My Adventure Abroad

School Welcome Party and BTSN

BTSN for anyone without kids means: Back to School Night.  Most (American?) parents know this, I think.  Is there Back to School Night at Japanese public schools?  I’m not sure.  Thursday, September 15 is Back to School Night for the Middle and High School parents at Osaka International School.  The PTA decided that they would host a welcome party today for the families immediately after school and leading into the back to school night program.  It seems partly to be a ploy to boost parent participation at BTSN.  This is just the kind of tactic that goes on at our home schools so I thought that was pretty funny. I decided to help out at the PTA Welcome Party.  It…

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Ishibashi

On Tuesday, September 13, John and I went on an exploratory trip.  We decided to take the train from the Minoh Station to a nearby train stop.  We picked Ishibashi.  I looked up Ishibashi and it means literally, stone bridge.  Ishi is stone and bashi (or also hashi) means bridge.  The famous Japanese company Bridgestone Tires was in fact named after it’s founder, Shojiro Ishibashi. Interesting! When we arrived at Ishibashi we wandered around and came upon another bike parking place.  This one had double decker parking for getting more bikes into a small area.  It’s so clever how they have figured out how to maximize the space constraints here.  I have also seen car parking with this type of…

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Catching up

This is the past week in review.  Just a snapshot of the kids’ second week of school and our 4th week here. On Monday, September 5th, we took Avalon back to the Gymnastics Club Minoo to try the intermediate class.  Much more Avalon’s speed, but a bit challenging and she complained about how long it was and it made her arms sore she said.  Biked home in the dark.  Late dinner. On Tuesday, September 6th, John and I had our first Japanese language class – reading and writing – at the community center called MAFGA.  We jumped right into it!  Learned a few kanji (Chinese characters) and the hiragana and katakana alphabet. Avalon went to a new friend’s birthday party…

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Shirahama Beach

Today, Saturday, September 10, is exactly 4 weeks since we got on the plane and left America. We are headed to a beach called Shirahama this morning.  It is a resort town located on the south coast of Wakayama Prefecture, about 2 hours and 30 minutes away from Minoh.  This is going to be a feet to the fire, 2.5 hour drive down the coast for John!  We are going with four other families in a caravan of four cars.  Avalon is going to ride in her friend Haruna’s car.  Before leaving our meeting place we carefully exchanged Google Map information, contact numbers, filled up the gas tanks and put our caravan in order.  We are second in the caravan line…

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The Game of LIFE

I’ve been looking forward to Friday, September 9 all week.  Today I have a Face Time call with my homies/besties/peeps in Newport Beach.  It will be 8pm Thursday night in California and 12 noon Friday afternoon in Japan.  They’re getting together for dinner for our annual back to school celebration (kid free days again) and commiseration (they’re growing too fast) combo.  It was great to chat and catch up in person.  I’m so glad they included me via 21st century technology.  Sandi had gone to Tokyo Central on Harbor Blvd. and bought all sorts of Japanese foods.  I think she needed some guidance since she didn’t buy the most gaijin friendly foods.  She had a lotus root, daikon, manju and…

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Talking Trash

Let’s talk trash.  It’s Thursday, September 8 and I’ve been working on this post for a few days. It is possible that there is nothing more confusing or frustrating about Japan than the Japanese trash collection system.  From day 1, it’s just over my head.  I’m sure I’m super confused right now because we just arrived but I know I’m not the only one.  Both Japanese natives and foreigners have expressed confusion to me about this crazy trash scheme.  Andrew went over the trash with me several times when we arrived but I still get lost.  He said he doesn’t even deal with the trash, he gives his wife that dirty job. It is even hard to know where to begin. …

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Scenes From Our Surroundings

Wednesday, September 7 Here are a few interesting comments about our blog: From my 100-year old Grandma:   RE: the Minoh waterfall post:  Taki-michi means waterfall road. — Winnowing rice is shaking rice to separate from straw. — Momoji means red leaf. — Hyaku-en is 100 yen. My friend Sandi says she is impressed by my new commitment to Costco. But here is a seriously impressive commitment to Costco… I met a mom today named Julie whose son is a high school senior at OIS.  She and her husband do not have a car.  They bike everywhere.  They say biking is cheaper than riding the train (and it is, but oh so much more work).  She and her husband ride their…

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Halyard Discovers Uniqlo

Saturday, September 3 and we have to get up earlier than we want because the boys are due back at the Tsubaki’s house at 10:30am for soccer and a Korean style BBQ afterwards.  Halyard and Kaiyo went back and forth about whether they wanted to go.  They were feeling self conscious about being poor soccer players and also not knowing many kids.  I said to Kaiyo, well Dad will go with you and he can be your crutch if you need someone to talk to.  He said, oh, now I really don’t want to go.  Whaaat?  I couldn’t believe he said that. I think the Friday night birthday party helped a lot and put them at ease about soccer in…

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Bike Trauma, Bank Drama, Birthday Nirvana

This was another busy day.  Friday, September 2 started out as usual, with all five of us biking to school together.  By now, Halyard and Kaiyo sometimes ride ahead and leave the rest of us in their dust.  They can’t be bothered to slow down for me.  And it’s probably a good thing because today I actually fell off the bike.  Ugh!  It really hurt too!  I was just arriving at school and I guess I was playing chicken with a pole but that pole didn’t flinch so I lost!  The electric bike is really heavy so once I started to lose my balance momentum and gravity took over.  I fell right in the driveway area of school so that…

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Target in Japan

On this day, Thursday, September 1, I am headed back to Aeon AGAIN.  This place reminds me a lot of Target back home.  I have a frequent flyer card at Target because I probably popped in there about twice a week.  I have many miles logged at Target.  If I was missing it at all, I have found Target’s replacement. So after biking with the kids to school John and I stopped by Aeon.  It’s one of the anchor businesses in Q’s Mall.  Though there’s a Starbucks in this mall too, it drives John crazy that it doesn’t open until 10!  He says who can wait that long for their morning caffeine!? Aeon is a grocery store, but it is…

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