Golden Week

Everything has been a mad whirlwind of activity since school started back up. It turns out that junior high school is intense. And then there is still elementary school matters and kindergarten matters and work matters and studying for the big Japanese test matters and scheming to move matters. I get dizzy just thinking about my to-do lists.

So it was a great relief to have a proper sunny Golden Week last week, a bank holiday of three days wedged up against the weekend to make five solid days of no work or school. We didn't travel off the island (Sebastian has kendo club everyday which makes it hard to go anywhere) but managed to enjoy ourselves all the same.

Golden Week from Tiffany Key on Vimeo.

xo

久しぶりな

And that is what we call a blog break.

So, yes, we made it back to Japan. We are now beginning our third year on Gotou Island.

Right now, Colette is busy copying kanji into her daily practice notebook. She's a new 2nd grader.

Luca is washing chocolate ice cream off his face and reading a book about fruit. He's in his second year of youchien and can read in both hiragana and katakana.

Sebastian just came in at 7:30 from kendo and is eating a giant bowl of spaghetti. Because he's almost fourteen. And he's taller than me. And a new first grader in junior high school.

And Nicolai? He's got all his stuff ready for tomorrow and put the futons down and is currently playing his 3DS under the covers. He's in fourth grade now. And also does kendo though not everyday like Sebastian.

So, yeah, it's been a while. After a little bit elsewhere, I have decided to return to this space. Because across the entire internet, this little corner feels the most like home.

Hope you have all been well. xo

Japanese Saturday School // 日本語土曜日学校

節分祭：アメリカンスタイル

Last week, Kayla of Kayla June told us about the Japanese Saturday School at the university where she teaches. I knew of Saturday schools, a popular way for expat Japanese families to keep their kids up-to-speed with Japanese culture and academics. I just did not realize that there was one in Jacksonville, our nearest city. The school started in 2011 and now serves over 50 families from the area. Starting from preschool and extending to the sixth grade, it is run by volunteer parents who use the official Japanese public school textbooks and curriculum as a guide. They are so above board that they anticipate to be recognized by the Japanese government in the coming year. Pretty rad, ne?

We attended their open house this past Saturday and were really impressed. For three hours every Saturday, Sebastian and Nico can study kanji, mathematics, and reading while making friends with other bicultural kids. Every other Saturday, Colette can join the preschool class where they sing songs, make crafts, and learn to read and write in hiragana. 

Being there amongst a crowd of bilingual/bicultural families was such a wonderful thing. We all felt it, a sense of belonging, a sense of relief. To be able to hear Japanese all around us, to be able to laugh at the same jokes, to hold our cameras high as the children threw beans at the demons: I cannot express completely what a fantastic occasion this was for all of us. You can take the family out of Japan, but you can't take Japan out of the family. 

The change in Sebastian and Nicolai was immediate. They walked differently back to the car, tall from their proud, straight spines. They stopped bickering and started helping each other, taking turns carrying their heavy bags across the campus. I knew that they had been frustrated that their bilingual/bicultural needs were not being met in the past few months, but it was not until after Saturday school that I saw what a toll it had been taking on them. It was as if the sun had been covered with clouds for the past seven months and suddenly a clear wind blew them away. 

We will definitely be going again. 

Home

Home is such a strange term for expats and travelers. Is it where you are from or where you are going? In this house we have multiple definitions for the term, multiple places that qualify. For the kids, Japan is home. Where they were born, learned to walk and talk, learned how to handle chopsticks. Even the oldest two with Florida printed on their birth certificates only really know Japan.

Japan is my adulthood, where I have given birth to two kids and raised the whole lot of them in a tiny apartment. Where I have overcome personal reservations for the good of the whole. Where I came to value precision as much as innovation. Japan suits me in many ways, the wabi sabi aesthetics, the quiet, the appreciation for nature.

Our time in Japan, five years this time, has come to a close. After losing one lackluster job and refusing a few others, I came to the realization that we have outgrown Japan. For now at least. For the way we have been here. Jason and I have figured out the work we need to do in this life and are no longer to delay or sacrifice for a petty security. I cannot justify it any longer. The distractions of being an immigrant are too severe. We need a true stability, a place where we can work on our projects and provide a healthy, loving environment for our kids.

Next month, a few days before Sebastian turns ten, we will fly home. It is to a home that I associate with childhood, a home my children will now include in their memories. We go home to family and friends, to a space large enough to contain us. We go back knowing there is a recession and determined to work and support ourselves by our own wits and hands. Frankly, as much as we love Japan, it is a relief. Jason and I are creatives with four children. Having to worry about visas and language barriers when we just want to get our work done has become frustrating. And the kids are a bit relieved too. They are relieved because we will be homeschooling them so their time will be less regimented. They are sad to lose their friends, sad to leave what they know. They are also excited about the adventure that they consider America to be. They look forward to the strange wilds of Florida, the diversity of people, the chance to play soccer and learn how to surf.

It is a huge change but it feels really right. We are ready to get on with our next chapter. Home is, after all, where the heart is. Home is my family, my work, my friends. These things are not anchored to place. Japan is home, Florida is home, this whole beautiful messed up planet is home. As we progress, humanity will eventually cease to insist on so many boundaries of perceived space. Already many of us consider ourselves to be global citizens, sharing an internationality. For our kids, I have no doubt that they will benefit from a freer world but in the end, I bet they will realize that it is not where you are but what you do while you are there that matters.

And, like that, Nicolai entered elementary school.

We not only made it to the highly anticipated entrance ceremony, somehow it is already over. I'm pretty sure we just did this ordeal with Sebastian yesterday and yet he tells me that tomorrow he starts as a fourth grader. Though sometimes a little sneaky, he is fairly honest so I guess I have to believe him.

 

For the first time in years there will be two first grade classes at the neighborhood elementary school. Both of them have 30 plus students. In America, I am sure this would not be something to be celebrated but in a country suffering from a rapidly declining population, it is a good sign.

 

Nicolai's new teacher's name is Ruriko-sensei and she is new to the school. Luckily, Sebastian's old teacher who speaks excellent English, will be around to help Nicolai transition to elementary school life. Though his Japanese is good, it is still developing so knowing he will have a little extra support is comforting for everyone (including his new sensei, I suspect).

 

At the entrance ceremony, the sixth grade students led the first graders in which is just so utterly symbolic that you can't miss it. This year, we know quite a few of the sixth graders because when Sebastian started they were just third graders. The benefit of staying in one place for a while has been the honor of watching the neighborhood kids unfold. It all happens so quick, too quick. You can watch it but in one blink they go from babes in arms to thriving, independent adolescents, showing the new class the way.

The Graduate

With much ado and fanfare, this boy graduated from kindergarten last week. Two years vanished in a poof and now here we are with a genki, semi-literate, functionally bilingual Nicolai. Japanese kindergarten is not for the faint of heart. In which I mean lazy. It is a full-time job keeping up with all the events and activities that go on in a regular school year and before you know it, your kid is bowing to his sensei and singing sayonara to kindergarten. Literally...



We were lucky to be able to send both of the boys to private kindergartens, both valuing that critical stage of childhood by creating an environment that encouraged creativity, cooperation, and social awareness. Academic prowess is not central in the Japanese kindergarten; it is more about cultivating experiences that the child can carry with them through life. Sebastian's kindergarten followed a Piaget approach, granting the children lots of freedom and space for discovery. Nico's kindergarten was a Buddhist school so regular lessons in manners, sensitivity, and compassion were taught in the week.




All in all, it has been a very wonderful experience for our family and I know Nicolai is ready to start school in April. We'll have a year off from kindergarten until Colette starts (we like them to have 4 years at home in English) which will be a good chance to catch up on other aspects of our life.
Then we'll be ready to start round three.

It will be hard at first to get used to this guy being a first grader.

Mistakes are really discoveries

Nico's really into making things with paper. Origami, paper cuts, boxes, birds, you name it and it will be in paper form in a matter of minutes. (As I type this Jason is trying to convince Nico to delay the tape-box he's making for me until after dinner. It's like water off a stone with our determined boy.)

A few weeks ago, I taught Nico how to make snowflakes. A thousand snowflakes later and I am prepared to declare him an addict. Now and then though, he makes a mistake. I say mistake only because that is how he perceives them. I am not sure if his idea of perfection is rooted in nature or nurture but I do know that I want him to relinquish the negativity he associates with mistakes and see them for what they really are: learning opportunities. Thomas Edison said regarding his failed lightbulbs "I have not failed. I've just found 10,000 ways that won't work".

Mistakes can also be a source of discovery, as Nico found out today. 

A broken snowflake is really just a pair of wings.


And once one person has a pair of wings...



Colette was happy to be a choucho (butterfly) and immediately jumped off the couch with great hopes. Landing with a thud, she said あれ (Japanese for 'huh?'). I love that she believed she could fly.


I also love that when Sebastian return from playing with friends, Nico asked him if he wanted a pair of wings too. 

 I love that Sebastian said of course.

Home Study Days

One of the challenges of raising bilingual kids is helping them to learn in both languages. For the most part we are more concerned with their childhood experience, encouraging exploration and acts of empathy/sympathy. We try to let them have as much free time as possible in the afternoons so they can play with friends or each other. For the most part, they determine how their time is spent, an element that is crucial as they step closer day by day toward adulthood.



I do want them to be scholastically well-equipped to support their journey through this world. So this year while I have been on maternity leave, we have started doing home study days. We sit down twice a week and do some formalized lessons, either with paper worksheets or more tactile materials. As you may remember, I try to incorporate Montessori methods in our home whenever possible. Colette is using the sandpaper letters and metal insets in preparation for writing. She is super alert to finding her "w's" as she refers to the alphabet whenever we are out and about. During the day I do more practical Montessori activities with her like pouring rice and dressing frames to learn how to use buttons and laces.



Nicolai is into Bob books, the movable alphabet, and math. Yep, math. He walks around counting by threes and fours and loves the hundreds board app on the iPad. The boy sits down and writes out addition problems, filling out the entire page with sums.

For Sebastian, I just try to supplement his school work to help him in what his teacher considers to be his weaker areas. I personally abide by the theories of multiple intelligences and various learning styles. I do not think Sebastian's weaker areas are truly weak but since the school wants well-rounded students, I try to help him to feel more confident in areas that he is not so interested in. I also work with him on his English reading which was really slow going until recently when we switched from phonics to sight words. And he is such a rabid reader in Japanese that I do not worry about his abilities.

We are still smoothing out some of the kinks of home study time (and by kinks I mean resolving disputes sparked by having three very determined and different learners at one table) but that is all part of the journey.

How does your garden grow

It has only been a couple of weeks since we started our gardening venture. I am so glad to have brought this into our lives. We all get so much pleasure in watering the plants and watching them thrive. Colette is the Queen of the Watering Can so I have to get out there before she does in the morning to make sure all the plants get watered. And she has learned the valuable lesson of not crushing the plants, or plucking them out of the ground. Now she is very careful and hardly ever plays with their dirt. Sebastian is pleased because the sunflower seeds that he planted, most of the twenty(!) seeds, sprouted and are zooming up in all directions right now. Jason even contributed to the mix by adding that lovely little hydrangea with the perfect antique blue tiny blossoms.

It is an addictive habit, this gardening stuff. This weekend we plan to add eggplant, shiso, rosemary, and salad greens. And we will be starting a little compost container to use all of our kitchen scraps, perhaps using the bokashi method. It is part of my goal of cutting our garbage production in half.

The best thing about this experience has been involving the kids in every step. They already have a natural interest in all things growing (and all things in general, of course) and the boys get to do a little gardening at both of their schools. Colette is happiest when she is digging and using her hands so this new routine of ours is perfect for her. I do worry about their attitude towards the natural world living in a human curated city that is heavy on the concrete and light on the green. This balcony garden of ours has given us a tiny corner of botany and ecology, of responsibility and togetherness. I just wish we had started it sooner.

Oh, baby baby.

Little Luca is now in the process of becoming Little Luca the American. We are a little tardy on all of the official paperwork. Next week I have to go all the way to Immigration to apologize and tell them that I don't have a passport yet. In Japan, unless you are Japanese you are always a foreigner so Immigration demands that babies have a visa in their passport by 6 weeks old.
Mathematically, we were doomed. A week spent in the hospital after the birth, then Golden Week, then my injury, then chicken pox, and chicken pox, AND chicken pox... nope, it just didn't add up to equal bureaucratic success.
Hopefully the presence of this lovely boy will melt the hearts of the worn-out paper pushers. I don't want a repeat of last year's deportation scare.


Hope you are all well. Take care.
xoxo

Two of a Kind(red)

These two middle children have become quite the pals. Of course, they each have a strong relationship with their Oniisan (big brother) but it is different from their playful connection. Nico knows better how to treat Colette since he is also a younger sibling; he also has the advantage of a smaller age gap (3 years versus 5.5 years).
Colette brings a whole barrel-full of silliness to the relationship which appeals to Nico's sense of humor (Sebastian also likes silliness but only if he is the producer).
Of course, I have to think that since they almost share a birthday they were bound to be more similar. Each of them have a sense of order and tidiness that skipped my eldest son. They are better at listening but also more willful than Sebastian ever has been. They are also more independent, a trait that comes with being younger siblings perhaps.

Right now it is dinner time and the two of them are trying to out-silly each other with their older brother both scolding and laughing at their antics. I try to imagine what mealtime will be like with four silly siblings sitting around the table without allowing such foresight to turn my hair white. As their mother, I try to find a balance of indulging in their right to enjoy each other's company and the necessity of having them get food into their stomachs. And with this pair, it really comes down to getting Tweedle Dee to focus on his dinner so that Tweedle Dum will, like with everything else, follow suit.

................

And just a pregnancy aside, no baby yet but as I am hoping that Luca will choose Saturday evening for his arrival (after Jason comes home from work, no less) then I am not impatient yet. I still have quite a bit of housework (aka nesting) to do before then, progress of which is hindered by the erratic back-to-school schedule which is peppered with lots of half-days (including the unexpected ones like today when I had to haul my big ol' belly up to the kindergarten after Nico's sensei gave me a nice phone call letting me know that my blondie was waiting patiently in the office for me). In the end, I know it won't matter to Luca if the kids' closet is put to rights before he comes home but I also know that once he gets here, all productivity will be suspended for a bit. I am in a funny limbo state right now that involves chores, naps, walking, more walking, and reading Elizabeth Gaskell novels.  I can't really explain the last one but there are a lot of inexplicable elements involved with the end of pregnancy so 18th century stories about the conflicts between the working class and their 'masters' appeals to me right now. Perhaps it is related to the amount of housework I have suffered endured accomplished in the last few weeks.

The Counting Game

One...

Two...

Three...

Four...


Surprised? We were too. But now that I am 24 weeks we have gotten used to the idea. It wasn't meant to be a secret. Time just got away from me. And now that we know it's a _____ we can start The Naming Game, one of my favorites.

Both

This is the story of two brothers. Two brothers, both born in a country far, far away. Two brothers who now identify themselves as both, not one nationality or the other. Not half. Both. Two brothers who spend their days in Japanese and now have brought it home to play. Left alone, these two brothers now play in Japanese. The older one reprimands the younger one in Japanese, and you know what, the younger one listens. Some of the time. There are jokes between them that we will never laugh at but they find hysterical. There are their demands for orderliness that are lost on us, despite our years of living here.

When we first started this bilingual adventure, we were not fully aware of what was lying in store. Our third-culture kids insist that we expand our expectations to include who they really are. They are a unique sub-culture with a small but feisty membership. I feel very lucky to watch their evolution and know now that they are the true pioneers, going places we have never even considered.
I am also happy that they have each other. Their understanding of each other goes far beyond what we are capable of. Especially when it comes to booty jokes.

And the winner is....

We've been a rather fortunate family. No major calamities, no broken bones, no long hospital stays, no stitches. Lucky, right? I would say so. Eventually the odds are that there will be an incident that breaks that winning streak. Nico is a competitive kid, despite what his sports day photos might suggest. Since suffered the bad luck of being born second, he has done all he can do to catch up and surpass his older brother.



Today he managed what none of the rest of us have managed to do. He fell off a bicycle at school and wound up with five stitches under his chin. I know, gasp, right? I'll give you a moment to recover.

Well, five stitches may seem puny to you but for this mama, it was a rough day. Yet not so rough, in some ways. Like when Nico, the massive 5 year-old that he is, had to be held down by four nurses and one of his teachers. He was screaming his head off (and if you had seen the needle, you would have done the same) and thrashing with all his might. But those ladies did not break into a sweat or a temper. They just gently encouraged him to keep trying, that it was almost over. I remember the doctor visits in the States and the nurses there would have not been so kind. I probably would have been reprimanded for having such a violent child. So that was a blessing.

And while I didn't relish having to witness this (needles and stitches make me queasy and they were very matter of a fact about the procedure) I did feel a surge of pride as Nico battled those sweet caregivers in complete Japanese. Nauseous but proud. Blessing.

Or like how I didn't have his insurance card on me (since it happened right before preschool pick-up time and I didn't know until I arrived and the principal and teacher were waiting with bloody Nico in the car for me and Colette so we could go together...) and the doctor's office said, no problem, just bring it next time. Is that even possible in the States? Could my son receive care immediately upon entering the building and be set to go home within ten minutes, without showing proof of insurance? So, another blessing.

Looking at it from this perspective, I see that Nico didn't break our lucky streak. His minor injury just helped me to understand how strong it really is. And for that, I am truly grateful. Now, if I could just rid myself of the images of that needle, I would be near bliss.

Why, hello there.

We have been swept away in the rapids of school life. It feels like we never, never stop thinking about school. Since the only day we have off all together is Sunday, it is spent preparing for the week ahead. Japanese school kids (and I include my own kids in that group) bring their gym clothes, lunch clothes, room shoes, and other supplies home on Fridays to be washed. So Sunday means that mama does the washing, drying, ironing, packing, homework checking, and nagging. By the time the kids go to bed, their backpacks and side bags are full of fresh clothes and sharpened pencils for the week ahead. And then the next morning the rush begins again. Sebastian, then Jason, then Nico go to school. Then Colette and I clean the house and work on other projects (to be discussed later). And before I know it everyone is home again and it is time for snacks and dinner. There is never a day of rest here and I guess with three kids, what can I expect? There are moments for grasshopper hunting (our pet preying mantises have to eat something) and silly play. Even though it isn't a nap in a hammock that I fantasize about, those moments of playing all together keep us going through another week.