Monday, December 31, 2012

Mochi, Mochi, Mochi

While Christmas is an attempt by the American in me to inflict my culture on my sons, New Year's, Oshougatsu in Japanese, is just pure, unadulterated, Japanese.

Not, let me state, that I particularly have a problem with this given my New Year 'traditions' mainly involved eating smokes oysters on Ritz Crackers with cheese-in-a-can while sipping sparkling apple cider. Party central I so was not.

Japan however, as stated, New Year's is the major holiday in Japan. If Christmas is for partying over here, New Year's is what Christmas is in America, a time for family and traditions and boy does Beloved's family go for it all. Thus while the warm glow of Christmas is still touching and the Christmas cookies are still piled high, I load the family up for the 12-14 hour drive down to my in-laws' house in Yamaguchi Prefecture at 1 am on the 27th.

While at Beloved's parents house, the rest of her family, her two sisters, their husbands, and various cousins, aunts, uncles, and whatnot come in for a visit as well (Though the last few years have seen a sudden growth as Beloved's cousin now has four kids, we have two, and one of her sisters one). The main reason being... mochi.

Mochi, for those of you who don't know, are pounded rice cakes. They were made in the day for a way to keep rice over the New Year's holiday (Traditionally, no work should be done over New Year's, a prohibition that more or less stops at the kitchen door). Traditionally, mochi rice is steamed over a boiler that rests over an open fire in wood boxes. The steamed rice is then taken to a stone or wood mortar and beaten the hell out of with a large, heavy wooden mallet. Once pounded into submission, it's taken to a table, and rolled off into balls (If you're in my wife's family's area. Some areas roll the mochi out into a sheet and cut it into squares). These are served on or around New Year's in a variety of dishes, soups, grilled, with anko bean paste inside, etc.

Now, that's how it's traditionally done. Most Japanese, like many Americans regarding churning butter or making ice cream by hand, may have seen it done a few times, they may have even participated in it once or twice in a kind of-this-is-how-it-used-to-be-and-boy-ain't-we-happy-that-we-don't-do-it-anymore kind of way, but, again like how most Americans get their butter or ice cream from the store, so do most Japanese. If you're feeling fancy, you can order mochi from a shop. Those who really want to go all out will steam their rice in a rice cooker and then use their bread makers to beat the mochi. Almost no one goes to the trouble of doing the whole steam it over an open fire and then wield the hammer to make it for their own mochi and not in any large number.

Except my wife's family.

The first time I came to Japan was to spend New Year's with my (then) girlfriend's family and I was introduced to mochi making (Up till that time I thought mochi was for ice cream). That's when I found out that Beloved's family, especially her aunt, are some what of a traditionalist. Her aunt, by the way, was ecstatic. Pounding that mochi takes a lot of energy, the hammer is heavy and Beloved's family makes a ton of mochi. Usually the job of pounding that mochi is a guy's job. This is our manly feat of strength for the end of the year. Sadly, Beloved's family was lacking in the XY person bit. Those that were there were getting a bit long in the tooth so Beloved's aunt was forced to deal with, what she mockingly called, women's mochi (i.e. the pounding was done by women and thus without the force or power a man can bring). So it's easy to see why she was so happy when her niece brought home a guy, a rather large American guy, and one who didn't have family in Japan that he would be called away to or knew that mochi is now usually bought at the store.

I believe you can see where this is going. I have now hammered out the mochi for 7 years (We missed two due to Makoto and Hikaru's births). And, even better, Beloved's sisters also managed to get married, so now there's at least two or three men not only getting into pounding mochi, but speed pounding!

And it gets better, then Beloved had two sons, both of whom have a large, strong American for a father, and who will be trained in the ways of mochi making. Pretty much Beloved's aunt has declared that she can now die happy, resting in the idea that her family's legacy of mochi making on New Year's is secure and will continue long after she is gone. And she's right. This year saw Makoto enthusiastically joining in, wielding a child's hammer. The other kids, Hikaru included, did it once and then decided that there were far more interesting things to do, Makoto kept coming back to join in bringing the malleters to three, Daddy leading with the largest, smashing down his full weight with a loud "HA!" (A summer of ax use did wonders for easing things out), then my brother-in-law who followed with his medium hammer shouting "Sore!" (so-ray), and finally Makoto with his kids hammer thumping down and screaming "GoBusters!"

Beloved's aunt beamed.

Later, standing around the table rolling the mochi into balls (Something that a summer at a pizza parlor helped out with) she was just thrilled at the quality of the mochi produced this year. Makoto of course had to mention that he had mochi making at his school, but he didn't need to listen to the teachers because he already knew all about mochi making.

He better, he has a lifetime ahead of him in terms of beating the crap out of mochi every New Year's with a large heavy hammer!

Wednesday, December 26, 2012

Christmas: The Aftermath

Forgive the silence, like just about everyone else, the last few days were a hectic mess of getting things done for Christmas. What you may ask? The usual, wrapping presents, taking the boys out to look at Christmas lights in order to give Beloved some wrapping time of her own, and of course baking.

Yup, baking.

It's become a tradition for me to spend a good two or three days in the kitchen baking and cooking for Christmas various treats and dishes (Thankfully for my sanity, the Emperor of Japan himself helps in this. December 23rd is the emperor's birthday and thus a holiday that is usually perfectly placed in order to let me get the bulk of the baking done). The usual range is eggnog (made from eggs, no mix here), gingerbread men, sugar cookie cutouts, snowball cookies, and cinnamon rolls for Christmas morning with a New York style cheesecake for our Christmas cake on Christmas eve. This year I added fudge and clam chowder to the mix as well, though I got to move the cheesecake till after Christmas.



Now, oddly enough, excepting the cinnamon rolls and clam chowder, none of the above figures in how I would celebrate Christmas back home in the States. I would bring home Cinabons for Christmas morning though and in my family, Mom's clam chowder in a sourdough breadbowl is the dinner for Christmas Eve, but in terms of cookie production, it just never happened. Let me hasten to state this isn't due to my mother being a bad cook (And no, I am not just stating that because she reads this blog some times), but more of a problem of single mother and way too much to do around Christmas to spend the day making cookies. That said, I had a number of relatives and friends who do/did the whole Christmas treat overload every Christmas and had no qualms about sharing. We didn't bake them, but we sure did eat them.

Which is more or less why I now spend a two days producing massive amounts of cookies. I simply missed the tastes of home during Christmastime and wanted to replicate them as much as possible. Once Beloved tasted the buggers, she got hooked. Since she likes to share, we now have a horde of family/friends/co-workers (I take a plate into my school) who also have started to look forward to Christmas baking.

But it has become more than being a bit homesick for the holidays, it's become making Christmas traditions for Makoto and Hikaru. As I previously mentioned, Christmas in Japan is not Christmas in the US. I'm sure many parents feel the tug every year of wanting to re-create their childhood Christmases for their own children, to re-capture the magic, to make memories, to... have that family Christmas. I am no different in this, but I am faced with a problem of being in Japan. My family is half way around the globe, the culture is very different, we lack any number of things that I took for granted back at home, but I still want to make Christmas happen for the boys in at least a semi-American sense.

Don't let squirrels happen to YOUR Christmas!
The semi bit is important I think. It would be impossible to recreate Christmas in America over here in Japan and to try... Well, I have no wish to host a real life version of National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation (The best warning there ever was about going overboard on getting the 'perfect' Christmas). As with many things, I've had to pick and choose want I want to pass on to my sons for them to remember. Baking works, it really does. Christmas was never a massive affair at my house growing up. That is to say, while we enjoyed it and celebrated it, it didn't usually involve massed relatives or going overboard on decorations, etc.

The only relative who was usually involved was my grandmother on my mother's side who lived 45 minutes away, meaning my sister and I would have to wait until she woke up and came to our house before opening presents, a horrible torture for children and one that felt like it lasted somewhere between a lifetime and a day or eternity.

But we did have our traditions from stocking raids to the above mentioned Cinabons and thus why I bake so much. After just 5 Christmases, Makoto has taken it as Gospel that this is how things happen. We have fun baking together, cutting out cookies, and he has fun with the smells of Christmas (Hikaru it should be noted isn't all that interested in baking, he's got the eating thing down though). We have other traditions from, again, looking at Christmas lights in a nearby park (This year, thankfully, there was a lack of Christmas lights shaped to look like bugs) to watching certain Christmas films from the US (A Charlie Brown Christmas for example), to the all important reading of "A Visit from St. Nicholas" before bed on Christmas Eve before setting out the eggnog and cookies for Santa.

According to Beloved's friends, this looks like a storybook
It's not my family's Christmas in the United States, it's nothing like the Christmas I grew up with, but it has become Christmas in Japan and so far it seems to be working in terms of making memories. Makoto and Hikaru both were thrilled with their gifts and the food (Oh boy was Hikaru thrilled with the food, he has been non-stop demanding cookies for days), and Beloved has been enjoying herself by taunting her friends on Facebook where she posts pictures of what looks like a storybook Christmas to her Japanese friends and casually mentioning that she has to do none of it, all the heavy lifting is provided by her husband. It is Christmas in Japan, but not a Japanese Christmas. It isn't an American Christmas either, but it is our Christmas and worth all the extra hassle.

But as for now, the gifts have been unwrapped, our tree is now dark, and Christmas goes back to sleep till next year. After this small taste of America, we're getting ready for an extra-large helping of Japanese, because New Year's is upon us and if I was busy as all heck for Christmas, Beloved has her turn at bat as we head towards Oshogatsu.

Merry Christmas!
This is how you know Christmas was well spent, two happy kids and a BIG mess

Sunday, December 23, 2012

The War On Christmas

Yes, there is one.

Oh, I don't mean the silliness the Bill O'Reilly goes off on every year (To be honest, given the mangling that I hear in Japan of "Merry Christmas" or "Happy Holidays" I don't care which one I hear just as long as it's actually pronounced right. If I did, I'd probably grab that person and kiss them full on the lips regardless of age, sex, or status. We're talking tongue may be employed here), no I mean a war on, or about, Christmas. For me it's a two front war.

The first front is familiar to anyone with young children, the annual battle in the toy store. As previously mentioned, Christmas in Japan is more for those with young children and young couples. This means that, for the most part, you don't have the insanity that is normal in malls across America during the Christmas shopping season as most people in Japan are not really going bananas buying gifts.

Except parents of course. Japanese children have picked up on this whole Santa thing and by God they expect him in. Those who have out-grown Santa aren't about to take any excuses for lack of presents either. This leads to the familiar battle in the toy store to get THE gift that has been demanded by your beloved children. And yes, it is a war.

You can tell the veterans, the fathers (It's always the fathers. Mothers are usually busy tending to the kids and making dinner so when I do my Christmas shopping for the boys, Toys R Us is filled with a crowd of guys, all of us sharing three things: 1. From our dress we obviously just got off of work. 2. We've been prodded by our beloved partners to go get that whatever instead of heading home to relax. 3. We want to get our present and get out of there as quickly as possible) who have been through this before. We are battle scarred, in our eyes you can see the hard stare of a campaigner who will let nothing and nobody stand between him and the toy that will make his child(ren)s life complete this Christmas. There's an economy of movement, the hard earned knowledge of knowing where this toy is located in Toys R Us, how to get it and get out with the minimum fuss and God help the fool who gets in their way.

You can also tell the new parents, the ones whom this will be their first battle of the toys, they are the ones who have a worried expression on their faces, the ones who waffle in front of the display, hesitating on which toy is the best one for their child. They read all the labels, agonizing over their choices. They also usually have track-marks down their back from where they were run over by a veteran.

This year was no exception, for me. I knew what I wanted, having the foresight to get Makoto to 'draft' his letter to Santa, which I then stole (I mean the draft, Makoto's actual letter got mailed off) which meant I had a pretty nice list to go off of in terms of toys that they wanted and the ones that they actually asked Santa for (So Santa can come through). I knew where those toys where, how to get to them, and was in and out in less than 30 minutes with a shopping cart full of gifts and stocking stuffers.

The only thing that threw me was Beloved's request at the last minute that I get a pair of boots for Hikaru since I had to find the right size and style.

The second front on the War on Christmas is the yearly battle to get my wife to tell me what she wants for Christmas.

And yes, this IS a battle. Every. Single. Year. Every year I ask to get some ideas and every year it's "I don't know, give me more time." and thus I wait and watch as the calendar advances. I beg, I plead, I threaten to unleash her sons with 2,000 yen (About $20) in a store and let them buy her gift (Hope she likes GoBusters!), I threaten to go to Don Quixote (A Japanese version of Spencer's Gifts) and get her a "Happy Evening" gift pack (I'm sure you can fill in just what might be in that yourself). I withhold Christmas cookies and still I get nothing.

Or coffee. Every year, driven to distraction, she finally announces she just wants coffee beans.

Now the problem with this is that a. Coffee is hardly a present, it's something you get at the grocery store. Also, since she has a mother and sister-in-law who also are demanding gift ideas for her, I tell them coffee. We don't need 10 pounds of it, we don't drink THAT much coffee! So around and around  we go with me demanding and Beloved stating coffee till finally she'll come up with something.

These somethings are almost always expensive. This year it was a blu-ray recorder, not a bad idea, except that we need one that is region free for DVDs. They are around $500. No, not in the budget. So how about an electric sweeper? At $300? No. Besides, I'd rather save the money and get a Roomba. So how about a wall heater?

A wall heater you say, as I did?

Yes, she wants a wall heater. Why? To make sure that the laundry room doesn't freeze. Of course, we already have one and it's not for her, it's for the house. so, no.

Finally, three days before Christmas, she finally comes up with an idea. I need to take her to the shoe store to get some half boots. Ah, thinks I, not too bad... Until she zeros in on a pair that, yes are beautiful, yes, look good on her, yes, are what she wants, but are also a bit pricey.

But this is what she wants, this or coffee.

I might have won the battle of the toy store but  think I lost the war.

Tuesday, December 18, 2012

'Zat you, Santa Claus?

Poor Makoto has Santa confusion.

It's my fault.

Yes, that IS me, your Author
You see... I am Santa Claus.

I don't mean in the father who buys the gifts and does the stocking stuffing kind of way, I mean in the I have the suit and wear it each year kind of way. I wrote something on it last year that I'll re-post here as to the how and why:
One of the 'perks' of being a Western foreign man in Japan is around Christmas someone will ask you to play Santa Claus. While there are Japanese Santa-san, a lot of Japanese children, and adults, tend to believe that the authentic Santas are White and speak English.

Usually, it's a few hours in a suit of dubious quality that will earn you a couple thousand, maybe even 10,000 or so, yen. Pocket money for whatever your pleasure is for the Christmas season. About 5 years ago, in what was probably a comment on my expanding waistline, my wife bought and sent me a beautiful deluxe Santa suit from the US. She had been joking about getting me involved in this whole deal and used my retort that there wasn't a suit that was nice enough, or big enough, in Japan for me as an excuse to actually buy one.

I've spent every Christmas season since then in that suit, adding things like a wig and beard set, proper boots, and a new belt every so often. It's not comfortable work. The suit is hot, very hot. With fake fur, not felt, the only time I am not hot is standing outside in a blizzard. The wig and cap is even worse and the beard, oh Lord. It's hot, it's heavy, dragging my chin down till my teeth ache with dryness and the effort to keep my mouth closed, and while wearing it I cannot eat nor drink anything that doesn't have a straw. Given that the events I am called for can last hours, once in my getup, I cannot remove it until the end of the program.

And while wearing the suit, it can be hard to deal with the children and other people. Once you're in, you have to stay in character, voice, posture, everything. If you break it, and a child sees you, well... Who wants to be the one who confirm to a child that Santa is just some gaijin in a fake beard? Other children of course view Santa as something terrifying and scream, or think that Santa is a jungle-gym and clime up on to you, sometimes trying to get into the suit itself! Of course being Japan, appearing in public with the suit causes adults, especially women, to stream in from kilometers to snap pictures on their cells phones. As someone who is somewhat camera shy, I'm not exactly thrilled with the fact that hundreds of strangers have my photo, dressed as Santa stored somewhere.

So, yes, it is very hot uncomfortable work that usually sees me thrilled to be able to tear the beard from my face, scrub off the spirit gum, wash the whitener from my eye brows, and not have to speak in that deep of a voice. I'm thrilled to get out of the suit at the end of the day and back into street clothes.

And all of that for a bit of spending money... and a bit of Christmas magic.

One of the last events on the Santa calendar is Christmas Caroling in Okaya. The Okaya CIR has this event that he does where he invites the foreign population to come sing Christmas carols at two retirement/nursing homes and an orphanage. Last year and this year I've been asked to be Santa. The job is rather easy, I mainly just stand there, looking the part, give out a few Ho-ho-ho's, and hand out cards or gifts. I don't really even have to sing (Which, of course is a GOOD thing considering how bad I am). But it's that last stop, the orphanage, that makes it all worth it.

If you don't know, Japan's family laws are rather archaic. They were written in the Meiji Era, late 1800's, and reflect a time when blood and family bonds were extremely important. Children were the property of their families and the state had almost no right or say in how the family was to treat their children. The laws have not changed all that much, and given the social conditions, adoption or even foster care is almost unheard of, if it was even allowed by the family. So children in Japan's orphanages might be there until finally discharged as adults, never really having a home, just the center.

Of course, there's another, darker side to the story as well. Some of the children there are not the victims of unfortunate accidents and have lost their parents, nor were they given up shortly after birth and have no idea who their birth parents might be, they know all too well because they have families.

There's a growing problem in Japan of partial abandonment, where parents decide that they simply cannot deal with their child and drop them off at these child facilities and walk away. Sometimes they come back and take their child home, just to drop them back off after a few weeks. Sometimes these parents treat the care facilities as a kind of boarding house, a place to drop off their children for a few weeks while they go off and get a break from being parents, knowing that the state will feed and clothe their child. Then they come back and pick them up.

Wash, rinse, repeat.

Some of these children have to endure watching their parents walk away multiple times, and then living with that stigma because in Japan, everyone will know where you live and that you aren't like the other children. Being different can be a rather bad thing here sometimes. And the state can do nothing due to antiquated laws that state a parent's rights are absolute and only in the most dire of circumstances can a child be taken into protective custody and only with parental or family permission can a child be fostered or adopted.

Of course, I don't actually KNOW the stories behind the children I saw last Saturday. Some of them may have lost their parents, some may have been given up shortly after birth, and some may have simply been dropped off. I didn't ask, because that's not what Santa does.

What Santa does, what I do, is give them, if just for a few hours, a bit of a bright spot. For the younger children, Santa came. He was there. They saw him, they touched his suit, tugged on his beard, heard his booming voice as he laughed at their antics, he gave them presents, handshakes, high-fives, and hugs. Santa is real, and he actually came to see them.

What a gift!

It doesn't make up for everything else, it doesn't provide them with a home or a family who cares and will always be around, but just for that moment, that few hours, that thing which gets derided and mocked, wished for and sighed over, that Christmas magic happened for those children and they could enjoy it.

Last year when I visited in the suit for the first time there was a little girl who was rather shy, she didn't want to get near me. She grabbed the gift I gave her and ran behind her caretaker, peering around the caretaker's leg at me with a frown.

This year, she greeted me with a huge smile and a hug and went back with us almost to the bus until her caretaker finally called her back.

So, for that day, for those times, I am Santa Claus. I look forward to being Santa for many, many more years. In the end, that suit isn't that uncomfortable after all.
So you see, being Santa isn't all that bad... except when it comes to my own children. The problem with being Santa is that, well, right now in my laundry room, Santa's suit is hanging up. His boots are being aired out. To prevent Santa from smelling like a storage room (Where the suit hangs out the rest of the year), I have to air it out. When Makoto was small, just a few months old, he of course had no idea who or what Santa was, so my hanging out the suit and changing wasn't a problem. Age one, no worries. Age 2, he started to get the idea of Santa, though he was not too sure just what was happening. Daddy and Santa were never seen in the same place of course, and he never caught me getting ready, but he was very excited when Santa came to a luncheon put on by the International Club and picked him up!

Is that Santa, or Daddy?
But when Makoto was three... I could tell, he was starting to put two and two together. Pictures from that year's luncheon showed a very perplexed Makoto who knew that suit, he had seen it hanging up in the house, and Daddy wasn't anywhere close by. Something wasn't right here, was Daddy, in fact, Santa Claus?

What to do? I decided the best way to explain it to Makoto at age 4 was to note that, yes, Daddy, does have a Santa costume because he is one of Santa's helpers. When Santa is busy, like he is at the end of the year, he asks Daddy to go off and pretend to be Santa for a bit to help him out. Makoto bought that. It makes sense, right?

This year, at age 5, however, he definitely knew. At the luncheon, he went around telling the other kids how Santa was his Daddy and offered to take them into the dressing room to show them the suit. He was quite annoyed when a quick thinking Daddy locked the door and didn't respond to any knocks or calls and then snuck out the other door.

The problem we now face is a culture clash, because if Daddy isn't Santa Claus, but dresses up as Santa, what about Santa who comes to his school?

Yes friends, the other day a Japanese 'Santa' came to Makoto's school to hand out presents (Tops that the kids will be playing with) and caused a bit of a problem, because Makoto's teachers told the kids that Santa lives in Finland whereas Daddy had told Makoto that he lives at the North Pole, and in fact that was where Makoto's letter to Santa went. Even worse, this Santa didn't speak English. This Santa was actually confused when Makoto spoke to him in English, which as we all know is the mark of an impostor as Santa has to speak English, right?

The final straw in my son's assessment of this Santa was the black mark of him not knowing how to say ho-ho-ho. That disqualified him immediately as Santa should ho-ho-ho. The poor teachers at Makoto's school had one hell of a time of keeping Makoto from telling all of his classmates that this was not Santa.

Thankfully, for peace of mind, Makoto's logic swung into play, if Daddy isn't Santa, and this guy isn't Santa, that must mean that the real Santa was just busy at the North Pole making toys. Thus will Santa keep visiting our house for a few more years, though I have a feeling Makoto is going to be an early learner of the secret due to a father who is Santa and two different cultural approaches to him.

As for Hikaru... at age two, his big thing is that Santa showed up and shook his hand! Something he has repeated non-stop for days now.

Ah, the magic of Christmas. Ho, ho, ho!


Saturday, December 15, 2012

Happiness is a Warm Gun?


I woke up this morning to the news about Connecticut.

My God, 20 children. 20 children, some of them around Makoto's age. 20. Children. And 6 adults who, as teachers, would be colleagues of mine. When is enough, enough?

Already spinning around the Internet is the usual "It wasn't the guns! Guns don't kill people, people kill people! If only everyone had a gun, this wouldn't have happened (Ignoring that there's a gun for just about every man, woman, and child in the US not to mention guns at school is a terrifying idea from a teacher's standpoint)!"

I don't think it was the guns, it's the culture. There are societies that are armed and do not have this problem. We are an armed society, but no, we are not particularly polite (Something that was brought home to me when I went back home). Societies with strict gun control also don't have this problem. The US however...

We have a culture that loves the gun. It's a nation that has somehow gotten to the point where we can not longer do without, we bind ourselves to it, to having them, judge our worth, build our heroes, and elect our leaders based on their views of firearms. It's... the wild west taken to extreme. We have become addicted to the gun, and like all addicts, we cannot and will not admit that we have a problem, instead we lash out at any attempt to remove that to which we are addicted. We're the drunk who after beating his wife cries that it wasn't the booze's fault, that he'll change, just don't take it away from him!

We're the one who swears that we are fully in control and who gets belligerent when any attempt to limit is spoken of.

And more children die. When will it be enough? When will we say that this isn't working, that more guns won't be the answer, that taking them away wouldn't stop it either? We need to change ourselves.

I know on my blog I rag a bit on Japan, I love it here, but from a humor standpoint, it's something to hold up, see what's odd? What's different?

In Japan, it is almost impossible to own a gun. Japan as a nation has less gun deaths a year than my hometown. There are those who would claim that it was the lack of mental health care that brought today's tragedy  but Japan is far worse than the US when it comes to mental health, and yet there are no school shootings. There are those who would state that a nation where you don't have the right to bear arms is close to tyranny, what is to protect you from the government after all? Perhaps. I don't have the right to own a gun over here, but then again I don't worry when I leave for the day that my sons might be shot. At the end of the day, I might not be able to march on Tokyo with a gun in my hand to force the government to back down, but I can hug my sons close to me tonight, something that 20 families in Connecticut will not be able to do again.

There's that pithy quote from Franklin about security and liberty, which might also be true, but I think we as a nation need to decide just what kind of price we're willing to pay, and pay, and pay for our 'liberty'.

I don't know the answers, except that the first thing to say is enough, this must change!

One of the hardest things I have done as a father was to have to explain to Makoto, who was watching the news tonight that a bad man went into a school and killed 20 children like him and 6 teachers. It was hard to look him in the eyes and tell him that Daddy just doesn't know why it happened, but that people are sad because it has happened. Makoto started to cry because of the kids and the teachers who were killed, and because he was scared.

At least then I had an answer for him, that Mommy and Daddy wouldn't let this happen to him, we have chosen to stay in Japan.

When is enough, enough? How many more times must we see this? How many more times will I have to comfort my sons and assure them that they won't be shot? We need help, not more guns.

Happiness is holding your family tight, not a warm gun.

Thursday, December 13, 2012

A Very Japanese Christmas

'Tis the season... And to understand just what all the following posts talking about my trials and the cross that I bear come every December here in Japan, you gotta understand Japanese Christmas.

To start with, one has to understand that Japan is in now way shape or form a Christian nation. If anything, it's a very secular nation with most of the population reporting that they have no religious faith. That said, the Japanese are rather... well... As I previously noted, the joke is that if you asked the Japanese about religion, 78% would be Buddhist, 78% would be Shintoist, and 78% would claim no religion at all. Even the Japanese joke that they are Shinto for birth, Christian for marriage, and Buddhist at death, denoting the popular practices of going to a Shinto shrine with a new baby, having a 'romantic' Christian style wedding, and asking that a Buddhist temple attend the passing of a loved one.

And no, the Japanese see nothing wrong with this, you do what works around here.

So with that in mind, it makes sense why a non-Christian nation would somehow adopt Christmas. The problem is that, well, if there has ever been any Western custom that has been adopted by the Japanese and implanted with a Japanese heart, it's Christmas. The problem is that for an American who did grow up with Christmas, the result of this implant is a creature with a bad personality overlay. The feeling that, something is just not right. That the heart, the soul, is missing from this time of year and has been replaced with... Something. Something odd.

It's not Japan's fault of course. They already have a winter holiday that ends in exchanges of gifts and family gatherings. New Year's, or Oshougatsu in Japanese, is THE major holiday for the year. People return to their families. The year's beginning is marked as a solemn occasion instead of with parties. Or as I like to put it, things are flipped in Japan in terms of Christmas and New Year's. So when you take out the family, and you take out the gifts (kinda), and the religion, what are you left with?

Japanese Santa
Well, if you're a child, you're left with Santa. The big man is well loved in Japan, if there's an undercurrent about if Santa should be Japanese or not.

Makoto, used to his father playing Santa and seeing American Christmas movies was a bit confused when Santa visited his school and didn't talk to him in English. He was also very put out that he didn't know how to Ho ho ho properly.

But Japanese children are taught that Santa will come at night on Christmas Eve and leave a present by their futon or maybe in their sock (No stocking over here). Santa doesn't come down a chimney here of course, someone has to let him in. But he does come and it's a poor child who doesn't expect some kind of visit by Santa.

MERRY Christmas!
If you're a young adult, Christmas is... well... *ahem* Sex. Kinda. Well. not kinda. Before New Year's, many Japanese engage in what is known as 'Forget the Year' parties. So the end of the year is a party time, especially if you're old enough to drink. Adding to this is an imported idea that Christmas Eve dates are romantic (Damn Western media) and thus for young couples, Christmas is the time where they can get together, and I mean together. Christmas Eve is apparently the most popular date for a young Japanese woman to loose her virginity.

The general idea is that the guy will take his lady love out to a very expensive hotel to enjoy a 'traditional' Christmas dinner of roast chicken (It should be noted that foreigner, missing turkey, would be noted eating chicken as a substitute. In the 1970's, KFC took note and managed to convince the whole nation that fried or roast chicken is exactly what people around the world eat for Christmas and thus does the Colonel, dressed as Santa in front of every store, sells out of chicken buckets come Christmas Eve with lines reaching around the block) where he will present her with a suitably nice present. After Christmas cake (Someone apparently told Japan that Christmas is Jesus's birthday, thus it must be celebrated with something akin to a birthday cake, complete with candles) and French wine, the couple retires to a love hotel he he gets to unwrap her.

For just about everyone else, unless you're a parent and thus dealing with children, Christmas passes by almost without notice.

Almost.

Bears are Christmasy, right?
There are Christmas carols, many translated into Japanese. And Christmas lights, the Japanese who have a long standing tradition of seeing lights at night (During the fall and spring, trees are illuminated for people's enjoyment), have gone gaga over Christmas lights. It's easy to find parks with massive Christmas illuminations set up, though there's, again, the feeling that something isn't right. Encountering hearts as if for Valentine's Day, or bugs for example.

Yes, bugs. The park that I take the boys has Christmas lights set up to look like such Christmas subjects as dragonflies or beetles.

If you want to fully imagine what a Japanese Christmas feels like, just toss a Santa hat on something, anything, and that's it. From 2 foot tall trees to Doraemon nativity scenes, it just feels wrong. Fake. Transplanted.

BUT!

And I mean this, for many Japanese it's fun. For my sons, they like it. They may get more by way of me, but this will be the Christmas that they remember and that's not a bad thing. I plan to go more into tradition mixing, but I will note that while we do not have roast chicken, we do have Christmas cake, or rather I do bake a cake, if not a simple sponge one. We do listen to Christmas carols in Japanese. And we do go enjoy the Christmas lights shaped like bugs at the park. I'm not complaining about how Japanese celebrates Christmas or even that it does, but it does bring up a problem with the culture clash that comes when I try to bring in a deeper meaning to this holiday in the face of Santa, KFC, and bug lights.

But more on that a bit later.

Monday, December 10, 2012

The Best Laid Plans of Mice and Parents

"Anything that can go wrong will go wrong". -Murphy's Law.

Murphy wasn't an optimist, he was a parent! If fatherhood has taught me one thing, it is that plans will never, ever survive engagement with your children. It simply will not happen and it is a fool of a father who things for a moment that it will.

Have I mentioned that I am a fool?

Now admittedly, many times the plan changes are not always the fault of said children, or at least not deliberately done so, but I'm willing to bet you buttons to dollars that at the end of the disaster, you'll find a kid at the bottom grinning up at you while you tear your hair out in frustration.

Take, just for example mark you, my previous weekend.

The Plan: Lacking wood and a snow-storm a coming, we would get up early and go get 200 bundles (Wood, for reasons I'm not too sure of, is sold in the bundle in Japan instead of cords. A bundle is, supposedly, about 3 to 5 cut pieces of wood that adds to the enjoyment of burning during the winter as now you have sharp wires to cut and dispose of before they perforate things you do not wish to be perforated, such as small boys). We would borrow a small pick-up for the occasion and I would tarp the back of our mini-van. The idea would be that we would get the wood at 8:30 am, and hopefully make only two trips and be done with getting it to the house by 10ish.

The reality: Hikaru got sick the night before. Beloved reacted by flat out laying down the law that she would not allow him out of the house on a cold morning (The snow being an overachiever got an early start) and thus I would have to shift all that wood by myself in the little truck. Even worse, the wood was not bundled as advertised, but instead came in a cubic meter, loose. So instead of slinging, I'd have to stack and take four trips while doing so.

Oh, and since it was snowing, I couldn't just dump the wood, I'd have to stack it as soon as I got it home. Which did kind of work as out I discovered that we had far more wood than we had storage meaning I was going to have to build a temporary storage area. In the middle of it all, I had to deal with Makoto and Hikaru fighting as well as Hikaru pitching a fit and a half because Makoto was allowed to ride along for one trip. Final finish time 2:30pm.

The Plan: After finishing getting the wood in and calling back Stateside, we'd head out to DoCoMo to finally change our address, a home store for some shopping, and then to the supermarket for the weekly shopping.

The Reality: After finally getting the damn wood in, both boys had gone to sleep. Beloved of course wouldn't wake them as both of them are unholy terrors when they don't wake on their own (And in Makoto's case, even when he does). This meant we left the house, finally around 5pm and the shopping now included needing to get freaking building supplies for construction of that temporary wood storage. This also meant that we wouldn't be having a home cooked dinner, but would have to stop by Hotto Motto, a Japanese fast food joint that does bento boxes. 

And this caused Beloved to cry. Why you may ask? The reason is familiar to any woman who spends hours each day working in the kitchen to make her family delicious and healthy foods just to hear her darlings state about how much they love McDonald's. Makoto and Hikaru's take: "Hotto Motto! YAY!" Beloved: "I cook for them everyday!"

Add in that DoCoMo had an hour wait and the longer shopping time, we didn't get home to dinner till 7:40 and dinner itself wasn't finished until well after 8.

The Plan: Given that the next day we would be at a luncheon where I was supposed to make chili, after returning from the store mid-afternoon, I would prep a bit and then spend the rest of the afternoon, early evening boning up on kanji. Then early to bed.

The Reality: After getting home so damn late, we ended up with a whirlwind of activity of attempting to get medication down Hikaru, both boys fed, cleaned, bathed, and shoved into bed. We finally manged to do so by 9:15, just in time for me to go and start getting ready for the chili by browning 5lbs of meat, soaking the beans, and then getting to kanji (Many of which I failed just because of being so tired). Finally got to bed around 11pm.

The Plan: Wake up around 7ish, enjoy a lazy breakfast and prep the chili. Go to the community center around 9 or so and enjoy cooking, lunch, and helping clean up. Home hopefully around 3pm at which case I would get some badly needed cleaning done, do my kanji, and get to bed early.

The Reality: Get up at 5am, go out into the snow to build temporary wood storage, move food until about 8:15, madly toss together chili and then go out to move more wood while watching two little boys enjoy themselves in the nice, warm, living room while they grin at their father struggling in the cold. Get to the lunch about 2 hours late with the chili and after cooking time, get told wife has been drafted as staff so I would have to watch and feed both children... as well as play Santa when the time comes. Help with the cleanup and watch in horror as an impromptu meeting happens afterwards that drags on to well after 3:30, leaving me again with watching both kids. Get told by Beloved that she would treat me to Starbucks by way of thanks, but realize that there simply was no time for this. Finally get back home at 4:30...

To find that Hikaru was dead to the world, thus no vacuuming for me. But I would need to go out in the snow to get more stakes for the tarp on the temporary wood storage.

Oh, and Beloved was told that she needed to make pickles today, so would I please go to the store and get pickling stuff... And oh, please watch the kids after getting the pickling stuff... oh, and please go back out into the cold as we got way too many veggies for the container so we need a bigger one... and watch the kids some more, brush their teeth, get them ready for bath, dry them off, read a book, and get them into the futon.

Finally get to the goddamn kanji (Which again I missed many) and to bed at 10:00. 

And by the way, wake up call for next morning would be my normal 5 am... and I would wake up to snow.

Now some might note that many of the problems here were not caused by the kids themselves. They didn't set the wood up, or the meeting, or planned the wood storage. They certainly didn't make Beloved make pickles like crazy on Sunday night, and I have to admit, this is true. But I look at it akin to the small pebbles that start an avalanche  It was all down to Hikaru's getting sick and both boys sleeping so much. Those were the monkey wrenches in my plans that caused everything else to go haywire as causality just ripples outwards making each moment a disaster in terms of getting things done at a nice time and without drama.

Like I said, Murphy was a parent, he knew exactly what happens when you attempt to plan around kids.


Saturday, December 8, 2012

Toys!

Yes, toys.

I'm not exactly too sure as to where this particular Christmas tradition came from, but every year, right around Christmas time, Makoto fails to pick up his toys.

And yes, this is a problem. As I have related before, I am well aware as to just how bad a room can get when kids don't pick up and so while I might be the world's largest hypocrite in calling for my house to be at least somewhat clean, I do want it clean. In calling for this however, I must face down two very stubborn boys. Hikaru has yet to master this concept of cleaning. In Hikaru's world, cleaning means ignoring Mommy and Daddy until he absolutely cannot, and THEN finally start cleaning... I.e. pick up a single toy, put it into the bin, and then rather cheerfully announce "All done!"

Makoto's habit is more along the lines of saying that, yes, he will clean up and as long as someone is watching him, he will. The key word is watching. If you're not watching, he'll stop cleaning and start playing. And when you do catch him not cleaning, he'll go over and take the toy Hikaru is playing with causing Hikaru to cry and a fight to start.

And then Makoto comes running to say Hikaru won't help and instead hit him.

Thus cleaning becomes something that should take, oh 15 minutes, maybe but instead lasts for well over an hour, during which whatever else I might want to get done, doesn't.

And as always, it ends up with me blowing my stack a bit until the boys get the idea that, no, Daddy is not a happy camper and now is the time to actually start to clean in earnest.

Cleaning, by the way, means grab toys and randomly shove them on the shelves so that the mess is just transferred. Really, I don't want to be an ogre about this, and my own cleaning leaves a lot to be desired (My file system is called "Put it somewhere on the desk, it'll keep"), but it's just a matter of not wanting to get back to what I grew up with. It was my own fault, yes, but that doesn't mean I want to go back to it either.

But getting back to Christmas, eventually though events come to a head where it becomes obvious that the boys simply have way too many toys. Part of this is just growth, the way things are now, Hikaru's toy bin is downstairs and supposed to be full of baby toys. Makoto's is upstairs and full of his toys. The reality is that Hikaru is no longer a baby and spends most of his time playing with Makoto's toys so the toys migrate around the house and of course the general child notion of 'Can't find toy you want? DUMP THEM ALL!' holds well and true for both boys, which just causes even more in terms of toy migration.

Another part of the problem is simply that they keep getting more toys, though that is not any doing of ours. Sure, they get toys for their birthday and Christmas, sometimes they get toys from relatives and once in a great while, just because, but a great deal of them are, well, garbage. Makoto has taken after his aunt, he loves art work so he gathers toy kits. Said kits are usually newspaper ads that he twists, draws, cuts, and tapes into... odd contraptions that require a great deal of imagination in order to see what he says they are. Not a bad thing of course, all children should be encouraged to be creative, but it does leave one heck of a mess in terms of scraps pf paper that liter the house.

Hikaru, being two, isn't into crafting yet, but he's an ace at destruction, especially Makoto's paper toys, which he more or less shreds once Makoto is done with This of course also adds to the mess of paper scraps littering the house.

And it presents a quandary, Makoto made it, thus it's kid art, thus turns parents all gooey and gives a guy one hell of a guilt trip to throw away, but it is a mess.

And Christmas is coming.

More toys. That they can't clean up.

In the middle of this mess cycle is what usually happens, I get annoyed enough that I start taking toys, putting them in boxes or up so that they can't play with them (Before I get called cruel, I take only those still on the floor, they still have heaps of toys and even worse, they never really seem to notice that they are gone). Currently we have three boxes full of toys in the attic that have been thus taken, some haven't been played with for years. For some reason however, Makoto always seems to get to this point right before Christmas and I have yet to figure out if this is some kind of sneaky way of getting his room cleaned out for more toys from Santa or what.

But all of it does beg questions. Some of the toys were indeed gifts, thus I feel hesitant to toss. Some of them are baby toys, which again I feel hesitant to toss right now (You never know if you're gonna need them again, right?). Some where just damned expensive, which also means I'd hate to throw my money away as well. But in the end, I'm having nightmare visions of my attic stuffed full of toys that haven't seen the light of day for over a decade by the time Makoto and Hikaru leave home just trying to keep my house clean!

So, toys... What the hell do I do with them?! 

It would help if I had a place to take them, but lack of second hand stores and both Makoto and Hikaru being in nursery school limits that idea. I can just imagine the problems of taking a toy away, just so that they can play with it at school. Not to mention the fun the teachers would have trying to break up fights between the boys who know the toy is theirs and other students. I'm starting to think that maybe what I should do is write Santa for pick-up service.

Thursday, December 6, 2012

The 100th Post Extravaganza!

I don't know how I got here. I really don't.

See, this was just a kind of "Oh, why not?" kind of thing. I pretty much expected that after about a month it'd die.

Now, admittedly I haven't kept to the daily schedule, I haven't even kept the every other day idea either, real life/lack of things to write about/lack of time/being Daddy take me away from the keyboard a lot, but still...

100 posts. Not bad I guess.

I'm not even too sure who reads this beyond on fellow father/blogger in Korea and a friend or two, but for those who do...

Thanks.

And I still have more stories to tell. After all, we're now fully into the terrible twos with Hikaru and Makoto is rapidly approaching elementary school so I'm sure I'm going to need a space to vent and just scream for help!

Tuesday, December 4, 2012

Let Those Toy Guns Fall to the Ground

It's the wandering cold. It's come back for a visit and since I told it that I could do without its company, it has thus decided to check out other family members. First it wandered over to Makoto, sending the poor boy to bed early one night with a slight fever. Last night we woke to Hikaru throwing up a bit (Not that this stopped him from waking up bright eyed and bushy tailed this morning to raid Daddy's breakfast as usual), and not to be outdone, Beloved has announced that she has a sore throat.

It's just that time of year, and the family that plays together, eats together, and sleeps together shares germs like no one's business.

But what was interesting was last week when Makoto got sick. Now, honestly, I think he was playing it more for effect than anything else. The kid sure didn't act sick when he was playing with his brother, but boy did he droop when I suggested it was time to clean up for dinner and when he decided that he didn't like dinner, he was far too sick to eat. Thus Dr. Dad prescribed "Well, if you're too sick to eat, to bed you must go".

This probably wasn't what he was expecting, but oh well.

What was interesting though was that left Hikaru alone. Normally my house is never quiet (Unless the boys are sleeping, and even then) and the shouts of two active little boys in an constant state of play/battle are our constant companions. Makoto and Hikaru just do... everything together. Makoto might not like it, and yes, it usually goes that they play for about 5 minutes then get into a fight which causes one to come screaming to whichever parent they can find first to complain, but in watching Hikaru wander around without his playmate constantly calling "Makoto! Makoto! Makoto!" Well, it makes you really feel just how close my two sons are right now. We didn't exactly plan on this, but, yes, it's obvious that Hikaru idolizes his older brother.

Also it made us realize that a bored Hikaru is a dangerous thing.

Since big brother was not to be found and Mommy was doing this... work thing, that left but one person left to play with...

Guess who?

Actually though, it was fun to have more one on one play time with Hikaru. I usually don't have one-on-one time with him. Makoto of course gets more, mainly because he can be taken to places, like a class, that I can't take Hikaru yet. Young age makes dealing with Hikaru a bit tricky so usually I get either Makoto or both boys, not just Hikaru. I'm explaining this so that my surprise at just how violent my youngest son is will be understood.

Let me restate that, Hikaru isn't dangerously violent, not in a "Whoa boy do we have trouble" bit, but it's a little disconcerting when your two-year-old picks up a rolled up newspaper and "shoots" his parents with it, proclaiming he's a GoBuster! I'm fairly sure this too is the result of having an older brother, Makoto didn't get into the rough-n-tumble stuff until much later in life. In fact, I don't think he started "shooting" anyone until age 4, or at least a late three. But here is Hikaru, barely two, and already attempting to GoBusters! Punch! and GoBusters! Kick! and GoBusters! Bang bang! his parents.

I'm really starting to think there's some truth to this TV is too violent thing. Maybe.


Wednesday, November 28, 2012

Gobble Gobble Wibble Wobble Do a Noodle Dance! Thanksgiving 2012

Thanksgiving has always been a really important holiday for me. My father's family lives in the San Francisco Bay Area (Why my father migrated to Nevada has always been somewhat of a mystery) and thus I didn't get to see them often. Our trips down were seasonal really, we'd come down for spring, summer, and fall holidays. Spring was Easter break, the 'long' trip. Summer was Summer vacation and Cousins' Week. Fall was Thanksgiving, our last chance to see our family before the winter snows made travel over Donner Pass too dangerous.

Before those who have never been over the Sierra Nevada in winter start giggling (Or those who drive it regularly winter or no), please remember that we're talking about a single mother in a small, front wheel drive compact car attempting to go over a pass that does get shut down often in the winter, or at least gets chain controls. Not to mention that getting stuck up there has happened before...

In any case, Thanksgiving was the last chance to see family until either March or April and while a quick trip, it was almost always fun. Mom would yank my sister and I out of school the Wednesday beforehand (And of course any chance to get out of school early...) load us up, and we'd be off to Bay Area in the annual race to beat the traffic. Certainly we had our share of adventures along the way, for example the 1989 Loma Prieta Earthquake managed to cause some issues, mainly the collapse of the Cypress Viaduct meant that our normal route to Grandma and Papa's house was gone, which ended up with Mom getting lost and winding up far, far from where we were supposed to go.

But usually we'd arrive and then the next day would be the big day, and boy was it. My family normally seats around 20+ for Thanksgiving and would serve turkey, stuffing, rolls, salad, mashed potatoes, peas, candied yams, corn, Quiche, olives, stuffed celery, cranberry sauce, pumpkin pie, and mincemeat pie. Not to mention all the snacks that came before and after, the wine, sparkling apple cider, etc. The table would stretch from one end of whomever's house we were at (It rotated every year) to the other and groan with the weight of the food, plates, and cutlery. The kitchen would become a mini-war center overseen by various aunts, mothers, and of course Grandma in which foods that had been more or less cooked at various houses were heated up and served while dishes would be washed and the dishwasher loaded and run non-stop. In the mean time, various uncles and Papa would be watching TV (Usually a football game), enjoying a pre-dinner drink, and yelling at various cousins and kids to either settle down a bit or not eat too many snacks and spoil our dinners.

We various cousins and kids of course would be ignoring this and tearing trough the house and outdoors like loons and sneaking as many snacks as we possibly could.

The magic time would be right before dinner when the turkey finally came out and raids on the kitchen would start in order to claim that magic prize, turkey skin!

To this day, my aunts have never managed to serve a non-bald turkey. The skin is always stripped before we get close to carving.

And finally of course, dinner, with family and catching up with what happened since we last saw each other, high dinner theater of the inevitable political argument, and finally clean-up with a chance of a possible ice and whipped cream war started by my grandmother.

It was glorious.

The rest of the weekend would be spent digesting and the start of Christmas shopping on Saturday. Sunday, we'd get into the car and race home in the hopes of not getting trapped by snow while listening to Christmas music; or rather, my sister and I would pray for snow on Sunday so that the pass would shut down and we'd have another day off from school.

Now as a kid, I liked Thanksgiving, but it was Christmas and Halloween where my heart belongs (Kids are kids and free candy and presents top turkey), but as an adult when I started making my own trips down to the Bay Area Wednesday night after classes would be over with at university, I started to really appreciate being able to be with my family.

And then I moved to Japan.

If any time of the year gets me homesick, it's Thanksgiving. As noted, it was the last time that I would normally gather with my whole family for the year. I missed the foods, I missed the traditions, I missed my family. Japan does have family gathering type holidays, two of them in fact and we do gather, but they are in late summer and New Year's and we gather at Beloved's parents house. There's also a lack of turkey in Japan as well. So for 7 long years, I didn't really have Thanksgiving. Oh, sure, I'd try to make something special, maybe have some chicken on the day, and I would give thanks, but... it wasn't Thanksgiving.

This year though, well... This year we have a house of our own and I have two sons who have not learned about this part of their heritage (And given the Japanese calendar, are unlikely to ever make it back to the States in time for it). We also had Beloved's parents coming up for Makoto's 7-5-3 festival and Japan's Labor Thanksgiving Day was the Friday after Thanksgiving Day thus I had a day off to cook so... It was time to have my own Thanksgiving.

Turkey before the roasting
Which was scary enough, yes. My previous attempts at cooking a turkey (One of my aunt's gave me a turkey when I was in college as payment for helping her) was mixed at best. Oh sure, the bird came out great, the gravy... Well, all I remembered was that one mixed pan drippings in with flour. Our gravy was more turkey flavored paste. Thus I concluded that Thanksgiving dinner should be left to wise aunts, mothers, and grandmothers. But this year... I had no wise aunts, mothers, and grandmothers to fall back on as turkey and the trimmings are quite different from the Japanese dishes that Beloved and her mother are so good at. Even worse, the time difference meant that there would be no panicked phone calls back to the States in hopes of getting a wise aunt/mother/grandma on the phone to help with a disaster. And even worse-er, just about everything would have to done from scratch. You simply cannot buy a lot of the pre-made stuff.

But I was going to do it anyway. And I did. Spending Thursday night making the pie and all day Friday cooking I served turkey (Bought from Foreign Buyers Club) in a roaster that came from the US, oyster stuffing from a recipe that has been passed down through my family from my great-great-great-grandmother, cranberry sauce, and candied yams. The smells of the day brought me back home and the fact that my sons proceeded to devour the bird and the trimmings till both of their bellies were large and round proved that they are indeed my true born sons, blood of my blood and Americans in the bone.

I see you trying to get into it!
Actually, it was a bit of a problem as Hikaru kept coming into the kitchen and trying to get me to feed him turkey while it was cooling by pointing and saying "Turkey! Eat!" and when I wouldn't, he'd go and get Jiji, Mommy, or Baba in an effort to get them to give him turkey. He got quite annoyed when that didn't happened and attempted to conduct a raid on the table instead. Somewhere I could hear my female relatives laughing at me as I fought to defend my dinner from a toddler. But my in-laws also took to Thanksgiving dinner, and to turkey skin (I, too, had to serve a bald turkey). In fact, the best compliment I received was Beloved asking me to make this again next weekend, which I am so not going to do, but it was great that it was enjoyed that much.

It wasn't quite the same, but it was Thanksgiving with food, laughter, and family gathered together before the coming chill.

Happy Thanksgiving!
It was glorious.

And it also was a taste, if a small one, of home; a chance to introduce my culture a bit to my sons and my in-laws. It was nice to see them taking to it so well too. My father-in-law even managed to get right into the swing of things with traditional American happily overstuffed on Thanksgiving dinner after-dinner nap. And I didn't even have to tell him about that one either!

Monday, November 26, 2012

7-5-3

Ok the communication tests are done, Thanksgiving dinner has been cooked and eaten, and the in-laws are back where they belong after a long weekend.

Back to the blog!

Going in reverse order, what I wanted to talk about today was Makoto's Shichigosan, or 7-5-3. In Japanese tradition, girls who are ages 3 and 7 and boys who are 5 get dressed up in kimono (Or nice western clothing) and head off to the shrine for a blessing. It's a bit in the way of asking for good health, luck, and fortune along with the kami's protection for the child. Of course, in modern Japan, there's less actual religious feeling behind it and far more "We do this because we are Japanese". It's also one of the few times that Japanese will wear kimono.

Yes, they are beautiful, but so are tuxes and ballgowns and most Americans don't wear them everyday either.

Shichigosan also makes the formal end of babyhood, going into childhood. Girls got to wear obi, the formal sashes on their kimono and boys... get to put on PANTS!

Seriously.

This ceremony is actually rather old, there's a mention of it in Tale of Genji, the worlds first novel, and for some reason it's translated in that book as "The First Putting on of Pants". This has been a non-stop source of amusement for my family. For me, it just sounds silly. For Beloved and Makoto, it's even better as pants do not refer to trousers in Japan, but underpants. And of course, every 5-year-old boy thinks that any mention of underwear is humorous.

Of course, the pants themselves are not what we back in the US are used to, but hakama, the traditional divided trousers used by men over their kimono.

Any case, the whole thing is a big deal, and of course Beloved's parents came up to see their grandson to under go this, bringing with them PANTS! The kimono that Makoto wore was one that he had since his birth, and indeed was taken to the same shrine as a baby in it to be presented to the kami. This time however, he got to wear the kimono and the pants. Hikaru in the meanwhile got to wear... a tie!

He was not impressed.

Still, while it took a while to get all the ties done up right and things jiggered into the right areas, and we had to endure a cold shrine, it was a nice ceremony and both boys came off looking good, Makoto in his kimono and Hikaru in his tie. Makoto came away from the shrine with a charm to protect him, an arrow to protect the house, a coloring book with Japanese myths in it, and the traditional bag of candy. Hikaru just came away confused, but since he'll be doing this in three years time, maybe he'll remember this day with his brother.

If I had just one regret about 7-5-3, it might be that everything for this came from Beloved and Beloved's family. Not, let me state, that this is a particularly bad thing, but it was one where Makoto's American side was more or less buried by his Japanese one. The only thing that was different from every other child at the shrine was that his last name was very much not Japanese. I guess I just wish that I could have had him had something from the US.

Still wasn't going to allow my mother to send over a tartan from my step-father's Scottish clan however. There's staying true to your roots and then there is horrible culture and fashion clashes.



Wednesday, November 21, 2012

WDTCUWTS #9

No Goodnight Moon!

No lights!

No Santa!

-Hikaru, complaining that all the fun things that show up at night are off in the day.

Sick Blogger is Sick

Yup. But fear not, it's not cancer (For some reason, when announcing that I've gotten sick to my classes, they respond back with "Is it cancer?" I'm not sure I should be touched that they are so worried about me, or enraged that they're hoping I drop dead and thus they are spared from more English classes). No, I've just caught a cold and between that and Thanksgiving, the impending visit of the in-laws, getting ready for Christmas, and speaking tests at school plus the boys... I'm beat.

Thankfully, I am not the kind of man who drives his wife nuts by reverting back to his childhood and becoming yet another baby she must tend to while sick. No indeed, while I drive my wife nuts when I'm sick, it's for an entirely different reason, namely refusing to admit that I am sick.

This one is my mother's fault, I'm sure.

Pretty much growing up the rule of thumb was if you can get vertical without passing out or throwing up or your fever is below 100, you are capable of going to school. This rule has more ore less been carried on into my adult life, if I ain't barfing and I can get up, I can make it to school and teach.

The fever thing is a bit trickier, but I get around it by just never taking my temperature.

Now back Stateside, this would lead to my boss taking a look at me and then sending me back home over feeble protests, but Japan... Japan is worse than I am. People will come in to work while on life support if they have to. It becomes normal to see hordes of people wandering around in face masks (Think the kind that a doctor wears) marking that they too have gotten ill, but they will still come in to work or to school. It's just the Japanese way.

One would think of course that Beloved would be happy that her American husband takes so readily to this Japanese custom, i.e. needing to be ordered home (It has happened, even in Japan. Usually though it has to happen because I just threw up in front of the principal), but no. The problem is usually that Beloved's first reaction to me getting sick is "Go see the doctor."

This one is my fault, I married the daughter of a doctor.

I have attempted to explain to my beloved wife that it is not as if I am scared of hospitals or doctors, far from it. I'm not particularly fond of them, but I'm not scared. It's just that I don't really like going to them, or bothering taking the time to go to them (See the rule of thumb, if I'm able to get to the doctor then surely I can get to school and teach, right?). I keep explaining to Beloved that not everyone grew up with a visit to the doctor meaning going to the breakfast table, complaining about being sick and having Dr. Dad write you a prescription right then and there. While Japan's national health care system is wonderful and cheap, it's still a bit of a hassle. Add in the language barrier, which can be daunting at the best of times, and I just tend to want to avoid going if I don't absolutely have to.

The other reason why I avoid stating I'm sick is just that, well... it doesn't feel right in Japan. In the US, when I finally got sick enough to stay home, my routine was pretty well set. I'd spend the day drugged up to the gills with NyQuil and either watching travel shows on TV (One year after a bad bout of the flu, I probably could have given a tour of London after all the shows on it I watched) or spend it in bed reading punctuated by naps. My food would be chicken and rice, easy on the stomach, and I would have as much apple and grape juice, not to mention 7-Up as I could drink. That's how one gets over a cold.

Japan has a different take on it. For one, day time TV in Japan is lacking in intelligence, unless you happen to like mindless dramas and even more mindless talk/variety shows. Two, NyQuil doesn't exist in Japan thanks to very strong drug laws, and finally... Well, Beloved has her own ideas of what a sick person should eat. Rice is involved, yes, but rice gruel. With veggies. And enough ginger to choke a whole team of horses (My mother swears by zinc for colds, Beloved, ginger). To say it is bland would be an understatement.

But there is one final problem, rest. When I'm sick enough to want to stay home, I want to rest. Not sleep per se, but just read (My idea of perfect relaxation) or TV that's interesting, but not particularly challenging. What I have discovered however is that both boys do not have "Daddy is sick" built into their vocabulary. Indeed, if Daddy is home that must mean he is available for playing, making things, being asked to settle fights, book readings, tickle attacks, and just talking to when nothing else is going on. And if Daddy is lying down... Well that just means jungle gym time.

And you attempt to tell a toddler that he's not allowed to watch whatever Thomas DVD he wants just because Daddy doesn't feel well and would like to watch some TV.

I'll just keep working, I get more rest at my junior high school anyway.