Well we are still here, just busy with life and not finding it easy to sit down and make a blog post.
I'll keep the words short and get some pictures up.
These are some pictures of Yokohama Chinatown, our house and the nearby Perry Park:
Sunday, March 4, 2012
Sunday, February 5, 2012
End of week 1 in our new house
Week one in our house that is.
Well in many ways it was an uneventful week. With me working most of the day, there isn't much time left for anything else in the evening. However, we did manage to get the rest of the car paperwork done, so now I can drive it anywhere. Kerri, on the other hand, ran into a kink getting her license. They let her take the test (written and practical) but won't issue her a license until she has a base ID. Technically, all she needs is her passport + orders, but showing that to a Japanese police officer would probably not go down very well. So instead we are waiting for the new orders that have us being here farther out than March 31st, which will allow me to get a card with privileges (right now, only base access), and Kerri and Rowan to get a card at all. It will also allow us to finish getting our 90 day tourist visas upgraded to real SOFA status with multiple entry/exit stamps. Hopefully that's coming soon.
Meanwhile, I'm the only one who can drive the car, which is a bummer for Kerri during the week as she can't go about looking for things we need like a dining table and chairs for example. We did manage to find a used fridge which is doing nicely. Also across the street from us is a recycle shop (used stuff) and we found 2 LP gas heaters that hook up to our gas outlets that exist in all the rooms. One is now Rowan's heater, and one is heating our "entertainment" room (mac mini hooked up to a computer monitor). Also a small electric heater for the bathroom which is cooooooold!
Yesterday (Saturday), we went to the base to do laundry (no washer/dryer yet), then on the way home stopped at every big box store we could find to assess our options for furniture. There are some critical items we need to start feeling more comfortable in the house. Oddly, we did not find very many good options. The best so far is a store called Nitori, where we got our futons originally. We ended up buying a lot of little things there, but even their furniture options were not agreeable to us style/price-wise. We're thinking we'll need to make the trek to Ikea after all...at least to see what they might have specific to Japanese homes. There is an Ikea in Yokohama, but it's over an hour away by the toll roads which we have not had the pleasure of figuring out yet. Today we've decided to just go to a candidate church and then come home to work on the many boxes of things scattered about the house. Kerri will take the train in to Ikea to do an exploratory run tomorrow and see if it's even worth it. I need to ask around at work for better furniture options.
Our internet is now on, and I have managed to make a perch out of a plastic box and cushion that is somewhat comfortable. I'll try to get back into the habit of blogging again. It's amazing how quickly the little things come and go in a single week, and all the cool stuff disappears from my brain.
I've tried numerous ways to get to work now:
1) Bike to train, bike to work: Verdict - not worth it. I have to walk my bike most of the way to/from the station near base, and the pain of wrapping the bike up in the cover plus hauling it up and down stairs negates any positives to the process. For a long train ride it might be worth it, but mine is only 15 minutes.
2) Walk to train, walk to work: Verdict - doable, but unpleasant feeling of being trapped on base. I want me bike with me so I can get stuff done during the day and get off base easily for lunch.
3) Drive to work: Verdict - very easy, but unpleasant dealing with driving on base. Plus - ick.
4) Bike to work: Verdict - I think this is the one for me. I did a test run yesterday morning (saturday). It took me about 50 minutes going there, but I was taking a weird route that sent me through back roads and tunnels. This is not so good on Japanese roads as this means sidewalks frequently disappear. On they way home I took main roads and did it in about half an hour. This gives me the best of all the options and includes an hours worth of daily exercise. It is unbelievably cold at the moment (and it isn't even raining yet!), but I can always layer up.
There's a liquor store nearby us and I've had the opportunity to try a couple of sakes. I was worried a bit about Japanese sakes as I've found the ones I've had in the US tend to be a bit heavy on the "off-rice" smell (I think that's the koji), so I've always preferred Momokowa (Sake-One) Sake made in Forest Grove, Oregon. But I'm happy to report the local stuff here is excellent! One misstep though...the first bottle I picked out on my own turned out to be Shochu, a distilled 25% liquor that tasted awful. It got poured down the drain and I went back and asked specifically to be shown the "o-sake" bottles.
We got to try out our o-furo (hot water bath) this week! Very nice (and I'm not really a bath person)...first your shower off, then get into the tub of hot water and soak. You push a button to fill the tub. If you've kept the water clean and free of soaps, you can push another button and it recirculates and reheats the water. That way multiple people in the family can reuse the water and not waste it. I also like the smaller, deeper bath tub. You basically sit upright in it and the water comes up to your neck. You can let the water spill over the sides as there is a drain in the shower floor right next to you.
There are plenty of other little annoying things that we're having to get used to in the house. For example we finally got some nightlights to help navigating around at night. It gets *dark*! The heater in the bathroom is helping with the freezing cold showers in the morning. And we are definitely looking forward to some basic furniture.
Well, that's it for now, I'll try and make updates more frequent now that we have internet again.
Well in many ways it was an uneventful week. With me working most of the day, there isn't much time left for anything else in the evening. However, we did manage to get the rest of the car paperwork done, so now I can drive it anywhere. Kerri, on the other hand, ran into a kink getting her license. They let her take the test (written and practical) but won't issue her a license until she has a base ID. Technically, all she needs is her passport + orders, but showing that to a Japanese police officer would probably not go down very well. So instead we are waiting for the new orders that have us being here farther out than March 31st, which will allow me to get a card with privileges (right now, only base access), and Kerri and Rowan to get a card at all. It will also allow us to finish getting our 90 day tourist visas upgraded to real SOFA status with multiple entry/exit stamps. Hopefully that's coming soon.
Meanwhile, I'm the only one who can drive the car, which is a bummer for Kerri during the week as she can't go about looking for things we need like a dining table and chairs for example. We did manage to find a used fridge which is doing nicely. Also across the street from us is a recycle shop (used stuff) and we found 2 LP gas heaters that hook up to our gas outlets that exist in all the rooms. One is now Rowan's heater, and one is heating our "entertainment" room (mac mini hooked up to a computer monitor). Also a small electric heater for the bathroom which is cooooooold!
Yesterday (Saturday), we went to the base to do laundry (no washer/dryer yet), then on the way home stopped at every big box store we could find to assess our options for furniture. There are some critical items we need to start feeling more comfortable in the house. Oddly, we did not find very many good options. The best so far is a store called Nitori, where we got our futons originally. We ended up buying a lot of little things there, but even their furniture options were not agreeable to us style/price-wise. We're thinking we'll need to make the trek to Ikea after all...at least to see what they might have specific to Japanese homes. There is an Ikea in Yokohama, but it's over an hour away by the toll roads which we have not had the pleasure of figuring out yet. Today we've decided to just go to a candidate church and then come home to work on the many boxes of things scattered about the house. Kerri will take the train in to Ikea to do an exploratory run tomorrow and see if it's even worth it. I need to ask around at work for better furniture options.
Our internet is now on, and I have managed to make a perch out of a plastic box and cushion that is somewhat comfortable. I'll try to get back into the habit of blogging again. It's amazing how quickly the little things come and go in a single week, and all the cool stuff disappears from my brain.
I've tried numerous ways to get to work now:
1) Bike to train, bike to work: Verdict - not worth it. I have to walk my bike most of the way to/from the station near base, and the pain of wrapping the bike up in the cover plus hauling it up and down stairs negates any positives to the process. For a long train ride it might be worth it, but mine is only 15 minutes.
2) Walk to train, walk to work: Verdict - doable, but unpleasant feeling of being trapped on base. I want me bike with me so I can get stuff done during the day and get off base easily for lunch.
3) Drive to work: Verdict - very easy, but unpleasant dealing with driving on base. Plus - ick.
4) Bike to work: Verdict - I think this is the one for me. I did a test run yesterday morning (saturday). It took me about 50 minutes going there, but I was taking a weird route that sent me through back roads and tunnels. This is not so good on Japanese roads as this means sidewalks frequently disappear. On they way home I took main roads and did it in about half an hour. This gives me the best of all the options and includes an hours worth of daily exercise. It is unbelievably cold at the moment (and it isn't even raining yet!), but I can always layer up.
There's a liquor store nearby us and I've had the opportunity to try a couple of sakes. I was worried a bit about Japanese sakes as I've found the ones I've had in the US tend to be a bit heavy on the "off-rice" smell (I think that's the koji), so I've always preferred Momokowa (Sake-One) Sake made in Forest Grove, Oregon. But I'm happy to report the local stuff here is excellent! One misstep though...the first bottle I picked out on my own turned out to be Shochu, a distilled 25% liquor that tasted awful. It got poured down the drain and I went back and asked specifically to be shown the "o-sake" bottles.
We got to try out our o-furo (hot water bath) this week! Very nice (and I'm not really a bath person)...first your shower off, then get into the tub of hot water and soak. You push a button to fill the tub. If you've kept the water clean and free of soaps, you can push another button and it recirculates and reheats the water. That way multiple people in the family can reuse the water and not waste it. I also like the smaller, deeper bath tub. You basically sit upright in it and the water comes up to your neck. You can let the water spill over the sides as there is a drain in the shower floor right next to you.
There are plenty of other little annoying things that we're having to get used to in the house. For example we finally got some nightlights to help navigating around at night. It gets *dark*! The heater in the bathroom is helping with the freezing cold showers in the morning. And we are definitely looking forward to some basic furniture.
Well, that's it for now, I'll try and make updates more frequent now that we have internet again.
Sunday, January 29, 2012
Moving in day
It's Sunday and we are finally moving into our house today!
I was able to get my driver license on Friday. Usually, only people who ace the written exam get to take the practical on the day of the test and get their driver license. I did *not* ace it, but no one in the entire class of over 100 people did either, so I took a chance and begged the instructor to let me take the practical that day as we needed to rent a car so we could move in over the weekend. It worked! He took me over right away and I got my driver license at about 4:30pm. I went immediately to the rental office and got a van booked for Sunday at noon. Then went to the insurance office to buy insurance for our new car. Next step there is back to the Vehicle Registration Office for something magic, then to a police station to register our parking spot. 3 days after that, we go back to VRO, then to LTO (which is in Yokohama somewhere). Anyway, our car won't be ours until another week or so.
Yesterday (Saturday), I was at the house with Rowan (Kerri felt sick and stayed home) in the morning. We met our landlord, the gas guy came and turned on the gas, the Internet guy came and we signed up for Internet (160MBs for $80 a month!!!), and our agent dropped buy to sign some final paperwork and show us how to operate our heaters and bathtub. We had lunch at a local ramen shop and rode the train back to base.
So today is moving in day. We'll meet a guy from work who is kindly coming in to let us into the company office so we can extract our boxes from it. We'll get everything in our house, then go hunting for futons, pillows and hopefully at least a refrigerator (used). We still need washer/dryer before our appliances will be complete.
Tomorrow is my first day of work (though I still have some other things to take care of during the week).
Here's a picture of some Japanese Navy boats taken from a walkway near one of the train stations (not on base).
I was able to get my driver license on Friday. Usually, only people who ace the written exam get to take the practical on the day of the test and get their driver license. I did *not* ace it, but no one in the entire class of over 100 people did either, so I took a chance and begged the instructor to let me take the practical that day as we needed to rent a car so we could move in over the weekend. It worked! He took me over right away and I got my driver license at about 4:30pm. I went immediately to the rental office and got a van booked for Sunday at noon. Then went to the insurance office to buy insurance for our new car. Next step there is back to the Vehicle Registration Office for something magic, then to a police station to register our parking spot. 3 days after that, we go back to VRO, then to LTO (which is in Yokohama somewhere). Anyway, our car won't be ours until another week or so.
Yesterday (Saturday), I was at the house with Rowan (Kerri felt sick and stayed home) in the morning. We met our landlord, the gas guy came and turned on the gas, the Internet guy came and we signed up for Internet (160MBs for $80 a month!!!), and our agent dropped buy to sign some final paperwork and show us how to operate our heaters and bathtub. We had lunch at a local ramen shop and rode the train back to base.
So today is moving in day. We'll meet a guy from work who is kindly coming in to let us into the company office so we can extract our boxes from it. We'll get everything in our house, then go hunting for futons, pillows and hopefully at least a refrigerator (used). We still need washer/dryer before our appliances will be complete.
Tomorrow is my first day of work (though I still have some other things to take care of during the week).
Here's a picture of some Japanese Navy boats taken from a walkway near one of the train stations (not on base).
Monday, January 23, 2012
Area Orientation Brief
Death by powerpoint.
And we've got 4 more days to go.
Paperwork signing for our house is set for Thursday.
And we've got 4 more days to go.
Paperwork signing for our house is set for Thursday.
Sunday, January 22, 2012
Car and Ginza
Well, today was eventful.
We met the guy to check out the car nearby at 9am. He showed up with another car as well, a 2001 Honda Odyssey (here the Odyssey is still the older 4 door version). It had 40,000km and was a one owner car. It's also got all the options and was very well taken care of. After driving that and the other vehicle, and then looking at the other cars in the lemon lot, we decided the Odyssey would be the car for us. It's a lot smaller than the US version, but still pretty big by Japanese standards. It'll be very useful for hauling stuff that we need to buy for our new house, and for when we have visitors. It was $5000.
Then we headed for Ginza (just a few stops before Akihabara in Tokyo), to church. We made it down fine, found the church, then wandered around til 3pm when it started. The worship and sermon were in Japanese, but the sermon was translated. It was fine, but not a realistic church for us to attend given how far and expensive it would be to go there every sunday. We'll try another next week closer to home.
Here's a picture of Kerri and Rowan in Ginza:
We met the guy to check out the car nearby at 9am. He showed up with another car as well, a 2001 Honda Odyssey (here the Odyssey is still the older 4 door version). It had 40,000km and was a one owner car. It's also got all the options and was very well taken care of. After driving that and the other vehicle, and then looking at the other cars in the lemon lot, we decided the Odyssey would be the car for us. It's a lot smaller than the US version, but still pretty big by Japanese standards. It'll be very useful for hauling stuff that we need to buy for our new house, and for when we have visitors. It was $5000.
Then we headed for Ginza (just a few stops before Akihabara in Tokyo), to church. We made it down fine, found the church, then wandered around til 3pm when it started. The worship and sermon were in Japanese, but the sermon was translated. It was fine, but not a realistic church for us to attend given how far and expensive it would be to go there every sunday. We'll try another next week closer to home.
Here's a picture of Kerri and Rowan in Ginza:
Little differences
As is often the case when first arriving in a new country, you are most impressed by little differences. As time goes by, these little differences seem less and less impressive until you almost forget about them, only to be reminded by a visitor when they exclaim at them once again.
I wanted to start a list of "little differences" from our first impressions of Japan so that I don't forget about them all.
Kitchen and bathroom faucets - mind you, these are just in our hotel room so far, but these are the type with the single, slightly upwardly curved, faucet handle. In every other part of the world, you would push these up to turn them on, and down to turn the off. Here, it's the opposite. Frequently we will accidentally turn the faucet strength all the way up in our effort to turn it off...
Bath faucet - this is best illustrated with a picture:
Neat, huh? The big white dial is a preset for the water amount you wish to fill the tub with (I think, I've not used it yet). The knob below turns on the bath water (turn right) or the shower (turn left), increasing the strength depending on how far you keep turning it. The temperature you ask? That's the knob to the right with the numbers on it. What does this all add up to? Precise temperature every time, no need to fiddle. Just twist the bottom knob in either shower or tub direction and presto...water comes out at exactly the temperature you want it. Pretty nifty actually.
Toilet seats - I've only had the privilege once so far of truly putting one of these to use. We don't have a fancy one in our hotel. The accuracy of the automatic spray is truly astonishing...wouldn't be surprised if there are little tracking devices under there to pinpoint the stream of water that shoots out at the touch of a button. Another knob to the side controls the strength of the spray, and you hit the first knob to stop it. Of course, the seats are heated. And I'm pretty sure I was using a base model, as the (wireless) controls on the toilet in Tully's Coffee were truly something to behold. I think I could get used to this...
Toilet flushers - In Germany there were usually 2 settings to flush the toilet, one for a full flush, one for partial. The same here, except instead of pressing one of 2 buttons, it's usually a twisted knob that you twist one way or the other depending on the flush.
Free water - Truly one of the most irritating things about Germany was the lack of (ungrudging) free water available. If you wish to purchase a minuscule bottle of water brought from some glacier in the alps, you can spend the 3-5 euro it costs. If you wish to opt out, you might be refused outright, but if not, you are certainly considered a cheapskate and/or weird for wishing to drink "leitungswasser" (i.e. pipe-water). This is not something Germans would dream of considering. Here we are often brought glasses of water without even asking (!) and sometimes a pitcher of water is conveniently already placed at the table. The relief we feel at not having to deal with this issue is almost physical.
That's all for now...maybe we'll do another one of these once we are in our house for the little odd things we'll find there.
I wanted to start a list of "little differences" from our first impressions of Japan so that I don't forget about them all.
Kitchen and bathroom faucets - mind you, these are just in our hotel room so far, but these are the type with the single, slightly upwardly curved, faucet handle. In every other part of the world, you would push these up to turn them on, and down to turn the off. Here, it's the opposite. Frequently we will accidentally turn the faucet strength all the way up in our effort to turn it off...
Bath faucet - this is best illustrated with a picture:
Neat, huh? The big white dial is a preset for the water amount you wish to fill the tub with (I think, I've not used it yet). The knob below turns on the bath water (turn right) or the shower (turn left), increasing the strength depending on how far you keep turning it. The temperature you ask? That's the knob to the right with the numbers on it. What does this all add up to? Precise temperature every time, no need to fiddle. Just twist the bottom knob in either shower or tub direction and presto...water comes out at exactly the temperature you want it. Pretty nifty actually.
Toilet seats - I've only had the privilege once so far of truly putting one of these to use. We don't have a fancy one in our hotel. The accuracy of the automatic spray is truly astonishing...wouldn't be surprised if there are little tracking devices under there to pinpoint the stream of water that shoots out at the touch of a button. Another knob to the side controls the strength of the spray, and you hit the first knob to stop it. Of course, the seats are heated. And I'm pretty sure I was using a base model, as the (wireless) controls on the toilet in Tully's Coffee were truly something to behold. I think I could get used to this...
Toilet flushers - In Germany there were usually 2 settings to flush the toilet, one for a full flush, one for partial. The same here, except instead of pressing one of 2 buttons, it's usually a twisted knob that you twist one way or the other depending on the flush.
Free water - Truly one of the most irritating things about Germany was the lack of (ungrudging) free water available. If you wish to purchase a minuscule bottle of water brought from some glacier in the alps, you can spend the 3-5 euro it costs. If you wish to opt out, you might be refused outright, but if not, you are certainly considered a cheapskate and/or weird for wishing to drink "leitungswasser" (i.e. pipe-water). This is not something Germans would dream of considering. Here we are often brought glasses of water without even asking (!) and sometimes a pitcher of water is conveniently already placed at the table. The relief we feel at not having to deal with this issue is almost physical.
That's all for now...maybe we'll do another one of these once we are in our house for the little odd things we'll find there.
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