I'm back. Back from Japan.
I took my first non-birth related vacation in about 6 years. 2 weeks in Japan. It was wonderful.
Despite what people may believe Japan is not Disneyland. Sure they tend to lend towards cute when able and that is fine, however there are no giant robots walking the street. All of the crazy things you find on the internet about Japan are generally only found in quirky places. for example the crazy school girl panty vending machines; I didn't see any of those. I did see beer, drink, pizza, snack, and book vending machines.The crazy bizzare toys you see touted, are generally not commmonplace. Well that is unless it is a giant robot, then it probably has it's own section at any decent toy store. Schoolgirl's wearing crazy outfits? OK those exist. I'm going to expand later and have a blog entry dedicated to Japanese fashion. My offerint to you about crazy Disney Japan, don't get too excited about that. Japan is a country not a theme park.
For most of our trip we spent time with family and friends. Mayumi's mom discovered that she isn't able to successfully watch both of our kids by herself. This revelation occured one day when Mayumi and I went out by ourselves while Oakel went to Japanese school. She watched Sean during the day and when Oakel finished school she picked him up. The school is honestly almost her back yard. There is one house and a street dividing them. She picked up Oakel as he began to get the glazed look of doom. For those without children this occurs once the child passes into the tired uber energy stage. They do things they know will get them in trouble with a fevered giddy child energy that is impossible for an adult to have. Not even Robin Williams has that kind of energy. This occured daily around 3:00 especially if we couldn't get him to nap at 1:00. Getting Oakel to nap is like getting the titanic to not sink 100 years ago. Sure it could be done but we have to develop time travel first. So I would usually be given the task of watching Oakel during this time. Did I mention I spent most of my time in Japan very tired? Anyway we usually went to be at 8:00 and woke sometime around 4:00 - 6:00 depending on how far into the trip you go. I now see a great advantage to waking up an hour earlier and am trying to continue that trend. It really wasn't that bad going to bed so early because there were no shows for me to watch, no internet and no friends to hang out with. I actually didn't mind going ot bed so early, especially knowing I would be waking up early.
Oakel is a cool little kid. It was really just cool watching him communicate. He would talk to me in English, then while we were talking someone would speak to him in Japanese and he would finish what he was saying to me and switch to Japanese to answer the other person. Once Oakel is old enough to spend some time away from us I hope for him to spend a week or two with my parents and a week or two in Japan each summer. Well unless we move to Japan, then I hope he can spend a month with my Mom and Dad. It is amazing how quickly he can pick up two languages. Sure he isn't the most articulate and he is a little hard to follow from time to time but TWO languages. Bi-lingual from birth kids have it made. If we move to Japan he is so going to own his foreign language classes ;). Another funny thing about that. Oakel has developed quite a southern dialect. I'm working to try to minimize it as much as I can but it is SOOOOO twangy. I know I have some myself but not like his. Silly piedmont dialect ;) kidding kidding.
Anyway we are back, I am back at work, the kids are in school and the hodrum habbit of life is starting to settle back in. I'm going to try to start injecting some diversity for us. We need to have more fun and less routine I think.
Posted by Rob at May 17, 2007 10:37 AM