Karaoke Yoga

Walking to School

Beerlike

Akane does the grocery shopping, and usually picks me up a single can of beer. Well, beerlike. Well, sometimes beer. If it says "beer", it's beer. But lots of them aren't really beer. They're a cheaper form, and they're not allowed to call them beer. They're good all the same.

Akane doesn't drink, but she drinks vicariously through me. She's always asking, "did you like that one?" (as she buys different brands all the time, one can at a time). Which forces me to actually evaluates what I'm drinking, which I guess is good.

Only the two on the left are true beer. The others are beerlike, and what's not to like?

Nearby Temple

A few weeks ago a woman on a bike cruised by our place, saw me, and asked if I spoke English. Good guess. She was from Norway and in Kyoto for an architecture conference. She was trying to find a nearby temple. I actually didn't know specifically what she was looking for but offered to go along to help. We ended up finding the entrance to the temple, just a few minutes by bike from our place. I left her at the entrance and returned home.

This evening after dinner, I took Riku to visit this temple. It turns out that it's a huge, sprawling property with lots of paths, stone stairways, tunnels, a cemetery, a pond ... all quite overgrown and exciting/atmospheric ... a perfect place for a 6-year-old boy.

We saw two small deer ... a first for us in our neighbourhood. That was in addition to a pretty good-sized lizard that was in our entranceway yesterday ... another first!

Back to the Temple

Riku's really into the newly-discovered temple, so we went back yesterday after school. Just a few more pics to share ...

Canadian Consulate

(What a thrilling title!)

I lost my passport. (It's getting better, eh?)

Yes, I lost my passport, which is kind of comical as I'm the one who is so proud that I always know where such things are, and I'm always lording over Akane about how awesome and airtight my system is.

Completely falls apart when an object that is supposed to be there is not there. I have no idea what to do. There is only one place to look, and I just looked there, and it's not there. I looked there about six more times ... still not there.

Riku and I are going to San Francisco for most of the summer break (four weeks in August). I need my Canadian passport (as I entered the country on it and it's tied to my immigration status). Canada made me file a police report (so I now know what the inside of a Japanese police station looks like).

I have no eligible guarantor in Japan so I had to go to the consulate in Nagoya to get them to vouch for me. Took Mirei along as her Canadian passport's expired and she also needs the in-lieu-of-guarantor thingie. 45 minutes by bus to Kyoto Station, a little under an hour by bullet train (next stop east), then a 10-minute subway trip, and there we were. 45 minutes of paper shuffling later, by the friendly, helpful staff (assisted by the friendly, trying-to-be-helpful Mirei) and we were done.

Time to head home. Mirei was asleep in my arms 5 minutes outside the consulate. Carried her to the subway, through Nagoya Station, through the train trip, through Kyoto Station, onto the bus ... and home. She slept for the entire 2 hours and woke up happy.

Hot and muggy here! But air conditioned everything makes the trip not-uncomfortable.

Next, have to send in the passport applications, and, because it's a rush job, I have to travel all the way to Tokyo to pick it up. That's like 4 hours? by train. And that's just for the temporary one ... when the real one arrives sometime in August I have to swap (through the mail, luckily).

Then I have to update a bunch of immigration stuff that's tied to my defunct passport number. Or, Akane does, rather. I'm just eye candy, like I was at the police station. I was eye candy, too ... all eyes were on me. Well, Akane's mom once said I looked like Burt Lancaster.

Fees, forms, trip to Nagoya, rush fees, photos, trip to Tokyo, ...

I wonder where the passport is?

Back to Himeringo

Summer is definitely here. We finished dinner a bit early and I thought it would be fun to go out for a sundae. The place is a bit far for a post-dinner school night walk. So I ferried Riku over first with Akane's bike (w. big "baby" seat). I told him to go in and tell them that the rest of the family would be along shortly. Then back home to pick up Mirei ... and Akane took my bike, which she mocked, even though it's monumentally cooler than her SUV-of-bikes.

Riku was sitting quietly at a big table in the back ("our" table, I'm now thinking). The wife of the husband-wife owner duo came over and complimented us for our very mature, well-behaved young man.

We got two big fat fruit parfaits. I ate about 9/10 of Riku's.

Frogs

Riku and some friends caught a few frogs the other day ... close to the school. I haven't seen one in the "wild" yet, just a million tadpoles. We're going to release these guys tomorrow at the place they were caught, so maybe I'll see a few then.

I spent the last hour clumsily trying to catch ants to feed to these guys. These tiny frogs, not much bigger than my thumb, turn into monstrous living mouths when hunting. Shockingly fast! Man, it's been too long since I've seen a frog I guess.

And a video.

Morning Glories

Each student in Riku's class has been taking care of a morning glory for the past few months. They were set up right outside their classroom, and the children had to remember to water them each morning. They took them home this week.

Frog Country

Riku and I headed off to release his frogs this morning. Overcast, breezy, early morning, but still borderline sweltering. Riku doesn't seem to mind, though. I asked him later in the morning, "too hot or not too bad?". "Not too bad ..."

Frog central appears to be in the irrigation channels in front of Riku's school. Even right on the main path we take to school every day, there are plenty of frogs around, if you know where to look. And just a few steps off the path and I now realize just how many there really are ...

A farmer who was working on a water pump called us over ... he was rescuing frogs that had trapped themselves in a plastic barrel in the night. These were by far the biggest frogs we saw, and he gave us two (which we released a little later).

Yesterday I said I hadn't seen a frog in the "wild" yet. Well, today I can boast that I've seen maybe 200?

And a video.

Piano Shrine

Since I don't know the names of the nearby temples and shrines, I'm devising my own naming scheme. The nearby temple is "Nearby Temple" and the shrine near the piano teacher's house is now "Piano Shrine".

We always stop by this shrine to have a pre-piano lesson snack, but as such is always a bit rushed (not much time between end of school and the piano lesson). So today, after release the frogs, we headed up there for a more relaxed poke around.

Riku usually hunts for bugs, but today he spent his time walking around the various structures. I also took photos of a few living "treasures" that Riku spotted the day before (but I didn't have the camera).

Riku's reacting to some nearby firecracker explosions in the one shot.

Sakai Medley

We went to Sakai again this weekend. Akane, Ayako, and Masu took Riku and Mirei to Universal Studios Japan, possibly Riku's favourite thing to do so far (the second being playing with the Wii at the condo).

(I didn't go ... I'm working on a secret project.)

Just a few photos ... two from the train ride there, and one of Riku playing Wii.

Time with Mirei

Riku is in the hospital! He had a really high fever (over 40°Celsius) and stomach ache, and neither was going away. This hit him in Sakai ... I knew something was up when he said that he didn't want to play Wii ... just watch Mirei do it.

Ayako drove us home, a huge favour. Riku's fever stayed high through the night and Akane took him to the pediatrician in the morning, who promptly referred him to the hospital for tests. He ended up staying the night (it's the next day now), and the doctor said that he would be there for a week (shocking!). Although the nurse subsequently said that Riku would probably leave earlier.

He was on IV, and the determination was that he has a serious infection. He's getting antibiotics through the drip. Fever is still high but lower, and Akane says he's looking better today. Akane's mom is at the hospital with them today.

So, Mirei and I are having some (rare) one-on-one time, and it's a pleasure. We're watching Charlie and Lola DVDs (recently unearthed from packing), working on her alphabet (nailed the troublesome "C" yesterday), eating pizza, napping, hitting the cafes, and generally relaxing.

This morning we walked to a nearby mom 'n' pop cafe. Mirei's been once before and really liked it (because there were a few older couples there giving her lots of attention). She was disappointed today as we were the only customers, but I let her sit by herself at the counter and she had a nice long chat with the owners (who are so sweet with her). I couldn't follow too much of the conversation, but at one point they asked her if she preferred English or Japanese, and she answered "pink!".

And a little video of Mirei playing Riku's lung-powered (which, for Mirei, means high-powered) piano.

Ken

I brought Mirei with me today on my weekly meeting with Ken, the language exchange partner I found on Craigslist. Riku's still in the hospital (we find out tomorrow when he gets out), and Mirei's out of school, so I'm continuing to hang out with her. We ended up spending a few hours with Ken ... we started at Starbuck's, went to Kinko's (I had some printing/scanning to do, with no printer/scanner at home), then poked around an outdoor mall and finally a pasta lunch ... Ken's treat.

Ken just got his PhD in philosophy from Kyoto University. He's doing a variety of teaching now ... part-time at the university, teaching English at a "cram school" for students trying to get into medical school, and teaching a medical ethics class at another university in Osaka.

Hospital Pic

Quick shot of Riku getting his hair washed at the hospital ... sent from her iPhone.

Collector's Passport

My temporary passport arrived! They were great at the Canadian consulate in Nagoya and the Canadian embassy in Tokyo. And despite the official story, they sent my temporary passport via courier rather than force me to go to Tokyo.

(Of course, I was secretly looking forward to that required trip, although with Riku in hospital I'm now actually glad, rather than merely officially glad, that they mailed it to me.)

I have to trade this for my real passport, so pretty soon this pic is all I'll have. Until I lose my next passport I guess.

Hospital Visit

Mirei and I visited Riku at the hospital today. He was asleep when I got there, and his baa-ba was watching over him (Akane and I were at the immigration office prior). He woke up after hearing Mirei's voice, and took a good ten minutes to fully waken.

It was Friday afternoon and he's been in since Tuesday afternoon, so he is really settled in. He's got things organized and spent lots of time trying to keep things that wasy as Mirei instilled little bits of chaos here and there.

At one point he had to go to the bathroom down the hall, and asked Mirei if she'd like to wheel his IV thingie for him.

The doctor came by with Riku's blood test results from the morning. He is still slightly infected but she thinks he'll be ready to go home by Sunday. She's going to do another check-in Sunday morning.

Ayako came up last night and is going to be spending the day (Saturday) with Mirei, so that I can get some work done. We are all just up now, with Mirei having slept through the night alone in her own bed for the second straight night ... exciting news if you're a parent! And not if you're not I guess ...

And a quick video of Riku discussing his toy slot machine.

Our Mirei

Ayako just left to pick up Riku and Akane from the hospital ... Mirei and I were playing with some clay and generally joshing around. She made a little bunny ...

... and hammed it up in this video.

Riku is Back

Our Riku returned happy and smiling from the hospital yesterday!

He had Haemophilus influenzae (non-B type) ... something I've never heard of but I guess is very common.

Some trivia: according to Wikipedia, "H. influenzae was the first free-living organism to have its entire genome sequenced." And, in spite of its name, it's not "the flu" ... it's a bacterial infection, and was treated with antibiotics.

And a little video of Riku monkeying around with his Melodion.

Flowers in Nishigamo

I'm not one to notice flowers, but I'm noticing flowers. I just took these photos on my way to and from the coffee shop. It went back and forth between light rain, sun shower, cool and overcast, and sweltering hot in the 15 minutes I was out.

¥800 Haircut

Sakai Panorama

I've taken a bunch of shots from Ayako's balcony in Sakai, but they never look anywhere as good as the "real thing". But I just discovered a feature in Photoshop that auto-stitches panorama frames. So I casually took four shots, fed them to Photoshop with default settings, and 100 seconds later I got this (click for big view):

This is looking roughly south, so the mass that is Osaka isn't visible. You can see the train tracks heading south to the airport.

The big green area just right of center is Daisen Kofun, a keyhole-shaped burial mound from the 5th century AD ... the largest one in Japan. There is a nice overhead photo of it in the Wikipedia entry.

The tall building on the very right is the Sakai City Hall, the only other building of any height in Sakai.

We are on the 29th floor here, although these buildings (two of them) are 42 storeys tall.

The Last Supper

I just got back from a little shopping trip in Osaka ... bought a few last-minute items for the trip to San Francisco tomorrow. Riku and Mirei were already eating when I got back to the condo. Riku had requested unagi, not really my favourite item (although definitely one of his), but this was the best I've ever eaten. Served over rice, with some kim-chee, soup, cucumber, water ... my last supper in Japan until end-of-August.

Summer Art

Riku has some over-the-summer homework to do, and he and Akane have been working away at it ... most of it is stuff that I can't do with him in San Francisco (that pesky Japanese language). He also has some drawings to do ... including one of the morning glory that he grew during the spring and is supposed to care for over the summer ...

Stopover in Incheon

On our way to San Francisco. Riku and I napped on the short flight from Osaka to Incheon. At the gate now, waiting for the "big" flight ...

First time "in" Korea!