Mad Ninja Skills?

So we moved into our new house on Yokosuka!  It was a week full of packing our stuff and relocating.  It is amazing how one can move from one house to another with near identical floor plans and still need to spend over $300 bucks at the exchange!  Oh well.  It is all worth it, especially for the boys who are now walking distance to the schools and all the after school activities.  

Amie and I have done this moving things a few times with the Navy.  We have an unwritten system that I think has contributed to our collective sanity thus keeping our marriage intact.  I roll in first getting the big pieces situated and most of the boxes unpacked and out of the house in order to reduce the clutter of boxes, paper and bubble-wrap.  Amie then follows, fine tuning the set up of the room.  

In an effort to keep the backyard somewhat organized, I was arranging the boxes and piles of paper.  We don't have a whole lot of outdoor stuff, some chairs, a bouncy house and some sports stuff, but I tried to move it into the outdoor shed that is provided.  The shed is a large shed with two doors.  After I opened the first door, I had to reach in to unlock the other door.  As I swung open the second door I discovered an inhabitant of the shed.

After shouting the standard "Holy Sweet Mother Of God" and climbing back down off the roof of the house.  I slowly moved forward to see if it was still alive.  You would have thought it was a live Cobra in a killing pose by the way I was moving.  I am not a huge fan of spiders, or as Megamind and I refer to them, Arachnis Deathicus!  I thought it would be wise to get Amie's attention in case I became engaged in a physical fight to the death with this beast, so she could call for back up.  I knew I was on my own when Amie saw the spider and quickly locked the door!

So as to be able to prove the immense size of this monster I stealthily placed a ruler and took a picture, because I knew no one would believe just how large it was!

The battle ensued.  Knowing I was on my own, I quickly fashioned a weapon out of the only material at my disposal.  The bouncing house was too cumbersome, but thank god for all that cardboard.  Using my years of weapons training, I quickly folded a small cardboard box into a poor mans club!  

My thought was to stun the mighty beast by banging on the back side of the door.  Hopefully forcing him on to the grass and out of his high ground (two feet off the deck) advantage.  My prey, however, was massive, cunning and quick.  As I struck the door, he leaped INTO the shed trying to take advantage of the dark shadows inside.  Despite Amie's advice to close the doors and never open them again, I bravely entered the shed to face down this terrible menace.  

As he scrambled for better position, I swung my club (cardboard) and forced him back into the yard.  Holding onto the initiative I swung again and stuck him square on the body.  The mighty blow stunned him and he began to slowly crawl away.  For the death blow, I threw the cardboard box over the top of him providing a 2x2 foot cover.  Then using the best martial arts move I could think of, I jumped up and onto the box.  (You would have thought the cardboard box had turned into a trampoline as I quickly leaped off the box heading for safety.)  As I turned to make sure was hadn't turned into the prey, I heard Amie laughing uncontrollably at me from behind the safety of the sliding glass door.  

I cautiously lifted the flattened box off the spider only to discover he was still alive.  With no other options I dropped the box back on him and proceeded to jump repeated on top of it and hopefully the spider as well.  After 7 or 8 Wrestle-mania type stomps.  I checked again on my prey onto to discover some dismember legs and a squashed body.  In order to remove the evidence from the back yard (like any smart killer would do), I refolded the cardboard box into a makeshift shovel/rack and tossed the body over the fence.  

I will never look at a used cardboard box with disgust again, this one box saved my life.

SUMO...Japan's #1 Sport

During the first week of our time here in Japan, it is mandatory that every adult attend an AOB/ICR, Area Orientation Brief/Intercultural Awareness Training (Don't ask, I don't know why the acronym is ICR.)  It is five days long.  The first two days are standard Navy training...we take 1 day's worth of material and cram it into 2 days!  The last three days of training were great.  It had lectures about the trains, food, chop sticks, shrines, all sorts of stuff I don't remember because I was in a jet-lagged induced culture shock.  Felt like I was looking at stuff through a gas mask while cooking meth (we just started watching Breaking Bad...that's what you do when your TV options either AFN.  Thank you Apple TV).

What I do remember from the ICR is that the Native Japanese Instructor, who went to college at the University of Alabama, was phenomenal, and SUMO is Japan's #1 sport! 

You hear about Japanese baseball in the news, but Sumo truly is King.  It is the equivalent of the NFL!  We haven't been to a Sumo match yet, it's on the list, but we had a great introduction last weekend.

Lila is attending pre-school at a Japanese school out in town called the Seika.  At first it was rough getting used to the new environment but she has really taken to it and is enjoying it.  Last weekend was Sumo Weekend.  It was held on the elementary school grounds adjacent to the Seika.  The playground was your standard setup...soccer field, basketball hoops, playground with swings and Sumo stage!  The Sumo ring is a fixed structure, it was not erected just for the Sumo weekend.

The school hosts a couple of Sumo wrestlers from a local Sumo training school to come out and introduce Sumo to the kids by giving a demonstration.  

The kids spend the two weeks prior practicing their Sumo skills.  The boys actually compete against one another to come up with the top 8 competitors who compete to determine the #1 Kids sumo wrestler of the year.  As a prize, that kid gets to square up one v. one against an actual Sumo!  The Sumo wrestler was great.  Despite his size and skill advantage every kid or group of kids who went up against him won.

 

I am not so sure Lila was impressed with the whole Sumo thing.  She participated and wasn't afraid to square up with the Sumo, but when push came to shove, she chose to push her classmates into the Sumo.

Lila said she had fun, but I don't think she was that into it.  

I think the major problem for Lila was uniforms.

She just wasn't that interested.

What's 'normal life' in Japan?

I think anyone who has lived overseas will confirm, at some point, despite all the new sites, cultural attractions, restaurants etc, you still have to live your life.  As Amie would say, you still have to do laundry, you can't always be a tourist.  The last few weeks has been an example of just that.  While we've still hit some great restaurants in Zushi and Yokohama, we've been really busy in the normal day to day type of things.

Now normal day to day, may sound boring, but even that has been pretty cool, in my point of view.  For example Harrison now is a certified, working life-guard, Amie has picked up a class of Japanese ladies practicing their English while also taking day to day excursions out in town, Lila is taking piano lessons, Ethan survived an end of year history project and Liam has learned to lay down a mean bunt in 10 year old baseball.

Harrison has taken swimming to the next level by becoming a certified life guard.  Not a bad summer job to have, much better than McDonalds!  Besides in the summer heat without our own pool, it should work out great.  I am a little suspicious though...Harrison has worked only a couple of weeks and already has a couple of saves.  One was legit, another lifeguard slipped off the lifeguard stand, cracked her head and started bleeding really badly .  Harrison was the first one there and handled it great.  The other one is questionable.  The pool has a 'Wibit', a large floating obstacle course for kids to play on in the pool.  Part of the Wibit has sections for lifeguards to sit to be in the thick of it in case something goes wrong.  Now, it just so happens that this one 13 year old made her way into the pool, onto the Wibit, got to Harrison's station and then suffered, from "Oh my goodness, I can't swim, please help me!"  Of course, Harrison sounded the whistle, dove in and helped the young damsel in distress to the side of the pool.  Evidently Harrison has quite a following which means there will be a large number of saves this year.

Amie has taken over a Japanese class from a departing Navy wife.  She now has a class of 5 Japanese ladies who will practice their English.  Not a bad gig, sit around and talk about day to day experiences, while learning about the little idiosyncrasies of the English language.  Not a bad way to make "vacation drink" money.  Amie has also been busy taking day trips with a local community group, exploring the local sites.

Lila has really gotten into her school.  We were worried for awhile, when she didn't want to be away from Amie's side, but she is really into school now with hardly any morning drama.  She has started to take piano lesson's once a week after school.  I know my Grandma Brock would be very proud, as both my dad and my uncle took piano lessons.  Lila is just beginning, we haven't heard her play yet, but she is slowly working out the keys and the basic notes "Do, Lay, Me, Fa, So, La, Ti, Do".  (I know it is an old joke, but it is also true!)

I swear to Sweet Mother of Pearl that I am ready for the end of the school 'projects'!  I am not certain what the learning point is supposed to be, if they really want 8th graders to learn, how about a good old fashion paper.  Amie has already passed her high school courses, yet she is continually tested on her ability to clearly display the appropriate information on a tri-board while constructing various things that supposedly generate thought and learning, this time out of paper  mache.  The big drama the last few weeks was Ethan finishing his Horse Pistol project.  This project required a construction of said pistol with a Tri-board of various facts and descriptions.  I won't go into the moronic way the teacher asked for their ideas and then assigned the projects.  Evidently if you are in the last class of the day, you may get stuck with only one or two options.  By the time Ethan got to pick his project his choices were a horse pistol or a gold presentation cane (No idea what that is!).  Someone is the first period was able to pick a lock of hair...really, a lock of hair, I declare Shenanigans.  What a load of crap!  Anyways, Amie did a fantastic job building the structure of the pistol, while "helping" Ethan paper mache.  The one coat of paint Ethan applied was phenomenal...okay, Amie touched up a little bit.  By little bit, I mean sneaking into the kitchen when I wasn't looking to apply a 2nd, 3rd, and I think 4th coat.  By the time they were finished applying the hardware and painting the trim etc, it looked great.  I can't wait to see Amie report card.

The final big news is Liam's baseball.  He is really doing well.  It has been fun watching him develop his skills.  His throwing and catching are great and his batting is getting better.  It's got to be frustrating trying to hit off of a 10 year old pitcher.  You have to dodge the wild pitches long enough to get one decent one.  One game Liam was walked and hit by two pitches, then got a hit.  The last couple of games, he has laid down two awesome bunts. Great stance, even pulling back the batt on a bad pitch, before placing the ball right down the line.  The good news is he is a good hitter in practice when the adults are pitching, but with kids his age pitching, the easiest way on base is to take a shot to the rib cage or bunt!