Konnichiwa

Golden Week - Part II

My fav coffee place in Yuzawa.

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Another great thing about Yuzawa?  Getting to spend some time with Lily and her boys.

We have such an easy relationship.  She called me a couple of months ago, as I was paying for groceries in the supermarket.  She wanted to know what dates we would be in Yuzawa.  That is how predictable our lives are.  She did not want to know whether we would be going to Yuzawa over Golden Week.  She wanted to know the dates we would be there.  She needed to know to book accommodation for her family in Yuzawa, so we can all play together.  As it was way before Golden Week, I had not even discussed dates yet with Tomo.  So I ran over to Tully's where Tomo was hanging out with the kids, checked the calendar and called Lily back with the dates. The whole conversation was no more than a couple of minutes.  And that was that.

We confirmed plans only on the evening of the day before we met!  Our families had not seen each other for 1 year, the last time we met was last year's Golden Week!  

First stop was our fav coffee house.  This place has excellent Viennese coffee.  It is a quaint looking place.  We went there twice together.  Here are some pics of our boys mucking around in front of the coffee place.

We also did some fishing.  Fishing pond fishing.  Here is a pic of Taiga being really friendly and warm.  I don' think he remembers Lily's son from before as he was too young. Lily brings out the bench for the boys.  Taiga sees me snapping away, he immediately puts his arm over Lily's son and pulls him over for the pic!

And then it all ended too soon.  It was time to say good-bye!

Golden Week - Part I

(Kai kept insisting that I get a shot of the frog's face.)

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I just could not wait for it to start.  Work had become too consuming and hectic.  I needed some R&R and desperately wanted to spend more time with the boys.  So it was with a burden off my shoulders as I finished off my work at 8pm on a Friday night and headed for home.  Woohoo - the 5 day Golden Week had started!

We left Tokyo after midnight that Friday.  There were still jams on the roads, but much better than earlier.  We arrived at Yuzawa at 3.30am.  We make this trip every year but never before have we seen so many cars at 3am on the highway.  This is probably due to the economic stimulus plan - the Japanese government has lowered highway tolls to a flat toll of 1000 yen (no matter how far you travel, it could be from southern Kyushu to northern Hokkaido) on weekends and public holidays.  

What did we do?  Nothing!  Nothing hectic, that is.  It was a lie-in on most mornings.  The good thing about coming every year is that we don't need to do the touristy bits or rush it.  After waking up, we play around with the Wii.  Have a simple lunch of udon or yaki-soba, and then head out to find other entertainment.

Entertainment for the boys this year included catching frogs!  Yuzawa is in Niigata which is famous for its rice and sake (apart from ski mountains).  So there were lots of rice fields around us.  Taiga was totally enthralled.  He followed a frog so much that he slipped and fell right into the rice field.  Came out totally wet (except for his hair), muddy and crying.  He wanted a hug.  But none of us wanted to hug him!  As I turned his shoes over to wash them, all that mud came pouring out.  So glad we brought his boots along so he had that to wear whilst his shoes were drying out.  

The boys also tried karaoke for the first time.  They loved it so much we went back a second time.  Ask them what was their favourite part of the trip and they would say singing (followed by frog catching a close second).  And it was cheap.  The karaoke room is at the place where we stayed, and they charged us only 1000 yen for 1 hour, 1,500 yen for 2 hours.  Dirt cheap.  Not to mention that the security guards manning the room were such lovely local chaps - they did not really care if we overstayed for what we had paid if there is no one waiting for the room.  What did the boys sing? Anpanman, Ultraman, Ponyo, Shin Kenja etc.  What was interesting was that even though Kai cannot read Japanese that well, he managed to sing the songs down to the very beat.  Which means that it is all by memory.  Which is amazing as when I look at the vocabulary, I doubt that he totally understands all the words in the lyrics.  Maybe I should sing more Japanese songs - would be a great way to learn Japanese.

We went skiing on the last day.  The ski slopes of Naeba were still open.  I have never been to Naeba before even though it is only 20 mins from our apartment in Yuzawa.  From the little I know of it, it is somewhat like Aspen in the US, the playground of the rich and famous here in Japan.  Tomo has a colleague who comes from a very privileged background.  Grew up in Yamate, Yokohama (affluent area).  Was married off (arranged marriages in Japan is still common today, particularly for the wealthy set).  How wealthy?  He used to give her JPY1.2 million a month just for household expenses, like groceries.  That would be approximately US$12, 000.  He hears lots of stories from her about Naeba, that is where she and her set used to hang out when she was younger, in search of the boys.  It is also famous for the Fuji Rock Festival.  I like the place, it is very family friendly.  We have already checked out their ski classes for kids, and I think there is where we will be come the next winter.  They also have a room with computers and free internet surfing!  I think that is where I will be when the kids do their ski classes.          

What has been happening here?

After the "Lehman shock", everything has just been about spiralling down.  And Japan has been very badly hit, since it is such an export driven economy.  Demand is down, exchange rate does not favor the Japanese manufacturers.  

Japan, the country of lifetime guaranteed employment, is no more.  At the beginning of this economic downturn, foreign workers and Japanese working as temps were asked to leave.  Now, even the venerable companies like Sony have asked their full-time employees to leave - in the thousands. 

So like all other employees who still have a job for now, I have been trying my best to behave at work.  So even though I was very free in the office in January and February, I resisted the urge to update this blog or organize my photos on Smugmug.  I tried reading Nikkei, Financial Times as well as other internet articles more relevant to my work.  I even tried not to read other blogs, unless it is a blog that is related to my work.  Very trying times, indeed.

And then in March, there was a sudden surge in work and I think I have a lot of overtime daycare/babysitting bills for that month.  But really, that was a blessing and I can't complain.  I am more than happy to be busy and to pay such bills now.

There has been a slowdown this week, but I am hoping it will not last.  Although I have been told this will probably continue until after Golden Week.  The company is very carefully looking at how much time we are working/billing.  And there has been a bloodbath in my industry in London and in the US.  Some companies in England are already on their 4th round of redundancies.  

So all things considered, I have decided not to go back to Singapore in June.  Can't risk losing the job.  But you guys in Singapore are always welcome to come visit us and stay with us!   

Singapore - Part V

 

A model of a street scene back in old Singapore.  

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What else did we do in Singapore?

We went "fishing".

We watched professional sand castle builders and tried to build our own sand castle.

We went back to the botanical gardens, to the Jacob Ballas Children's Garden.  I just found out that Jacob Ballas was a family friend, a friend of my maternal grandfather and he used to go to my grandparent's house every new year's.  The garden is amazing. Fun and yet educational.  

We fooled around a lot.

(A blurred photo but what a great time they were having.)

And most of all, we just hung around family and enjoyed their company.  My dad just retired.  His nurse could not find another job (given this bad economy and her age) and her own daughter looked like she may be laid-off soon.  So he delayed his retirement for a bit more and gave her his entire takings earned during that extended period.  Which amounts to quite a bit as my dad does not pay rent, he owns his own workplace.  Isn't that swell?  This is in here as I want Kai and Taiga to know that when they grow up. 

As is family tradition, (it is a tradition now!), we had dinner at Hyatt.  This is a family pic, after dinner, and just hours before we flew back to Japan.

 

Singapore - Part IV

(Kai and me - @ "Kai's slide".)

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Botanical Gardens - we were there twice.  Especially coming from a concrete city, being enveloped by all that space and lush greenery was so refreshing.

So when my girlfriend gave me a list of places where we could meet up, I jumped at Botanical Gardens.  It turned out to be a great choice in the end as the night before, when my kids were at my sis's place, apparently Kai broke his cousin's precious helicopter and the cousin was furious.  I was going to ask my sis if she could also look after my kids whilst I met up with my girlfriends but after that incident, I thought I should just bring my kids along.  Besides, there was lots of space for them to run around in the Botanical Gardens.

We met at the cafe right at the entrance.  The food was good, given it is only a cafe.  I was told that the ownership changed recently and the cafe is now owned by the famed Les Amis group, who also run the chic Au Jardins Les Amis french restaurant in the Botanical Gardens.  If I were to stay in Singapore, I can see myself frequenting this cafe and the gardens.  So here is a pic of me/my family with my friends.

It was not too long ago when one of these girlfriends observed that every time we meet up, it is around food.  And so it was again.  It had been at various Indian restaurants the last few years, as I love Indian food.  The girl between Tomo and myself, I met her in London through friends and she later stayed in the same hostel that I was in.  The other girl, I met her through that first-mentioned girlfriend in Singapore when we were doing a course together.  I remember that first meeting clearly - we were introduced whilst Q'g up for the toilet!  They helped us a lot on my wedding day in Singapore.  The second girlfriend was also in London at the same time but we never really knew each other then.  The funny thing is, we were all from the same school in Singapore previously but I did not know them then - they are senior to me.  (I also separately met up with another girlfriend from my London days - I forgot to take photos though, sorry Min!  The funny thing again is that this girlfriend is also from that same school and I also did not know her then as she is a year senior to me)  I actually left that school halfway through to move on to a convent school although these girls stayed all the way.  Strangely, I am in touch with only 3 girls from this school and none of them I knew whilst I was in the school!  But I think a lot can be said for being of the same wavelength, coming from the same school ....

As we were finishing up lunch, Kai comes running over and says he found a slide and insisted that we go check it out.  Around that time, the first girlfriend's husband and 2 of her kids came to join us.  This turned out to be the "slide":

It may a a simple slope, and never intended to be a slide.  But we had so much fun!  I think we spent more than an hour on these slides.  

Singapore - Part III

(Taiga with his Dinosaur - a drink popularly seen on menus in Singapore nowadays.  It is actually Milo with lots of undissolved Milo powder at the top.)

What did we do in Singapore?  We ate, and ate, and ate.

Shopping trips were punctuated by eating/resting at restaurants, meet-ups with friends were always inevitably around good food, christmas was celebrated with the family xmas party (an annual event at my parents place) where lots of good food was to be had, new years was celebrated by more good food and then there were those restaurants that we had to go to because they are my favourites.  All within 15 days!

Kai and Taiga ate a lot!  They are good eaters already in Tokyo, but they were pretty unstoppable in Singapore.  They absolutely loved the food there, Chinese food in particular.  They discovered har kau and siew mai (OK, we have that here in Japan for yum cha also but it absolutely does not taste the same).  Kai additionally just had to eat all noodles he saw.  Here he is stealing my bro's noodles and my bro pretending to be angry!  (I am sure he was secretly happy to be sharing with Kai.)

I am a Crystal Jade fan.  We went to Crystal Jade Kitchen and the ultra-fancy Crystal Jade restaurant at Paragon.  Crystal Jade is a must-go-to even after all these years.  I could go to Crystal Jade every day of my trip back home if I had to.  Another must-go to is The Big O at Wheelock Place.  Their desserts are excellent (pineapple upside-down cake being my favourite, but their durian cakes and various chocolate cakes are very good too).  We had lunch there this time round and it is now definitely a must-go-to place for food too.  The portions are huge too, which is nice.  I used to like the DKNY cafe too  - the best pastrami sandwiches, cheap Coke out of a can, marshmallow brownies, magazines provided, tranquil atmosphere away from the madding crowd but with good people watching.  They have however closed down the cafe.  Outside of town area, Jumbo Seafood is another regular haunt.  I just discovered that Jumbo Seafood is now in Tokyo!  Will check that out one day although I suppose it will not be as good as back home. 

This time round, we had a celebratory dinner with friends at Min Jiang (Szechuan cuisine), but the one at Dempsey Hill.  (A little family history here for the benefit of Kai and Taiga when they read this later in life.)  My family has a little connection with Goodwood Park Hotel so growing up, we frequented the Min Jiang at Goodwood Park.  Many family celebrations/family meet-ups (with uncles, aunties and cousins) were there.   I was keen to check out the new (to me, that is) Min Jiang and Dempsey Hill.  Dempsey Hill is off the beaten track but that area has been gorgeously re-done.  It is a cluster of colonial bungalows set in lush greenery.  All the bungalows there have now been converted to fancy restaurants, many with outdoor seating.  The menu was pretty much the same as the one at Goodwood Park, and the food fine as usual.  

So back to my friends - the celebration is of their recent wedding!  We could not come back for the big event due to work/kids etc.  I have known the husband (of the newly weds) since my London days.  (I was reminded by another friend from my London days that our London days is almost 20 years ago - yikes!!!)  As luck would have it, at the last minute, I managed to leave my kids with my sis.  So that meant a very adult dinner with wine and uninterrupted conversation.  I can count on 1 hand the number of times Tomo and I have experienced this together since we had kids.  This is only the second time I have met his wife, but I think we all got on just fine and enjoyed the company.   

(Photos of Dempsey Hill to be inserted later.)

Singapore - Part II

We went to the zoo.  

Our arrival was marked by Kai puking in the taxi.  I had totally forgotten that he is a bad traveller in the car too, and forgot to give him the motion sickness pills.  He was really chatty in the taxi until the end when he became really quiet.  Just as the taxi pulled into the zoo's car park, he told me he is going to puke.  I was telling him to try and hold it in, we are arriving and telling the taxi driver to hurry up.  Just 1 second before the taxi stopped for us to alight, he threw up.  In the taxi.  The taxi driver (an elderly female) was really nice about it though.  Thankfully, it was more liquidy than solid.  And he did not soil his clothes!  He has thrown up so many times now that he knows how to avoid his clothes where he can.  

Taiga was particularly keen to see the elephants and the lions.  He kept talking about seeing them even when we were in Japan.  Alas, the prime viewing spot for the lions was cordoned off for a private reception and there was only 1 elephant which they rushed to keep when it started to rain!!!  (Apparently the elephants are in the Night Safari section rather than the zoo.)

There was also a kids water park and we came prepared.  The kids had a grand time in there.  They also had a grand time with the little pull-along trolley (Radio Flyer) that we rented for the little ones.  I think we over-used that when all the cousins - except for the baby of the lot -  decided they wanted to be in there together!

Kai the Japanese boy meets Kai the tribesman.  Who is Kai the Tribesman?  

Crawling?

Having fun spraying others.

Kids eagerly awaiting below for the big pot to tilt over.

Little Taiga hard at work pushing his older sibling and cousins ...

and then they were all there (save for "baby" Kaelyn)

The tropical downpour.  Just 2 seconds earlier, there was not even a sign of any rain.  

 

Elegant zebras.

Singapore - Part I

We did so much in Singapore, that it is quite difficult to coherently document everything here (with the limited blogging time I have).  So, in no particular order, I will just write whatever comes to mind first.

Northwest

For starters, we flew Northwest and they are so kid-unfriendly as a whole.  We had 1 supernice stewardess (who happened to also be on our flight back to Japan), but apart from that, some of the stewardesses don't even bother making eye contact when talking to passengers, which really irks me.  But before we even started our flight, I found out a couple of days before that they had seated me  separately from Kai & Taiga.  I don't know why, especially since we had the same reservation number.  I called Northwest to change the seating and they said it would be difficult, I should just do it when I enter the plane.  Not to worry, I told them, I really don't mind seating on my own, I just hope whoever is next to Kai and Taiga can cope with them.  Gosh, I really should fly with Northwest more often.  What an opportunity to be apart from the kids.

On the way back to Japan, we had the same problem in that I was placed to be seated with the kids, but Tomo was a few rows behind.  It was not Northwest's fault this time in that Tomo had a different reservation number (he flew to Singapore on his own a week after us, but we all got back to Japan together).  I tried to get Northwest to change our seats but again, they said do it when you board the plane.  So we approached the girl next to us and asked her if she could please trade her aisle seat for another aisle seat 2 rows back.  Surprisingly, she was hesitant and uncooperative.  She said no.  Finally, that super nice stewardess came to help us and that girl again said no, this time citing that she had ordered a special meal.  She did move in the end though.

Service in Singapore

I must say that this time round, I was quite disappointed in the service.  Sometimes when I go back, I get service that pleasantly surprises me but this last trip was not one of those times.

In one incident, I was a Borders and was seeking out Seventeen magazine that I had promised my niece.  Could not find it in the magazine section.  Looked around for a Borders employee, could not see one, started walking around looking for an employee.  About 15 meters later, at the Politics section, I spot an employee.

Me: Excuse me, I am looking for Seventeen magazine.  Can you please help me?

Employee: That would be in the magazine section.

Me: Yes, I know.  I just came from there but could not find it.

Employee: Then we don't have it anymore.

Me: Could you please show me the shelf where you usually have them?  I may have missed it.

Employee: *waving in a certain direction that excluded only the half of the bookshop behind her* There.

Me: And when do you think the next issue will arrive?  

Employee: We have no idea.

Me: Would it be in the computers?  Could you please check?

Employee: It is not in the computers.  You just have to keep coming back to check.

Lovely.  Is that how they keep their customers coming back?

Spoken English

The kids' English always markedly improve every time we go back.  Even if for just a week.   This trip was no different.  Before the trip, Taiga did not speak much English although he understood a lot.  Since coming back, he has been chattering away fluently in English as if it is his native language.

Now, Taiga love the song Old MacDonald Had a Farm.  He would dictate which animals are in the farm and I have to sing it and make the appropriate noises.  He was like that in Singapore too.  First, the cows, then the sheep, then the pigs .....

and then, the COCKROACH!

Yup, old man MacDonald's farm would not be complete without a roach.  And what sound do roaches make???