Partying Stateside . . . Flying Solo

Four of us left Japan, but only one of us Kasdans has returned. (For now.) Mike had an uneventful flight back home and arrived tonight to a very quiet apartment. The past week's trip home was terrific, but it absolutely flew by. (In fact, the trip was so short that they had the same movie choices on the airplane on the way back. Not good.)

By the way, the picture above and at the left is from the extremely large 51st floor patio of a building that Mike's brother, Dave, had been working on. Nice view, huh?

Our time was mostly filled with family events leading up to Dave and Heather's wedding. and the wedding itself. There was the Thursday night Steak Dinner Party. There was the Friday night Family and Friends at Our Aunt and Uncle's House In Brooklyn Party. There was the Saturday Night Out-Of-Town-Guest Pizza Party. Oh, and then there was the wedding itself too! (Sounds like a lot of parties; and it was, but each was really nice in its own way.) In between, we also crammed in some visits with friends, as well as some much-needed shopping.

The wedding which was absolutely wonderful. It was so special to spend so much time with family. And we were so proud of Jacob and Lauren, who carried off their ring-bearer and flower-girl duties with love and energy. (We are considering renting Lauren out as a flower-girl and wedding dancer. She was literally non-stop.)

Here are some pictures from the wedding:

Back in the US...Back in the US...Back in the US

So, after a longer-than-necessary flight from Osaka to JFK (by way of Chicago - we had to stop to drop off a sick passenger, refuel, wait and then carry on to NY), we arrived back in the U.S. for the first time since moving to Japan in January.

We spent our day visiting with family, and the following day back in sunny tree-lined Maplewood. We visited Jacob's kindergarten class, checked in at our house, lunched at our favorite local coffee shop, and ran into some friends. It was great to actually drive a car again. Among the highlights of the day was the quintessentially American experience of shopping at Costco and Trader Joe's.

It is nice to be home.

Heading Home

Tomorrow AM, bright and (very) early, we are heading home to New Jersey. Mike will be back in Japan in about a week. Until then, there is unlikely to be anything new posted here.

In the meantime, feel free to post comments on topics of interest that you'd like to hear about in the coming weeks. In short, "Tawk amongst yourselves."

Industrial League Baseball - Matsushita vs. NTT

On Monday evening, we got to experience a different brand of Japanese baseball - the Japanese Industrial League. Panasonic (Matsushita Electric), owns an amateur baseball club that competes in this league against teams owned by many of the other large Japanese companies. Every summer, there is a large tournament, with the finals played in the Tokyo Dome. The Panasonic team is playing in the Osaka Region preliminary round, held at the Osaka Dome (大阪ドーム).

A co-worker of Mike's was good enough to translate an email that was sent to all employees urging them to go and take their families to cheer on the Matsushita team. Tickets were free and transportation was paid for. They just want those fannies in the seats. We took them up on that offer. (And we were without a doubt, the only gaijin there).

The level of play is akin to the high minor leagues; many from this league are eventually drafted onto Japan's professional teams. The atmosphere, however, is very similar to college sports, complete with raucous cheering and lots of team (company) spirit. They handed out Blue and Yellow Panasonic Fans to everyone on the Panasonic side (the first base line), which we beat and sang in unison. Much to Jacob and Lauren's delight, there was a band, some guy whaling on a huge drum, and a mini-stage for the and male and female cheerleaders. The two main cheers translated as "Beat NTT" and " Player X Get a Powerful Hit." But set to music and in Japanese, it sounds much better! Every time we scored a run, it was like a 20 minute party, complete with insane cheering, including the waiving of flags and banners in Hiragana and Katakana (good reading practice!) and Kanji (below are the cheerleaders on stage unfurling banners with each syllable of MA-TSU-SHI-TA written in Katakana), pounding on our Fans, the singing of the company cheer, and the young band members taking a frenzied lap of our side of the stadium.

Lucky for us, the game itself was also very exciting. NTT got out to an early 3-1 lead, but Matsushita came back with single runs in the bottom of the 8th and 9th innings. Then in the bottom of the 10th, we pushed one more run across to win it on a walk-off bloop single. That's how we roll at Matsushita baby.

Jacob was ecstatic with the come-back win. Lauren, who was dancing around with her eyes glued to the cheerleaders all game, also had a blast until she fell asleep on Ilena. She is only built for 9 innings.

Oh, and yes, the cheerleaders pictured above are full-time Matsushita employees. They float between the Matsushita baseball, volleyball, and basketball teams.

School's Out! Scream and Shout!

Friday marked the last day of school for Canadian Academy and the other international schools in the area. Over the past few days, Jacob and Lauren's classes both had visits to the River Mall and class picnics, and the kids brought home their many end-of-the-year class projects. We were invited to Jacob's classroom on Friday for a "poetry recital," which was totally adorable. Jacob wore his pride from ear to ear and didn't stop glowing. Here are some photos and a short video clip of the recital.

Here is Jacob, with his terrific KB teachers:

And Lauren with her fantastic BBP teacher:

While the end of the school year has arrived for us, it's not even close to the last day for the Japanese schools. The Japanese school year starts in April and students have a one month break from the end of July through the end of August. They continue their studies in the grueling, hot summer heat while the rest of the ex-pat community is traveling and relaxing.

(On a related note, we continue to be impressed by the detail-orientedness and work ethic of the Japanese students; this past weekend we witnessed an intense super-organized dodgeball (!) practice (seriously). Organized chants, high stepping lines of kids ducking flying dodgeballs for hours on a weekend morning. In the U.S., we dabble in this "sport" at gym class and then make bad funny movies about it; here they work at it until they master it. It certainly says something.)

Since the summer holiday is the only time some families get to return home, Rokko Island really clears out for July and August. The ex-pat community fans out all over the world. Our friends are heading home to places like New Zealand, Barcelona, Canada, Korea, India, The Philippines, and of course the USA. Lauren's teacher and family bought an "around the world" ticket and will be traving west from Japan making at least a half-dozen stops in the next 6 weeks before returning to Japan. Pretty cool, huh?

While a trip literally around the world was pretty enticing, we've decided to head home to the New Jersey area for Mike's brother's wedding. Mike will be home for one short week, before returning to Japan, to join the ranks of the "summer-time single Dads," while Ilena and the kids will stay in the U.S. for an extra four weeks -visiting family and friends, and traveling the span of the eastern seaboard, from Vermont to Florida. We are all very excited for our first trip home.

In the meantime, we have a few days just to relax and enjoy:

A Great Local Yakitori Place

In the food department, on Saturday night we met up with friends for yakitori, aka all sorts of different types of grilled chicken items on sticks. Here is an example menu of the types of items they have.

Our friends recommended a terrific place in nearby Ashiya called Masaya that they had been to many times before. This yakitori-ya was really great. Delicious cheap eats. And everything was so tasty. We had grilled chicken with scallions, grilled chicken meatballs, grilled chicken mixed with cartilage (slightly crunchy!), grilled chicken skin, thigh meat, grilled ginko balls, yaki-onigiri, baked potatoes, all washed down with half-and-half beers (Kirin Black and Kirin Lager) and Chu Hi. We will be going back, no doubt.

Following our friends' advice, the only food on the menu that we specifically decided to steer clear of was the chicken sashimi. Just not sure our constitutions are meant to quite handle that. And it just sounds wrong!

From The Natural Disasters Department

Well that was strange timing. Strange times weather wise world-wide, it seems.

Today, a powerful earthquake (around 7 on the Richter Scale) hit Northeast Japan. (Very far from where we live, but apparently it could be felt a bit as in Tokyo.)

Here and here are some articles with early news coverage.

Of course, earthquakes are not strange events for Japan. Here is a link to the Japan Meteorological Agency website, where you can see information on the many earthquakes - most quite small - that hit Japan just about every day.

But this was a sizable one. Hopefully the damage is minor.

Natural Disasters...In NJ?

What are the chances that our town in NJ would be hit with a bigger storm than we've witnessed since being in Japan (so far) ?!

Apparently, New Jersey, along with much of the rest of the United States has been riddled with strange violent tornado-like storms.

Earlier this week, our town back home had a declared state of emergency, with two-day-long power outages, uprooted and fallen trees, smushed cars, and blown out windows and damaged roofs of houses. Yeesh.

Aside from the above link, check out some picture albums (here and here) that have been posted of places that are mere blocks from our house back home.

Our Number One Son

Jacob, meanwhile, is now helping us read books and is also (all of the sudden) doing basic addition. As he brings home more and more of his school projects from the year (only two days left of school!), we continue to be more and more amazed with his intellectual curiosity and how much he actually learned this year.

On the sporting side, he continues to be a fierce competitor. Especially on the soccer field. (Although he was a bit bummed to go to soccer practice, and not be able to watch Lauren's first ballet class! He got over it quickly.) We heard from some other kids around school that he is known as "the football (aka soccer) kid." Jacob is like a soccer gym rat, organizing a pick-up game at every opportunity. He is definitely large and in charge out there!

These days, Jacob is spending most of his time playing in the fountains with his buddies at the River Mall:

Our Little Girl!

Is there anything she can't do?! Lauren is a caring "mother" for her baby-dolls, an amazing artist, super at puzzles, great at card games, and a huge help around the house. She is a great distance runner. She scooters. She bikes. She is the perfect sister and playmate for Jacob. And as we've said before, it is actually therapeutically relaxing to watch her play by herself.

Yesterday, Mike got home and was looking at some of the papers the kids had been working on. In decent Kindergardener handwriting, one sheet read "Jacob" "Lauren" "Mom" "Dad." It looked just like Jacob's handiwork. But it was actually Lauren - who did it all by her self!

This week, with school winding down, Ilena got to join and observe her gym class.

She plays soccer:

She also plays floor hockey (those puffy hockey sticks bring back memories, huh!?):

Ilena also took Lauren to first very first ballet class this week! Insanely cute:

We love our little girl. Hey, we might be biased . . . But we're allowed to be. Its our blog! Here is one for the grandparents: