Sunday 12 November 2017

And it begins

Some wit once penned, 'Never has so much been written by so many and read by so few.'
He or she was, of course, referring to blogs. So I thought I may as throw my lot into the hurly-burly that is the blogosphere.
This blog is just my thoughts on life as it happens to me, a 43-year-old married guy living in Japan. It's as much for posterity for anything, but it may be equally as much that I'm sick of watching Rick and Morty, if that's possible, and felt like doing something constructive.
If you want to comment, go ahead. I've never had a comment on a blog I wrote so it would be a welcome change. If you want to tell me I spelt something wrong, go ahead. If you want to tell me I'm a genius, always welcomed. If you want to tell me I'm wrong, be my guest.
Enjoy.

The Lion King
I watched The Lion King today whilst sitting in my wife's aunty's (she's my aunty too, but I referred to her as such to avoid confusion) apartment. It was of course in Japanese. My wife tried pressing buttons to change the language to English, to no avail.
What struck me is how easy it is to follow a story with no language. The expressions and the visuals saw me right.
Kind of think we think too much into things sometimes. Just look at what is in front of you and it's a lot clearer.
Nice story, and it always impresses me how they can translate songs into Japanese and keep them humming along to the same tune.

The car check up
We bought a new Honda N-Box a couple of years ago. This is what's called a 'kei-car' in Japan. The kanji is 軽自動車 in Japanese. The first kanji means light, and the last three combine to mean car. It has a 600cc engine, but that's all we need.
Inside, the seats fold down completely flat, so we can sleep at a full stretch. Kind of like a poor man's camping car.
When we bought the car, brand new, it came with five years of services included (or prepaid to be precise). It's grand. We take it in and they service it for nothing down, sit you down with a coffee and tell you any issues they may have had.
What I was chuffed about this time was the work the sales guy had put into finding out about the 2019 Rugby World Cup commemorative number plates. We wanted to get them on the car to express ourselves. However, we got a few months ago we got told it was not possible. As we were hire- purchasing the car, by the letter of the law the finance company owned it, so we couldn't do as we wished.
Turns out, via the sales guy's research that this was not, in fact, the case. We could change the plates, just not the numbers.
I love that. He put the work in. Didn't have to. Our money is already in his (company's) pocket, and he still puts in the yards. Is that usual with buying a brand new car? Is that Japan only?

The children playing, and loading up on sugar
Finally, we stopped at a friend's to drop off some food from our garden. Turns out that there was a kid's party going on. About ten of her daughter's friends were round having a bit of a shindig. What impressed me was the fact that there was not an electronic device around. They were laughing and playing and just having a good time. My entry, of course, engendered a sudden desire to speak English to the foreigner, so I had a bit of fun with them. Their take home for the day was that when they introduced themselves, they didn't need to use their last names. Leave that to the business people I told them.
The other thing that I noticed was what they were eating. Crikey they were downing enough sugary sweets to kill a horse. They offered me some, but these days the chocolates, although delicious, leave me feeling sick as a dog if I overindulge.
Shame.

So, it began. My pointless blog, which is as much as record for myself as it is for any enjoyment that anyone may derive from it.
Leave a comment. Or a question. I'd love it.



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