Thank Yous

So much appreciation....

When preparing to take your family, so they can stay intact, and move around the globe for almost
three months there are several people that make that decision easier.  There are several people we would like to thank for making this adventure less stressful...and possible from home.

My Mom - We did leave a family member in the U.S., our cat Scout.  And Scout has been staying with my mom and they have been getting along and keeping other company.

Charlie and Carole - You also have to have great neighbors to be able to just leave your home for so long.  Charlie and Carole have watched our house, walked through it to make sure nothing is leaking, etc, went over and checked things out with the storms that came through a couple times (apparently our grill blew over and needs some repair because of one of the storms) and told me it was no problem each time I ordered more online items so when we got home Grace would be ready for school.  When our trip was extended I got nervous about getting everything done and went on a little buying spree...and all of the packages were shipped to Charlie and Carol and are sitting inside our house waiting for us.  Grace is excited to see her new backpack and lunchbox!
Tabitha - Tabitha doesn't even live in Florence, but every couple weeks she has gone to the Florence Post Office and picked up our mail, gone through it and emailed about any of our bills that have come and a couple wedding invitations too!  In addition to her own mail, imagine the three month pile of junk mail she has gone through that belongs to us.

Lori - My friend Lori offered to buy all of Grace's school supplies for us so it's one less thing to do in the days we come home.  Yay!

People who have sent mail - My goodness.  There are several of you who have sent the girls mail.  We didn't really want mail in the beginning - knew it was more expensive to mail and didn't realize the value it would be for the girls, but people have spoiled them to the point that when Sarah walks off the elevator each day she says, "Mail?:"  The girls have enjoyed the cards, letters, artwork, stickers, etc. they have received.  It seems that many times the mail came on a rainy day when we needed a pick me up too!

All of you who have read our blog.  If you have read our blog, you have been with us on this journey.  Thank you for reading....for caring.  For those of you who have commented on the blog, emailed me or simply "liked" a post on Facebook.  I cannot explain how much of a large impact that has been to me, although you probably feel it was a small one on your part.  By doing any of those things - letting me know you were reading - it helped me feel connected to my life at home.  Connection to a community is so important whether you are living in it or on a journey away from the community you call yours.  Knowing you were next to me...to us... has been so truly meaningful.  So thank you for reading and thank you for letting me know that you were with us.

Final Weekend: Osaka Castle

So, our first weekend we set out to see the Osaka Castle, but got distracted by the International Korean Festival.  So, it seemed only fitting that our last weekend we visited the Osaka Castle.

The Osaka Castle is one of the more famous castle's in Japan - it played a large role in the unification of Japan during the 16th century.  (Wikipedia)

We toured the inside of the castle, which was filled with artwork and models of the castle in the various periods in Japan history.  As we were leaving, we found the opportunity to dress up...

Final Weekend: Fireworks

The summer brings fireworks in Japan.  There are fireworks every weekend.  This past weekend, since we extended our stay about 5 days, we were able to go to the second largest display in Japan.  The fireworks can be seen from our apartment building.

However, we decided to make the 15 minute walk to the river where they are let off.  The girls had a wonderful time (they love fireworks).  And, the fireworks display was wonderful.  The fireworks manufactures showed off a little (haha) toward the middle of the show and blasted fireworks that were shaped as happy faces, perfect stars and a face of a kitty.  It was a great show.

We left about 10 minutes before it was over - to beat the crowds - and it was a good evening.

Restaurants and Hand Towels

In every single sit down restaurant your server brings you hand towel when you sit down.  In many restaurants your server may bring you a diaper wipe-type thing (except no smell, just wet throw-away cloth) wrapped individually in plastic to keep it damp.  It's disposable.

In nicer restaurants, you get warm, damp cloth hand towels.  One per person.

The purpose of these is for you to wipe/clean your hands before you eat.  It's actually fantastic.  Grace and I have figured out that if we share one then we get to put one in my purse for another time (and let me tell you mamas...it comes in handy every single day!  I'm guessing you can buy them, but I haven't seen them at the store.  I'll miss having them so handy.

Claw Machines

We thing it's interesting some of the things you can try to win in those "claw" machines here.

How have we eaten out, not speaking the language?

Presentation is everything (I think) in Japan.  Outside of many, many, many of the restaurant windows are plates of food showing you what is offered inside.  Apparently, plastic food is an industry here.  We were going to visit one of the manufacturing facilities that makes this food with our friends upstairs (and the girls were going to be able to each make their own plastic sundaes.), but it turned out they only had the tours/classes on the weekends - which didn't work out for us.

However, plated presentation reminds me of the things they judge on Master Chef.  Have you seen our post about waffles??? Beautiful :)

Anyway, here is a sampling of window shopping (photo taking) I have done through the summer.  And, sometimes we asked the waitress to come outside the restaurant and then we pointed to what we wanted in the window.  It works.  And, I mean LITERALLY this is how we have ordered sometimes.

Also, many of the restaurants have photos in their menus too.  In those restaurants, we don't ask the waitress to go outside with us to order - we just point to ourself and then to the picture.  Not kidding.

But, aren't these presentations beautiful???

Safety and Crime in Japan

8.8 MILLION people live in Osaka, Japan.  That's 7% of Japan's population and makes it the 3rd largest prefecture (kinda like a state) in Japan.  Osaka is also the third most expensive city to live for expats (i.e. foreigners) which was published in the paper a few weeks after our arrival.  Osaka is also a sister city to Chicago in the United States!

Speaking of Chicago, it's population is about 2.7 million.  The actual city of Cincinnati has just under 300,000.  Kind of a different place over here.

Now while you are trying to conceive 8.8 million people - just in one city.  Let's talk about crime.  Specifically, murder.  (only because I'm trying to be fair and compare apples to apples here and it's the only number that I can find quickly that ensures things are being added up and divided out equivalently.)

So, per 100,000 people...in Chicago...there are 15.6 homicides
And, per 100,000 people...in Cincinnati...there are 28.8 homicides (cough, cough)
Let's whisper this so we may not faint - or just completely not believe it.
In Osaka (in a city of 8.8 million)...there are .79 murders per 100,000 people.  And, that decimal placement is not a typo!  I meant to type seventy-nine hundredths of a person is murdered per 100,000 people.

That doesn't mean murder doesn't occur, it's just not the top story on the news each night because it doesn't happen every day.
*************

On a lighter note...
We wanted to show you photos of what Jim and I have decided are examples of the theft rate in Osaka.  No numbers, just pictures....

This is a photo of a drug store by the smaller of the two train stations near our apartment.  This is actually an entrance to a hallway of maybe a restaurant and some back doors to stores along the street near the station.  There is another separate entrance on the street (and I'm taking a picture of the street entrance to this hallway which is just about 8-10 feet from the street entrance to the store).  You can also enter this store about mid- way from this aisle...see what looks to be a blue line in the center of the photo.  That's about where the door is.

Notice anything?  No store clerks.  Pretty much never...and there is an exit right where I'm taking the photo from.  Oh an there is also not really many people walking in this hallway (to keep people honest) either.  We do often see one or two people grabbing and item out here, this just happens to be a time when there was not.  I don't like taking pictures of people who maybe don't want to be on our blog.  And, I don't want to look like a tourist (haha).

Here's another example.

These are contact lenses.  Sitting on the street outside a shop where you buy them.  And not sales clerk standing out there.  Jim and I debated that the boxes were empty...aren't they locked up behind the counter at home???  Anyway, I lost.  I checked and they are not empty boxes.  And, although I didn't check the price - I don't think I have found one thing here that I can say is cheaper than in the U.S.  I'm guessing prescription contacts would be more expensive too. 

Trust is awesome.

Laundry

I wanted to share with you that many apartments we looked at did include a washer, but not a dryer.  Some included a dryer, but not a washer.  Seriously.

But, our apartment has both a washer and a dryer.  Yay us!!!  (We also have a dishwasher - which is a super bonus!)

Anyway, walking to the store one day, I took these photos to share with you.  Hanging your laundry out to dry is common...normal.

Grocery Stores in Japan

I wanted to show you some of the differences you may find in the grocery stores in Japan versus many of the large grocery chains in the U.S.  As you can see there is much more of an open market atmosphere.  And you can just pick what you want, place it in a container and go.  When you check out the cashier gives you chop sticks, mustard/ketchup, etc. depending on what you have selected.

Notice the fish.  You can reach out and touch them.  Just take what you need...

In one of our first posts, I mentioned the grocery stores were full of individual portions.  People come here to grab lunch or dinner.  It's very common (and not McDonalds!).  Here is a sampling of the variety you can grab for your meal.



Apartment: Family Room

This is our family room area.

Apartment: Bedrooms

These are the bedrooms in the apartment.  They are a nice size.  Below is a picture of the master bedroom from the doorway.  There is a closet across from the bed.

These are pictures of the girls bedroom.  They have had a "sleepover" summer and enjoyed sharing a room!

 

And we wanted to share a picture of a special angel the girls got right before our trip.  Rosemary and Hobie gave the girls each these angels and they've kept them in their room this summer to "watch over them" during our adventures.

Final Kids Plaza Visit

This week marks our final (and seventh) visit to Kids Plaza Osaka.  We spent the day playing and making sure to fit in some of the girls' favorite things.

Today, Grace entertained some children with puppets in the library area.  She was so cute, making them laugh.  Then, one of the little girls took a liking to her and grabbed her by the hand and dragged her around.  It was cute.

Afterward, we went outside to the park for a couple trips down the "big slides."  We haven't been to the park that the far side of the building exits in to since our first trip because it's just been so hot.  But we decided a few minutes wouldn't hurt...and of course those few minutes turned in to thirty!

Mangos

Fruit is packaged like this in Japan.  Almost all fruit ~ Apples, white peaches and mangos - just to name a few.  A mango is pictured to the left.  One of our dear friends in the building gave us this mango.  It is a rather large fruit for Japanese fruit size.  To us, it's probably about normal.

But, fruit here is expensive.  White peaches are often 2 for 700 Yen ($9.00).  My fruit stand couple beats that by a mile which is only one reason we go there :)  But being expensive and delicate...they package it so that it is well cared for.

Now, I'm not sure I've mentioned this before but there is this drink that was in the vending machines here for about a month that we call "Mango Juice.:  It's a mildly carbonated beverage that is flavored like a mango.  Sarah loves it.  The first time she tried it, I promise you it was like a drug to her.  She could not get enough and she would not let the bottle go.  Then, it left the vending machine and everyone was sad for her.  Luckily though, our favorite grocery store (Life) carries it so she is not without until next week when we go home.

So, this may be part of the reason our friend gave us the mango...because she knows about the mango juice obsession that someone in our family has!

Oh and by the way...real mango fruit...Sarah says is quite good too!

Weekend 11: Giggles

On our way home from the beach, we stopped and had dinner inside this really nice mall.  The restaurant we ate at was a nice open air restaurant that reminded me of an environment at a hotel (without walls).

Across from our table was this clock.  (This past week we have been reviewing telling time during our "school work").  As we were leaving this was our conversation:

Grace:  "Look!  That clock is in Japanese."

Me:  (laughing) "No Grace, those are Roman Numerals"

Grace:  "Those aren't Ramen Noodles!"

Weekend 11: Shirahama Beach

For one of our last weekends we decided to take the girls back to the beach.  But, this time a beach with beautiful clear blue water...and one that was 3 hours away.

We got up and left the apartment at 6:30 a.m. (so we could make the 8 a.m. train that connected about 20 minutes away).  It was 6:45 a.m. when I looked at my watch and noticed that the air was so humid that when you rubbed your hands together they felt wet - at 6:45 a.m.!

We walked to Osaka City Station, rode to the Tennoji Station (by subway) and then bought tickets for the 2 1/2 hour train ride to Shirahama.  The picture of Grace to the left is how she waited for the train to arrive.  We knew Sarah was going to love riding the train for this long! 

After we arrived at the Shirahama train station we then got on a bus for a 10-15 minute ride to the beach (that's three modes of transportation Sarah has ridden on today!  She is so happy!)  Here we are on the bus:

Here are pictures of the beautiful (and very busy) beach:

While the beach WAS busy, we easily found a place to put our stuff down, spread out our blankets and really did not feel like we were right on top of the people next to us.

For days now Sarah has talked about how much she loved the floaties Daddy bought her so we didn't have to hold her in the water.

For some reason the girls made it a game to collect seaweed and put it in the sand castle bucket.  It was mostly Sarah on this mission, but they both took part in it.  For some reason I only got a picture of Grace with the seaweed.

And, of course, Grace made a friend.  And although they couldn't actually speak to one another, that doesn't mean they couldn't communicate and have fun together!

Somehow we left the beach without a family photo.  But, we did leave with a little sunburn and lots of great memories.



In the taxi

P.S.  Here is a funny story.  A couple of weeks ago the girls and I were talking about how Daddy takes a train and then a taxi to work every day.  (Now the funny-ness of the story is in how fast Sarah turned her neck around at that comment).  After she heard what I said, she snapped her neck around to me and said, "IIIII haven't ridden in a taxi."  It was a moment where she realized there was yet another mode of transportation...and she hadn't tried it out yet!!!  I told Jim the story and we had been laughing about it for a couple weeks.

So, on the way home from the beach, we were trying to figure out when the bus was coming we could take to get back to the train station - and also worried we may miss the train (the long one) and then would have to wait 2 hours for the next one, we saw a taxi.  Soooo, Sarah is now able to say she has also ridden in a taxi!