemed that the family had found a healthy balance of culture and language, which is encouraging and inspiring.

I was particularly drawn to this essay besides for the shared host country because both of the parents were American. Most bicultural families that we encounter typically have one expat parent and one native parent, thus a rather different situation than what we are facing right now. The book is very satisfying in this regard as it includes such a wide variety of situations that there is bound to be some essay that the reader can relate to. This book may be written by multicultural mothers but the audience will be much broader than that small sliver of the population. Families considering moving abroad, as many are in these dire economic times, as well as readers just curious about a more grounded experience of life in foreign countries will benefit from this book. Beyond the journey-bound, other readers will profit from truths that have no borders, shared candidly and poetically in the pages of Call Me Okaasan.

april (g)

i love humans.
enjoy.

april (f)

Hello there.


I'm going to take a break from the blog for a bit. And hopefully from the internet. If you want to get in touch you can reach us on skype (technically the internet, i know) at iheartkansai or drop us an old fashioned postcard: 1070-1 Fukue-cho Gotou-shi, Nagasaki-ken 853-0007. We'd love to hear from you.

Hope you are all well and we'll be in touch soon. Take care.

april (e)

Hello Weekend. How glad I am to see you.

Sebastian is doing well in his new class. He has a new teacher this year as his old teacher quit due to conflict with my infamous boss. The boss' sister is Sebastian's new teacher. She's been teaching at the school for about 35 years so she has experience. She's known for being strict but I've seen that since she's been back in the capacity of a regular teacher (she was an assistant for a few years), she's become quite affectionate and warm towards her students. Sebastian likes her so far. She came down to the office where I was one morning to express her surprise at how much Japanese Sebastian knows now. He can do more than just function now, he is actually in the mix. I am constantly surprised when I hear him speaking Japanese because he knows more than I do. He doesn't hesitate to question which particle he should use. He just uses it. And, he is starting to write in hiragana at school and loves it. So, our nomadic ways have been tamed for a bit since we at least want him to finish kindergarten here.

This weekend we are going to explore different parts of the island then return here for some sewing and preparation for next week. It is almost time to switch to the summer uniforms (next month) and we have to make sure it still fits. Sebastian is the tallest kid at school now, if you can believe it. It is really strange to see him at school assemblies, his auburn head bobbing a bit above the black heads of his friends. And then to hear him turn to his friends and speak so easily... my heart swells with pride but more with admiration. He inspires me.

Hope you are all well. Take care.

april (d)

on the way to his first day of kindergarten:: opening ceremony:: he played the drums in in ode to joy


waiting/playing while sebastian became an official kindergartener

easter check list:

-dye eggs: check
-make deviled eggs: check
-make chocolate eggs: in progress
-make potato salad:
-make carrot cake with "grass" and "easter eggs" on top:
-make bbq sauce:
-help prepare the way for a certain bunny to visit: check

in our house, we celebrate easter in a very secular but fun way. i honestly tried to figure out how to make baked beans but all we have here are azuki beans and soy beans. i did order this pattern but it hasn't arrived yet so the easter bunny had to modify her plans. i am making their easter candy by melting good chocolate and pouring it into egg shaped molds. i have little colored foils for wrapping them up. tomorrow morning if the weather is as gorgeous as today, we will trek up to the central park and bring the colored eggs with us. i know we will look a little odd, but so what? when have we ever not looked odd?
i hope you are all enjoying the weekend. take care.
xoxo

april (c)

i want to see this.


who does she think she is?

april (b)

from the lobby of a multi-storied abandoned hotel here on the island

so, just so you know, i am still interested in your input about the last post. i have always had questions about this but things have been stirred up in my mind by reading a collection of essays about parenting abroad.

last two days of spring break. hair cuts and baker's clay. rain and sandwiches.

verbs:
listening to this this american life episode about the recession.
looking at these pictures of different recession related images from around the world.
looking forward to this movie that jason introduced me to with the description that it seems a bit like us.
trying to figure out where we fit into this puzzle. as usual.
hoping you are all well.

take care.

april (a)

warning: this is a really long post.


i don't know. i just don't know.
i've been thinking too much lately. thinking about what we are doing here, on this island, in this country. i know the immediate reasons but the long term? i am uncertain.
i've been considering racism and bullying in japan. wondering if things will ever change. wondering if it is better to give up or stand up.
every generation always says the next generation will have it better. that things are better than they once were. but on this island, we live as in amber. there is no change.
the argument that rises when people question racism, discrimination, condoned school violence is that it is their country. they get to choose.
but....
but.....
is it just my happy-go-lucky white american view of multiculturalism and globalization?
does this explain why i feel that everyone around the world needs to let go of prejudice and accept that we are all in this human mess together?
is it better in america?
i don't know. my america is the american south, a region riddled with racial tension and tremendous prejudice. a place where even in my last part-time job, i saw a girl get fired because of "cultural differences" that didn't mix well with the team. aka she was black. i defended her but i didn't quit over it. i needed the paycheck. which made me feel part of it.
which brings me back to japan. we are the token whites. our children are fair and nico looks like a kewpie doll (he gets called kewpie-chan all the time). people give them money, presents, and snacks just for being cute. nico gets it more than sebastian this time. sebastian no longer has red hair but nico's blond is still shining bright, fitting into the stereotype of ideal foreign-ess. he gets a ridiculous amount of attention for his looks. luckily he's not very aware of it, for being two he naturally expects everyone to treat him like the sun. in general, toddlers in japan do get a lot of attention but nothing compares to this.
and yet, is it acceptance? no, it is just the blond hair. so again, i feel in our own way we are supporting racism since it works in our favor right now.
do i have the right to make my children the discriminated against minority? should i gamble that sebastian and nico will be the lucky ones? that they will have good friends and supportive teachers, unlike many others? it's not the minority status i fear, but the institutionalized racism that allows bullying to flourish. the fact that so little is done to amend it makes me wonder, what am i doing here?
at times like these, i try to put on my objective lens that i crafted during my undergraduate studies. but the mama lens refuses to be removed.
raising the kids bilingually and biculturally has to be worth it, right? we have to hope so. but maybe we are wrong. are the benefits of bilingualism enough to overcome what could potentially be a traumatic childhood? i am just being neurotic i suppose but i have to get this out here and ask you, what do you think? seriously, i really need some perspective. thank you.

march (l)

so this last week of my spring break is chilly and a bit grey but we are still having fun.



today we made pizza with some of sebastian's school chums and while they played with mountains of plastic go onger toys, the mothers broke out their dictionaries, confessed their ages, and were wowed by jason's typical weekly menus, based on washoku.
tomorrow is another day of hanami, this time with his class. it is a weird thing being involved in these school-related functions. i am actually hoping just to send jason so i can have some time with nico at home but most likely i will be roped in as well. i don't want to sound anti-social, i just think it is a different world for those moms. they made plans for making okonomiyaki after school next week, but of course, i can't go. because i have to teach. it is strange being a working mother in a land where staying at home to mother is the norm.
but unless something changes, jason will continue to be the stay at home parent and so he gets to make okonomiyaki and negotiate play dates and talk about the wonders of the daikon. i am not really jealous as it has always been this way for us. jason lives in a different part of japan. i get the insight into education and he gets the insight into vegetables and family matters. to each his own.
for those curious, we use this fantastic book for most of our meals.