Japan - Day 2

In Japan in summer, the sun rises at 4.15am. We did not rise so early. In fact, even though we went to bed a good 11 hours before breakfast ended the next day, we barely made it in time.

After hurriedly eating, we set off for the nearby jigokudani - Hell Valley. It wasn't the most hellish Hell Valley we've ever seen, but still quite steamy and stinky.

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I spotted a sign that seemed to say fire forest walk, which sounded like lots of fun... only then we realised it was actually a warning about forest fires. D'oh.

We did do a short walk through the forest though, along a hot stream.

After a nice foot soak, we headed off to a reconstructed Ainu village museum. Lunch was traditional Ainu food - acorn noodles with deer and vegetables, and a kind of sweet potato pancake. Despite this being very yummy, the kids opted for plain rice.

The village was interesting - though had a looong way to go in terms of animal cruelty. Dogs and bears in small cages might be authentic, but are really not necessary.

 Hair clips, on the other hand, may be necessary but are not really authentic.

Ditto for crocs.

Lukan with his godfather, Shabolz.

We thought we might stop for a swim in the sea on the way back, but driving along the coast road we were quickly reminded that Japanese shorelines are often concrete blocks and ports rather than beaches. Oh well.

The sunset was quite lovely. 

Back at the hotel it was onsen time then dinner time - where we discovered that the buffet was exactly the same as the night before. A different menu wouldn't have changed much for our kids though; all they wanted anyway was edamame, rice and ice cream.

Then it was back into the bath for the nightly fireworks (they weren't on the first night as it was extremely windy). Well, you didn't have to be in the onsen to see them, but Shabolz was taking the kids and I figured it's not every day you get the chance to see fireworks over a lake while soaking in a steaming hot, nicely scented, rooftop public bath.

Just before heading to the onsen, I'd actually discovered it was forbidden to take photos. Pffft. I mean, how could I miss such a fabulous Facebook opportunity?

There was a bit of noise again from the men's bath next door, but it was easy enough to lie back and ignore it. Well, for me - Shabolz had a harder time of it. He turned his back on the 3 kids for a minute only to turn around again to a full on shower hose water fight. When I asked the kids later who started it, the response was, well it just kind of happened naturally.

Afterwards, doubly clean now, it was bed time.

Japan - Day 1.5

Seriously, the last time I posted was in April? And between my summary of last summer and now, when the next summer already feels over, there were only 3 posts in total? Life... slow down already!

Not that there's been so much to blog about. I mean, I've done the "I hate nagging my kids all the time" posts, and so even though I'm still nagging, I can't really write more about that. You may have gathered also that I'm prone to fretting about my parenting abilities... the issues haven't really changed, same old same old, nothing new to write about there either. I've spent a lot of time in the garden too, but again - blogged that already, a lot.

We have had some excellent holidays though. So, in an effort to keep the blog alive, but mainly as a way of remembering our trips in more detail, I thought I'd record them here.

First up, Japan, given that it's the freshest.

So then. Japan. Hokkaido, actually - a place we'd both wanted to go hiking for a long time. I'd imagined going when the kids were a bit older, but then we found out our friends Shabolz and Yoko, with their son Andy and Shabolz's parents, were going this year for their family holiday. We asked if we could tag along. They didn't say no. Then we proposed an itinerary, including a number of hikes we wanted to do. They didn't say no. And even better, Yoko booked all the hotels and found cheap flights and cheap car rental, including for us. They are keepers, for sure.

We left early on a Saturday morning and some 15 hours later arrived in Tokyo at lunchtime on Sunday. (No Lukan spews on the plane, but then he suddenly vomited in baggage collection. I managed to whip out a bag in time though.) This was 1 hour later than planned, which meant we only had an hour to go through immigration, get our luggage and then check in for the flight to Hokkaido. We were very relieved to make it to the check-in queue around 30 minutes before the flight departure... but despite making ourselves known about which flight we were supposed to take, we had to stay at the end of the queue. 10 minutes went by and we were still in the queue... another 10 minutes went by and we were still in the queue... 5 minutes went by and we got to the check-in counter... and somehow we still made the flight. Phew!

Bonus - a Mt Fuji sighting!

90 minutes later we were in Sapporo, where we had to go through a bit of a kerfaffle to get the car. Nothing major, just the document-heavy and time-consuming Japanese process. Sardinia two weeks before - keys and one piece of paper in 5 minutes. Japan - keys and a whole huge dossier after a good 40 minutes.

But actually it was lucky we could hire a car at all. Just over two weeks before, C had realized that our driving licenses are not valid in Japan: he needed a translation of his, which would take 3 weeks, and I needed an international license, which required the submission of a real photo and the sending of the license to me. You got some fam-lee that can help ya, luv? was the response when I called about our predicament to ask if please, pretty please I couldn't submit everything electronically, including a photo? Luckily I do indeed have family: my lovely brother responded to my please, pretty please by printing out all the necessary documents, going to the NRMA and sending me my international license. C also begged for his translation to go a bit faster, and got it in time too.

Anyway, we finally got the cars and headed off towards our first hotel, on Lake Toya:

We hadn't had lunch yet but figured we'd eat on the way. Only, the way was all forest. Forest, forest, forest. But there was a scenic view point with a restaurant and happily, Japanese scenic-view-point food is edible. And especially happily for Lukan, who hours before had said he wanted edamame and only edamame (steamed soy beans), the restaurant had a vending machine selling edamame.

And so begins what would come to be called the great edamame shortage of 2014

From the scenic view point it was only another 20 minutes to the hotel - which was even more scenic, being beautiful and right on the lake.

It was very windy, and so very wavy.

Because natural beauty can always be improved by kitch. And noise. Good grief, this boat headed out every couple of hours with a blare of music and babble... and next to no passengers.

The hotel had a rooftop onsen so it wasn't long before the yukatas and slippers were on...

... and we were happily soaking.

My soak was slightly disturbed by some rowdy children in the next door men's bath.

Then it was dinner in the hotel restaurant (edamame, rice and ice cream for the kids)...

Love, love, love the Japanese custom of eating in your hotel-provided dressing gown.

... and, after a long Sat-unday, bed.

Valium. I need valium.

I have mentioned before that I don't like dandelions. Which is a problem as Spring around here is dandelions. Roadsides and backyards and vineyards and entire FIELDS full of dandelions.

I can just about tolerate the flowers, kind of, as long as they're not in my lawn. But the puffs. I truly despise dandelion puffs. Even the sight of just a few gives me the heebie jeebies.  All those nasty little weed seeds threatening my property. A full field of them? *shudder*

And then there's the puff blowing. Sure, it looks like innocent childhood fun. Sweet even. But what it actually is, is stained clothes. Dandelion-juice-stained clothes that will never be stain-free again.

And of course, it's those weeds-to-be. Fistfuls of them, stripped off by hand, gleefully flung about. Such as into Lukan's hair, because he wanted to be a dandelion puff. Not that I fear they'll sprout on his head, of course, but it's not like combing seeds out of his increasingly long, fine, easily knotted hair is exactly fun.

Non-grippy flowers in hair - perfectly fine. Grippy dandelion seeds - not so much.

Today though, today really did not help my dislike of those puffs. Because here is where they were flung:

All over my vegetable patch. My painstakingly weeded vegetable patch.

Deep breaths happening over here, people, deep breaths.

Sunday snapshot

So I recently read a book, "The Signature of all Things". And in this book were two children whose only apparent desire was to be good. To learn, and be good, and make their parents proud.

It was basically parenting porn. Terrible, trashy, parenting porn that you dismiss because it's so unbelievable, so ridiculously unlikely, but at the same time you wish - oh how desperately you wish - it was true. That you were like those parents, where a stern look or expression of disappointment would suffice to correct any slight misdemeanour. That your kids were like those kids, obedient and polite and good. Smart and good. God, I wish!

And not just because stern looks would be so much more pleasant than endless harping and occasional shouting - not to mention more pleasing to the vision I have of myself. But just imagine - one disapproving look, and your child does the right thing! What instant gratification! What wonderful self-satisfaction! And what heavenly peace of mind! No doubts, no worries, you are all right, your child is all right, all is just fine and dandy.

God, how I wish.

It's not that my kids are not smart, or never polite. It's not that they're not all right. But I am not always all right. Or even right. I never really understood the term "button pushing" before. I do now. And I hate that when the button is pushed, I respond the same unhelpful way, every time.

You broke your promise, one of them said in tears the other week. You said you wouldn't yell again, and you just did.

I did some filming at work last week, where I was "coached" by one of the leadership professors. I had to handle a conflict situation as a leader, which I failed at - quite naturally and without any prompting or acting. The professor then came in and did it a much better way... which was the point, of course, to show how it should be done, but it was a disheartening experience. I honestly did my best, I was trying to do it right dammit, and it was all wrong. My instincts were plain wrong.

So. Where does that leave my parenting instincts?

I asked the professor why it is that what we think is the right way to handle a conflict situation - what most people would do - is so wrong. We've evolved to be a cooperative species... why hasn't this included handling conflict more effectively?

He said we need to learn how to do it. We need the right role models, and most people have never been taught the skills.

Again, where does this leave my parenting? What scars and failed lessons am I giving my children?

I don't need my kids to always be good, always polite, always obedient. I do know how I'd like them to be though, and I know there's a couple of character and personality traits to overcome in order to get there. I'd like to know that we can actually help them with this. More than anything, I'd like to know how.

God, how I wish I was sure I knew how.

Summa Twenny-Thirdeen

So summer. It went by kind of fast. And in fact, it was quite short - since October last year, we have had exactly 8 weeks of warmth. But those 8 weeks? They were fabulous. Sunny and HOT, mostly coinciding with the school summer holidays. And even though C and I didn't have any time off, it was still fabulous.

Finally, finally, the kids had a summer of proper swimming lessons. Finally!

The best thing was, there should have been 4 kids per class but most days they each got a private lesson. The 5% of the time when they didn't, there was only 1 other kid. They both made huge progress.

Téo was already water safe, but by the end of the summer he could swim really well. He got so good, he's now in preparatory classes for a swim club.

Lukan started the summer unwilling to put his head under water, and ended it being able to swim underwater - although only with goggles on. So, not quite water safe, but a lot better.

So that was the kids' weeks, and the weekends were also often watery.

Sometimes frozen.

And that was it really: the pool, various lakes, a river, a big hike, a visit from my mum, a visit from my aunt and uncle, lots of fire-grilled sausages.

And marshmallows.

A fabulous, fabulous summer.

Even better