Summer Vacation

Summer vacation, the time of year every child looks forward to—sun, water, no school, freedom—ummm, not quite in Japan!

Summer vacation here is considerably shorter than I remember mine being—I recall getting out of school sometime in June, and not going back till the first week of September. And the best part about it—no homework, no teachers, goofing around, being lazy, wow!!

My children’s vacation begins around July 23^rd, and they are expected back the first weekday of September. Ok, so 40 days, a bit shorter than mine, but I can deal with it. But on top of that, they have HOMEWORK!! The first time I realized this, I freaked! When do the kids ever get a break?? Homework—on vacation?? It’s unheard of! Not here in Japan though.

First off, let me explain how the school year runs:
You begin your new year in April and end it in March of the next year. You get a 2-week vacation in-between terms, and this is the only vacation that has no homework. Otherwise, both summer and winter break include homework.

What does the homework consist of? Usually there’s a booklet that includes both math and grammar homework, about 20 pages or so, and then there’s a schedule-like diary they are supposed to fill in every day with a summary of what they did that day and how was the weather. Then they are supposed to choose one activity from a long list of subjects to complete—these can be as simple as drawing a picture to as complicated as a science experiment. As they get older the homework load gets heavier, to where my eldest in Jr. High School now has several different booklets to complete.

To be fair, it doesn’t seem that any of this homework is compulsory, but to be honest, what kid wants to be the only one who didn’t do their homework?

This year my kids got smart, as soon as they got home from the last day of school, they sat themselves down and completed the whole booklet in a couple of hours. Phew! But in years past it was usually a last minute mad rush to complete everything, including a full-blow craft project the day before going back to school!

Besides having a short vacation, topped with homework, the kids are expected to show up at school at least twice—mainly it seems just to check in and make sure they’re doing their homework. We usually skip these days since I never remember them, but it does seem most good Japanese kids go—maybe one day I’ll qualify in the ‘good Japanese’ category.

There are some truly wonderful things about summer in Japan--WATERMELON!! Yeah! We finally get to eat some! A bit pricey, but it's worth it! And FIREWORKS! Lucky for us, we live about 30 minutes by car away from one of the largest firework shows in the world, which we have managed to go to 7 out of 11 years, and of course, buying little hand-held fireworks to do in your back yard, something I know many countries don't have. And since we live in the countryside, we have a great variety of rivers to swim in. But still, the homework....

A Smoking Nation

July 18, 2007

A Smoking Nation!

When I first arrived in Japan, long long ago, you could buy cigarettes, sake and porn from vending machines on the street. A child could walk into a grocery store and purchase any of those items. Coming from the US, where laws were much stricter, this was quite a marvel for me.

As years passed, things slowly changed, and those vending machines have slowly disappeared off the main streets. Mind you, every so often I do come across a beer-selling machine, and cigarette vending machines are still widely available, but the porn-sellers have definitely diminished, except at midnight, the local vegetable stand makes the great switcheroo to the local porn shop. Hmmm… well, at least the kids are all in bed by then!

Fifteen years ago I made a trip from Osaka to Tokyo by shinkansen. It’s a beautiful ride, you go right past Mt. Fuji, and through the wilderness between Kansai and Kanto, traveling at an incredible speed, there’s a nice little snack bar on the train, of course toilets. Under normal circumstances I really enjoy this trip. Unfortunately for me, it was the end of Shogatsu (New Year’s) and everyone was returning to Tokyo after the 3-day vacation. I hadn’t reserved a seat ahead of time, which I normally don’t do anyway, but once I got on the train I realized the mistake—there were NO seats in the non-reserved sections. With my wool dress and high-heel boots, I slowly wobbled down the car aisles, searching for a seat, finally finding one in a reserved section. I would have to pay more for it, but at this point, a 3-hour standing trip on a train traveling over 250km/hour in high-heels was not a fun prospect. To make things worse, it was the smoking section of the train!

Japan today is still a very smoking-oriented country. Although there is a smoking ban on the local trains, the reserved express trains and shinkansens still have smoking sections (which really sucks if you have to use the toilet and the only way to get there is through the smoking car—yuck!) The local family dinner restaurants (Gusto, Joyful, Royal Host, Denny’s…) have finally put in smoking and non-smoking sections, which really doesn’t make much difference cause it’s still all in the same room and you come home smelling like an ashtray. Our local Joyful finally got the point that there are more non-smokers coming to eat, and switched the large smoking and tiny non-smoking areas to accommodate the changing local society. But usually the smokers get a very large portion of the restaurant, and those of us who don’t smoke are relegated to a small corner by the toilet. On busy nights this can be pretty inconvenient (and so we no longer go out to eat on busy nights).

Starbucks has made a great impact on the restaurant/smoking culture of Japan. They are almost the only eating establishment that forbids smoking on the premises—GO STARBUCKS!! It is one reason the chain is very popular in Japan, besides a decent cup of coffee (which is another article of its own). The company set a new standard of non-smoking for Japan, which is slowly catching on. Now, if McDonalds would just get the idea!!

But still, the Japanese are a smoking society. People smoke under the ‘No Smoking’ signs on train platforms, they walk down the street with a cigarette in hand, they stand right outside the game center door puffing away, no mind for the children or people who might be passing by, no concern for the health of others around, not to mention the smell of it. I’m not anti-smoking, if someone wants to smoke I absolutely don’t mind, just not around me please! Not in public areas where my kids are breathing the same air, not in restaurants where we want to enjoy the flavor of the food and not come home with smoke-scented clothes and hair.

Slowly the transition is happening. The convenience and grocery stores have signs up that make it clear they won’t sell cigarettes or liquor to anyone under 20 (now, do they check ID—that’s the question!), more and more shopping centers and restaurants are putting a ban on smoking, and I just read in the news that starting in October, people caught smoking on the streets of Osaka will be fined 1,000 yen—GO OSAKA!!

The sad thing is how easily available tobacco is to children here. My daughter could easily become a smoker at the age of 13 and I’d never know—she can buy it at the local vending machine, smoke it on the way to school, I probably wouldn’t be that much wiser to it. Lucky for me she things it’s disgusting and hates the smell of tobacco, but I often spy many kids in their young teens out on the street corner smoking away in the evening. It’s a sad thing that the country could easily change by just putting restrictions in place about where to sell these things, as well as enforcing no smoking rules in public places—ah for the day!!

For further information:A Dying Breed

The Freedom of Raising a Child in Japan

A Foreign Mother in Japan
July 13, 2007

My foreign friend and I often discuss child-rearing practices and policies in Japan compared to our own home countries or cultures. In my case I have to say culture since I’ve lived in Japan for close to 2/3rds of my life, so I’m not sure that my own policies reflect American ones. We’re both married to Japanese men, both have school-aged children, and both have had to learn the ropes of the parenting system here.

There are a lot of little rules in this country, those who live here realize it, those who don’t, but have been reading my blog, are aware of it. Kids NEVER go barefoot, they always have a thermos wherever they go, they all wear caps in the summer, and they all buy a ‘randsell’ backpack for entering 1st grade. Mothers show up to every school visit, all the school volunteer cleaning days, and they all buy the school required shuji set, sewing kit, and kanji dictionary. They never forget to include chopsticks in their children’s backpacks, and would never buy their school recorder from the 100-yen shop—all the things I’ve done without a second thought. Oh yes, they don’t make their kids work for their allowance.

So, yeah, I get frustrated and irritated by all the little rules that all the other mothers seem to know by instinct and I don’t. And I wonder “What’s the big deal, so I just cut up an old towel to make their school-required rags rather than buying some at the supermarket, so I made a sandwich for their excursion lunch rather than pack a full-course obento, so I didn’t give my kid the full 500 yen of spending money for the outing, since I only had 200 in my wallet, oh well!” (I think my kids realize this about me, and have found other ways to prepare for the things they know I won’t do).

But in many major areas of your child’s life, the parent has a lot of freedom and control. For instance, I can leave my kids in the car while I go shopping and no one will report me, I can leave my little kids home alone and no one would get upset, I can give my kids a whack in public and no one is going to be outraged, I can allow my kids to throw a full-on temper tantrum in the mall and everyone will ignore my child and me. I can laugh while my kids pulls the hair of the little guy sitting next to him in class, and I can expect the teacher to think my kid is still absolutely adorable, even when he hits her, calls her names, ignores her and is otherwise a monster. (Hey, anyone who knows me knows that I would never allow my kids to behave like that—but I HAVE seen it happen regularly).

Those are things that are important to me, things relating to safety, to danger, to behavior, I feel those are the important things to be concerned about. But, I do agree, that as a parent, despite the many small rules that I manage to not follow anyway, I have a lot of control over really main issues, and for that I’m grateful.

The 100-Yen Store Explosion

Something I absolutely love about Japan, one thing that has only gotten better and better in all the years I’ve been here, and that is---

100 YEN SHOPS!!!

Oh my God!! If you’re thinking “100yen=$ Shop”, THINK AGAIN! There is no comparison at all. It is literally possible to outfit your whole family and decorate your whole house from a 100-Yen shop, and to do it in style and class! Before I buy anything, I check at the local Daiso for it, and if it isn’t there, I’m really bummed that I’ll have to buy it for maybe 10 yen more at another store. The 100 yen shop has been a supplier of omiyage (souvenir gifts), birthday party prizes, Christmas decorating, snack supplies, glassware and cutlery, storage containers, baby toys, stationary, gardening needs—I can’t even think what I’d do without the shop! And thank God, we are SO lucky in our little tiny country town—we don’t have a Starbucks, we don’t even have a Mister Donuts, but we do have TWO 100-yen shops!!

Whenever I ask my Mom what she wants me to bring from Japan, she always says, “Some of those cute little plates from the 100-yen shop!” When my friends return home for vacations, their first stop for presents is—you got it!! When the kids need something for school—guess where we go to find it! When my supply of teaspoons has dwindled down to 3, it’s time to make the trip!

Funny thing is though—I noticed that some of that stuff is actually cheaper in other shops—so why do I feel like I’m getting such a good deal when I get it at Daiso?

When I first came to Japan I was introduced to the 100-yen shop, actually, it was more like the 100-yen stall, set up outside a supermarket for a week, before moving on to another location. You were lucky to be on the circuit. About 11 years ago came the introduction of Daiso, and with it the 100-yen shop explosion, or more like the Daiso explosion. The shop has become so popular that it even has its own little (or rather large) corner in high class department stores like Takashimaya! It is slowly moving overseas with stores set up in Canada, the US, the Middle East, Indonesia, Taiwan, Korea, New Zealand and more. If you’re thinking about a good possible future investment, Daiso stock could prove to be very profitable.

It’s sometimes hard to imagine life before the mega-100-Yen shop, it’s not quite on the same level as the Internet, but pretty close!

Uniforms and School Lunches

Janina in her Jr. High uniform

A Foreign Mother in Japan

Article 3

Ever since I’ve been in Japan I’ve found myself rebelling against the uniform system 98% of the country has adopted. Kids all wearing the same clothing, they all look the same already, you can’t hardly tell them apart, much less putting them in the same uniform! How can a mother find her child in the crowd, how do you know if that’s little Yuko or Sayaka on the stage reciting something?

We were lucky though, our local kindergarten and elementary school don’t require uniforms, only matching PE clothes. The kids are free to come to school in shorts, t-shirts, pants, jeans, dresses, whatever they feel like, only their shoes are restricted to tennis shoes, no sandals or boots, but that’s ok, I can ‘give’ on that point.

But---once they hit Jr. High, goodbye freedom, hello conformity! At first Janina was excited to be getting her uniform, FINALLY! A uniform! I hated it, I let her know from the start, I complained about it, it’s too hot in summer, not warm enough in winter (and they aren’t allowed to wear a coat or sweater on top of it, even if it snows!), blah blah! After 1-1/2 years wearing the same clothing day after day, Janina has finally realized that uniforms SUCK!!

This is one of the few points my husband and I disagree on about the Japanese school system—uniforms! He grew up with it, so he’s used to them, he accepts it as a better way of doing things—and to be honest, it does make life simple! No clothing choices every day, they are pretty sturdy so they don’t wear out too quickly (they should be sturdy since it usually costs about $800 to get your kid’s uniforms for the year!), and at school there’s no comparing or bad feelings about who’s dressed to style, who’s not, who’s ‘in’, who’s not (don’t worry though, those problems are still there, they just come out in different ways—who has the cool pencil case….) But for me, I love the variety of clothing, I love choosing something new to wear every day, I love color, and I think color in the classroom gives it a bit more life! Uniforms go against my love of freedom and not being bound by unnecessary rules. There’s enough rules to follow, ones that make sense, why do we need to enforce conformity?

OK, now I’ve ragged on the uniforms, I want to talk about something Japanese schools do very well—lunches!

Every school district does it a bit differently, but generally schools have a school-lunch system, meals are delivered on a daily basis, usually served with milk, once in awhile with coffee-milk or chocolate-milk. In our area, school-lunch, or kyushoku, is served to the elementary grades. It costs about $35/month, and I really like it. Every month we get the menu complete with nutrition information, we know exactly what they’re eating that day. And there really is hardly any junk, meals are very balanced with veggies, protein and starch. Kids are NOT allowed to bring soda to school, or even fruit juice unless they have a good reason, but they can bring water, or mugi-cha (barley tea), or when they’re sick I’ve often sent warm herb-tea or lemon-tea. Basically, they can’t bring anything sweet.

Something that varies from the American school system is there is no morning snack recess. I seem to remember always having a snack break around 10 or so. Here they kids stick it out till lunch time, and I guess the body adjust to it. Even now I always find myself hungry at about—yes—10 or 11, but my kids can survive all the way to 12:30 with just breakfast. And in many families, the kids don’t even eat breakfast. No wonder everyone’s so skinny over here!

As I said before, I have a true love-hate relationship with Japan—and since I was the one up and making breakfast and Janina’s lunch today, I loved the elementary kyushoku service, and wished the Jr. High had the same!

OT--Doing the Boogey!

This post is OT--off topic--and not part of the regular issue of A Foreign Mother in Japan.

--courtesy of Boogey Woogey
I've been doing my daily hour-long walk now. I love listening to Doobie Brothers while walking past the Bay. I do some walk-dancing and boogying while walking. I want to post it on your blog... foreigners in Japan can "BE DIFFERENT" and be happy about it! Thank goodness we don't have to be confined to their crazy mannerisms!

Jumping Ahead

Today I take a huge jump across the years to the present. Something I have had to learn to cope with culturally is my children’s schooling. All 3 of my children attend the local public schools. They started in kindergarten, and the eldest is now in 8^th grade.

Japan’s schooling system basically goes like this:

• K4 (kindy for 4 years)
• K5 (kindy for 5 years)
• 1-6^th grade (elementary school)
• 7-9^th grade (Jr. High)
• 10-12^th grade (Highschool)

The only years that are mandatory are the elementary and Jr. High years. Kindergarten and High School are not mandatory. Actually, you are considered an adult at age 16, though you can’t drive until 18 and you can’t drink or smoke until 20 (hmmm—that rule is not strictly kept—up to a few years ago I could’ve sent my daughter to the local store to pick up a pack of beer for me or a bottle of wine, no questions asked, but they have clamped down on it. Nevertheless, it’s pretty common to see young kids in the Jr. High bracket smoking, my daughter tells me the Jr. High 3^rd grade naughty-boys all congregate in the stair-well to smoke during school time).

While I’m happy my kids go to school and are getting an education, I find myself in a constant battle with the rules and requirements, esp. as they get older. Here is a recent conversation I had with Janina (13):

M: Hey kiddo, I think you’re hair looks really nice up in a high ponytail. Shall I help you do it this morning?
J: Umm, no Mom, cause I can’t wear my hair higher than the tips of my ears.
M:WHAT!! What do you mean!!
J: It’s the rules Mom.
M: What are they gonna do to you if you put it up?
J: Well, probably I’ll get lynched (and this is the actual word they use in Japanese) by the seniors.
M: Jr. High SUCKS!!!

And the list really does go on. Everything is dictated, my daughter is even afraid to put her hair up after school or on weekends going out in case a senior sees her and she gets beat up at school.

There’s an odd variety of other ‘rules’: First years must wear white socks, but 2^nd and 3^rd years can wear black, only 3^rd years can wear a sweater or scarf to school in winter, no bangles, baubles, accessories of any kind, those are the ones I know about, I’m sure there are many others.

Another conversation with my daughter:

J: We’re having a musical competition at school, I finally learned the song!
M: That’s great!!
J: But the seniors threatened to kill us!
M: What??!!
J: They want to win the competition so they said if any of us do anything other than sing, they’ll kill us! We can’t clap, or move, or dance…
M: Seniors SUCK!! How can they get away with that!

That’s the usual ending of those conversations—it SUCKS!!

It seems that the seniors have a lot of power here, and they keep the juniors in a state of fear and control. It’s quite ridiculous, and in looking at society, it’s where the whole “respect your elder—pay obeisance to your elder—your elder is always better than you” mentality begins. While I believe in respect, I believe respect goes towards anyone, older, younger, it doesn’t matter. This school form of “We’re going to beat you up if you wear green socks!” respect is not respect, it’s bullying, which Japan has a major problem with. And where are the teachers when these things happen? I’m sure the teachers are aware of it, but rather than tackling the problem or trying to change the students’ mentality, they let it go and say, “That’s the way it is…”

Some things are changing though. Because of the high rate of suicide, esp. the recent rash of Jr. High suicides, people are taking a closer look at the education system and what goes on in students’ lives, as well as listening closer to the silent cries of the students. For the meantime, I try to keep close communications with my children, educate them on what I consider good values of respect, and let them know when I think something happening at their school is just plain stupid.

Some would say I should tell my daughter to buck the tide, but I decided to leave that choice up to her. There’s a time to fight, and a time not to, since she will be the one to bear the consequences, she is the one who has to make the choice to stand up against it. I would hate to see her come home with a black eye over something as dumb as her hair, I just hope she stands up to fight for things that are really important—defense of the weak, right and wrong and good morals.

Beginning of the Journey

Welcome to the first article in my “Foreign Mother in Japan” series! Living abroad in a foreign country is not always easy, nor does it always feel rewarding, nevertheless, it is what we make it, combined with what the country makes of us. Raising children in a culture so very different from my own, I’ve found I’ve had to cope with adjusting to policies and ways of thinking that go completely against my own, and I’ve had to learn when to speak up and insist that something be done differently.

Though the birth of my eldest daughter, Janina, 13 years ago could mark the beginning of this path, I believe the true beginning was when she entered kindergarten at 6 years old. This was when I was faced with the true differences in my culture vs. the culture I was living in, and it is something I face every day I wake up and send my kids to school, every time I interact with the local mothers, every time I talk with my English students.

I find I have developed a love-hate relationship with this country, and it’s hard to say which is stronger. I am often asked “Are you used to Japan?” I never quite know how to answer that question. At what point did I stop getting used to the country and the country became a part of me? The better question would be when I visit California—“Are you used to America?” to which I could quickly reply, “Not really.” But am I used to Japan? Yes, no, sometimes, never and always.

I’m used to the weather, the seasons, the sound of the language, the habits of the Japanese, the groceries in the stores, the cars on the roads, the little neighborhoods, the rice-patties, downtown, crowded trains and being stared at everywhere I go. But more than being used to it, it is part of me and I am part of it, no matter how much I stand out.

Fortunately I’m short and my hair is dark, so if I wear sunglasses, long sleeves and pants, and speak Japanese I can occasionally get away with being Japanese, but remove the layers and I suddenly find myself a magnet for attention. Through the years I have learned to deal with it graciously, but there have been moments of pure hatred, when I locked myself up in the house and refused to go shopping, dreading the moment I stuck my foot out the door, when I have glared in anger at anyone who tried to approach me to speak English, and other times when I have played it up and loved the false glamour being white gave me. And now, now I mostly ignore it, I put my chin up in the air and pretend I’m as normal as the guy next to me.

How did I come to this country? It’s a long story in detail, as is any, but the short version is I was the child of a missionary and came in my late teens. I spent the next 10 years working with foreigners, teaching their children, caring for my own siblings, before I married Toru and we began our own.

And so the journey began.