A Different Christmas in 2011

Well, my posting has been slack to say the least. No, I haven't disappeared off the planet. Not quite yet. But I've been finding it harder and harder to dedicate time to blogging. Some might say that's a step in the right direction. And indeed, what with my G+ goings on (just look me up on +Ben Adelaide) I've been struggling to work out what it is that I do, or even what I want out of this so-called social media. And I continue to struggle...

In the meantime, I'll post a few moments from our Christmas this year... a very strange Christmas. Expecting a second child is much easier in many ways, but also quite unusual too. It's also the last time L-kun will be the sole centre of attention too. And yes, it wasn't exactly a Japanese Christmas (whatever that means... for instance, not a single KFC in sight).

In the mean-time, we had a great Christmas this year (full of the usual ups - and downs). It started off with a great little party over at our house.... with four of L-kun's favourite friends (and their mothers of course). A great time was had by all, and T-chan had a great idea to make Candy Christmas Trees which all the children loved to make.

L-kun write his first letter to Santa (that had to be express delivered by the Priority Elf Mail... 1 day before Christmas). 

He was so happy the mail was sent, and his Samurai DX Megazord was on it's way. Even if he did need a little help from Mummy and Daddy. It was great that he'd finally been able to settle on just one thing.

We also popped down to the Torrens River Christmas display at the Brewery (of all places)... It was pretty much the same as last year (which you can check out here). Though - to be honest, this year was somehow lacking something. There were quite large crowds there (and unfortunately a car+pedestrian accident just before we arrived which looked quite serious), but the displays lacked a sense of fun. Part of that could have been an over commercialisation (the Jack-In-The-Box had been replaced by a popping out add for one of the major sponsors... a TV station). Still there were still the basics there... the nativity scene mixing it up with Hey Diddle Diddle... only in Adelaide.

But it was a time to be merry, and to think about Christmas. And poor old Santa had a lot of visiting to do...

L-kun decided to offer a few extra wishes to his letter... the wishing well is always there to lend an ear.

Christmas - as I've mentioned - was an uncharacteristic occasion for us... and we don't tend to have traditional Christmassy dinners. Our menu: stuffed mushrooms, meatloaf, fuji-san-styled potato salad and pilaf. [ok... it wasn't supposed to be Fuji-san!... ]

And to finish it all off... a wonderful tribute to Japanese Christmas cakes from my wonderful (and exhausted) wife, T-chan.  Kawaii!

And for that final, final touch... L-kun insisted that we just had to leave cookies and milk out for Santa. Which of course Santa consumed with appropriate gusto (late at night). 

Now as for whether L-kun's letter was answered... well, that's between him and Santa Let's just say that L-kun will still be writing to Santa next year. If he's not totally NAUGHTY (in which case extra measures may need to be put in place).

So, even though this post is decidedly late (and I'm going to have to change my watermark shortly), I hope you all had a great Christmas. This is a special one, as it will soon be a Christmas for 4, rather than 3. The important thing is to find those things that make the day special for you - and make the most of it. And most important of all. Don't let the stress of Christmas get you down.

Merry (belated) Christmas 2011.

PS - it seems to me that this year has been a strange Christmas season all around, and despite media reports suggesting a good retail year, I just don't buy it (literally). The shops seemed mostly normal or even quieter than normal, and no matter how many late night shopping nights they had, it just seemed to be a very, very un-exciting Christmas shopping season. Australia has had it pretty easy coming through the GFC (mark I and now mark II). I suspect that the second and third order effects are only now beginning to make themselves felt here. It's times like these that the meaning of Christmas, and the importance of family and hope are not forgotten. I hope that your Christmas was a good and safe one... Ben

3...2...1...Liftoff! Japan Here We Come!

Well today we can sort of rest easy. We just confirmed tickets for our next (eighth) trip to Japan coming up in a few months. This will be a big trip. T-chan's brother H-kun will be getting married... and we're off to Tokyo (and of course Sapporo) for the big occasion. Actually, to be honest, this is earlier than we had planned to return to Japan, but... weddings pretty well take precedence over everything. It's funny that whilst the world in many ways is shrinking at an unimaginable rate (electronically at least), the reality is that it's still not as easy as we'd like to travel from Adelaide to Japan. Nowadays however we can do most of the bookings entirely on-line (except stopovers). On our last trip (which I haven't blogged about yet on my other blog), we did a stop-over in Tokyo, this time we're doing a completely separate booking (so I will be meeting T-chan/L-kun and her parents somewhere in Tokyo)... hmmm... this is embarrassing to say, but it will be my first time travelling anywhere inside Japan by myself - except to and from from Sapporo! 

So... what does that have to do with rockets? Well, I have to say that this trip feels a bit like a rocket journey... into the unknown.  And it's also very last minute. Even though we've known about the wedding date for at least 3 months, we've just been distracted by so much going on - not to mention Christmas and New Years... Anyhow - we've got the hard part done (getting into country). Now we just need to organise what happens when the rocket lands!

And this time, it's lead by our courageous captain, L-kun, who has been telling us over the last few weeks (but increasingly) that he wants to go to obaachan and ojiichan's house (Japanese grandma and grandpa's) to play in the snow - and go to Disneyland at the same time. I'm not sure he really understands what months means... When I showed him where we lived, and where Sapporo was on GoogleEarth, he knew that we'd need to get on the plane to go there... but that we could do that anytime. If only life was as simple as jumping on a rubber bubble to launch us across the world.

As an aside - rockets are one of his favourite games at the moment (thanks to Santa), and whilst we've recently re-located launches to the nearby park (a few too many rockets landing on our neighbours roof) it's still a source of great enjoyment for L-kun. It's a simple enough process.... even a 3yo can understand. Generate a rapid pressure imbalance in the tube that connects to the foam rocket... pressure gradient overrides friction... and gravity... and it soars into space (well... perhaps not quite space... but high enough to land on our neighbours two storey house). In other words, jump on the bubble, rocket takes off! The beauty of a child's world is just how direct and obvious it is.

This rocket was definitely one of the great Christmas presents Santa has brought. Cheap, fun, and NO batteries required! It even has some educational value (with some explanation from a handy parent).

By the way - the back yard's looking a little chaotic as we've been trying (with some success) to repair the lawn from many years of drought...This year has been far from typical of the summers of late. We've had quite a bit of rain, and it's generally been very cool (except for the very occasional high 30/low 40 degree celsius day... note: 40 degrees Celsius = 104 degrees Farenheit). Having those sorts of temperatures plays havoc with most plants... and people too.

Speaking of temperatures and snow... here's a look out the window of T-chan's family home earlier today (from their webcam)... and yes, that's ojiichan out the front shoveling snow. And that's a fair bit of snow to be shoveling. In Hokkaido they have a word for snow-storms that come through and dump this sort of snow... fubuki... and it's been fubukiing snowing over the last few days persistently. Fubuki! Under those conditions, you have to shovel the driveways repeatedly to avoid them getting buried... and that's even with under-driveway heating which is not unusual in Sapporo.

 I feel sorry that our trips haven't been in winter for too many years now as I would always be out there helping. It just goes to show you that whilst snow is great fun, when you get a lot of it, it can be a right-royal pain in the.... ahhhh sooo, that's a very good reason to get L-kun muscled up ready for January holidays over to Japan to help out. Now to work on some upper-body strength to go along with his rocket-powering legs.

Note the Differences - Christmas Time

Actually... Christmas is actually a big event in Japan, but not necessarily for the reasons that you might think. Firstly, Japan has a very small proportion of Christian followers (<1% by most reckoning... but that's still over 1 million people in total). Secondly, Christianity has seen many purges from the country over the centuries, and has to some extent persisted by not being overt in nature. Finally, as is often the way in Japan, the external trappings of Western Christianity have to a large extent been subverted for commercial and social enrichment (e.g. faux church white weddings).

It is the image of Christmas that is most appealing... and can you blame them? It is an image that the West has developed (and commercialised) for centuries... culminating in the Coca-Cola Santa folk-lore image of the 1930's. When we look at Christmas in Japan, it's like looking through a secular mirror of what our own Christmas is becoming, if not become. Yet, there's more to Christmas in Japan than the trees, decorations, Santa and presents...

Christmas in Japan is first and foremost a time of romance... and to be without a date on Christmas Eve is to have suffered one of the great social evils. Well - it might not be that bad, but it's close for the youth of Japan. In fact it's second only to Valentine's Day in terms of romantic overtures and commercialisation. This goes especially for single women...

The other odd thing about Christmas that is often talked about is the Japanese pseudo-tradition of eating KFC for Christmas dinner - and supposedly many Japanese pre-order months in advance to avoid disappointment. The odd thing was that when staying in Japan for Christmas with T-chan's family, we also had KFC (which I thought a little odd at the time), but they just assumed that this was their family thing to do. I've read that up to 1/3 of Japanese families partake of this tradition. KFC first came to Japan in 1970, yet, by 1974 the tradition of  "Christmas Chicken" had supposedly started in one of the first restaurants (in Aoyama).

Nowadays the dominance of KFC, thanks to it's Santa-like Colonel Saunders is unassailable (for now).

The other tradition is of course the Christmas Cake. Unlike the traditional fruit-cake/pudidngs that often adorn our tables in the Australia, the Japanese Christmas Cake is an extravagant affair... well, then again, most cakes are in Japan. The cakes themselves are often just sponge cakes, with strawberry and cream toppings. Sadly, single women in Japan always get it hard - and traditionally when they reached over 25 years of age and were still single, they were referred to as "Christmas Cakes"... which like their real counter-parts must be heavily discounted from the 25th in order to sell. Thankfully those days are gone (are they T-chan?)

And the other thing that is becoming more popular in Japan is the Western Santa Claus... such as our cold Sapporo friend here, photographed in Odori Kouen in very cold conditions)

Actually, Santa's with real beards are becoming especially popular these days, and many foreigners will earn a tidy sum coming to Japan to be the department store Santa. And they can be the most unlikely people.. ever heard of Santa living in Okinawa?

In the West, Christmas is generally associated with spending time with the family, and yet this is traditionally associated with New Years in Japan... but I'll post more about that shortly. The important thing for our family is however that Christmas is almost always a reminder of separation for us. No matter which way it turns out, either my wife or I will be missing our family over Christmas. And this is a common thing for many people sharing international weddings. Of course, whilst T-chan has no Japanese family here in Australia, she is part of a broader family of fellow emigré that spend their Christmas here in Australia with their partner's families.

Over this Christmas break, think back to your own traditions and the way you have spent the time leading up to and including the day. For most of us, a large amount of time is spent worrying about presents to buy, looking for presents to buy, or wondering how we might be able to pay for the presents we've just bought... let alone what presents we will ourselves get. It's good to take some time out from that rat-race and reflect on what Christmas (even from a secular point of view) means to our modern international societies.

So, as the Japanese say "Merii Kurisumasu", or メリークリスマス! And if you have your own Japanese Christmas traditions to add to the list, please drop me a line or send a comment.

Christmas Tree... L-kun's Moment of the Possible

Actually, we've had our Christmas tree up for more than 5-6 weeks already... so this post might be a little on the tardy side. We may have put the tree up a little early this year (is there a rule for this sort of thing?), but L-kun was adamant that we should put it up as EARLY AS POSSIBLE. It's amazing to me that even though L-kun is only three and a half years old, he still knows what time of year it is, and knows what the Christmas Tree means.... you find presents underneath it!

He really enjoyed helping Daddy set the tree up...  though he held largely a supervisory role. Learning to delegate is a great life skill, and apparently L-kun will soon be teaching me all about it.

But that's not to say it wasn't a serious business. After all, Santa-san is coming to put presents under the tree. The sooner it goes up, the sooner he - and the presents - will appear. At least that was how L-kun reasoned it. Seems quite logical to me too. The only problem is that he often looks questioningly at the tree, as if to say... Daddy.... I know how the presents 'get' here... let's not make a scene, I'll just turn my back for a few minutes and "Santa-san" <insert air quotes here> better get busy and put the presents there. 

Santa-san had however, other worries...For example, counting the possible ways that things can go horribly wrong when a little boy suddenly tries to eat a tree decoration. Er... L-kun, that's for the tree, not your tummy.

Actually, when I look at this photo now, I can't help but squirm. Bad things can happen in a blink of an eye... and even things that you think are harmless have a way of going awry. Parenting is often like riding a roller-coaster. Even though you see the twists and turns coming up, often it's down to faith that the car will continue to follow the tracks...

There really is something nice however about setting up the Christmas tree and enjoying the atmosphere of something special comnig. I wonder however if we often don't see the trees for the forest of expectations.

Christmas is a time of built-up expectations (not only with the simple things like gifts, relationships and our careers)... it's also very much about how we perceive ourselves and the benchmark we set for ourselves. Christmas often doesn't live up to those expectations... nor should it. That's a different story altogether.

This will be L-kun's 4th Christmas coming up. It's things like that which are the true joys of Christmas... of course, what makes it really fun is to see yor children's reactions. So Christmas Tree... what will we find under you in two sleeps time?... Hmmm... I wonder. 

And whilst Christmas is a time for transition - the old year gradually (and sometimes less than gracefully) coming to an end. It's also a time for hopes and sometimes sadness. Furthermore, it's very much a time for living in the moment... a truth that any three year old could have told you with a simple smile. If they could be heard with a Christmas bauble in their mouth, that is.

Christmas is the moment of maximum possibility, where past, present and future collide, and then exchange registration details amongst the carnage. So sit back in your roller-coaster car, take a deep breath and live in that moment known so well to any three year old. If only for a day or two before reality makes a begrudging return.

Christmas by the River... Santa's Secret Wonderland.

Well - Adelaide may not have Melbourne's Myer Window Display, however we do have the fun of the West End Brewery Christmas Display... er... the what now? That's right, Brewery = Christmas Display is not a typical combination in everyday conversation. Just on the western outskirts of the CBD is the area known as Thebarton (or as some inter-staters have called it, "The Barton").  The site backs onto the main river Torrens that cuts through the city. The Brewery was first established in 1859. It says some thing important about Australia, and Adelaide in particular, that the brewery was up and producing beer for the masses only 23 years after the city was founded... it's pride and joy the Southwark Ales - which was later amalgamated with the West End brewery (and is now owned by Lion Nathan... which is weirdly... owned by Japanese Kirin brewing company. It's a small, small world.

Another century on, in 1958 the brewery decided  to establish a garden on the banks of the Torrens... basically to hide the unsightly dump that had evolved on the side of the river after a 100 years of drunken revelry... I mean distilling the nectar of the gods. Well, the following year, in 1959 they established the first of the Christmas decorations; which have grown to become an Adelaide Christmas tradition. I've just put together a few of the photos from a recent trip there with T-chan and L-kun (and myself). 

On the western end of the display we see the nativity scene...

Hmmm... taking out the zoom lens gives a slightly better perspective... and I have to say that Joseph must really be hanging out for his Remington shaver. As a very non-Christmas aside... Remington (the shaver company) did actually start life out of the firearms company - which also had another by-product. The QWERTY keyboard.... which chances are, you're still using this very day. Right now, I don't think Joseph has  typing, shaving or shooting on his mind.To be honest, he kinda looks like he's got drinking on his mind... a good cold Southwark Ale mayhaps?  

I always get a little put off by nativity scenes... they always kinda look like they just happened to find baby Jesus just lying around and don't quite know what to do with him.

Once you move on from the nativity scene, you quickly realise that this is more than a simple Christmas display. In fact, it's more a celebration of childhood than anything else. The displays consist of a number of fairytale and children song motifs.

The Fairy and her magic toadstools

I'm not entirely sure about what nursery rhyme this house comes from... Anyone have any ideas?...

 Actually, I've read on one website that it was described as the nativity inn... surely not. Knock knock...Hello people, the story is set in Bethlehem... on the West Bank in what used to be Palestine. Not the bleeding Swiss Alps! Oh well...I shouldn't get upset, but I think that may be taking just a few too many artistic licences with the story. Time changes everything.

Actually, it's amazing how much difference even a year can make. This time we were sweltering under 40-45degreeC temperatures. This year, we were struggling to get over 20 degrees. In fact, about 2 or so weeks ago storms ripped through Adelaide and dumped about 40+ mm of rain in one night. As a result, the Torrens river peaked 5m higher than normal damaging some of the displays. In fact, some of the displays are still missing

L-kun looks around... no floods tonight, Daddy?

One of the favourites is Vulcan and his volcanic workshop. He stands in his lair, hammering away relentlessly at his anvil. What's he making?... Most probably a door for some privacy. The thing that children love is that every so often the volcano belches out a column of smoke...

And as he hammers away, there are choreographed and timed sparks flying... accompanied by bellowing bangs and clangs. Actually, in close up it looks something more suitable to a Tarantino flick than a Christmas display. But this is a G-rated blog, so I'll leave it at that.

And another favourite is Moby Dick... hey - wasn't he a white whale? Clearly that would  be breaching copyright or something. We're kinda lucky that Moby made it at all... during the recent floods he was dislodged and almost made good an escape. He was clearly remembering the floods of 2005 when there really were huge water flows that took poor Moby on a ride several kilometres towards the sea. He almost did a Free Willy as well. They've increased security (and chains) since then however.

T-chan and L-kun look on... as will over 100,000 people over the month long display. Yeah, I guess Adelaide's a small town that we make a big deal about these sorts of things. Still, isn't it good to see the joy in even the small things?

Certainly Snow White did... er... I mean... platonic joy that is... I guess. Then again, who knows what went on in the wee hours of the night...

The Ferris Wheel is another focal point... the carriages depicting children from all around the world. A nice thought, but somewhat reduced in impact when set alongside Dorothy, The Tin Man, Scarecrow and the Lion (off to the left) from Wizard of Oz.  

Still, the reflection in the river makes for a nice view...

Another of the attractions, at the eastern end of the display is the carousel of toys... with all manner of different gifts.... at least I assumed they were toys...

The teddy bear seems a safe bet...aw, isn't he cute.

Maybe even the dragon (though the wind-up "Chinaman" was a little disturbing, and not the sort of thing I'd expect to find in my stocking come Christmas morn).

But then we get to the pièce de résistance, the ballerina. Is it me, or did they spend just a little too much time working up her curves?

I'm not entirely sure if the following is a symptom of the growing chorus of political correct mania, but good old Frosty the Snowman used to sport a pipe (stuck nonchalantly from his mouth). This year that's no more... Another less "big brother" reason for this social censoring could be that the good (but admitedly unhealthy) pipe got washed out to sea with the recent floods. Either, Frosty's looking like he's got a case of the cold turkeys. Ganbatte Frosty. You can do it.

And now we come to the highlight of the night.... with a hi-ho, and the stomping of reindeer feet (lead of course by Rudolf and his nose)... we know Christmas is just around the corner...

When Santa Claus' sley makes an appearance with his rocking reindeer.

Merry Christmas one and all!

Oh Santa-san, you crazy guy. You bring so much happiness to my son's life - even though we know he already knows who's really putting the presents under the tree. Mr American Express and his wife Visa. Still, L-kun will get quite upset if you even suggest that Santa may not stop over because (a) he's been naughty, (b) the house is too messy, or (c) coz Santa's knocked back a few to many "Christmas Cheers" to warm himself up on the long sleigh ride around the world...

And as we were about to depart... L-kun spotted something off in the distance...

A motorbike ride! Ok - Daddy will ride with you... let's hit the road, bikie man!

So it was a good night... though L-kun didn't get to bed till around 10pm (that's a bit too late, but every now and again doesn't hurt). Also, a good smile and laughter is worth a whole night of sleep to a person's heart. It was a great night, and even though it was a lot cooler this year, it was still a great experience. We'll have to try and go back again before the year is out.