Christmas Part Two

 Christmas Eve was really great. Just being together, talking, laughing and eating!

I spent most of the day cooking. I actually enjoyed spending the day cooking. 

I did roast beef in the slow cooker, it was very tender! Roast chicken. Fluffy saw me take the chicken out of the fridge, she then watched as I prepared it. She kept pawing at me to get some! When I put the chicken in the oven, Fluffy cried. She then sat guarding the oven! And, yes, she did get some after it was cooked!

I also made roast potatoes, broccoli, carrots and of course Yorkshire Puds! And lashings of gravy! 

Christmas Eve dinner

Hannah's plate, most of the beef is under the chicken!

I asked the kids not to buy presents, I couldn't, no extra money! But Christopher used what bit of money he had to buy for everyone, even me. I told him when he said that he wanted to buy something, not to buy for me, as he paid for Costco!

He bought books for Mikey and David, a little pouch with cats on it for Hannah to use for her medicine when she's out. It holds a few days' medicine, very compact and cute!

He got me an electric blanket that wraps around like a cape! It is so nice and warm! I might never get out of bed again!

My lovely warm cape!

Christmas Day started at 4am! Dad called to wish us Merry Christmas!

Hannah and I had tickets for "Phantom of the Opera". We planned a day in the city, window shopping, nice lunch, the show and a look at the last day of the Christmas Market. As always plans changed but in a good way!

After talking to Dad to I decided it wasn't worth going back to bed as I had to get up at 5am to make breakfast and obento for Christopher. Also, Hannah was too excited to go back to sleep.

Mikey dropped Hannah and I off at the train station about 9am. We were able to get a rapid train, the one that doesn't stop at every station, it took about 30 minutes to get to the city!

We arrived in the city before 10am, when everything opens. The first problem was finding toilets! Train stations in Japan, especially in the big cities, are almost cities in themselves, with department stores, cafes, restaurants, movie theatres and even clinics in them!  The train station we were at has two floors of restaurants, the 10th floor was open because the movie theatre is up there, and people were already queuing to get in. I know that the toilets up there are open, so we went up. The escalators and stairs are located in the stores, so they are not accessible before 10 am. Therefore, we had to use the elevators. On the elevators, there have always been signs asking that people who really need to use them have priority!  Now there is one elevator that is a priority elevator, painted pink, with signs in Japanese, Korean and English!

Sign next to the priority elevator.

The red mark on the bottom is for people who have some disability or health problem that is not visible. Hannah has this badge because of her epilepsy.

We realised that we had a lot of time to kill! It was only 10 am, but the show didn't start until 1:30! 

On the eighth floor of the station building is a massive bookstore, Maruzen, which has branches throughout Japan.  I love going there, just to browse the English books. I was tempted but didn't buy any. I left Hannah to have a browse around; she is always looking for books on education and linguistics. 

I found a bench to sit on and had a look through an English textbook aimed at elementary school kids. Once we reopen our school here, I want to invest in some new textbooks, but this one had some obvious mistakes! 

France is not a city!

As we were walking around, we saw a lot of very excited kids, all racing to the same area.  The new Nintendo store was opening that day!

Nintendo Store

We were going to go to a nice Japanese restaurant for lunch, but neither of us was very hungry, but I wanted to eat something, as recently I've been getting dizzy if I miss meals. Part of the fun of having diabetes! We found a soup cafe. We got some lovely warm soup and bread, not very big, just enough to keep us going!

Our early lunch.

I had a beef stew, and Hannah had onion soup! Both were very delicious!

Hannah is being cute!

We took the subway to and from the movie theatre. I don't like this subway line as it's very deep, but I do appreciate that even at the most busy times it's always clean, no graffiti or litter and quiet. I took a little video from when we were going back, about 5:30, the start of the rush hour. Quiet and orderly as people waited for the trains!

Near the subway exit is a shrine, Kushida Shrine.

It's just a few minutes walk from the subway, so we decided that we still had a couple of hours to kill, so we went to see it! This was a change to our plans, but doing something spontaneous is good to, sometimes.

The area around the subway and leading up to the shrine was really interesting! A mix of older buildings, very old shrines and new buildings!

Across from the subway, the symbols are interesting!

A street near the shrine, with very old, small shops.

The entrance to the shrine.

It was so beautiful inside, but there were signs everywhere asking not to take photos! Of course, the Chinese and American tourists disregarded the signs and were taking photos and videos!

This is one of the oldest shrines in Japan, founded in 757! It's dedicated to Amaterasu, Susanoo and Ohatanushi. 

I thought I could write everything in one post but it's getting late and I haven't even got to the main event of the day, "The Phantom of the Opera".

So I'll leave it here, see you in part 3!

Christmas

 Merry Christmas, everyone!

It's Christmas Eve afternoon here in Japan! I had plans, but of course they got changed!

I planned to do a load of baking and make a lovely dinner for this evening.

But I'm so tired from yesterday's trip to Costco, then more shopping for vegetables, and then teaching!

One thing I'm really happy about is that I'm not in so much pain! I did just over 7,000 steps yesterday, the muscles in my thighs feel tight, and after standing to make obento, breakfast and cleaning the kitchen a bit (just over an hour), my back started to hurt a bit, but not like before! I'm so happy about this; it really shows that losing some weight and exercising is paying off.

I asked David to pick up some milk and eggs on the way back from work. He did, but he also raided the snack aisle!

David's snack haul!

Plus, there's cake in the fridge! I'm glad that he got this. I don't need to bake, but I did make some snickerdoodles! We don't buy snacks, I don't think we've bought this much in the past year!

I've put the beef in the slow cooker. I like it done like that, long, slow cooking. Makes it a lot more tender than in the oven!

The beef, all ready to cook.

I forgot to mention that Mikey had a magic show on Saturday. 

Saturday was crazy busy for Mikey; he had three classes in the morning, two of which overlapped in time. He asked Hannah to help out; she could start the one nursery class while he finished the one before, and then drive to the other place.  This worked out well. Hannah watched Mikey's show and said it was very good! She sent a few photos!

Tomorrow, Hannah and I are off to see "The Phantom of the Opera". I'm really looking forward to that, but it still seems strange to go out on Christmas Day!

Costco

 Last November, Costco opened a store nearby, about a 30-minute drive away.

I've been wanting to go since then. But if I had time, I had no money; if I had money, I had no time!

This time, however, Christopher offered to pay for me. He even made a credit card just to go to Costco!

One problem is that neither Christopher nor I can drive, so we had to coordinate with Mikey and David!

We've been planning this trip since the beginning of December!

David came home from work, picked us up and dropped us off. He then had to go to the dentist. Mikey finished his morning classes, then picked us up!

I was rather excited to go there. I think it has to do with being able to buy things that are different, more to my taste.  Also, there is always a feeling of nostalgia, the many times I went when the kids were little, and Hisao was alive.  We went to a different branch, almost a 2-hour drive away. It was always a full day out, always a lot of fun!

I didn't buy too much, I did get a whole chicken and a piece of beef for tomorrow's dinner. Everyone will be at home. I'm really looking forward to having everyone around the table again!

While I was choosing the beef, some ladies started to ask me how I cook it. I managed to explain, in rather broken Japanese, Christopher helped when I got stuck. But I was rather proud of the fact that I tried instead of just relying on Christopher!

As I was wandering around, I came across these rather interesting stuffed Mickey Mouse toys!

White Mickey

Black Mickey

I can't write what Christopher said about them!

A couple of photos of what I bought!

I normally wouldn't buy apples from Costco, but these were really nice. I also got a 3kg bag of potatoes for 800 yen!

Of course, I took a video. Sorry if the quality isn't that great, but you can see what I bought!

The Tree Has Gone

 Not the Christmas tree; I don't bother with one anymore.

The big tree near the house and storage room! 

I'm talking about this big tree.

It was a lovely tree, but it had grown too big and too close to the buildings. The first plan was to trim it down, so the top was lower than the roof, but I think it died! I noticed over the summer that the leaves were brown, and there was no new growth!

While it was still green, if we had a typhoon or strong wind, there was a possibility of it hitting the roof, especially the storage roof.  Once it had died, I was very worried that a strong wind could snap it and send it onto the house roof; it seemed very dry and brittle.

This year, we have been lucky in that there have been no typhoons that have passed near here, and the windstorms haven't been that bad, but I didn't want to push our luck!

Recently, David has been out with his chainsaw, cutting down trees or trimming back some of the branches.  Today he tackled the tree!

Before

He had to climb on the roof behind the tree to reach the top part of it!

About halfway done

No more tree.

Looks a lot better. Also, there seems to be more light in the living/dining area!  

David said that the view from the roof is really nice!

I would love to have the money to take down the old storage area and build a new two-storey house! I can dream, can't I?

The Weather

 Not the most exciting of topics, but the weather here has been strange!

It's almost Christmas, and it's warm! 

We've had a couple of cool days, with temperatures around 12 °C, and a few nights where the temperature dropped to -2 °C. 

Today, however, the high was 21 °C. Currently, we are under a thunderstorm advisory. 

I just had a little walk around the garden and noticed that some trees have buds on them!

Lovely clouds!

The temperatures should be a bit lower tomorrow, closer to the average! 

I'm still trying to get cleaned up, doing a deep clean before Christmas. Even though we aren't really doing Christmas, I still want everywhere to be cleaned and refreshed. I keep telling myself that if I get everywhere cleaned, decluttered and sorted, then it will be easy to keep up!

The problem is (of course, there are problems) that the more I clean, the more I can see where we are going to have to pay money to fix things. I was hoping that by having the water systems changed, the kitchen, bathroom and toilet, then the house would be alright. But I think the tatami will have to be taken up I would prefer a wood floor, but it depends on the expense. Also, I need to figure out what to do about the windows; the pools of condensation are driving me crazy!

A lot of money that I don't have at the moment!

I'm trying not to worry about that. I will make money, somehow! 

Next week is going to be busy!

Tomorrow and Monday, finish cleaning, see if I can clean the garden a bit, and also do some baking!

Tuesday, I'm going to Costco! Finally! Costco opened near here (about a 30-minute drive) last November. I've been wanting to go since then.  Christopher is going to pay this time, that is why I can go!

I'm planning a nice dinner on Wednesday evening, everyone will be home! It'll be nice to have everyone together. 

On Thursday, Hannah and I are going to see "Phantom of the Opera". I'm really looking forward to that!

Busy week, but nice busy, not just work busy!

I have a couple of weeks off from teaching. I hope to use the time wisely to prepare for next year, set goals and make some determination!

New Oven

 This post contains an Amazon affiliate link.

My oven arrived yesterday! 

I was thrilled to receive it. Christopher asked why I got an oven as soon as my old one broke, but not a rice cooker. I realised that even after all the years I've been in Japan, rice is still a foreign concept to me. Having a rice cooker is nice, but not necessary; I can cook rice on the stovetop. Not having an oven means that there are a lot of things I can't cook. I always thought that I didn't really need a microwave, but the past couple of weeks, I haven't had one, made cooking a lot harder!  Also, the oven has a grill function, I love to grill up vegetables and, of course, baking or doing a roast, I need an oven!

This is the one David bought for me!

https://amzn.to/48XG5d

It's a lot nicer than the image!

It has two tiers, plus an interior light, two things my old one didn't!

New oven, old toaster!

I've only used the microwave so far. After I finish this, I'm going to bake some little cakes!

One thing I noticed is that it tells you have much electricity you've used. Running the microwave for one minute is about 0.02 yen! 

It also connects to the Wi-Fi! I can set the oven from my phone, but to start it, someone has to press the start button!

I was so excited by these features that I was telling Hannah how great it is! Her reply was "Welcome to the 21st century"

When I thought about it, I've seen many types of ovens and used many different ones!

In England, the oven and stovetop are usually one unit; I've always called it a cooker. I'm wondering now if that is British English?

As a child, we (usually my Mom, brother and me) would visit my great aunt. She had an electric cooker, but almost never used it. Her fire in the kitchen had a built-in oven! She had a shelf in front of the fire for pots, and the meat would go in the oven to roast. I remember this long fork she had to toast bread on in the mornings. I was fascinated by how this worked. At home, Mom put the meat in the oven and turned a knob; at great aunt's, there was a lot of fuss to get the fire hot enough. Also, the kitchen would get very hot!

My Mom had an electric cooker, then changed to gas after the power cuts in the early 70s. I learnt to cook and bake on a gas cooker, which I prefer.

I've used industrial ovens and stovetops. They are great, but if they aren't serviced regularly can play up a lot!

When I first came to Japan, I was horrified to find that ovens were a luxury that few people had. Also, the stovetop had just two burners. Now, however, ovens are becoming more popular, even if they are small compared to English ovens. Also, it's possible to get a stovetop with 3 burners!

I'll let you know how my first baking attempt in the new oven went!

Thirteen Years

 Today is thirteen years since Hisao passed away.

It's hard to believe that much time has passed!

I was sorting through some photos to use, and just looking at them brought back so many memories. The hopes and the fears I had about our future.  One thing I never thought was that I would be widowed so young!  I thought we would grow old together, watching our kids grow up, and have their own families!

Here are a few photos.

With Mikey

I can't remember where this was taken!

This was from one of our first visits to England.

With Dad and Mikey

This is at Mount Kora, the place I went with David last week.

A couple of weeks ago, I came across a YouTube channel by another widow. She's Japanese, in her fifties, with children. In one video, she was talking about making decisions. How even the most simple of decisions are harder to make. This is so true! When Hisao passed away, I hated making any decisions at all!  Even the most basic things, like organising my schedule for the day, when to go shopping or what to make for dinner, felt so overwhelming!  Bigger decisions like helping the kids decide what high school or university to attend left me paralysed with fear! 

Over the years, I've learnt to cope with the small day-to-day things! I think the first year or so was the hardest. Larger decisions are still hard, but now that my kids are adults, I can ask them for advice.  As a mother, I don't want to burden them, but they have access to more information than I do; even using translation apps doesn't always help.

Being widowed is hard. But life goes on!

I have a lot to do this week. I'm trying to do a deep clean before it gets too cold.

I'm also battling a cold, an early Christmas gift from! Mikey!

The Kitchen.....

 Is almost done!

Since moving here, I've struggled with storage space in the kitchen.

There are cupboards under the stove, counter top and sink, but they smell. It's hard to describe, but it makes me heave. Currently, I have cleaning supplies and Tupperware stored under the sink. The drawers under the little counter area hold my cooking utensils and bowls, but I have to rewash them before using them! Under the stove top, I keep the very large pots, and bake wear that I use very occasionally.

The cupboards above are too high. I keep things that I don't use very often up there, but I am thinking of putting a small step ladder in the kitchen so I can store things like flour, sugar, etc. I want to find some kind of container that would be easy to pull out. I'm glad that we have 100 yen shops! For things like that, they are great!

One thing that I've changed that has really helped is moving where I store the plates and dishes we use every day. Before they were in the cabinet where I was also storing food. It was alright, but putting the clean dishes away was a hassle, so many times the dishes got left on the drying rack. This meant that many times dirty dishes were waiting to be washed because there was no room on the drying rack. For a day or two, this is okay, but when it gets to be a week, it gets crazy. We bought a dish rack to replace one of the drying racks, so now dishes are washed, dried and stored very quickly. No more mountains of dirty dishes in the sink!

Before

After

I want to buy some sort of storage container for the things between the two racks. Basically, the daily cleaning supplies. 

I'm happy with how it looks and functions now. I want to try and save some money as it does need to be pulled out and remodelled. I think the bad smell might be from the drains, but we need professionals in to fix that!

Next is my bedroom. I really want to do a deep clean. Hannah will be staying over Christmas and New Year, so I want to make the room a bit more comfortable!

Mount Kora And Kora Taisha Shrine

 Today turned out to be very different to what I had planned, in a good way!

The plan was to finish deep cleaning the kitchen, start on my room, make lunch and have an easy afternoon.

When David came home from work, I was looking at Amazon to find an oven. I realised this morning that I do need a microwave, also, I don't have confidence that the other functions on the oven will keep working.  The oven I have is an oven, microwave and grill combination. I thought about buying a cheap microwave, but I don't really have space, plus the electrical system isn't that good; if I run more than two appliances at once, the fuses get tripped!

I noticed that Amazon offers split payments, where you can pay over a few months. I haven't checked all the details as yet, but I'm hoping that I can use this system.

I explained to David that I was going to buy an oven from Amazon, he suggested that we go and have a look at the ovens at one of the many electrical stores.  David buys a lot online, and unfortunately, what he expects and what he gets doesn't always work out! The other week, he ordered a heater, but it turned out to be a lot smaller than he thought it would be. 

We had an early lunch, then went to the store. I'm glad we went to have a look. The one oven I liked had a very complicated system to run it. The one I have now has buttons for the different functions; the one I liked had a couple of buttons, but most of the functions were on a dial that you had to turn slowly to get to each function. I think trying to use that at 5am when I'm half asleep would be rather frustrating! I found one I liked and will order it later, if the split payment option works!

After we finished, I thought we would go back home, but David asked if I would like to go to Mount Kora. Of course, I said yes.

Mount Kora is one of the high points in this area; it's part of the Mino Mountain Range, the mountains that are behind our house. The shrine is Kora Taisha Shrine and has a history of 1600 years.

The drive up there was hair-raising to say the least. I took some video, but the road was bumpy, and I couldn't hold the phone still, sorry! You can hear me tell David to change down gears. He has only ever driven an automatic car and has no idea what the lower gears are for! I've never driven a car, but I know that on the mountain roads, the lower gears are better!

The views from the top are spectacular.

Explaining the view

I asked David to take some photos, so, of course, he took a selfie!

David

This stone explains about the cherry blossom trees that are planted here.

Father, Son Cherry Blossom Trees

The trees were planted by a Navy Admiral. The tree split and became known as Father Son Cherry Blossom Tree. The first two gold letters are father and son.

The steps up to the shrine itself are long and very steep. 

Steps up to the shrine.

I took one look at those and decided to send David up to take photos, until I noticed the funicular railway on the side. 

It's free to ride, but there was a donation box, so we dropped in a couple of hundred yen and rode up to the top.

The next video was from inside.

A much better way to get up all those steps. I think I could have managed going up, but coming down would have been hard!

Again, incredible views.

Looking down the steps.

View of the river

The steps again.

There were many things to see up here.

I remembered to take a photo of the shrine this time.

The main entrance to the shrine.

Interesting colours, also, why a rabbit?

The side of the shrine.

A dragon's head

I enjoyed noticing all the little details in the architecture.  From a distance, the shrines look very similar, but getting up close, you can see the little differences that make each shrine unique!

The main part of the shrine.

This is beyond the red entrance. Very beautiful.

Also, we found some chickens!

Shrine chickens.

And a massive tree.

We went to the observation deck, but by that time the weather had turned, and it started to rain!

I remembered that the road we were on went back toward our house, so instead of going back the way we came, we went for a real adventure.

Most of the road was alright until we came to this very narrow part, with very few places to allow cars to pass. Also, in many places, there was no guardrail. 

I was worried that the leaves were getting wet and could be a bit slippery! I was very happy to get back onto the main roads!

On the way back, we passed a few other places that looked nice. Maybe, when the weather is better, we can go out there again!

I actually had a really nice day. I still have all the cleaning to do, but getting out, just for an hour or so, has given me energy to get things done!