One month anniversary

Friday 19th February marked the one month anniversary of our Japan adventure. Although we’ve only been here for a month (actually six weeks for me but let’s not split hairs), it feels like ages, so in that sense you could say we’ve settled in.

With the kids now firmly ensconced at school, the initial honeymoon period has worn off and it’s now life as normal. Not that getting up at six in the morning is normal; I don’t imagine I’ll ever get used to it. The end of the honeymoon period is defined by the simple fact that we hardly ever get to go to Mr. Donuts any more, what with school and soccer practice and the need for early nights. Just as well we managed to pick up a full set of mugs during the first couple of weeks, when we were in there just about every day.

I’ve been inundated with work over the past few weeks (the lead-up to the end of the Japanese financial year on March 31 is always a busy time, with government departments eager to use up their budgets on useless things like translation of obscure documents). Eleni isn’t working yet, on account of she has to go back to the Immigration Bureau in Hiroshima to fill in yet another form asking for permission to work. Happily this is (touch wood) a simple procedure and she plans to do it this very Thursday, possibly fitting in a spot of shopping in the big city while she’s at it.

The upshot of Eleni not working is that she has had heaps of time on her hands to scour her recipe books, trawl through the local supermarkets and cook up some excellent meals for the rest of us. We have been eating very well as a result, and I’m feeling the pressure of when Eleni finally finds a job and I have to start producing some food myself.

The other main change that marks the end of the honeymoon period is that the bills have started coming in. The first gas bill was a rude reminder of the high cost of utilities in Japan, although the electricity one wasn’t too bad. Soon there will be local taxes and National Health contributions to pay, and not long after that it’s Income Tax Return time! (Not that there’ll be much to contribute to the Japanese government this year, since I’ll have only been officially working for two months.)

The flipside of being legal is that we get child benefit support (a couple of hundred bucks a month, although the government is talking about raising that further) and we also get to enjoy very generous hospital and dental benefits courtesy of the local version of medicare (would you believe: I got a full crown for my tooth the other day for about $80 all up).

And in a broader sense it’s nice to be all legal and settled and just experiencing the minutiae of daily life like everyone else. After all, that’s what we’re here for.