Golden Week

We have had a series of successive public holidays over the past three days which means we have had an extended break since last Saturday. This period is known as 'Golden Week' here in Japan, so named after one of the great villains of the James Bond series. The weather was unseasonably warm and sunny so we got out and about a bit. Below are a number of photos form our spring wanderings and some accompanying notes.

First, next, and last, there was surfing. Three glorious days of it. Early morning down at kanisan.

We also took a stroll around Hachiman Shrine to see the cherry blossoms. Because we have to. This is Japan and they have rules about that sort of thing. They also have rules about purifying yourself before entering the hallowed ground of the shrine, so Cian washed his hands. Or else the watching dragon would eat him.

 She's my cherry blossom, ya'll.

 Such was the warm sunshine we were blessed with a lizard who made a surprisingly early season appearance.

 View from the top of Sokuryosan; a typical mixture of blue skies, fog, and smoke.

 A fern plant. Or an alien, depending on your imagination.

 Mizubasho in the park near Lake Poroto.

The woods around Lake Poroto beginning to turn green, and yes, I like my prosaic captions.

 Lake Utonai, in Tomokomai, where we usually go during Golden Week. They had a nature quiz at various spots along the walkway around the lake. We were set to get a clean sweep of correct answers when Mammy overruled the men on the last question on whether we came across a male of female willow tree. It was a male, damnit, a male! Easily distinguishable by it's adams apple, penchant for fast cars, and FC Barcelona replica soccer jersey.

To console ourselves, the men had some ice cream. Chocolate and ...

 Tricky vanilla.

On the bridge.

I know, I know... aawwwhhhh. But note how Daddy has to bend his knees in order to physically compensate for the difference between man and hobbit.

Cian and Sanae headed off to Sanae's mother's house for two days while Daddy did some thesis writing and, ahem, caught the occasional wave. Whilst there they visited Eco-no-Mori in Otofuke which has a giant bouncing area. Cian spent 2 hours on it.

Mammy had a go to. For somewhat significantly less than 2 hours.

Then it was also time for bike rental and some practice for the up coming Tour de France under the watchful eye of Coach Granny.

 Cian then retreated to his 'lair' to plot his next move...

...which involved a large chocolate and strawberry sundae, all part of his 'carbo-loading' for Le Tour.

AIB Part 2

Well, that didn't work. Myself and Sanae paid a trip to our local post office to prove my bona fides but they weren't having any of it. They politely but firmly said "No, we can't certify a copy of your passport", the implied subtext being "we will not be part of whatever Al Queda inspired global financial terrorism you are planning on unleashing, Mr. Brian lunatic foreigner Gaynor". And this despite me buying life insurance off them a couple of years ago. Oh, but they were oh so helpful then...
Hence, I will just have to wait I return home in August whereupon you may well witness a 'Dog Day Afternoon' like scenario occurring at the South Anne Street branch of AIB.

Elections

Yesterday was election day here in Muroran for the city mayor and council. Unlike back home such positions have some municipal merit as our elected representatives oversee a budget of just over 438 million yen (about 3.4 million of that Euro funny money) which gets spent on everything from school lunches to social welfare payments. It does not however get spent on an exiled Gael's attempts to start a Junior B football team. This despite the fact that said Gael has being contributing to city taxes for the ten years he has lived in Muroran. On average I pay 900 annually in city taxes and what has a decade and 9,000 Euro got me? Feck all. And certainly not the vote. Obviously 'No taxation without representation' doesn't translate into Japanese. My thoughts are beginning to turn revolutionary...
Anyway, yesterday 37 year old Takeshi Aoyama was reelected mayor of Muroran for a second four year term. Sanae voted for him as his daughter goes to the same school as Cian and she figured he'd probably keep the school open until she graduated. Mayor Aoyama's success wasn't unexpected as he managed to convince both main political parties to back him along with securing the endorsement of the local labour union (though not the backing of the city's Irish diaspora).
What intrigued me most about the election was the actual voting process. First Sanae received an official 'Voting Place Entrance Ticket' (no, really), which, as the wonderfully pedantic title makes clear, enabled her to actually enter the polling station at the local junior high school. Then they confirmed Sanae was Sanae but unlike AIB, she did not have to provide any proof of identity. Rather, her 'Entrance Ticket' and the voter list was compared. Each of these had half an official stamp on them and when the halves were aligned, they matched perfectly. She was in!
She was then directed to another counter where she got the official voting paper to write her preferred candidate's name. Yes, write the name. No ticking boxes, or marking x's, or photographs of the candidates to help you. You write the name and you had better not make any mistakes or you'll render your vote invalid. Then you put your ballot in a special box and hope the talliers can read your handwriting. And then she had to repeat the process all over again, this time to vote for her preferred candidate, yes candidate singular - none of that head wrecking proportional representation voting here - for the city council. Who also got elected. It would seem that Sanae has better luck at picking political winners than equine ones.

参観日 sankanbi

Last Saturday was 参観日 sankanbi in both Cian and Sanae's schools. Sankanbi is often rendered as 'parents visiting day' or 'parents open day' which, although fairly accurate, doesn't quite encapsulate all that is involved. There are three such days throughout the year, one for each term. 'Show class' is what Sanae terms it as it basically involves showing the parents how much (or lack of) progress young Satoshi and Saori are making. For us, or rather me as Sanae was at her own school and so couldn't attend, it was my first opportunity to observe Cian's new teacher.
Now usually this exemplar of tall, swarthy, yet broodingly poetic Gaelic masculinity tends to freak out the teachers but to be fair to T. sensei, she maintained her composure rather well. Then again it is my third year visiting the school for sankanbi and I think they are pretty much used to me by now.
For the 'show class' T. sensei had the students individually announce their aims for the coming term. Japanese education places a lot of emphasis on students establishing goals to which they should aspire. They aren't necessarily academic, nor even directly school related - Cian, for example, announced that he wanted to run a faster time than last year at next month's Northern Horse Farm Marathon - but they are openly stated and it is the public pledge aspect of the act that is important. It demonstrates that (a) you are motivated to do something you (and your teacher) consider worthwhile; and (b) you realize the effort and discipline (though sadly lacking in Cian's case) that is necessary to achieve this goal.
This is all related to the Japanese concept of gambaru, to strive or do your utmost to accomplish a difficult task. Whether or not you succeed isn't as important as showing that you tried, and tried mightily. In many respects gambaru is a bit like the Wexford hurling team.
In third class such gambaru pledges tend to split along gender lines with the girls focusing on classroom accomplishments while the boys plan on tearing up the sports field. As they progress through school these promises become more specific and academically orientated. Specific test scores are aimed at, high schools to be entered, straight A's on the university entrance exams, and the such like. Personally, this socially induced pressure-to-perform doesn't sit well with the laid back Kerry man in me. Forty-five years in and I think I am entitled to say things like 'there is more to life than test scores' but over here that is very much the minority opinion. So Cian makes his promises, his teacher (and Mammy) are happy, while Daddy every so often tries to lure him away for a twilight walk on the beach to see the star sprinkled sea.

AIB's most wanted

I have been a customer of Allied Irish Bank (AIB) since 1987 when I opened an account during Fresher's Week at COMAD and got a three pounds bonus (yes, pounds) for doing same. I have remained with them ever since - even here in Japan -  which means I am customer of close on 28 years.
Yet, they don't believe I am who I am.
For the past couple of months AIB have being sending me letters demanding Proof of Identity and Proof of Address documentation because, and I'm quoting from one of their letters, "under current legislation AIB as a bank must be able to show that we know the customers to whom we provide financial services".
So after 28 years AIB still don't know who I am? Amazing.
And they want me to provide proof of my address. Or rather, repeated proof of my address as I already supplied them with this when we bought our house here in Muroran a couple of years ago and I changed the coresspondence address for my account from Ireland to Japan. Plus, they keep sending those letters to Tenjin-cho so you would think they have a fair idea of where I live. But no, apparently they don't really know who I am or where I live.
In order to get off AIB's 'person unknown' list I have to supply them with certified copies of various identifying documents. Certification requires that the "original document ... must be branded and signed as being a true copy of the original". 
Now that 'branded' part got me thinking I would need to go down to the local cattle mart but no, it turns out the following will suffice:
(a) Employee of a regulated financial institution
(b) Public Notary
(c) Registered practising Solicitor / Lawyer
(d) Embassy / Consular staff member
To take each of the these in reverse order:
(d) The Irish Embassy is in Tokyo which is a combined four hour car-airplane-train trip away and would cost about 400 Euro there and back. Not an option.
(c) The only encounter I have had with a solicitor here in Japan was when we were buying the house. He was old, expensive, and bizarrely tried to talk me into giving his grand daughter free English lessons.
(b) A public notary will charge ¥11,500 (approximately 90 Euro) per document to be certified. As AIB require three documents that is, maths fans, 270 Euro. Not an option either.
Which leaves us with (a) the regulated financial institution people. The obvious contact here is Shinsei Bank from whom we got our home loan from. But they are based in Tokyo which raises the same problems as (d). Also, besides a quarterly statement, I have had no dealings with the bank in the past 5 years and I would probably have to prove who I am to prove who I am.
The only people who I deal regularly with and could vouch for me as being me are at our local post office, but I am not too sure if they are emotionally ready to legally verify my identity, but I still intend to try.
If that doesn't work, then feck AIB, they'll just have to wait until I am back in Ireland in summer and I rock on up with my Japanese driver's license, Japanese utility bills, and Japanese bank statement, all written in Japanese, and then they can verify who ケイナーさん is.

The new school year

Cian started in third class today which basically means that he can now add Science to the ever lengthening list of subjects he doesn't particularly like. Unfortunately, I think English may well soon top that list. Personally, I blame his teacher - he's an awful dour old fecker.
Cian got a new homeroom teacher as well, a Mrs. Takahashi. No, not that one. As Cian himself put it that would be 'too scary'. The Takahashi surname is as common as Murphy or muck here in Japan so it was probably going to happen at some stage of his schooling. However, Takahashi sensei is a woman which means that since the age of two when Cian started nursery school he has had, and again I am quoting our budding misogynist, "fecking women teachers" the whole way up. His hot blooded masculinity is beginning to chaff at the constant imposition of the fairer sex as his mentors. None of them, apparently, know how to poc a sliothar properly.
Mind you all this was overshadowed by Daddy's (belated) 2015 long board debut down at Itanki last Saturday morning.
For shame.
My surfing colleague M. has already clocked up 41 days on the waves this year so far which, given that most of those days were in minus temperatures, is some achievement. I will be doing exceedingly well if I manage to hit 41 for the entire year. Which is why our trip home this year may well involve an extended sojourn to the People's Republic of Cork and the beach break down at Castlefreke. Moss, you reading this?

The dream...

... and the reality.

The 'S' word

As you probably noticed from the previous post, there isn't much snow around any more. In fact we have had, by Hokkaido standards, a very mild winter of it. My Met Eireann approved means of measuring the severity of our winter is to add up the number of times I have had to climb on the shed roof and shovel off the snow. And this year's total? Approximately zero. Which has been great as let's face it folks, I'm not getting any younger and Cian is taking his own sweet time about growing older. The weekend saw the temperatures come tantalizing close to double figures and some of the more irresponsible amongst us are already bandying the S****g word around.
Hush now. Have we so quickly forgotten what happened last year - remind yourselves here.
Still, the signs are there.