Yuichiro Miura

At yesterday lunchtime, Japan time, 80 year old Yuichiro Miura stood on top of Mt. Everest. In doing so he set a new record for the oldest person to climb the world's highest mountain. "Climbed" though may be a bit a tad expansive as by all accounts he was hauled to the top by a small army of sherpas, and is now in the process of being lowered down the mountain by the same army.
Such mountaineering impurity doesn't matter a damn here in Japan where Miura-san is being hailed as a national hero. He is from Sapporo so his "Look at me, Ma!" moment made the front page and was covered in depth in the Hokkaido Shimbun. He was all over the evening television news last night (though even his remarkable exploits were overshadowed by the even more remarkable plunge in the value of the Japanese stock exchange), and this, I suspect, is merely a prelude to the frenzy that will accompany his return back to Japan.
But, I hear you ask, has he ever climbed Muroran-dake in winter and then stripped off to the waist? No he hasn't, but like all true lovers of the high places, he relishes the feel of the crisp, thin air against his manly skin. Though he could do with a little more chest hair to be truly termed a 'mountainy man'.

Sausages

We had our first barbeque of the year yesterday. In fact, it was our first barbeque ever, 5 crisp sausages worth. We held it beside a lake so that if things went flammable we could sling the whole thing into the water (or, alternatively, if Cian's inferno dreams were realized and we started a raging, uncontrollable forest fire, we could sling ourselves into the water).
Yesterday was also the first real spring day in Muroran; the sun shone, though lazily and hazily, the temperature rose into the mid-teens and Daddy unleashed his winter pale legs (though with that all-season muscle tone) upon an unsuspecting world.
Spring has been late arriving this year. The cherry blossoms are only beginning to bloom now, a full two weeks later than normal; the rice crop has yet to be planted and the winter geese from Russia are sill here, enjoying the chilly weather and craping their communist shite all over the place. Sanae, rather ambitiously, planted some tomatoes and cucumbers yesterday, but today a bone chilling fog rolled in off the ocean, the temperature dived, and most of the plants keeled over in shock.
The geese ate the rest.

Endaka

In August of 2012 the Yen set a new record high against the beleaguered Euro; 94 yen would have bought you 1 Euro.
We didn't go home last year.
This year we are planning to go back to Ireland in August (brace yourselves) and as of Friday's closing prices, it now takes 131 yen to buy 1 euro.
That is a decline, nay base jump freefall, of close on 40%.
Now if you are say, Toyota, you are counting all your yen denominated profits and laughing all the way to the 'ginko'. In the three months from January to March alone the company reported profits of $3.2 billion. For every, single yen the currency drops in value against the dollar, Toyota rakes in an extra 350 million dollars in profit.
But I don't work for Toyota, don't have shares in the company, and don't even drive their cars.
I do however have airplane tickets to pay for. As these have now got ridiculously expensive we have decided to invoke the 'Ghost Protocol'. There is a lot I am not at liberty to tell you about, but what I can tell you is that involves flying home via Dubai, slave traders, indefinite bonded servitude, and Cian.
Yes, we will miss him, but listen he's 6, old enough to make his own way in the world and there comes a time in every parent's life when they must loosen the ties that bind and have somebody else bind them, probably with iron manacles, and allow the boy to experience life in all its verisimilitude, or whatever quota of verisimilitude has been allotted to the notorious salt mines of Taghaza.
But at least me and Sanae will be back for the hurling semi finals in August so it should all end well (as long you are not a Clare supporter).

Spring

This weekend was Golden Week here in Japan, a series of public holidays which meant we 'enjoyed' a four day weekend as both Friday and today were days off. Given the weather though 'enjoyment' was hard to come by and in truth 'Pissy Wet Winter Week' would have been more apt. Since early last week we have had unseasonably cold temperatures with highs here in Muroran barely touching 6 degrees. Mind you in comparison to Obihiro, in the center of Hokkaido, we are positively balmy here. Or rather, I am positively balmy. Sanae and Cian went to Obihiro to visit Sanae's mother over the weekend and really, should have brought their skis. This morning they woke up to this:

At midday the temperature in Obihiro was 1.9 degrees and the snow was still falling. According to this evening's weather forecast, the mercury in Japan's arctic is due to fall to minus 4 tonight.
Minus freaking four! And this is the 6th of May which, according to the Augustinian calendar, is the sixth day of summer. No wonder Japan has remained a resilient unchristian country.
Daddy, meanwhile stayed in Muroran 'working' and, ahem, catching my first waves of 2013, but you'll just have to read about that in 'Mad Hairy Bastard Surfing Magazine'.

Half Marathon Drug Shocker!!

 Reuters: Last week's Date Half Marathon was rocked, I say rocked, by an unprecedented athlete doping scandal. Organizers had braced themselves for a potential terrorist attack but instead the bombshell exploded from within! A still unnamed Irish athlete is at the centre of a furious controversy having allegedly used performance enhancing drugs, specifically Yotsuba 100% full-fat milk. There are also unconfirmed reports that he 'indulged in a spot of dwarf tossing' prior to the start of the race.
In the days leading up to the race the 'athlete' in question had repeatedly played down his prospects, claiming amongst other things to be "too old for this shit", "only three days away from retirement", "suffering from food poisoning, insomnia, baldness, impotency, and a liking for early eighties Duran Duran". Yet, on Sunday he ran a new personal best of 1:41 for the race some ten, yes ten! freaking minutes faster than last year.
At a hastily convened post race press conference, the spectacularly hirsute athlete vehemently denied the allegations, terming those making claims "small minded" and "small bodied too". Asked to explain the traces of full-fat milk in his blood, he claimed to be 'lactating'.
His repeated denials only inflamed passions further with some of the hobbits, sorry, other competitors present angrily denouncing him for "cheating, and lying about it". They further denounced the lanky representative of the race of men for "taking our jobs, bedding our women, and throwing us into bushes".
Race organizers plan to behead him, sorry, question him further, but only if he lies down so they can look him in the eye.

"No, really, they all only come up to my chest"

The doper contends he was only "lactating" whilst beside him a clearly infuriated Coach Cian loses his temper with the media. Note subtle product placement.

The 2013 Date Half Marathon

As Paddy Power's newly appointed representative for Japan, Sanae 'The Turfmeister' Takahashi is offering the following odds on tomorrow's Date Half Marathon.
3-1 Daddy not to finish the race but to succumb to vicious stomach cramps somewhere around the 16km mark. Background: Yours truly was biologically blindsided by some food poisoning on Wednesday evening, or what the doctor said was "a touch of d'auld ebola virus". Thursday and Friday were two long days of emptying my stomach contents from both ends of my body. Today things have calmed down a bit but I am close to a kilo and a half off my preferred starting weight and not really in the mood for some intensive pasta-and-potatoes carbohydrate loading this evening.
5-1 Daddy to get detained by the Date police as a possible terrorist suspect. Background: After the terrible events in Boston last weekend the Date Five-O announced heighten security at tomorrow's event. Why? Because as any Al Queda operative worth his jihad salt instinctively knows, a strike at the heart of Hokkaido's strawberry growing capital will surely bring the Japanese infidel to his knees. And as the only foreigner who ever takes part in the race, I am, naturally, suspect number one.
10-1 Daddy not to finish the race due to, well, not being able to, basically. Background: too much criss-crossing the Pacific Ocean eating stodgy airplane food and not enough hard winter running means that my curtailed training has left me fit enough to run about 5km and after that, well, maybe it would be better if I got detained by the police before the race.
20-1 Daddy to get ambushed by a joint band of hobbits and dwarves somewhere around the notorious Kaminagawa Tunnel. Background: After last year's blog the guttural, rough-hewn word from the mines amidst the Toya hills is that the small bearded ones are gunning for me, or rather, axing for me and have teamed up with Sanae's brethern to get their revenge. Could get messy.
50-1 Daddy to go surfing instead. Background: tomorrow is supposed to be a bright sunny day, with an offshore breeze and and a gentle one metre swell. And I am less likely to be set upon by enraged hordes of the vertically challenged. Tempting.
1000-1 Daddy to finish under two hours. Background: none. There's not a feckin chance of that happening. Not unless I figure out the secret to time travel somewhere around the 14km mark. Or they preemptively end the race at the 14km mark.

Cian's start at Elementary School

 
Although Cian started school last Monday week, in the Gaynor-Takahashi family and Turf Appreciation Society gambling takes precedence over all else, so you are only reading about this now.
And at 26 to 1, rightfully too.
As with Cian's 'graduation ceremony' so it was with his 'entrance ceremony'; lots of 'be good students' speeches, technical issues with these newfangled things called 'school bags', and of course, wonderfully outré fashion choices.
What was thought provoking about all of this was the realization that upon starting school, or more pointedly, starting in a Japanese school, Cian is not merely learning various universal academic subjects; he is also being educated and socialized in how to be a Japanese person. It is a necessary form of acculturation but decidedly different from his father's culture.
This process goes considerably deeper than merely liking rice instead of potatoes, and bowing instead of shaking hands; culture is what we use to interpret the world and our place in it. That act of interpretation is not innate but learned, and much of that learning takes place at school. And this may well prove to be contentious in the future for, as Sanae will readily testify, there are aspects of Japanese culture I do not accept, particularly its conservative, parochial view of the wider world, and its reflexive, uncritical submission to tradition. That Cian may well be inculcated with such an outlook is something I, as his father, as his non-Japanese father, am not completely comfortable with.
So send the parcels full of Tayto crisps, Barry's teabags, Jacobs fig rolls, smarties,  GAA county jerseys, Peig Sayers' autoboigraphy, Reeling in the Years DVDs and Christy Moore CDs. With your help we can make Cian, if not 100%, at least 50% guaranteed Irish.