Adrift in Japan

Adrift Elsewhere

Adrift in Japan is over, but the blogging isn't! Come visit me at the new location, Click Clack, where I'm posting (almost) daily photos and a few words about life in Singapore, where I'm currently pursing my MBA at INSEAD.

We're Going!

Packing is in "The Final Packdown" and we're ready to put our Airport in our suitcase and start staging our things for departure. Yes, I said staging. We have so much stuff we have to take a full load to Matt's office of the things we are leaving behind for others to pick through. Then we have another extremely full load which we are taking to the airport with us. We stay at the airport tonight and fly off early tomorrow. Wish us luck!

Sony Stylin'

After months / weeks / days of consideration, we finally bought our new digital camera tonight using our Yodobashi points. It's a Sony DSC-W1 Cybershot. When the T1 first came out, we were enchanted by its small size and its 5 megapixel resolution, but we kept an open mind about what we'd buy. After all, we were still saving up Yodobashi points to cover our new camera. Then we considered the Kyocera / Contax camera that twists, but my dad has it and doesn't love it.

When it came down to it, I was interested in a few specific things in my new digital camera (I say "my" because Matt got the rangefinder for his birthday):

• Relatively small size, but not at the expense of picture quality or other desired features
• Good ergonomics
• Different pictures modes
• The ability to easily take self-portraits, because Matt and I usually forget to take photos of ourselves
• An integrated cover of some type for the lens so I don't have to worry about (1) remembering to take it off, and (2) losing it

This led us to consider the Sony DSC-F88, which I've personally always liked this design because the swivel of the lens lets you see yourself in the LCD while you frame the shot (this is the first model of this type available in the states but the 3rd in Japan), as well as the Canon PowerShot A80, which has a swivelling LCD that would serve similarly to the swivelling lens on the F88.

I had a successful conversation (in Japanese!) with a helper person yesterday about which was better and he took me to the Kyocera camera. Kawai! (cute) he said. I guess 'cause I'm a girl. Then he took me to the Contax one which is the same except with a better lens, but my dad's not thrilled with his and I thought it would be weak to get the same camera. So even though we had a good communication experience I had to pass on his advice.

In the end we decided on the W1. The A80 is only 4 megapixels, it's a little chunky, and the LCD is small (I do like the A80's choose-your-focusing-point function). The F88 is too new yet to have reviews in America, the power button seems too easy to hit accidentally, and, well, it was the most expensive of the three. The W1 is smaller than the A80, has the largest (read: huge) LCD, the best ergonomics (IMHO), and good scene modes (read the review). Ok, it doesn't have a swiveling lens or LCD. We'll still have to hold the camera out in one hand and guess on the composition of the shot. Still, it didn't seem worth it to pay the premium for the F88 just for that capability, and lose other features in the meantime. So, the W1 it is!

I'm charging the batteries now. We'll let you know how it goes. I expect to buy some accessories, like maybe the wide angle lens and the extra flash.

[Sorry for the lack of updates here. Things have been busy... Japanese class is now every day for 4 hours. It's a great class, but I've been tired.]

Back in Town

We're back from our trip with our parents to Kyoto, Nara, Koyasan and Tokyo. Details soon. After I recover from this horrible bug I got during the trip.

"Pointo Cado" Mania

One of the things that Matt and I didn't jump in on when we first got here is the point card that seems to be so ubiquitous here. Okay, yes, we did manage to sign up for a Gold Point Card at Yodobashi Camera, which has served us well. We have over 43,000 yen in points and I'm hoping to use those points soon to buy a new digital camera to take with us when we go to Kyoto in May (Matt got a new film camera, I get a digital with the points. Good deal, huh?) But our Yodobashi Gold Point Card is the only real point card we have.

And every store has one. You can't make a purchase anywhere without being asked if you have one. Sometimes I can understand the question ("Pointo cado o motte imasu ka?") but sometimes I can't and I just assume that's what they're asking. For all I know they're asking if I would prefer paper or plastic. Just a quick list of the point cards I don't have that I probably should have signed up for: Seibu and Loft (Club One), Daimaru, Stellar Place, Maruzen... okay, actually, that's not so bad. I guess I don't shop in too many places. Matt and I realized at some point we should have signed up for the cards but we have finished all our major purchases and don't expect to spend much more, and we don't even know how much you have to spend to earn rewards, or what the rewards are.

I do however have stamp-for-purchase cards from several places - one for Toppi, the keitan sushi place we like, and one for Baskin Robbins. Actually we got one for our favorite Italian place here too, once, but I lost it, and they haven't given us a new one, but we regularly get dinner coupons there so maybe they think there's no point in giving us a stamp card. I also have a discount card for the dry cleaners that gives some ridiculously small percentage off each visit but it's better than nothing. And a couple of days ago I picked up Starbucks's new promotion for the summer, which as far as I can tell, not really being able to read the material that well, seems to be some sort of stamp card that includes spaces for whether you have tried all of their "Summer Experiences" (seasonal beverages).

This post was prompted by today's visit to McDonald's. I bought a "Happi Setto" -- the Japanese happy meal, because they're giving away little stuffed dogs from The Dog artist collection (I got a little bulldog). And the woman asked me if I would like to sign up for a McDonald's point card. Yep, you heard me. As of today I am the (proud?) ownder of my very own McDonald's point card. It's good for a year according to info on the card -- expires 2005/04/19. I'm not sure what I can get with points and I don't really eat at McDonalds that often, so I'm not sure how useful it will be. Still, it's pretty funny. And I might go back and buy another Happi Setto so I can get another mini-doggie in a different breed. Plus, I got a scratch card today and won what I seem to have determined is a Minute Maid Orange, small size. So I have to go back at least once.

(To our loyal readers, who are pretty much friends, family and the odd knitting blogger, I apologize for the recent irregular blogging at this site. Stay tuned for more regular updates and the addition of a new photo gallery.)

More Peeps Fun

• The Pioneer Press Peeps Diorama Contest! (check out the slide show)
• A Small Victory's Peeple are Peeple
• Peep Jousting
• Marshmallow Peeps Marshmallow Maker

Leave a link if you find some good Peeps stuff.

Happy Easter!

We now interrupt our weblog silence to bring you Easter Greetings and a little information on Peep Research.

Hanami

Yesterday the temperature in Sapporo reached 10 degrees Celsius for the first time this year. Today, it's snowing again, big fluffy white flakes that will probably be gone tomorrw. The snow is definitely on the decline here, although we're still getting new snow almost every day. Given the conditions, it was a little humorous when we turned on the English language translation of the news last night to find the Hanami Forecast for the rest of Japan.

"Hanami" is the Japanese word for "cherry blossom viewing," and is very important to the Japanese. They plan major festivals around when the blossoms will be at their peaks, and plan parties which can be ruined if they are scheduled for the wrong date. From watching the news, Matt and I can tell that Hanami is even more important than we had suspected. The length of time they spend talking about it makes it seem that people drop everything else in their lives to hurry with bento boxes to the best sakura blossom viewing places for picnics.

In case you think I'm exaggerating, let me point out that a specific portion of each news broadcast in the spring is dedicated to the forecast. I'm not talking about the regular weather forecast - this is a specific Cherry Blossom Flowering Forecast. There's an abbreviated forecast at About.com, but the one on the news features a maps with dates of Cherry Blossom Flowering onset, complete with information about the best viewing window, to help people plan which days they will host their parties or picnics. In Tokyo, where they expect full Hanami time to strike any minute now, there was a full report on the man whose responsibility it is to officially announce cherry blossom season. Apparently, there is a specific tree they use as the barometer (sort of like Punxsutawney Phil). When a certain percentage of its buds come into bloom, then the season is officially underway. The Japanese government official was convinced that enough blossoms would be in bloom very soon, and returned yesterday several times to the tree to count blooms. It must be his only responsibility for this time of the year.

Apparently the blooms are very early this year due to unseasonably warm weather, coming about 9 or 10 days earlier than the usual date of blooming in the various cities. This is causing some consternation among those whose livelihoods depend on the income from people on Hanami picnics or walks or parties. It reminds me a little of the great trauma experienced in low-snow years in Wisconsin, where all the people who depend on snowmobilers or cross country skiers suddenly find they have no income because there's no snow for outdoor activities. Still, it's not as if the cherry blossoms aren't coming out at all -- they're just coming a little early. Perhaps people's parties have long been planned for dates which it's now clear will be after the main blooming time. All the same, I am sure people will still flock to see the blossoms as soon as they come out. Everyone's just caught a little off guard.

Hokkaido wasn't even included in last night's Hanami forecast. In the cherry blossom forecast, they showed pictures of cherry trees with buds on the limbs, just waiting to burst out. Considering the piles of snow still on the ground here, it's clear our trees won't have buds any time soon, let alone blooms. I suppose that's why Hanami time here is supposedly in May. Stay tuned. I'm sure we'll have pictures.

Weaving

The weather continues to be very spring-like. By that, I don't mean it's really warm, although that has happened. What I mean is that we cycle through the seasons in one day, starting sometimes with a clear morning, having almost a blizzard an hour later, clearing slightly, snowing again, clearing.... going from 4 below zero to as high as 8 degrees (Celsius) above zero in one day.

All of these rapid changes could be seen through the large windows spanning an entire wall of my classroom at Geijitsu no Mori, although most of the time I was there, it was snowing like mad. Read the rest of the details of my weaving class.

Classes in Japanese

This past weekend I took a spinning class at the Art Park here in Sapporo. When I say "spinning," I don't mean bicycling to music on an imaginary bicycle with a sweaty instructor barking out commands. I mean the old-fashioned kind of spinning, where you make yarn.

Now I know I've said before that people in Sapporo don't really speak English. Sometimes people working at stores or restaurants will dredge up a bit of their English knowledge (such as around the time of the Snow Festival when lots of gaijin were around), but most of the time, we struggle. Still, certain communities of people know more than others -- Matt's labmates may not speak much English but they do understand quite a bit, from reading English journals, if nothing else.

If I was looking for a community with the poorest English language skills, I would have to say I pretty much found it at the Art Park. Most of the other students were older women, say in their 40s and 50s. None of them spoke any English. Nor did the primary teacher, an older woman, or the secondary teacher, an older man. Nor did the assistant, a young woman who managed to speak perhaps 10 words of English to me over 2 days. The class did include one woman who could say a few words in English but whose primary foreign language was French because she studied it for 8 years. Too bad she hadn't studied German for 8 years; then, we might have had a chance of actually talking to each other. There was also one younger woman, perhaps just a bit older than me, who could communicate somewhat in English, enough to say she might know more English than I know Japanese. Anyway, the class was challenging for not being able to speak the language. We'll see what next weekend's weaving class is like. At least I've already taken a weaving class.

Read more about my spinning class.

Kushi-ya

When we went to Toppi, we saw there were quite a few other good looking restaurants up there, so last night Matt and I decided to try another restaurant in ESTA's 10th floor "Gourmet Town."

We peered in through the windows of the restaurants and chose one that looked relatively busy (we avoid empty restaurants, assuming they're empty for a reason) and where you cook in your table. After we walked in, we quickly established that the language barrier was going to be something of a problem. It turned out to be an all-you-can eat style restaurant with several different plans, but we couldn't determine what the plans were. I asked the waitress in Japanese if she could speak English and she clearly couldn't. Eventually, she told us to wait and went to the back, returning with an apparently Chinese-Japanese man who proceeded to ask us, in Japanese, if I spoke Chinese. Um, no, that's why I asked if she spoke English, not Chinese.

At this point, the original woman reached into a folder and took out a sheet of paper that explained the restaurant in English. It seems to me this should have been her first instinct when we told her we spoke English, but maybe I'm being unreasonable. Or maybe not. At any rate, we finally figured it out, picked our plan, and were seated.

Even after that it was clear we were the center of attention. The Chinese guy who spoke a little English accompanied us and stood there next to the table while we read our English language instructions. He also asked me several more times if I was Chinese (I'm Chinese-American, which I told him) and whether I spoke Chinese. I answered in Japanese, "amari..." which essentially means, "not so much." I speak less Chinese than I do Japanese at this point, which isn't surprising considering I've lived here since August and I only studied Chinese for 9 weeks 6 years ago. He did ask me something like "susi?" which I didn't understand but turned out to mean he was asking if we wanted sushi. I just didn't catch the sound properly. He brought us a free plate of sushi, most likely because he thought we had never eaten sushi. It was a little uncomfortable at first being the focus of their attention, but finally more customers started showing up, the Chinese guy (a cook) retreated to the kitchen, and we could eat in peace.

About the Restaurant
I'm sorry I don't know the actual name of the restaurant. It's the kushi-ya on the 10th floor of Esta. In a kushi-ya, there is hot oil on your table. You take skewers of meat, vegetables, and seafood, dip them in a batter and then roll them in panko (Japanese breadcrumbs) and fry them in the oil for a few minutes before pulling them out , letting them cool slightly, and then dipping them in a sauce and biting in carefully. Here's a picture of Matt holding two skewers.

<sidebar>I'm not sure why, but Japan seems to have more different types of cooking-food-at-your-table than most other cultures -- shabu shabu, sukiyaki, genghis khan, kushi-age, etc. I'm curious how it evolved; maybe Japanese people just like to control their food.</sidebar>

All-you-can eat for 90 minutes was 1999 yen, and an additional 1000 yen for all-you-can-drink. All people at the table have to get the same plan, and since I wasn't going to drink, we skipped the drink option. Our money bought us unlimited trips up to the buffet, which included salads, edamame, steamed Chinese buns, eggrolls, and more, in additional to the skewers. The skewer selection was extensive, and included chicken, beef, squid, lotus, quail eggs (one of my favorites), small shrimp, octopus balls, egg omelettes, hamburger, green chiles (Matt's favorite), mushrooms, potatoes, gyoza (another favorite of mine), and more. There were also at least 6 different sauces, not including the flavored salts.

Between us, we ate 55 skewers, plus some smaller pre-cooked items from the buffet, and our free plate of sushi. And we only ate for an hour.

The verdict? We had this style of cuisine once before, in Kyoto. This was actually much better, probably because the oil was very hot which cooked the skewers very well. The oil was held in a built-in unit in the table and the built-in seemed to maintain the temperature well. Plus, the batter was very light and the panko gave a great crunchiness. All in all, thumbs up for a fun time. Definitely a great thing to do with a small group (small enough to fit around a table and share one cooker), if not the healthiest. We'll be back. Of course, at this rate we're identifying so many restaurants we like enough to go back to, we might not have time to go back to them all.

Just Another Day

The past two days were snowy and blowy. Sunday featured heavy, wet snow that seemed to even shut down some of the trains, causing our train to be late coming in to Sapporo Station in the evening and leading us to slog home afterwards since there weren't many trains running. All day and all evening and all day the next day, heavy snow was falling off of the roof. Yesterday it was blowing so much that even when it wasn't snowing, it looked like it was. I went out to Starbucks and Jusco and found snow (both fresh and drifted) up to just below my knees in some places.

You might say that it wasn't spring-type weather. Certainly the snow was beautiful and white and fluffy... well, okay, not fluffy. More like fluffy, heavy bricks. But anyway, white. Not muddy. And it's true. It was lovely. But it just serves to extend springtime (see previous entry). More snow = takes more time to melt = yucky ugly part of spring is longer. Today it seems to be warmer. Snow continues to pour off the roof. Water drips. Mud gathers. Matt predicts I'll be grumpy about spring for months. We'll see. Wet soggy socks are never, ever fun. And sometimes they smell like wet dog. I don't want to deal with that smell until we actually have a dog.

Hello, My Name is Michelle

... and I hate Spring.

You heard me right. I hate Spring. There, I said it. Because so many people love spring and I'm always hearing people say, "Oooh! I love Spring!" stating my feelings so bluntly almost feels like becoming a charter member of "I Hate Springtime Anonymous."

It's wet. It's dreary. It's cloudy. The formerly beautiful white snow gradually turns to dirty brown mush and then to squishy messy mud. On the way it goes through the slush stage, which, at night, freezes again into slicks of ice. And then warms again the next day to turn to mush and sludge. Did I mention it's wet? And not at all pretty.

Maybe springtime in some places is nice. I remember not minding springtime in San Francisco. Of course, there there is no snow to melt into 6 feet wide pools in the middle of the street, or into a gigantic mud pond on the walk to the lab. Here, there's nothing but slush turning to ice turning to dirty water. Did I mention it's wet?

And now Sapporo seems to have settled into permanent springtime, or at least it seems like to be like this from mid-February to at least mid-April. It seems to have perfected staying in this icky state. Cold one day, with a little snow, warm and slushy the next, cold and icy afterwards followed by a dusting of snow and another couple of days of warmth. Aaargh.

That Infernal Noise

Last night, just after getting done in the bathroom and ready for bed, we heard a horrible sound coming from outside, which Matt was able to identify as the screeching sounds of our building's fire alarm. Of course, we were already in jammies and debated for a while whether we should bother to leave the building. Is it a drill? Do you smell smoke? Maybe we can wait to leave the building, since it's not like it would be tough to get out of the building. And so on.

But eventually I pulled on some jeans over my jama pants and a sweater over my jama shirt, and Matt put on some real clothes too, and we bundled up and headed outside to join the rest of the residents of our building milling around outside. It was only our building with an alarm going off, so none of the other international people were there. Everyone looked kind of lost and confused, wondering what was happening, and were either standing around in clumps or climbing into their cars to keep warm.

We were waiting and waiting for the fire truck to arrive. I have to say, we were not particularly impressed with their response time. It's not like we could see flames licking out of the building or anything so worrisome, but even if there had been, the truck certainly wouldn't have gotten there any faster.

When the truck finally did arrive, it (rather humorously) tried to enter the area through the nearest driveway, which is blocked by an enormous pile of snow. After hesitating, it went down the block to another driveway and then doubled back. I'm thinking they should notify the city or university and say, what's up with the big pile of snow preventing us from prompt emergency response?"

Once they finally got here, they scrambled out of their truck and ran around, and somehow thought they identified the apartment at fault. 006? they ran around asking residents where it was. Of course, there is no 006 in our building. Sorry. Doesn't exist. It took a while for the firemen to figure that out, but even figuring it out didn't stop them from scampering around like lost chickens as they searched for the source of the problem.

The best part of the whole thing was that none of the adult residents of out building could communicate with the firemen beyond nodding or saying (in Japanese), "I understand only a little Japanese." Only the kids who go to school here could speak enough to understand the firemen, so it was up to them to communicate. Unfortunately the kids didn't speak English either, so as the only native English speakers in the area we were pretty much out of luck on figuring out what was up.

Eventually they turned off the alarm and identified the apparently two culprits as our upstairs neighbors - directly above us and above across the way. They had to send a kid to fetch some of them back from someone else they were visiting and make some sort of signals and said some things about what had caused the alarm to go off.

Naturally Matt and I stared blankly back, and nodded. We still have no idea, but we think it's something our neighbors did to their apartment, or maybe to their smoke detector. After we went back into our apartment, the alarm went off again, just for a second, and it sounded like the firemen were demonstrating, see, this is what you did to make it go off. Now please don't do it again!

Sapporo Snow Festival

Today is the first official day of the Sapporo Snow Festival, the biggest event each year in Sapporo. Despite dire predictions that quality of sculptures would suffer this year due to the deployment of Japanese Self-Defense Forces to Iraq, the festival doesn't seem to be affected.

The festival may not have started till today but we spent the past few days visiting the sights so we could see everything before my aunt had to go back to Singapore today. We were able to see sculptures in both ice and snow under construction and completed, as well as see the giant snow sculptures with ice slides for kids at the Self Defense Forces base.

The sculptures are both beautiful and imposing. To say I'm impressed almost seems like understating it. I heard about the festival, but I had no idea it would be this grand (after being disappointed by White Illumination). The dinosaurs appear to be carved in their true-to-life dimensions. The building replicas are incredibly detailed. Info on the large sculptures says they were created by the combined efforts of between 2500 to 3000 people EACH. That doesn't count the smaller sculptures created by competing teams, such as the Uncle Sam from the US Navy guys from Massawa or the numerous Finding Nemo sculptures or Winnie-the-Pooh (Pu-san) renditions.

I posted a few photos of the ice festival already in our Adrift with a Camera [Phone] blog. Stay tuned for a bigger gallery when I download the photos from my dad's digital camera.

Happy Chinese New Year!

Yeah, we know, we know, we've been slacking on the updates.

Had a great time skiing -- although we didn't ski that much. There was a snow storm and so much wind the gondola closed... so much blowing snow, it was one of the worst white outs I've ever driven in (although technically, I wasn't driving). The onsen was cute; we were the only gaijin, but (surprise!) we managed to run in to people we actually know while we were there! Now for a trip to Tomakomanai to see them.

Otherwise... keeping busy here, a little Japanese studying and lots of work for Matt, a little Japanese studying and lots of puttering for me, including knitting, drawing, and cooking. I've made some small inroads into Japanese cooking, mostly me reading the cookbook recipes and then playing it by ear to see what we get. So far, so good.

Happy Year of the Monkey to everyone, and don't forget to wear something new today as a token of good fortune. And don't clean your home for the next 2 weeks. Wouldn't want to sweep all that good fortune out the door!

Xmas Round Up

We're back from our trip to the US - one week in Michigan with Matt's side, followed by one week in Wisconsin with my side of the family. A good time was had by all, including tasty food running the gamut from traditional Ukrainian Christmas fare to homecooked Chinese food and, oh yes, that sinful almond toffee my mom has taken to buying for everyone for Christmas. Not that I didn't like the panattone bread she gives away - but this toffee is the best ever.

Christmas primarily centered around things we can use while we're here - such as slippers to keep our feet warm, and DVDs (the Indiana Jones box set) to entertain us. Among other things, I got the Wacom Intuous2 graphic tablet off of my wishlist (which, by the way, I already love, despite being a pretty poor artist), and Matt got some great headphones from Bose. You know the ones -- those noise-cancelling headphones that make you envy people wearing them on airplanes listening to their music or to blissful nothingness while you deal with engine whine and the cry of that baby three seats over. They're Grrreat!

Matt also got a pile of games for his GBA, including Lord of the Rings, Prince of Persia, a compilation of old arcade games and Final Fantasy Tactics. Now in the gameboy: Mario & Luigi superstar saga. One plus for this game is that it can save gameplay for more than one user, so Matt and I are playing it at the same time and saving separately. Fun and interesting, it's one of the few games of this time to hold my interest this far. I'm several hours into it with a lot further to go. And as much as I like it, I might have to put it on hold... I can't wait to try Final Fantasy Tactics. As a long time viewer of others playing all kinds of titles in the Final Fantasy series, I'm finally ready to tackle it on my own. Here's hoping there's a lot of training in the game.

I also received several Japanese cookbooks and bought one myself. We're planning to take a lot more care to learn Japanese cooking over the next few months. Stay tuned for reviews of the cookbooks. On deck: Japanese Homestyle Cooking by Tokiko Suzuki, Japanese Cooking the traditions, techniques, ingredients and recipes by Emi Kazuko, and Bento Boxes: Japanese Cooking on the Go by Naomi Kijima.

This weekend Matt's planned a surprise trip for us which he just told me about yesterday. We're heading out to Niseko to a small onsen for relaxation and hopefully at least one day of skiing. Hopefully jetlag will be under control and ski conditions will be good (they should be; it was just snowing this morning). Stay tuned for moblog photos!

New Year's Resolutions

I can't believe we've already been living in Sapporo four months. As time ticks away, I'm living in fear I'm not going to make the most out of my time in Japan. Here's a few things on my to do list for 2004.

• Get my official work permission
• Open my own bank account at the post office so I can get paid (see previous point)
• Get as much as possible out of Nihongo Salon
• Get together with my Japanese teacher now that she's not my teacher any more
• Hang out with the other nice Japanese woman who volunteered to be my friend
• Get together with Yukino-san and her husband
• Host a Chinese New Year party
• Take more pictures
• Go out with people from Matt's lab
• Study Japanese at least 1/2 hour a day, 5-6 days a week. Actually, I'm hoping for more, but I'm setting my goals at a reasonable level
• Have Kohyama-san and his wife over for dinner
• Learn a Japanese craft

Happy Thanksgiving

I'd say "Happy Turkey Day" except I don't think we're having turkey.

We're not roasting our own turkey. We're not baking our own pie. We're not doing anything that vaguely requires having an oven. Why? Because we don't actually have an oven.

The stove has two burners and a broiler which is meant to be a fish cooker (the button actually has a picture of a fish on it) but which we use primarily as a toaster. Sometimes we use the broiler to cook tandoori chicken. But that's about it.

I suppose we technically do have an oven. The microwave is actually a combination oven / microwave range / toaster, but I don't trust it. I tried to use it to toast once and it took a ridiculously long time and didn't toast the bread at all (hence we use our fish broiler). Our microwave is pretty old and beaten up and only 500W. I'm not sure you can even type in a temperature for the oven; I think you might have to choose a pre-specified food type. We're considering making an investment in a new, higher-powered combo microwave/oven. If we do, stay tuned for us trying our hand at making roast chicken or cupcakes or scones.

But first we have to get through Thanksgiving. My plan is to head over to Jusco to pick up a ready-made rotisserie chicken, poke around to see if they have any cranberry sauce, look for something resembling a pumpkin pie (which will probably turn out to be sweet potato cake or squash mash) and pick up whatever other fixin's look attractive. We'll stuff our faces and drink Beaujolais Nouveau until we keel over. At least that's the plan.

UPDATE: We've posted a couple of pictures of our Thanksgiving dinner. Share our celebration with us and check them out in our photo album!

Is this California?

Last night we were sitting in our living room, relaxing a little, reading, listening to music from Roo (our iPod) and just generally chilling out, when the room started to tremble. It shook enough that we knew it wasn't just a train going by on the tracks. There's something about an earthquake; even if it lasts only a few seconds, you can feel the whole room sort of sway a little.

In San Francisco, with that little bit of an earthquake, you'd be able to turn on the news right away and hear all about it. They'd be collecting phone calls from people saying, "Well, I live in ... and here our cabinets were really shaking and I saw trash can fall over!"

Yesterday's quake didn't make it on that evening's news (at least not what we saw of the news). This quake was closer to us than the big quake of a couple of months ago, but not as strong, and therefore not as widely reported. I did manage to find this little article about it in a few online papers: M4.8 quake jolts southern Hokkaido.

If earthquakes keep coming at this rate, I'll have experienced more of them here in a year than I did in California in 11 years. (Matt's already had more of them here than in California, having been an earthquake virgin before the one last month...)

How Not to Splash On Your Toes

The official part of my Japanese class at IAY is over (I'm doing an extra week soon to finish the text book). Now I can say things like, "I am going to Kyoto at Christmas by airplane because my husband has a conference there," and "On Saturday I did some knitting, played with my computer, and went to the store." My vocabulary still needs a lot of work, but I did manage to learn quite a bit in just a month. And not just how to speak Japanese. Spending so much time at IAY finally led me to learn the proper technique for using a Japanese toilet.

Avid readers may remember my early experience with the Japanese Super Toilet at Matt's lab. Since then, I've actually managed to successfully use the various buttons and knobs on the super toilet and even come to appreciate them. It's too bad they're not more widely available in the US - and it's too bad they're so expensive.

At any rate, the public bathrooms at IAY don't have super toilets. They have the simple squat toilet. If you haven't seen them, they look like urinals lying down on the ground, or like oblong ceramic pits. I've used them before, in other Asian countries. I've always gone into the stall, turned around to face front (as if using a normal toilet) and then bent down as if sitting on invisible seat, you know, as if a normal toilet were just behind me, but I wasn't touching it. But when I tried to use the bathroom at IAY... well, I'm embarrassed to say, I missed more than once. I, um, had to clean up with extra toilet paper.

It turns out my Japanese text book actually has a little stick-figure drawing of the proper way to use a Japanese squat toilet. It shows the little figure facing the back of the stall, crouched down low. And, by golly, it works.

Home INTERNET

For the first time since we moved to Japan, we did not go to the office this weekend. The reason - we now have INTERNET at home. After three monthes of starts and stops we were finally hooked up to the world wide web on Thursday morning.

In Michelle's last update she alluded to Plan B which involved running the cable from a utility pole along the ground about 80 meters away and then snaking it up our balcony and through an airvent. Plan B sounded simple enough - NTT would pull the cable but we were responsible for providing the tubing to protect the fiber optic cable. The NTT consultant assured Kubo that we could buy the tubing at the Home Depot of Japan, Homac. But a visit to Homac a few Saturdays ago proved him wrong and we were forced to order the tubing from a cable supplier. Fortunately, the lab paid for the tubing and will reuse it after we leave.

The cable arrived two weeks ago Friday. Kubo and I installed it on Saturday. Then last Tuesday we had our final consult to make sure everything was all set for installation on Thursday. Kubo went alone to meet with them and to my surprise when he came back he told me that they pulled the cable (see the Photo Album). The NTT guys returned on Thursday to run the cable into the house and set up the box. In less then an hour they had us connected to the internet at an average speed of 30 Mbs though it is advertised as 100 Mbs under perfect conditions.

We have set up our airport and our now happily surfing away!

Sapporo Autumn

We're back. It went surprisingly smoothly, getting in the car early Wednesday in San Diego and driving up to LAX, hopping on the plane to Narita (Tokyo) and settling in for the duration of the 10-11 hour flight. They showed 4 movies, two of which I actually watched (Daddy Day Care and Legally Blonde 2: Red, White & Blonde) while Matt listened to The DaVinci Code from Audible.com on his iPod.

We arrived in Narita to discover that Yukino-san had booked us into a hotel we hadn't anticipated, and we were busy trying to make plans to see our friend Takashi. Meanwhile, I was tired and cranky and Matt was a little tired and feeling more than a little ill, but it turned out that hopping on the bus to Haneda and then grabbing the our hotel was easy, easy. And no sooner had we lugged out luggage upstairs than Takashi phoned up from the lobby and met up with us. Phew.

We headed out to dinner with him and returned to the hotel alone (early night for him, but hey, we had good reason to be tired) around 10, where we made good use of the hotel's free high-speed internet connection, showered up in the mini-bathroom, and slipped into the nightshirts provided by the hotel before falling asleep sharing one of the rooms two single beds.

This morning, we grabbed the breakfast at the hotel - raisin and walnut rolls, I think - and lugged the luggage onto the Toyoko Inn shuttle, which dropped us right at the ANA entrance. Our flight wasn't scheduled until the afternoon, but with a single polite question ("Is it possible to travel earlier?") we found ourselves booked on the 11 am flight and winging our way back to Sapporo, arriving at back in our apartment even before we were originally scheduled to take off.

All in all, I was completely startled by the ease with which this whole week's confusing travel plans went off. In just 10 days, we slept in Manhattan Beach, Santa Barbara, Hollywood, San Diego and Tokyo, not to mention all of the hours we spent on planes or in cars and time lost by crossing the dateline.

As for the results of our trip? Couldn't be happier with what we got done. Spend time with friends - check. Celebrate friends' wedding - check. Buy some good English reading material - check. Pick up great package of yarn to replenish stash - check. See Lost in Translation - check. Eat good food not available in Japan - check. Buy software - check. Get games in English for our GBA - check. Get new memory (2 GB!) for Matt's new G5 - check. Get all kinds of toiletries - check. Stop by Sephora for some cool lip gloss - check. Generally appreciate what California has to offer - check.

Happy to be back "home" in Japan? Check. It's a relief to be here, if only for the promise of being able to sleep as long as I want without having to get up tomorrow and pack all my stuff up again and put it in the car or on the plane.

Fahrvergnügen-ing with my G5

I have been quiet over the past week or so as I set up my new Macintosh G5 and switched from Windows XP to Mac OS X. Overall, the transition went pretty smoothly though there were a few hiccups along the way. The biggest headache turned out to be moving my email from Outlook and Outlook Express into Mail. The Apple switching guide recommends signing up for a .Mac account and then migrating your mail using an IMAP server. While this may work for a few email messages and no mail folders it is in not a fast or efficient way to move 1000s of archived email messages in multiple folders. I freely admit the other half of the problem is Microsoft .pst files archive mail in a proprietary format. After some poking around the web I found a solution. It turns out that Netscape Communicator 4.7x can import .pst files and export then in standard mbox format that Mail can read – so that solved the mail importation problem.

My other main headache was installing and getting the special IBM C and C++ compilers to run. It turns out that Mac OS X is like UNIX in many ways but its file format system HFS+ does not support case sensitive file names. For some reason the people at IBM did not remember this even though they built the chip and named the C complier xlc and the C++ compiler xlC. Fortunately they were installed in different directories and I was able to set the path the C++ compiler.

As I was switching I did find one comical thing on the Apple website. Apple seems to stress that there is no need for Windows or Microsoft – but in their switching guide they fail to tell you how to migrate your IE bookmarks into Safari. The guide still tells you how to use IE on your Mac.

Even with the few hassles of setting up – I must say Mac OS X is a great operating system. It has all the features of a windows environment with the added features/convenience of a linux/unix operating system for those that need. I can be listening to music in ITunes, typesetting a scientific document with latex, polishing a figure in Adobe Illustrator, writing scripts in vi, and have a video chat with a friend using IChat AV all at the same time!!

Waaay Too Much Yodabashi

Or, how I learned to stop worrying and love my SO505i.

The plan sounded simple. After breakfast on Saturday, we would head to the office, check e-mail and use the English language websites for NTTDoCoMo.com and DoCoMo Net to figure out which phones we would buy and what calling plans we should sign up for. Then we'd head over to Yodobashi to pick them up, and maybe an air cleaner too, since we'd already be there. Afterwards, we'd head out in search of other things to fill our afternoon. How naive we were.

We never really got to those "other things." With e-mailing and web surfing, we ddin't reached Yodobashi until close to 1:30 pm, when we grabbed lunch at the in-store McDonald's before getting our Yodobashi Gold Point Card, which is like a cash-back award card. Then, we started looking at phones in earnest.

At that point, we had it narrowed down to 505i phones from Sony, Mitsubishi, and Fujitsu. They're all cool, with built in cameras and the Japanese iMode service. Of course, they have design differences, from the specifics of the cameras to their size and weight. We weren't terribly decisive, spending time in the store debating the benefits and drawbacks to using the Memory Stick Duo format since we already use memory sticks and have a memory stick reader, or getting phones using the SD expansion card, which would require buying a new card reader but seems to be a broader use.

We were intrigued with the beautiful SO505i, with its swing-open design, large screen and nicely integrated, stand-alone digital camera feel, camera. We had read some comments about the phone (notably Joi Ito bought one), many of which said that it was bulky and that they worried about the screen, which faces out, getting scratched. So we kept picking up the other two phones, the D505i and the F505i, trying to get into them. They're both very nice, but I couldn't get over the fact that the camera lenses aren't covered. And I couldn't see the use for a fingerprint scanner. And who wants to hold the phone up that way to take a picture? And... well, when it comes down to it, the SO505i had already captured the minds of both of us, so the other two didn't have a chance. Isn't that so often the case?

After making our decision, we floundered about waiting for someone to notice we needed help and finally managed to attract the attention of one of the women. After blundering through talking to us for a few minutes, she left and returned with another woman, Hirata-san, who could speak better English. Of course, we had to negotiate the usual questions, "Eh, do you live in Sapporo? Do you have Japanese bank?" We managed to communicate that yes, we do (showed our Alien Registration cards), and, yes we have (flashed our CitiBank ATM card), and we wanted to buy two SO505i phones in different colors. She brought over 3 of each with different phone numbers to let us choose, as she talked into a mobile phone evidently confirming that we were eligible to buy phones.

We sat in front of her at the corner as she nodded and murmured into the phone and we tried to fill out our forms for signing up for service. Suddenly she looked up and handled the mobile phone to Matt. "Speaks very good English," she indicated, nodding. Matt took the phone and talked to the NTT DoCoMo woman, who asked him all the details of what we were looking for, gave us advice on selecting a calling plan, and essentially tried to explain all aspects of signing up for DoCoMo service to us before getting back on the phone with Hirata-san and telling her what we had decided. Meanwhile, Hirata-san changed our phones to English menus and bustled around sorting papers, photo-copying our registration cards, and doing god knows what else.

This seemed to take forever. I was perched on a stool next to Matt and I started to feel myself go crazy from the overstimulation. The Yodobashi theme song was playing, and all around us sales people were calling out to customers, some yelling through bullhorns, and music was blasting from computers and TV sets, and bells were ringing, and... well, it was overwhelming and was endless. Around 3:30 or so, we finally finished up the paperwork, and we were about ready to sigh with relief when she looked up, smiled, held up a finger. "Come back in 1 hour?"

You'd think we'd leave the store, but instead we browsed more, looking at the TVs, the super-toilets, the air cleaners, the computers... and searching for the Memory Stick Duo cards. We found a huge wall full of SD cards, but no memory sticks. It felt like we'd made a mistake after searching multiple places turned up memory sticks, but no duos, and I'd basically given up, but Matt finally found them in an area with various card readers and Memory Sticks that held up to 1GB. 1 gig?! We managed to entertain ourselves for a full hour and returned to Hirata-san, who said, "10 minutes?" and left us to flounder again. By this time we'd been exposed to several hours of a constant noise barrage, but we frittered away another 10 minutes while she did some last things with our phones.

Hirata-san brought us our phones. She'll be sending the English language manual in the mail, but gave us the rest of our stuff right away. What a relief. I was beginning to think they were going to tell us that because our bank is CitiBank we wouldn't be able to get phones after all. But I was worried for nothing. All that was left was paying for everything. That's when the stunner happened. The phones, which we saw listed at something like 15,000 yen each, were charged to us at just 10,800 yen a piece, and then we got some sort of equipment discount. We ended up paying less than 15,000 yen for both. Shocking, since when we set out, we thought we might be spending more than $400 dollars, and in the end got both for less than $150. Wow.

Then, we did the "lucky draw" - one ticket each. Nope, no luck. Hell, I never win at those. Then Hirata-san walked us to the door, holding our bag; we thought she had to accompany us to make it clear we weren't shoplifting. Instead she showed us to the NTTDoCoMo people just inside the door, who offered us two more lucky draw tickets. Matt took his and peeled off the backing. We, of course, couldn't read it, and showed it to them. Oooh! Cheers! Ringing bells! "Segoi!" We looked at each other bemused. What had he won? "Game Boy Advance!" Wow. I opened mine. I got a cloth to wipe off my phone and my glasses. Whoopee. But Matt won a Game Boy! We have no proof. We have nothing but Hirata-san's word that she's going to send it to us. We're waiting to see if it ever shows up.

[For those interested in the grisly details, we ended up with calling plan M for both of us, which is 4100 yen for one, with a dialing allowance of 1,300 yen, or 79 minutes. Don't even try to compare it to calling plans in the US. But, we also got an IchinenDiscount (one year level) and a Family Discount, which together I think mean a 30% discount. Plus, we signed up for something that gives us 30% off when we call each other and other numbers on our "frequently called" list. So it's not so bad. We're going to use it for a while and see how much it really costs.]

We've been playing our phones ever since. The camera's cool and takes great photos. The ringtones are polyphonic (practically a full version of "Layla"). More experimentation with iMode is required before we can make a full report.

And now we're mo-blogging using Typepad's easy to use remote blogging features. Check us out at Adrift with a Camera [Phone] (over in the sidebar). Keep coming back again and again... we hope to update there often. I mean, it's so easy!

Lush-ious... Art Park

It was nice today when we got up, and we wanted to head a little further afield, so we decided to check out Sapporo Art Park, which is in the far southern part of the city, so far in fact, it might not really be considered in the city.

We headed off to Matt's office for a little internet break, and followed it up with lunch at Cafe Danmark at Sapporo Station. As we walked into the Cafe, I spotted something a little further on, and ended up walking past the cafe, towards what turned out to be an outpost of Lush Japan. So, after moving halfway around the world, I'm closer to a Lush store now than I was even in San Francisco when the Lush store opened last December. Admittedly all the packaging is in Japanese, but some of it is in katakana, which means with a little effort it can be deciphered to discover it says "conditioner," or something else familiar. Just from the smell, I could tell they have the one product I can't seem to do without - the remarkably stinky but surprisingly effective Soak and Float bar (smells bad in the bar, but works well and has no smell after sudsing). Great news - because it's another thing I won't have to bring with me from the States.

Afterwards, we headed out for the last subway station going south from Sapporo station. The subway here is quick and efficient, and we hopped off at Makomanai and headed for the bus stop. We actually hadn't taken the bus yet, so we weren't sure how to go about dealing with the ticket issue, and we ended up walking out to the stop just in time to see our bus pull away from the curb. When another bus finally pulled up, we got on, and asked the bus driver in somewhat broken Japanese if he'd be stopping at the art park ("kono basu wa Geijetsunomori ni ikimasu ka"). He said Hai, and we sat down. Only later did we realize we were supposed to pick up a ticket when we got on, but we managed to figure out the rates from a board of ever-changing numbers up at the front. When we arrived at our stop, he looked back at us to let us know, and we paid without tickets, dumping our coins into his little box.

The art park was very nice, even if the sky started to drip a little while we walked. The first area we checked out was the craft studio, where they offer classes ranging from jewelry making to ceramics. We actually walked past the ceramics and glass building, and saw a man just finishing heating some glass and just beginning to blow it. All of the facilities are very nice, the rooms modern and well-maintained. We also headed over the Craft Hall, which had a nice exhibit space as well as some items available for purchase - handwoven scarves, handmade bowls, handblown glasses, ceramics... the full array of things made at the park. Upstairs was the weaving studio :-) where there was a spinning class going on. (too bad I didn't know about it in time). They had a full room of people carding some roving and spinning away, right next to a room full of looms. Hopefully in the next few months or early next year, I'll have the chance to take a class there. I figure that by then I will know a little more Japanese, and I can always learn the specific terminology in class.

So, it was a worthwhile trip there to get the class schedules and to find that it seems like a welcoming place to hang out; I'll probably be try to spend quite a bit a time there if I find classes accessible. The rest of the art park - namely the sculpture gardens and the meditation garden - we are saving for another visit on a sunnier day. Admittedly, the cost for both of us to get there and back by subway and bus was pretty expensive - round trip was 1080 yen for one so for both of us, it was nearly $20. It looks like driving there will be the transportation mode of choice. Provided we get a car, and I get used to driving on the left side of the road.

No Internet at Home, For Now

We've been trying to get internet at home since before we got here. In fact, we started the process before we left San Francisco, getting things underway with the help of Kubo-san, who now shares an office with Matt. Kubo-san handled contacting AsahiNet, setting us up with an account, and arranging appointments with NTTDoCoMo and Asahi. When we got here, the internet people came by, and (as we blogged about before), discovered they needed plans for the building to figure things out.

So, we waited and time passed. Finally, last week, they came by again, two consultants contracted by NTT to come out to our little apartment and figure out whether we could get the fiberoptic connection set up. They weren't there to actually set up the connection, mind you, they were there to investigate whether it was possible. They came into the apartment and slid cable through the walls to make sure they could see it out where conduits emerge outside our unit. That actually went smoothly, and they headed outside. Naturally, this is where another challenge popped up. Apparently there was something like a 10 ft length outside where the tubes were too full and just couldn't fit another length of cable coming through, and we were relegated to finding another solution.

At this point, Kubo-san was still quite optimistic. The NTT consultant had suggested installing a mansion box (or something like that) which would allow everyone in the building (perhaps in the complex) to connect to high-speed internet. Kubo-san had already tried to get that approved, apparently, and while the manager of housing for foreign researchers was not against it, the manager of housing for foreign students apparently felt it was not appropriate, and there was no way to appeal. So, the NTT consultant suggested running the cable to a nearby pole, and then laying it across the grass, all the way from the road to our apartment, and then threading it in through an air vent. Apparently, they do this sort of thing regularly, and he expected it to be quickly approved. So this is our plan. My optimism level on its probability of success has been somewhat low, but, hey, it's our only plan. I was hopefully of perhaps getting it set up in the next couple of weeks.

So, today NTT called Kubo-san to follow up. It turns out that whoever it is at NTT whose responsibility it is to approve our "lay the wiring outside wherever it goes" plan is on vacation. And, even better, after the person gets back from vacation, plows through all of his e-mails, and finally has the chance to decide whether he's okay with the cable stretching across the lawn, it's going to take "a couple of months" for them to actually do it. I thought the Japanese were supposed to be efficient, but I'm realizing that's just another stereotype best ignored.

A couple of months? Considering we are not sure whether we will spend the entire summer here next year, our total number of months with high-speed internet at home may not end up being very many. We may use the dial-up service provided by AsahiNet, but since local calls are still charged by time connected, it's kind of annoying (I think it's like 20 yen per 3 minutes, which may not seem like much, but it's the principle of the thing). Unfortunately, we don't have any other high-speed options at home. ADSL, which is popular in Japan, is not available in our area [say what you want about Earthlink, my DSL was working practically from the second I took the modem out of its box]. We could look into Air-H wireless internet access, but it's fairly expensive, and not really that fast.

In light of these new depressing revelations about the state of our home internet access, I'm choosing a desk here at the office. It looks like I'll be getting my own little spot here at Matt's lab to sit, surf, and work on some things I have "in the hopper," like Matt's new professional site, which has been brewing in my brain and in Photoshop for months. I prefer to work at home, but clearly that's not an option. So, now I'm reduced to figuring out which desk I want. Do I want to face that person? How is this seat situated in the traffic flow? Where can we put these old monitors that seem to be perched on the desk as if it's a graveyard for old electronics?

Sunday Cleaning

Yesterday was our big cleaning day. In our continuing quest to rid the apartment of the smell of mold/mildew we washed all the walls with a combination of Tilex bought at Tokyu-Hands and a bleach-based Japanese cleaner. It took most of the morning but the apartment still smells better as of today. If the smell comes back we are prepared to buy an air cleaner from Yodobashi Camera. Yodobashi Camera is the greatest electronics store. It is four floors of latest cameras, phones, computers, TVs, stereos, plasma screens, etc…

The afternoon was spent as Seibu Loft buying stuff to make the apartment feel more homey. Our first goal was to buy something to cover our orange sofas. We settled on two navy blue slip covers with a slight texture. In addition we bought some new accent pillows. To finish off the living room we bought a beige rag rug woven in India (probably horrible overpriced). We debated about buying some new lamps and curtains but could not find any lamps we liked and the curtains seemed a bit too expensive.

Our second goal was to buy a futon to make the bed more comfortable. Our bed consists of two twin beds pushed together so there is an uncomfortable crack in the middle. We found a nice double bed sized futon to put over the two mattresses. With all this stuff we knew we had no choice but to try to take a cab home. We had tried to take a cab home last week but were unsuccessful. We succeeded this time by giving the taxi driver a card with our address in Kanji. He got us there no problem.

After putting down all our new stuff the apartment is actually starting to feel like home!

7 days and Counting

It's our one-week "anniversary" of our arrival in Japan! We went out to dinner at a noodle and tempura shop, where I got something that came with three different kinds of noodles: udon, soba, and something that seemed like spaghetti. The other stuff was tempura and a strange selection of sashimi and lotus. Matt's came in several different bowls, each with the spaghetti-esque noodles topped with different things, such as salmon, or salmon roe with some unidentifiable white substance. All in all it was a successful dining experience, despite our seeming inability to communicate. At least we managed to try to order tea, discovered they didn't serve it, and got a beer instead.

After first impressions, we have managed to settle in a little better, even doing some yoga in the morning before Matt goes to the office. The apartment still smells a little funny, and we've been a little worried about mold, so we're thinking about getting a HEPA air filter and/or a dehumidifier for the place. The bed is still uncomfortable and needs some padding, and we still want slipcovers for the sofa, but we are waiting on buying these things until (1) we put more money in our bank account, and, (2) we've done as much as we can to de-odorize the place. Other things on our list: lamps (non-fluorescent - they really seem to like fluorescent lights here, especially big round ones that go in the middle of the ceiling), a floor covering, a new pillow for me, some of those cool bento-box-style lunch containers, and some things for our kitchen. Oh, and internet. AsahiNet people are coming again next Wednesday, building plans in hand, so hopefully we'll have news about when we'll be hooked up from home then.

Garbage Day (or should I say Days!)

One of the most time consuming parts of daily life is taking out the trash. There are four trash days in Japan. Count them four! Burnable trash is picked up on Mondays and Thursdays; Recyclable and Non-recyclable plastic is picked up on Tuesdays; and Non-burnable trash is picked up on Fridays. Needless to say we now have four trash cans in our house and are getting into the practice of sorting everything.

I am just happy that tomorrow I do not have to take the trash out!

First Impressions

We're here! All the travel went remarkably smoothly, even with almost an hour long wait in the immigration line at Narita airport. All 6 of our bags were loaded on the plane in SF, and waiting for us on luggage carts at the baggage claim just in front of customs. We wheeled the bags over to the domestic check-in, where they told us they might not be able to put our skis on the plane, but in the end there was no problem at all. A professor's wife picked us up in her van and brought us back to the Hokkaido University campus where we met up with her husband Kohyama-san and they took us to our new home!

Our apartment is thankfully on the first floor, so we didn't have to haul the heavy bags up many stairs. The place is quite nice, complete with a little vestibule area for leaving shoes and coats. Inside it has a living room, small kitchen, washer/dryer, bathroom, smaller bedroom with bunk beds and one desk, and a larger bedroom with two twin beds pushed together so it's like a king size bed. It's actually a great size for the two of us, so I think we will be quite comfortable. Kohyama-san and his wife gave us a little orientation to our place and helped us settle in, and then left us alone for the evening. By this time, we were pretty tired, but Matt went out to the store to get a little food for the morning, and I hunted through our things to get out our bedsheets and pillows. The place came with some packaged sheets and things, but we brought some of our own for that "touch of home," and, well, frankly, they're just nicer. Before hitting the sack, I cleaned up from the flight and thankfully the water pressure in the shower is fantastic. Low water pressure is one thing that really drives me nuts.

To me the bed feels almost as hard as sleeping on the floor, although we actually slept pretty well. We're thinking about getting a futon or something to put on top of the mattress for a little additional padding. After a little poking around the apartment, we have a little list of things we'd like to get for the place, including trash cans, a bath mat, sharp kitchen knives and possibly slipcovers for the sofas.

I'm wondering though - what is it about Asian homes that they all have a similar scent, sort of like that of light mold? Is it the laundry detergent? The humidity? Whatever it is, I've never liked that smell, not in Singapore, or Malaysia, or now in my own home here. It makes me wish I had brought some Febreeze or some Glade plug-ins or something, to freshen the place up. The closets also have a smell to them, so we are hoping to find some drawer liners or something before we put our clothes in the dresser.

The people in the lab here have been great so far - admittedly it's just the first day but it bodes well. Yukino-san and another person drove us around to the local ward office and to immigration so we are all set with our application for alien residence permits and with our multiple-reentry visas (which will spare us the long foreign passport immigration line next time). I couldn't believe how smoothly it went, albeit probably because we were in tow of someone who could actually speak Japanese. Another guy in the lab went to our apartment to meet up with the NTT man to try to get our internet connection set up, but that looks like it's going to be a longer process than we'd hoped. They actually needed to request the building plans in order to figure something out. So until then, we'll be posting from the office only.

So far, other than the humidity and the strange smell in our apartment, we seem to be settling in well. Even the humidity is not so bad as long as you're sitting down. It's only when you walk around that you feel like you might be drowning. Or, in my case, it's because I tried to use the buttons on the toilet and wasn't sitting far enough back in the seat, so instead of the stream of water coming up and hitting me in the butt, it sprayed all over my back. Thankfully none of the Japanese people noticed, but Matt laughed when I told him. I'm a little nervous about trying the automatic spray buttons ever again.

It looks like the only thing that's going to be an irritant on a daily basis is the fact that everyone here seems to think I'm Japanese, from the flight attendants on the plane, to people in the lab. It's awkward to have them speak to me in Japanese and me just looking blankly back at them. I'm thinking when that happens they are more likely to think I'm just stupid than that I don't understand Japanese (ie, that I'm American). If only I were Caucasian like Matt! Then they'd just assume up front I don't speak Japanese. When I learn a few words, it will simply be expected I know more. When Matt says a few words in Japanese, it's like a miracle to them and they titter and smile.

Our New Abode

Though we have neither airline tickets or visas we do know where we will live. Sometime in late August we will be moving into the Hokkaido University International House. We are lucky to have a family apartment that is 64 square meters which is about 700 square feet for those challenged by the metric system. It has two bedrooms which should be plenty of space for the two of us and maybe even a guest or two every once in awhile.