Weekend wrap

Hello all. Sorry this weekend wrap is coming to you on a Tuesday; it was delayed by Technical Problems with the mega-floppy-bits at the server. Happily these have been fixed by Steve the wonder guru back in Australia, and I am now able to bring you the following riveting information.

We had a friend to stay last week. Kuniko is Japanese but has lived in Australia for about the last 20 years and thus is able to offer an interesting perspective on the two countries that we know so well. The first thing we did after she arrived on Thursday afternoon was to whisk her off for a meal of–what else–okonimiyaki.

As part of my ongoing search for a decent coffee in Mihara, on Friday morning we headed down to a funky jazz-inspired cafe by the sea called Cafe Hoxton. The coffee wasn’t that great (I really should abandon my quest for the holy grail about now) but it did sport some rather excellent Coffee Art on top:

On Friday night the girls went down to the local hot springs (except Ruby, who for some reason still steadfastly refuses to get naked with strangers) before Kuniko headed back on Saturday morning. So in two and a bit days I think we adequately covered the three key cultural highlights of Mihara: food, sea views and hot water.

Saturday was a big day for soccer. First of all I drove Ruby in to Sanfrecce soccer practice, which we don’t normally do because it’s an hour away. I couldn’t resist the opportunity to get a photo of the matching purple buses that take the girls to their games of a weekend:

Felix came along for the ride and managed to ingratiate himself into the practice session as a goalie:

After that we headed over to Felix’s soccer practice at Mihara UFC. This week was the annual Parents vs Kids match which was great fun for all concerned, and the parents would have thrashed the U10 kids had not a certain father let in a few too many goals (although I maintain that it made the game more even and therefore more interesting).

On Sunday morning we were meant to take part in the local clean-up day organised by our neighbourhood committee, to which I had duly promised to contribute only to have to cancel at the last minute when an impromptu soccer match was organised by Felix’s team. I mean, pulling out weeds for two and a half hours isn’t really my idea of fun on a Sunday morning, and you’re permitted to pay ¥1500 ($16) and officially squib out that way, but I felt a bit bad all the same. Particularly as the head lady came around afterwards to give us our gift for taking part (a bag of chips or something) when we didn’t actually take part… is that a sort of punishment via reverse psychology?

At lunchtime we went to see a concert by the local brass band, called the Poporo Junior Orchestra or PJO for short. (Kinda snappy isn’t it? By the way, the local culture center and concert hall is called Poporo. Nobody knows why.) This is because we thought it might be good for Ruby to have a proper place to play her saxophone other than the school band, where half the girls are still trying to convince her to give up the saxophone because it’s not a wind instrument. So we went for a squiz at a PJO practice session last week and guess what: (a) it turns out that some of the girls from the school band (the nice ones) are in the PJO too, and (b) it looks like fun and Ruby and Felix both want to join, and furthermore (c) they need a bass player and I am seriously considering it. Yes! Aging rock god lured out of retirement for ONE MORE ASSIGNMENT. Don’t you love the storyline, there’s a film in it for sure. But I figure it could be fun playing a few swing band jazz lines. May need to dye my hair grey for authenticity. Anyway Yusuke has lent me a bass and I found a dinky little Vox practice amp in the local guitar shop for the very reasonable price of ¥7000 (new) so it seems the planets are in alignment on this one.

To finish off the weekend we hosted Yusuke and family at our Second Ever Barbeque on Sunday afternoon. I managed to get the coals going nice and early but still burnt the food, although perhaps not quite so badly as last time. I’m confident that my coal-fired technique is improving and we should be onto edible food sometime before the evil rainy season arrives in June and barbeque plans are suspended until further notice.