Life in Japan

Recycling Poster

This was in my mail box this morning.  You may remember my post earlier this year that showed my trash can and described all the various categories.  This poster is describing another one, recyclable plastics.  So now I have the following categories; recyclable plastics, non-combustible, combustible, cans, glass, pet bottles, cardboard, newspapers, magazines, milk and juice cartons.  All of these have to be separated and bagged.  The newspapers, magazines, cardboard and milk cartons need to be separated bundled and tied with string.  I have until October 4 to figure out how to do it, actually I have until October 14 since I am leaving for China on October 2.  I intend to head to the 100 yen store this afternoon for my supply of string.  I think I will start now so I can get it right before then.  So while you think I may be complaining the new recyclable plastics category actually saves me from carrying my plastic grocery bags and my styrofoam trays back to the store.  Now, they pick them up for me.

My motivation for doing this is two fold.  First, not doing it right makes more work for the sweet Japanese man who maintains our apartment building.  I know he checks each bag of trash I put downstairs or he will hear from the local officials.  The garbage men check to make sure it is done properly.  Second, I love to think that all this recycling that I do and that Japan does helps the earth.  I also love the fact that the local government sent me three posters explaining the change in both English and Japanese.

After two years, I finally bought my first “container” of Japanese gum.  Yes, I normally think of gum coming in packs, too.   You may also wonder why it took two years.  When we were living in London I bought several packs of gum only to discover that they tasted like Vick’s vapor rub, yuck.  I have only bought Wrigley’s at the international market.  At least, I know what it tastes like.

Last week, a young couple sitting across from me on the train were comparing their containers of gum.  The girl had hers in a plastic teddy bear head which turned out to be inferior to the boys sleak purple container.  He was able to provide her with a square white paper to dispose of the piece she had been chewing.  Intrigued by this feature, I headed to the corner convenience store to get my own.  The gum in the container is the chiclet type.  The container has two sections the large one holds the gum and a small narrow one holds the white paper squares used for disposing  of chewed gum.  Japanese packaging never ceases to amaze me.

Katsu Don

Today is Respect for the Aged day and a national holiday. It wasn’t a school holiday for my seminary students so we had seminary this morning.  When I got home Rick had planned an outing.  We took an excursion to an interesting town called Nogata.  First, we had lunch at a little restaurant there, Rick had his and Leigh’s favorite, katsu don (breaded pork cutlet on rice with a fried egg on top) with soba noodles on the side and I had Ebi Tendon with soba (shrimp tempura on rice).  We went to an English performance of Rakugo which is Japanese Comedy theatre.  We only stayed until intermission because the first half lasted 1 1/2 hours and the second half had more performers.  Rakugo is one performer at a time kneeling on a cushion on a red platform in the center of the stage.  They are in traditional Japanese dress and they may only use two props a large handkerchief and a fan.  They tell a long (15-20 minutes) story that is supposed be funny.  Although they were speaking English, I only got one of the the jokes. 

It was about a man going to the eye doctor because he couldn’t see and the doctor told him his eyes were dirty and he popped them out with a fork (the fan) and sent his assistant to boil them.  When he tried to put them back into the patient they were too big after being boiled.  The doctor had his assistant put them in the sun to dry so they would go back to their original size, but the eyeballs disappeared.  So, they took the eyes out of a dog and put them in the patient and he could see really well.  When he came back for a check-up he reported not only improved vision, but sense of smell and also hearing.  His only complaint was that he had the urge to lift his leg whenever he saw a pole.   Heheheheheh! Yeah right!

I know that something was lost in the translation in the other 4 stories that we saw.  I listened to the last one about money and a lottery ticket carefully because the Japanese women performing spoke beautiful English.  I was really disappointed at the end because I didn’t get it.  It was a great day.

Little Red

Hooray!  Last night, Rick brought Little Red back home (see Stormtrooper post below).  It seems like she has been gone forever, although it has only been about a week and a half.  I was so glad to see her that I spent over an hour with her and the English instruction manual setting her back up.  She has a new sim card and battery and seems to have recovered quite nicely.  Ako-san went to a lot of trouble to get her taken care of for me.  I think in the US I would have been offered a new contract and a new phone. 

In fact, when she went in for repairs I really didn’t care if I saw her again.  After two years I was ready for a new phone.  Little Red was a great little flip phone when I got her, but there are some really cool looking phones out there.  Enter the Storm Trooper loaner phone.  Whoa!!! It is amazing how that phone put Little Red in perspective for me.  I love Little Red and was so happy to get her back.  She is tiny and most of all she’s red, my favorite color.  She works and after two years I am finally learning about some of her finer features.  My favorite feature is being able to send and receive email.  Ako-san even arranged an easier email address for my phone.  The last one looked something like this npnwsnerhxi63v0eke at ntt dot com.  How could anyone remember that and anyone receiving an email from that address would most likely think it was spam.  Now, I have a really nice, easy to remember address and anyone receiving an email will most  definitely know that it is from me.  I am so glad Little Red is home. (Please note-My phones did not have names until this experience!)

Last Friday Rick traveled with a group from our stake to Mount Fuji.  They spent the night in a dorm and began the ascent early Saturday.  It is a long hard climb and most people who do it, only do it once.  A few of the people from our stake have done it a few times.  This is a picture of Rick at the summit.  He is so amazing!!!

Rick on Mt Fuji

…this is the best candy in the world.  Now, I really love my chocolate, but sometimes I just want something sweet that isn’t chocolate.  In the USA there are Starburst, but in Japan we have Hi Chew.  Hi Chew are much better than Starburst.  They are very soft and not nearly as sweet as Starburst.  The writing on the lower right side of the package says Ha-Chi-Yoo.  The writing in the upper left corner says Ra-ee-chi, that’s the flavor, Lychee.  If you are not familiar with the lychee fruit it is a small asian fruit with a red skin. 

When I was a child growing up in Salt Lake City my family frequented a restaurant on Broadway called the Ding Ho.  Chinese dining at it’s finest!  Well maybe not, but my parents liked it and knew the Chinese cook Von.  Our waiter would come to take our order and my dad would say, “Tell Von that Van and Carol are here.”  I always felt important when my dad said this.  I’m pretty sure that he did too and that’s why he did it.  Von would then decide what we were having for dinner.  I am pretty sure we got the same dishes that were on the menu.  They just tasted better knowing that Von had selected them just for us.  He always included tiny white cups filled with green jello that was just like rubber for dessert.  We loved it!

Anyway, back to lychees.  I was introduced to the lychee by Von and I can’t remember if I ate them at the Ding Ho or if he gave us a can for a gift.  I just remember thinking that they were the most disgusting fruit I had ever tasted.  For some reason I grew up thinking that they tasted like mothballs.

Every member of my immediate family and just about anyone who has ever tasted Hi Chew love them.  Rick and I carry nearly $100 worth back to the US every time we come.  Everyone requests them.  The cost about $1.00 a package and everyone has their favorite flavors.  The problem with having a favorite flavor is that they change the flavors all the time and in the winter months they are hard to find because their place on the shelf is taken up by cough drops.  (Which reminds me I better stock up before they disappear).   My niece loved the grapefruit ones I found last year.  Allyson really likes banana and apple.  Maddie’s favorite is strawberry and Ruth and Jame’s kids like any flavor because Ruth opens each package and dumps all the flavors into a big ziploc so they can’t request certain flavors.  There are many flavors that I have seen only once.  All flavors are wrapped in silver except the special ones and they are wrapped in gold.  The gold flavor used to be kiwi, but this week a new gold flavor appeared, LYCHEE.  So after getting past my childhood memories of mothball flavored lychee, I decided to buy a pack and they are really good, but then I actually have only found one flavor that I really don’t like and that is plum.  Fortunately, I’ve only seen them once.

Somewhere after Omaha my cute, little, red, Japanese, flip phone stopped working.  I hoped that it would start working again when I returned to Japan, it didn’t.  With my limited Japanese, it is impossible for me to communicate with NTT DoCoMo, my cell phone company.  Rick took it to work and gave his secretary; and mine, I suppose, since she does all kinds of things for me; the assignment to talk to the phone service.  So after a few days I asked Rick for an update.  Well…my phone is in the shop.  Not the answer I was hoping for.  A new phone would have been nice.  Rick said he was bringing home a loaner with my sim card in it.  I thought he would show up with my phone in a black version because I know that the company has some.  I wasn’t so lucky.  Begin playing the Star Wars theme song here.  He brought home the Storm Trooper Phone.  I really haven’t seen a phone this big or ugly in a long time.  My camera is a Sony touch screen and the phone is twice as thick and 1/2 longer.  It won’t even fit in the cell phone pocket in my purse.  I hope I get little red back soon! In the meantime, maybe I have Darth Vader’s number in my phonebook now.

The Storm Trooper

This summer was great.  It began with a little trip to London.  I got to go to Maddie’s end of the year play.  She was the star of the show, The Little Black Cloud.

Izzie was so happy and let me play with her a lot.  Ally and Luke even left the girls with me for a few hours and went out.  Yea!  We had so much fun!

I was home in Tokyo for just a few weeks before Andrew and Leigh arrived.  I showed them some of the famous sites in Tokyo and Rick took them on longer outings on the weekends because my broken toe was still hurting some.  We took a long weekend and went to Kyoto and Nara.  They were with us for two short weeks and headed back to Dallas. 

A week after their departure I flew to Salt Lake and spent time visiting my mom and helping Kristina get ready to move (she was well organized so she didn’t need much help).  I guess I was good for the manual labor part of it.  We moved her couch, bed and love sac to a storage unit until Alex and Stacey found an apartment to put it in.  Let’s just say I’m not as strong as I used to be. We had a lot of fun.  The truck we rented had issues and would only start if you moved the key around and found the right spot.  For some reason I could do this and Kristina couldn’t so I guess I was helpful.  Then we drove across America.  It was a great drive and for most of we saw continuous corn fields.  When we realized that we were going right past Kirtland, Ohio we decided to stop and tour the church historical sites there before heading to Palmyra.  I am always so impressed with church properties.  The spirit at both places was so strong.  We saw the Hill Cumorah at dusk and the Sacred Grove early the next morning. Our visit just reconfirmed why I know the gospel is true and that Joseph Smith is truly a prophet of God.

After Palmyra we drove directly to Boston.  We checked into a great little bed and breakfast and then went to move the stuff that was in the car into Kristina’s apartment.  Her apartment is cute and huge.  Check her blog if you want to see pictures.  Then we walked to Coolidge Corner for some dinner.  I can see why she was drawn to Boston…I could live there easily.  It a great city and so much history.  Saturday we took the “T” into the heart of the city and walked around a farmers market and Quincy Market.

  After a little seafood and stroll to the harbor we headed back to get Penelope and Yolanda (Kristina’s car and GPS respectively).  We wanted to go to Target to get some basics for her room, sheets, blankets, towels etc  We programmed the nearest Target into Yolanda and drove straight there. 

Monday was another adventure.  Kris rented a u-haul and we headed to Framingham to get the boxes she had shipped.  Again, we needed Yolanda’s help.  When the forklift driver pulled up the boxes were very smashed but nothing was broken.  Moving the boxes up to the 3rd floor without an elevator wasn’t as bad as we thought it would be and we finished quite quickly.  Then we headed to Home Depot to get paint for the furniture that she bought from the former tenant.  We spent the rest of the afternoon painting and ended up eating cereal for dinner.

On Wednesday we flew to Houston together and then Kristina went on to Salt Lake to help with my niece Nicole’s wedding.  Rick met up with me the next day.  We were there for our oldest granddaughter’s baptism.  What a great day!!!

The evening of the baptism Rick and I and and James and three of his children flew to Denver.  Ruth and the two other girls came on Sunday.  Luke flew in from London and Allyson and her girls flew with Kris from Salt Lake.  Stacey and Alex were already there and Leigh and Andrew flew up from Dallas early Sunday.  Yea!!! We were finaly all together for the first time in four years.  Sunday after going to church, meeting Stacey’s family for the first time and having lunch with them, we drove to Breckenridge to the mountain house that we had rented.  What wonderful week we had together.  We went rafting, ice skating, to a gold mine, on picnics, but most of all we just enjoyed relaxing and spending time together.

Friday we came down out of the mountains to the Denver Temple to witness Alex and Stacey’s marriage.  Although it was raining it was a beautiful day and we are all so happy for them and so blessed to have Stacey in our family. 

Leigh, Kris and I

We were in Colorado for a week and I spent another few days there before flying back to Tokyo.  Whew!!!  The final amazing thing is that after being away from home for an entire month I hardly had any problems with jet lag!