Living the international lifestyle….

Posted on January 29, 2012 by John

We are an international family!
I am from Northern Ireland, Emily is from Japan, and Anna is straddling both. International sounds fun and exciting, and quite often it is! It’s fun to see how Emily and I see things in different ways, it will be fun to see how Anna grows up to see the world and what we can learn from her. But with all of the benefits that we gain from being multi-cultural, there are also some difficult things.

Right now Anna’s application for her second passport is in Hong Kong, hopefully being processed and approved. This is for her British passport, she already has her Japanese one. Tomorrow we go to Sapporo to get a re-entry permit for me so that I can leave Japan and return again (provided we can return before my current visa expires). Then February will be spent sorting out and applying for Emily’s visa for the UK so that we can enter the country as a family in May. It’s a fairly arduous affair that needs us to prove our marriage isn’t a sham, that we have somewhere to live in the UK and that we will be able to support ourselves while we are there.

These are all things we tend to take for granted as we (well most of us) grow up in our passport countries. We pay our taxes and get healthcare, the promise of benefits should we need them, the right to live and work in the country we call home. But now as an international family, while we have these rights, we don’t all have them in the same places. For the time being, wherever we go, at least one of us will need special permission to be there, more permission to work there and it won’t be something guaranteed indefinitely.

Recently I have been working on a message from Philippians 3:17-21 and as I work on it, I have never been more thankful that we can claim our citizenship of heaven, somewhere that we can all be openly accepted and leave the paperwork behind.

Unstoppable force vs immovable object revisited…

Posted on October 8, 2011 by John

I wrote a while ago about a TV programme here in Japan that tests extreme claims about products and things by finding two claims that are in (granted sometimes stretched) contradiction and pitting them against one another.

It is one of the few genuinely original shows on TV here that doesn’t involve food (OK, sometimes it involves food, and normally with no real reason to involve food…)
So I thought I would write again about it, so far two of the challenges have really made my Monday evening, one because of the cockiness of the guy that lost, and the one I will share with you because of just how incredible the product that won was!

The first of the two products were anti-theft paint balls that a shop worker can throw at a thief to mark them. These balls supposedly break on contact first time, every time. Their competitor was a mat made of “alpha-gel” that claimed to save any delicate falling object from it’s particulate fate.

The mat had it’s prowess shown by dropping various objects on it (usually an egg) and at one point getting a pro handball player (yes really) to throw it as hard as he could at the mat, which duly saved it from it’s messy fate.

The balls were demonstrated by dropping them gently onto various soft materials and showing how they broke at the slightest contact, the most impressive was the big thick pile of hotel standard towels – I am sure the hotel wasn’t happy with the indelible orange paint they found after check out!

You can watch the episode here but it is the whole episode in Japanese without subs…

For those who couldn’t be bothered watching the whole thing, the crucial point is at 20:00 in. Retired Hiroshima Carps pitcher Manabu Kitabeppu was brought in and allowed to place the throwing line at a distance that he thought he couldn’t miss the target, which he did. Then he missed the target with the first ball, splattering the on lookers with the criminal marking paint! The question I have here is why the makers who were so sure the ball would break were standing within splattering distance. If I thought the ball was sure to break, I would at least stand far enough away so as not to get indelible paint on me!

The second ball is the one to watch though. If you haven’t already, click the link above and slide along to 20mins in. Absolutely incredible!

Looking forward to this show coming back next Sunday afternoon!

Driving licence lecture…

Posted on August 8, 2011 by John

Japanese "gold" driving licence (not mine!)

Yesterday I went to renew my Japanese driving licence. In Japan licences need renewed every 3 years – at least to start with – and expire one month after your birthday rather than when you first get your licence, so for me that was yesterday! I had put it off a little bit, then duly forgot about it, only to realise on Saturday that the local police station don’t do it on weekends. So I ended up taking a bit of a trip out to the licence centre on the other side of Sapporo to renew it. An “advantage” was I could renew it and have the lecture all in one go.

Yes, to renew your licence in Japan, you get to attend a lecture about road safety and any changed laws since the last time you were there. First time renewals (me) get a 2 hour lecture and it reduces each time to 1 hour, then 30 mins, then if you manage not to have any accidents or tickets you get a “gold” licence and are spared the lecture (apparently gold licence holders don’t need to know about changes in the law!)

Overall it was fairly straight forward… I learned that Hokkaido’s drivers are the worst in Japan, having most accidents and kill most people, but watching people weave up route 12 is enough to convince me of that! I learned that pedestrians in Japan are liable to wander out into the street. I learned that last year in Hokkaido more passengers died in accidents wearing seatbelts than not wearing seatbelts, but also that many of those not wearing them wouldn’t have died if they had been…

I also learned that most people renewing their driving licence for the first time are about 20 years old, another reminder that I am a bit different than most people here.

Zamami Island

Posted on July 17, 2011 by John

Photos from Zamami Island

On Thursday we went to Zamami Island, a small island in a group lying just west of Okinawa’s main island. The ferry trip across was beautiful, clear blue seas, little sun-kissed islands here and there and even flying fish skimming over the surface to get away from the on coming tourists.

We stayed in a little family run place with our own (air conditioned!) room etc and 15 minutes walk from Furumizami beach, a beautiful coral beach with a small reef no more than a 10 metres offshore. We spent a few hours there after we arrived just swimming around, and then went back for most of Friday doing some snorkelling around the reef and relaxing in the shade.

When we checked in we were greeted with news that a typhoon was heading for Okinawa and it might miss, but it was due to arrive on Saturday the 16th and should be far enough passed for our ferry to leave on the 20th (so we could catch flights home on the 21st). But as time passed the strength f the typhoon was rising and its path changing and in the end we opted to leave on Saturday and spend the remainder of our time in Okinawa on the main island.

Photos from Naha etc.

So we are back in Naha and any more pics from here will be added to the Naha album we started the last time we were here! We will be here until the typhoon passes and expect it could be quite an experience only having experienced them on Honshu, the main Japanese island. Eventually we will head home on Thursday 21st to Hokkaido and normal life will resume!

Okinawa!

Posted on July 13, 2011 by John

Emily and I are on holiday in Okinawa! We flew here on Monday via Tokyo and were picked up by Emily’s sister at the airport. We have spent 3 nights in Naha, the main city, and had a chance to do a bit of sight seeing and spend some time with Seika (the sister in question) who is living and studying here.

Okinawa - Naha pictures

Tomorrow we get on a ferry and go to a small island (Zamami Island) for almost a week to relax and enjoy the quiet!Here are some pictures from our trip so far, who knows if there will be any from Zamami, or what the internet situation will be where we are staying!

Continue reading →

Television commercials and the Tohoku earthquake

Posted on March 29, 2011 by John

The Tohoku earthquake and tsunami have not had a significant affect on life in Hokkaido. To me, in some ways watching the TV footage and hearing from others who are going to help feels like it is happening in another country. There have been stories of gasoline shortages, food not arriving, people panic buying goods and worrying about radiation levels, water being cut off, electricity rolling blackouts and all kinds of other things going on in Japan, but in Hokkaido, at least in Ebetsu City, there has been nothing like this. One supermarket had a sign telling us we could only buy 20kg of rice per person and one pack of toilet paper, but we don’t need that much at one time! For most people, life has returned, even continued, as normal here in Hokkaido.

We ourselves are, of course, praying for the people in Tohoku, giving money where we can and helping out others directly involved in helping where we are able. But our church position has meant not being able to go with the team of OMFers who just got back from Iwate prefecture to help clean up and provide food for people in the area. The church pastor of 33 years has just finished and a new pastor is coming today, we are the “link” between the two in terms of filling in and helping the new pastor get up and running.

One affect it did have was on entertainment and media, for about a week after the earthquake, regular TV shows were put on hold and every channel was showing 24 hour news coverage of what was going on. In itself this was a noble effort in keeping people up to date of the dangers that could be coming their way, of government messages regarding safety and “life-lines” (electricity, water etc). But after a few days Hokkaido it meant brisk business for local video rental shops. For some people it has meant feelings of anxiety and concern did not subside and even people relatively unaffected by the earthquake have been considerably disturbed by the continue flow of media.

I hope this post doesn’t seem too flippant, I don’t mean to take anything away from the disaster that has occurred in Tohoku and Kanto, many people are suffering greatly, mourning family members, neighbours, friends who have been swept away. Many people have lost their livelihoods and homes, wondering how to build for the future.

Really the truth is I want to blog about a TV commercial… Since the earthquake, understandably, companies don’t want to be associated with the images of suffering and destruction that have been on TV, and so have pulled their commercials. The result is the Advertising Council of Japan have been given a LOT of airtime for their commercials, including this particularly irritating one about why you should use everyday greetings to make friends (the message isn’t irritating, the constant playing over and over of the same tune grates a bit though). The ads are beginning to return, but aside from news reports in the regular slots, the ever present AC ads are one of the few every day things that reminds me of the disaster that happened just a few short weeks ago.

But it also means the run of a particular favourite of mine was cut short. It’s a commercial for a product to keep pollen out of your nose called Ion Block. Last year it featured a few pollen grains dancing along singing “At last! We’ve arrived at the Nose!!” only to be taken out by Ion Block at the last minute and told not to come back again. This year it is back with “This year too, we’ve arrived at the Nose!” and another devastating tackle, and Ion Block is joined by his mentholated “cool” friend.

What happens when an unstoppable force meets an immovable object?

Posted on March 8, 2011 by John

There is a TV show here in Japan dedicated to answering just that question. Well sort of…

The show “世界で誰も見たことない対決ショー　ほこxたて” (“The Showdowns that no one in the world has ever seen before Show! Spear x Shield”) is based on a Japanese word 矛盾 which literally means “spear” and “shield”, but together means contradiction. There is a proverbial example of the law of non-contradiction (see the title) in Japanese about a spear that can penetrate anything meeting a shield that can’t be penetrated.

But this TV show takes things purported to be un-somethingable and sees if they really are. Last night was an unbreakable chain for securing expensive motor-bikes vs a cut anything industrial set of pneumatic shears (attached to a massive digger). Of course the unbreakable chain snapped like a twig. But to it’s credit it was it’s second appearance having survived a pile driver, “cut-anything saw” and even mining explosives in a previous show.

Other competitors have been a man who can move so slowly and un-human-like that a motion sensor system that can detect any human movement can’t detect him. It did. His nose twitched, and you can see it at the bottom of this post. Another was a type of metal so hard no drill can drill a hole in it against a drill that can drill a hole in anything, a second outing for the metal block. It remained hole-free and the drill company had a bit of a repair bill for a rather expensive, burned out drill.

Last week was an international outing with Blendtec of willitblend.com fame being pitted against an “unblendable” dried fish fillet (鰹節). The blender had one minute to blend the fish to powder, but didn’t make it, so that is one you won’t see on their website!

As if it couldn’t get any better they have a panel of comedians and entertainers who vote each week on who they think will win, then in true Japanese TV style you can watch their faces for reaction while you watch the rest of the show, just in case you can’t tell which bits are funny or interesting by yourself. Then there are the pundits, two “experts” who make calls based on their scientific backgrounds. One of these is a professor who’s scientific understanding has lead him to get every one wrong so far this series (that’s 7 in a row as of yesterday’s show).

The whole thing makes for a great bit of TV and for an interesting cultural experience, which you too can enjoy with this clip! The slow moving guy is actually pretty incredible!

Tokyo and iOS 4.0

Posted on July 6, 2010 by John

Today has got to be the furthest I have travelled and returned home within one day… I got up at 6am to get the train to the airport, flew to to Tokyo and got the train into town, then in the evening was back at the airport flying back and getting home to Sapporo just now at 11pm! ”What did you forget?” you might ask… But forgetfulness wasn’t the reason for the trip. The whole event was a highly organised and coordinated trip to go to the British Embassy (they only have an embassy in Tokyo and consulate in Osaka) to apply to get a CNI (Certificate of No Impediment) which will let Emily and I apply to get married here in Japan. According to the website I had to attend an “Interview” at the embassy, which I had to apply for (an application so I could apply to get the document I need to apply to get married…), but the whole ordeal took a matter of minutes, with the short walk down the hallway to the next room to pay the fees I was in and out of the embassy in around 30 minutes! All that travelling for 30 minutes!!

But hopefully it will be worth it! I took stamps for them so they could send me the certificate in the post rather than going back again to get it, and I got a form that I need to fill in and post back to pay for the actual certificate as I won’t be there to pay for it on the day of issue. Strangely they wouldn’t let me pay for it while I was there and had the cash, but rather I have to send it. We had a brief discussion about how I could just go outside and fill in the forms and post them in that very day which would only take a day or two off the actual time the embassy was responsible for my money… So I will maybe wait a little while before sending the form in, until that point I was quite impressed by the efficiency of the embassy, but not being able to pay in advance was a sharp jerk back to the reality that the small patch of land I was on was technically British (is it?) and I wasn’t not eager to please and super efficient Japan for that half an hour! Hopefully it will process and work and I won’t have to rush back to Tokyo with a few days to spare before we actually get married…

Anyway! A few days ago I upgraded my (already ageing) iPhone 3G to iOS 4.0 and it was lovely for a little while. But today’s trip to Tokyo tested it to the limit. I was listening to music and catching up with podcasts (and Bill’s latest messages from First!) while finding my way with maps and GPS, looking up train times online, writing texts and an email or two, tweeting the odd tweet and even watching a YouTube video or two at some points of non-activity. This was normally not an issue, it could do all of these things fine, and probably still can as long as two don’t happen at once! But after a short time using it, it started to be unbearable. It was very slow responding to key presses, particularly on Japanese input, it ground to a halt more than a few times apps were crashing left right and centre and even once it needed an all out reboot!

So long story (slightly) short: I want to go back!!
But it isn’t easy. From looking around it seems that I will basically have to go through the “jailbreak” process to install the older version 3.1.3 of the operating system… So my question is, should I just jailbreak it? My reasons for not doing it before were that it just seemed like too much hassle, and the little risk involved was probably not worth any of the benefits…
But if I am going to have to do it anyway to get back to functionality maybe I should just do it? Has anyone out there jailbroken their iPhone 3G and have any experience? Good experiences? Bad experiences? What are the risks and what are the main benefits? Would Softbank go nuts on me? If I went to the apple store (urgh) would they restore me back to 3.1.3 or tell me I should be glad to have 4.0?

Conference, Norn Irish and rememberance

Posted on June 27, 2010 by John

This past month has been pretty busy with language school, wedding preparations and so on all taking up time. We also had the OMF All Japan Conference in Jozankei, Hokkaido, last week. I was part of the tech team for the conference and it took a bit of preparation and work while we were there, but everything seemed to go well, except for Tre’s laptop! It was great fun roping Oliver and JP into helping out too! (Thanks guys!) So you’ll forgive me for not updating in a little while!

Japan Field Conference is a time that all of the OMF missionaries in Japan come together and spend four or five days listening to teaching (Patrick Fung, OMF’s General Director), have fun (in the pool and onsen!) and fellowship (over delicious food)!

The field conference actually only happens every 3 years, the years in between have regional conferences instead and we are divided into Hokkaido and East Japan regions.
But this field conference had something special. A team of short ter missionaries came out from Norn Iron to run a kids programme for all the missionary kids!
The team was mostly made up of people from Helen Lyttle’s church, Bloomfield Presbyterian, but also had 3 other guys, Mark, Roger and Jonny. Jonny of course being known by aliases such as Silly McSilly, Marvin the Minstrel and now also Buzz McLightyear!

Now that conference is over I have the priviledge of hosting Roger and Jonny in my flat for a few nights before they head back to Tokyo and on home to NI. Today I took Jonny to Oasa to see the church and meet some of the people. Then we went to the local university’s festival to sample some local delights and see the Yosakoi Dancers performing.
Tomorrow we will be taking the team to a nearby lake and volcanic area, I am looking forward as I haven’t been to that area before either!

The service today at church is the last part of my post title. Here in Japan remembering those who have passed away is a major part of culture, and also of Japanese Buddhism. As in the west such dedicated official rememberance is not part of our culture (we prefer more personal rememberance of Granny and Grandad), and because Christianity doesn’t revere ancestors as Japanese Buddhism and Shinto do, it seems as though we Christians don’t care about our ancestors to many Japanese. Which is a reflection of culture rather than faith.
So to enable Japanese Christians to faithfully remember their parents and grandparents without compromising their Christian faith, churches often buy an area in a graveyard for interning ashes of members. Then once a year they have a special service to remember those who have been called to heaven before them. This service is a very serious affair and is very moving. Pastor Horita gave a short description of each member who had passed away since the church began (it is a bit over 30 years old) during his message and after the normal service there is a short one at the grave site.

This tradition fills many gaps that a plain western Christianity would leave in many people’s expectations and hopes. A Japanese Christian’s non-Christian family might expect to have religious ceremonies of rememberance at the temple and this could result in the deceased Christian being worshipped as a god or spirit. It also shows non-Christian family members that Christians do care about those who have been before. And finally it is just a touching way to remember grandparents and parents who have passed away and honour their memory! But it is a bit unusual to be in the service without knowing what is going on!

Sapporo…

Posted on May 23, 2010 by John

Last Wednesday I was privileged enough to be invite to climb to the 38th floor of JR Tower by my friend JP (The dancing one, not the snowboarding one!) JR Tower is one of the tallest buildings in the city, if not the tallest…

From the top floor you can see pretty much all the city, from the mountains in the west to the fields to the east… So what better place to have a go at making some panorama pictures?! I was quite lazy though and didn’t maintain position well enough to take good pictures for stitching really, but here are four rough panoramas of Sapporo from the top of the JR Tower! The pictures are pretty large, so once you’ve clicked through to the album, you can click to zoom in for a closer look…

Sapporo panorama from JR Tower

If you live in the city see if you can spot your area (For the Higashi-ku folk, you can see the Tsudo-mu community dome in the north picture…

Then on Saturday I went with Emily to Shinrinkouen in Nopporo, Ebetsu, or Nopporo Forest Park and climbed to the measly 8th floor of the Hokkaido Centenary Memorial Tower to find out of use elevators. But the view from the 8th floor was still quite nice, particularly as there isn’t anything to get in the way… And of course the tower looking like the tower of Barad-dûr of Mordor in Lord of the Rings was a bonus!
So I took a more simple series of pictures and made another panorama! The glass was pretty dirty (lots of insects on it, ladybirds and stinkbugs) but here is the result!

From Shinrinkoen

Flat3D

continues…

Category Archives: Culture