Jyoya no kane

Jyoya-no-Kane, or midnight tolling of the temple bells consists of 108 solemn tolls on the temple bells. It usually starts 15 minutes to midnight. According to Buddhism, man has 108 sins and that by hearing the bells toll that number, he can be relieved of all of them.

As I mentioned before our house is right across from an old temple - Saijyo-ji. We got an invitation from the temple the other day to come and strike the Joya-no-Kane. Matthew and I were very excited as since we built our Japanese house this is the first time we get to join this ceremony. I was hoping Oliver will stay awake (he had almost 4 hours nap this afternoon) but he fell asleep 15 minutes before we left. My brother in-law, Goichi and Yuzuki also fell asleep so we left them behind and just took Hinata with us.

It took us 10 seconds to get to the temple!



Each of us went up the steps to strike the bell. It was very windy and extra cold tonight. There was a guy counting with lots of tokens so that there won't be more than 108 gongs - what a job!



When we finished, each of us got Buddhist prayer beads - Juzu. The temple master put a special prayer into the beads wishing for happiness and well being.



I hope we will have a great New Year - Only two more minutes till New Year!

New Year's Eve

We treat New Year as one of the most important events and people traditionally spend it with their family.
Part of the culture we have is to eat Soba noodles (toshikoshi-soba) on the night of New Year's Eve (close to midnight). It is often said you need to finish your soba before the New Year begins and it is bad luck to leave any soba (you will lose your luck for money for the coming year).
People eat soba wishing for a long and healthy family life.

Mum normally cooks soba for everyone but this year we decided to go to a special soba restaurant near our house.





Hinata with his soba.



My soba!



Matthew, Hinata, Oliver and Ah-chan.



Oliver's first toshikoshi-soba. Hope he will stay healthy and happy : )

Catching up

Today we got on a train to go to the city to meet up with my old workmates. Oliver was so excited to be on the "Densha/train".







It's always great to catch up and see them. It has been 3 and half years since I left work but we can still laugh at work jokes etc.




It took forever for Oliver to be held by someone not us, but finally he gave in, very nicely...



I wanted to do some more shopping but there were soooo many people around, we couldn't push the stroller and Oliver got really cranky so we got back on the train and came home.
Even though it was a short time it was nice to see friends and feel the buzz in the city.

Fingers crossed

He had his fingers crossed most of the day today...but for what??

Quiet few days

I forgot to mention in the previous post but it actually snowed a bit on Christmas eve. It is quite unusual for this area to get snow. It didn't last long but made us feel soooooo cold. Since then it has been really really cold.

Oliver has been struggling to wear lots of layers of clothes, taking them off, feeling cold outside and hot again in the department stores. The last few days he was quite fluey and quiet. So we mostly stayed at home or my parents house, keeping warm and chilling out.

I think he was feeling a bit better but needed to catch up on his sleep so yesterday he spent all day sleeping...
I hope he will be well enough to go on the family trip in few days time.

Christmas 2010

This year we were lucky to have all of our family members together for our Christmas Eve party. In Japan people celebrate on Christmas Eve more than the actual Christmas day (It is a very commercial celebration rather than tradition or religious celebration). My family always celebrate it on the Eve as it is also my father's birthday.

They were so busy this year that they couldn't put up the Christmas tree until today but we managed to do so before the party started! Runa and Yuzuki did a great job putting on the decorations and Oliver did a great job taking them down - it took them forever to finish up!



When we put out all the presents under the tree we realised we need a much bigger tree! There were over 50 presents!!



Last year one of my friends in Brunei asked me what we eat on Christmas day in Japan. My answer was - KFC! cause they are chickens! I still remember we had KFC for Christmas when we were kids. Some people do cook turkey etc but all of my family members still work full time so they prefer nice and easy traditional Christmas KFC.

There is even a special pick-up spot in the mall. (This is for you Nicole!)





We also had yummy crabs and sushi for dinner.





Ah-chan with the kids



Mako, Hinata and Yuzuki



Hinata and Oliver



Matthew and the kids



Yuzuki with her special handmade Christmas hat!

Oliver was this years Santa, he was quite tired by the end of 50+ presents.







RBA model plane!



Oliver the Santa got wonderful new toys!



Oliver with granddad - Happy Birthday!!

As usual the boys had lots to drink and the kids had a ball playing till late. It was a great night : )

With his cousins

There were some fine days this week. Oliver got to play in our backyard with his cousins. When we bought the section, our plan was to put grass in all of the backyard but we found out Japanese lawns die completely in winter and need extensive care in the humid hot summer. So in the end we decided to just put gravel down until we move back here to live.

Even with no grass the kids are lucky to have this big empty space to run around and play.
They love playing on the swing but today they found a hole so decided to fix it.







Yuzuki (posing for the camera - Japanese style)



Oliver loves playing golf and pulling the golf bag : )

Hope it won't get too cold so that they can spend lots of time together outside while we are here.

Japanese beer

Matthew is loving his favourite Japanese beer - Kirin!
Mum's fridge is full of these, he is so spoiled.

Matthew arrived safely

Last night we all went to the airport to meet Matthew. The kids love going to the airport to meet at the arrivals. His flight time changed slightly - 30 min earlier around 8:30pm.
We already had a plan to have dinner at the airport restaurant so had to eat quickly and rush to the arrivals to meet Matthew. Well... we waited and waited and waited but he didn't show up. By 9:30 I thought something went wrong so tried to text him.

"Are you here yet? we have been waiting over 30min" and this is the reply I got " I have been out over 45min and waiting for you guys, where are you?" - he was at the other arrival! It wasn't only the flight time that was changed, they also changed the arrival from South to North : (

So unfortunately his arrival was not as exciting as it should be but all the kids were very happy to see him. Even though I was bit annoyed (as we rushed out of our house, rushing to finish dinner and waited over 30min) I was very happy to see him.

Oops

This afternoon when I was busy vacuuming (I quite enjoy housework when I am on holiday as we don't get to / need to do it in Brunei, it is kind of my holiday activity!) I heard Runa screaming from downstairs. I almost got a heart attack when I heard her calling me. She was supposed to look after Oliver for me...

When I came downstairs I saw my son soaked in cold water (with his clothes on). Runa said she thought he was just in the hallway but actually he went into the bathroom and turned the shower tap on and just stood under it as he was so shocked...

I quickly dried him and put new clothes on. By the time he got warmer it was time for his nap. When he woke up he looked a bit different - his mohawk was back!







Matthew thinks he looks like Hamish, what do you think??

Pancakes

Runa made us pancakes for lunch today. She did a very good job and all the pancakes were gone in no time!
It is just great to have older kids around. They are now old enough and know what they are told is not really negotiable and most of the time they are willing to help. I am so glad I was the last one to have kids in my family : ) I have four kids to help me out.

Lucky boy

Oliver is into matchbox cars. He can be entertained for a long time, just pushing them around. They were great on the airplane too. I bought three new ones from Hua Ho before I left and gave him one when he got very cranky during our journey.

When he got here I told Mako about his obsession. She told me Hinata used to love these cars too and Oliver can have his old ones. I was thinking one or two but....



He got the whole lot! And even the car parking building with them!



It is just lovely to have siblings with older kids : )

What a lucky boy!

Weekend shopping

Mako and I took the kids to Rinku town shopping mall near the airport today (more for adults Christmas shopping in the end...).
Everything was on sale and at great prices but unfortunately not much for me to buy as they are all winter clothes. There are some homeware places I like to check out but this time I wasn't in the mood and didn't buy anything.

The kids spent most of the time in the Lego shop - they have a great play area where they can build whatever they want and it is nicely heated. So we left them there and did power shopping.

By the time we were ready to leave all the Christmas lights came on, very nice and Christmasy.



We walked to the food court at the other side of the mall and had some noodles, the complex is fairly new and has a big ferris wheel - it was also lit up nicely.

Densha!

Oliver quickly learned a new Japanese word, densha (=trains).
We went to my parent's apartment for lunch the other day. Their place is right by the train line.

When we were kids I really didn't like living by the train line. We couldn't hear anything when the trains went by and constantly had to change the TV volume.

But all of our nephews and nieces loved watching all the different trains going by when they were small. Oliver was not an exception. He quickly got into pointing out to them and scream "densha densha!"





It is bit cold to be out, but he can be entertained for a long long time so I am very happy : )

With his Ah-chan (grandmother)

Great i-phone shot of Oliver and Ah-chan : )

Not that cold Oliver...

Oliver's having fun putting everything in the microwave. In Brunei the kitchen appliances are placed higher so Oliver cannot touch anything but here he can reach and touch all sorts of stuff...



He got some cooking wine and cooking oil out of the cupboard and tried to put them in the microwave. It's pretty cold here but not that cold honey...

Kid's weekend fun

It was a very warm lovely day so I decided to go and see my nephew and nieces at school where they had a weekend fun day at the school gymnasium.

Even though it was very warm I still had to wrap Oliver. Here is Oliver in the push chair.



We are in a great location regarding schooling. It is the very school I and my sisters attended when we were kids. It takes only 10 min or so walk. As we spent the first few days at home it was great to be out in the crisp winter air.

When we got to the school we were welcomed by lots of rabbits and a funny looking chicken! Oliver got very excited.





In the gymnasium kids were playing dodgeball - all excited and running around.





Here is Hinata posing, very Japanese!?



Oliver got to play a bit too, he was so happy to be able to run around.





Mako (my older sister) and Oliver



Oliver playing with Yuzuki

On the way home we stopped at the Japanese sweet shop and bought some treats for the kids - Banana chocolate wrapped in Japanese rice cake : )