More Year-End Traditions

The end of the year is a busy time for the Japanese. While the Western world is off relaxing on vacation, the Japanese are busy wrapping up the year. December is filled with salesman making their customary and required visits to their customers to thank them for their business during the year. This visit usually involves giving a small gift to the customer, such as a calendar, date book, small planner, and so on. Skipping a customer leaves the customer feeling neglected. The Japanese also spend time cleaning their office and their home as the previous submission discusses.

While all of this busy work is going on, the Japanese find time to fit in the year-end office party. In a large company, this is organized by division or work group. This consists of everyone in the group going to a restaurant for food, drinking, and good old fashioned camaraderie. The party begins by everyone getting a glass of their favorite beverage, and once everyone has one, making some speeches, toasts, and so forth. Then the party begins. It is pretty light hearted and a good opportunity to make jokes and laugh outside the rather serious, ‘nose to the grindstone’ office environment. My office party was last night. The food was great. It would take a very long page to describe it all, so you’ll have to trust me when I say it was great.

Once the meal is done, the Japanese feel the need to change venues and pick up the pace. Thus, everyone gets up and heads out the door to the obligatory 2nd party. No normal Japanese party (wedding, office party, etc.) would be complete without a 2nd party. Basically, this is an excuse to hop from the restaurant to a bar. Usually, this means going to some bar where people can sing karaoke. Unlike in the USA, many people here practice their favorite songs during the year so when they have a chance to sing in front of friends, co-workers and so on, they have an idea of what they are doing. Karaoke is often used as a stress release on the weekend or on the way home. Those that are really into it have 1 or 2 favorite songs that they have practiced dozens of times and know every bar of the song. This is their chance to show their stuff.

If things are going really well, some of the group may head off to a 3rd party. However, since most train lines stop service around midnight, this can get rather expensive as the 3rd party often comes out of the workers’ pockets, and in order to get home late at night, an expensive taxi ride is needed.

It is amazing that everyone shows up in the office on time the next day and puts in a full day’s work.

Out With the Old, In With the New

The Japanese have a tradition of cleaning up and throwing things out at the end of the year. This done in the office and in the home. Everyone participates. The idea is to get rid of junk, clean things up, and start the New Year on a clean and organized note. This supposedly applies to bad habits as well. It is a chance to throw out bad habits and start fresh in the New Year. I know several folks that are planning to quit smoking from the New Year. One man in my office is taking this last week of the year off of work to begin kicking the habit.

In my office today everyone stopped work at 3 PM and began cleaning. Shelves, counters, desks, cabinets, and chairs were dusted, cleaned and straightened up. People cleaned out their desks and threw a lot of junk away. It was nice to spruce the place up and get rid of junk. It looked a lot better when we were done.

The Move to Greenhouse

We survived our move to our apartment. The movers did a superb job. They walked fast and/or jogged/ran the entire time! The apartment is called Greenhouse; probably because the outside color is green. The apartment is 6 years old and was recently remodeled. We’re the first to move back in after remodel. It is a 2-story apartment with 1 unit on the bottom and 1 unit on the top. We are renting the top apartment. It’s a pretty typical Japanese apartment inside. It has 2 bedrooms that are about 9’ X 9’. Each bedroom has a good sized closet for storing clothes and futon. Additionally, it has a combined kitchen area and living/dining area. This apartment size/configuration is called 2LDK for 2 bedrooms, living room, dining room, and kitchen. Total size is around 602 sq ft. It’s a little small for a family of 4, but not bad for Tokyo. We did not want to get much bigger as we are not planning to live here forever and did not want to pay a lot in rent. The apartment also has a separate toilet room and a Japanese style bathing room next to the laundry room.

As you can see in the photo, most Japanese hang dry their laundry as there is little space for a dryer and electricity is expensive. Therefore, laundry is done first thing in the morning and hung out to dry. We purchased a new washing machine that also dries clothes, but running on 110V, the dryer takes hours to dry a small amount of clothes. It’s used for the rainy season or when laundry is done later in the day and can’t wait to be hung out the next day. In other words, we’re still Americanized.

Michael and Tommy’s favorite part of the apartment is the bathing area. The tub is about 4’ X 3’ X 3’ deep. You wash outside of the tub and when you are all clean and free of soap, you get into the tub and soak. It’s like sitting in a hot tub. The boys love to soak in the warm water and relax. It’s all automated so you punch in how much water you want and what temperature to heat it at and it does the rest. Since the water doesn’t get any soap in it, you can use the water a couple of days before changing it. There is a cover for the tub to keep the water clean. It’s not kept heated when not in use, so the next day you simply tell it how warm you want it and in a few minutes it’s ready. And thinking environmentally, the washing machine comes with a long hose to put into the tub so you can use the water the next day for laundry. It seems to be a pretty popular conservation measure here as all the washing machines come with the hose and are equipped to pump the water from the tub.

It will take a while to get all situated and comfortable. While we have much less stuff than in America, we still have a lot of stuff compared to Japanese folks. Moving from the house into a smaller place also contributes to the excess amount of stuff. The movers came by the house to make an estimate on the move and decided they needed to bring their ‘big truck’ to move us. They were right. We packed the truck completely full.

The new neighborhood is about 4-5 minutes’ walk from the house we were living in. It’s actually a bit closer to school for the boys. It’s about the same walk to the train station for Terry. The neighborhood is a little quieter and a bit more upscale feeling. The people living downstairs have a girl in the same grade as Michael. She’s in a different class, but they recognized each other. We gave them a box of laundry soap to introduce ourselves the day we moved in. Japanese custom is that the new people give a gift to the neighbors to introduce themselves. Luckily we only have 1 direct neighbor. The neighbors downstairs also have a boy in the 6th grade. So, hopefully it should be OK if we make a little noise since they have kids too.

Several people have asked us what it costs to move into an apartment in Japan. We had to pay first month’s rent ($1200 at current exchange rate), finder’s fee (2 month’s rent), commission to the realtor ($1400), and deposit (2 months’ rent). All together, it cost us just over $7000 to get the key for the apartment. All of this is extremely standard here. On top of that we purchased a new, but cheap, refrigerator ($500), a mid level washing machine with integral dryer ($700), cheap vacuum cleaner ($70), ceiling lights for the rooms ($150, many Japanese apartments do not include lights or curtains), a heater/AC unit for 1 room ($500), and then the usual cups, bowls, silverware, a few pots/pans, and so on ($300). There will be more to come, but this gets us in and able to eat and sleep.

It is already feeling like home. Everyone is feeling comfortable and quickly adjusting to our new digs.

Recent Train Experiences

The overcrowded rush-hour raisin trains have provided some new experiences recently. Almost every day I see the platform pushers prying the doors open on a train car to shove someone’s bag, foot, arm, shoe, etc. back into the train before it departs the station. It is very normal and no one thinks twice about it. Last week while I was on the platform watching my train pull in, I noticed that one of the train doors had a bag clinging to the outside of it. The train doors were closed, but there was a bag on the outside of the doors with the bag’s strap on the inside of the doors. Apparently the platform pushers missed this one and the train rider was on the inside holding onto the straps of the bag hoping it did not get snagged on something while speeding from one station to the next.

Today on the morning rush-hour commute, the local train was the most crowded I have seen it. The people were pushed inside so tightly that several around me were gasping for air. It was one of those days when the doors open and close several times allowing the pushers to shove everyone and everything inside. When the train stopped at one of the stations, the force of the people taking a full breath and standing up straight literally shoved those standing next to the door outside of it. The force was so great that one girl standing near me and holding a large duffel bag was forced onto the platform face down onto her bag. She could not move her feet and bag fast enough to counter the force of the folks behind her. The girl directly behind her was not able to move around the girl on the ground and was shoved on top of her. The people in the middle of the train could not see this event taking place and began their shoving and hustling to get off the train. Within a second or two there was a pile of people lying on the platform. Several of us jumped out of the train to help get the people up off of the platform before they got trampled. In the effort to help the folks on the platform, someone’s arm caught my bag on my shoulder and in their mad dash to make their connecting train, swung me around 180 degrees and nearly toppled me as well. I was happy to arrive at work in one piece today.

A Place of Our Own

As most of you are aware, our living arrangements are about to change. The adjustment from living alone for the past 15+ years to having a full house has been difficult for Mio’s father. It has also been difficult for him to become reacquainted with his American-influenced daughter. After 17 years in America, it is natural that Mio has been affected by her life there. Her communication and actions are much more direct than the average Japanese female. And as I have experienced firsthand, the reverse culture shock of returning home is often harder than the initial culture shock of moving abroad. Add to that the responsibility of a family to look after, and it is easy to see that Mio has faced a lot of challenges in our adventure. She has done a great job. In any event, the inn no longer has room for us and we went searching for a place of our own to just ‘be’.

Mio’s swift actions quickly located a suitable apartment near her father’s house. This allows the boys to stay in the same schools with little change in their commute to school. And for Terry, his commute will essentially be the same. The apartment is a typical Japanese apartment. It is likely that we may actually have more useable space in the apartment than in the house as we basically confined ourselves to the upstairs in the house. We are all looking forward to our own place where everyone can be themselves and focus on school, the language, the culture, and so on. I am sure we will visit Mio’s father occasionally and that he will come to visit us as well. So, as the story goes, we went in search of a place to ‘be’. We have found a place and will move Christmas weekend. All is set. Stay tuned for pictures and more details in the following days.

Have Chopsticks, Will Eat Christmas Cake

French styled bakeries abound in Japan almost to the level of fast food restaurants in the USA. At my local train station, there is a French styled bakery on either side of the train tracks to capture customers coming and going in either direction. You can find almost anything baked into bread: hot dogs, curry, mashed potatoes, spaghetti, apples and other fruits, squash, you name it. Only the imagination limits what you will find baked into different breads. And while the Japanese make extremely beautifully shaped breads, cakes, pastries and other assorted items, the nicest aspect of Japanese baking is that it is less sweet than in the USA, and that is a good thing. One can eat a big piece of cake here and not feel like you are going to throw up from the sugar overload. This brings me to my point. The annual office Christmas cake.

Today we enjoyed our annual office Christmas cake. The Japanese love to have a cake for special occasions, like Christmas. A cake here easily costs double of one in the USA. The cakes here are much smaller, so folks get a much smaller piece of cake than in the USA. For example, a 6”-8” cake can easily start at $12-$15 dollars. Add fruit, fancy filling or fancy designs, and I have seen them in the stores for $30 or more for a 6” cake, especially if it comes from a popular bakery. Our cake today was a white cake with a light cream cheese mouse filling. The white frosting with rosettes and fancy swirls was topped with some fresh blueberries and a few strawberry slices. It was almost too beautiful to eat. The taste was light and good. Had it been an American cake, I would have felt ill after eating that much sugar.

When my piece of cake came around I politely thanked my server, picked up my chopsticks, and dug in. Yes, you can eat cake with chopsticks. I haven’t seen anything here yet that can’t be devoured with chopsticks. It seems most people carry a few pairs of chopsticks in their desk drawer, so one is never without a means by which to eat. Have chopsticks, will eat.

Tommy Turns 5

Tommy turned 5 last week. We celebrated his birthday on the weekend as Terry was on an overseas business trip on Tommy's birthday and arrived home about dinner time on that day.

Tommy has been asking for a bicycle as he really missed the bike he had back in Portland. So, we decided to splurge and get him one. It's a fairly basic one, costing $150 with a kickstand and police registration added.

Tommy has also fallen for the kids’ beetle arcade game and trading cards they have here. Mio found a small air hockey game featuring the beetles. Big brother Michael also loves the beetle craze here and was more than happy to help Tommy play the game.

New Year's Celebration

To say that the Japanese love rice is an understatement. The foods made of rice are endless here: steamed, boiled, broiled, deep-fried, baked, sweetened, fermented into alcohol, candies, snacks, and so on. For New Years, the Japanese pound the rice into a substance that resembles playdough. The pounding is called mochitsuki. The pounded rice is called mochi. They put different toppings on it including sesame seed, sea weed, dried fish flakes, sweet beans with syrup, and more. Here are some pictures of Tommy’s school taking part in their annual mochi making festival.

All of the kids got to have a turn at pounding the rice into dough. The parents provided the real muscle in pounding the rice. Once the pounding was done we got to enjoy the rewards of everyone’s efforts. This activity is about as common as a Christmas party is back in the states. It definitely symbolizes the New Year season.