Last BBQ (for this time...)

The episode of working and living in japan for this time is coming close to an end. Last week was the last week in the office and now I will have paternity leave and summer holiday until returning to sweden early next month. The three of us will spend the remaining time in japan with a few trips as well as relaxing days in Tokyo. Starting tomorrow morning we will leave for a roadtrip in Shikoku, one of the main islands south of Honshu. We will fly to Hiroshima and take a rental car for 6 days and drive around Shikoku.














As a "see you again" party the friends in the office organised a BBQ in a park in Tokyo yesterday. A very nice way to spend a day with the people you have been working with for a long time. No doubt it will be very sad and strange to return to an almost empty office in Kista without all Tokyo friends.














The grills kept being loaded with various kinds of food and you could walk around trying all different things.














And we are fortunate enough to have friends that know how to cook real tasty indian food. Mmmmm!














Takahashi-san's, the main organiser, best trick: if the grill is not hot enough, just use a blow torch to BBQ the meat!














Kai got all the attention he wanted and it was no problem finding baby sitters volunteering for the job.














Part of the group that stayed towards the end.


















I went to Tokyo for 2,5 years and my best memory is this t-shirt. It's been a kind of tradition to give members a hand decorated t-shirt when leaving the team and now it was my turn to get it. Fun and heart warming messages, truly a great memory to keep. As a bonus it came with a bottle of single cask limited edition Suntory whisky including a certificate issued in my name :)

Golden week

Today is children's day in Japan, the last of the golden week holidays. We have celebrated Kai with the traditional food and decorated the house with this kabuto, a present to Kai from his grand parents in Tokyo. Kabuto is a traditional gift to a baby boy in Japan and is said to protect him.














Earlier in the golden week we have been to the beach in Chiba with friends. The weather has really taken off and gone from long stretched winter to summer in one go with temperature up towards 25 degrees and a lot of sun. I even had the first swim in the ocean of the year, not even that cold. I also tried surfing again next morning. Pretty much same result as last time. Strong wind and lack of wet suit made it a very short attempt to get up on the board. Except for swallowing a lot of sea water I didn't manage to do much at all.














We've had a relaxing day in Yoyogi park as well. Difficult to understand how big this park is. Even though we have been here many times before we managed to find a completely new area where we have never been before.














Kai is very keen on being able to walk and he has used most of his time during golden week to practise getting up on his feet. He is not really there yet but I think it's only a matter of time now (maybe that's a quite safe bet when it comes to children and their development when I think about it).














Little Kai - growing bigger but still with a cute smile.

Stuck on the way...

After 2,5 days delay from skellefteå we landed 45 minutes ago in stockholm, 15 minutes ahead of schedule. So far so good. Until we got on the bus to go to stockholm. Right before the highway someone had crashed into a traffic sign resulting in the sign falling over the road. The driver took a chance to pass under the sign. And now we are stuck... waiting for fire brigade to come and lift it up.

Moving on south

Now it looks like our holiday in the north part of sweden is coming to an end. After 2,5 days of cancelled flights it looks like we'll be getting on a flight to stockholm this evening and later a flight to tokyo on monday if there is no new volcano outbreak. We've had a fantastic time up in skellefteå with sunshine every day and a lot of fun winter activities as well as relaxing moments.















Linn and Lukas gave the swings a go and practised jumping off them into the snow.















Maki and Kai going downhill with the "bob" (bob sledge?).















Niklas' family out on one of the childrens favourite winter activities in the north, to go with bob sledges after a snow mobile.















Maki and Kai waiting for someone to drill a hole in the ice to do some ice fishing.



















And that someone drilling a hole for them.















Dad with a somewhat lazy style of doing ice fishing.















Maki on the snow mobile with Niklas.















Niklas cooking the dinner using a moruka over open fire.















Out on a walk across the ice with Kai on a sledge. By for now!

Northern light

We are now up in my home town Skellefteå in the north part of Sweden for a holiday. And to prepare, practically and mentally, for the coming move to Sweden. We have had some very nice relaxing days with fantastic weather and daylight stretching through most part of the evenings.














Maki and Kai on the last flight up to Skellefteå, sometime around 22 hours after leaving our house in Ebisu. Kai was truly tired and for the first time ever could fall a sleep easily anywhere without first being carried around.














Next morning we woke up in the "lada" outside mom and dad's house. It's a traditional hay barn that we have furnished as a guest house.














We have visited Skellefteå city and the "Place of possibilities". Don't know all the possibilities the place is named after but it was at least possible to get a decent hamburger from "torggrillen", just like old days. Needless to say, quite a difference from Shibuya-ku. Very, very relaxing though.














Maybe the place of possibilities is not the best way to enjoy a holiday in Skellefteå we thought and went to the ice for a picnic. We've had fantastic weather all week with sun shine and around 5-7 degrees. And yes, this is the perfect way of enjoying a holiday in north part of Sweden!














Kai fast a sleep in the sledge.














A small fire on the ice allows for grilling tasty sausages.














Friends and family coming by the place by the sauna in the small marina in our village for a relaxing time in the sun. Also this sauna is built from a traditional hay barn, just as our guest house at home. Hay barns has been used everywhere in this part of the country and now when there are less farmers and less need for hay they tend to be used for other purpose. In my opinion they are very beautiful.














Kai enjoying the sun on the ice. Later he noticed that snow is very tasty and couldn't get enough of it. His food menu has been kind of one-sided so far and maybe he was happy to find something on the ground that was actually eatable














Kai with "old grandma" Karin in Bygdsiljum. We had a nice day together in her house yesterday.

Evening hanami

Tonight we took an evening stroll down to naka meguro and walked under the cherry blossoms along the river. It's become tradition to go to naka meguro for evening hanami as it is one of our favourite hanami spots in Tokyo and especially nice in the evening time with all the lanterns along the river. Tonight we were lucky to have clear view of the moon as well.















Anyone can pay for hosting a lantern and put their name on it. We planned to do so for this year but we didn't remember to when it was time.

First hanami

This weekend we stayed over at Maki's parents place in Ogikubo and could enjoy Kai's first hanami ever and our first hanami of the year down by the river where big cherry trees grow along the water. The trees have not reached full bloom yet and the best period is still to come. Previous week was fairly cold and the blooming kind of stopped or at least slowed down. Yesterday was quite warm and we could enjoy a few hours in the park before going to a hanami party at Paul and Junko's new place in Yokohama. Today has been back to cold weather again and the forecast for the next couple of days it doesn't look any better.















Close-up of the cherry blossom by the river in Ogikubo.

More Hokkaido

On the last day in Rusutsu, Hokkaido, we didn't see as much of the sun as the forecast promised, but the skiing was just as great as we hoped for. With two thirds of the system closed during the snow storm on sunday there was plenty of untouched new powder snow for monday skiing. Below is a few more photos, and some videos, from the trip last weekend.











Japanese afterski! Beer and hot dog.











Skiing after afterski is not recommended. Don't ask me how this happend! All of a sudden there was no snow under my skies and shortly after I was laying on my stomach a few meters in front of the skies.











Checking the snow depth with my 130cm long pole, but had to pull it upp a bit for the photo. I could easily push it 30cm under the surface.











Another ski after afterski accident!











A fairly permanent looking sign warning for lack of snow. We had a hard time to believe it. In a true japanese fashion it could very well have been decided last summer that this spot would have lack of snow coming winter. A fact that some 200cm of snow cannot change.











View (?) from the top of the mountain.











This photo was taken at the end of the last day. If you can see the nice powder snow on the other side and the few tracks that has been made during the whole day you understand that this is really a great place for anyone who actually want to ski off pist.











The whole hotel was built as a funny resort and playground. Here are our friends in the mechanical jazz band Daniel and the Dixie. The dogs do talk and sing if you were wondering.



Nice run in the forest no one except for me wanted to ski, the tracks to the right are from my previous run. Not really possible to see but this place is quite steep - and very fun.



A few different clips from the great skiing in Rusutsu.

A lot of weather and good skiing

We've had strange weather but lucky enough good skiing. We came up yesterday after lunch and got a few hours of really nice off pist skiing. The area here is like made for off pist skiing with open forest and some pists left unprepared and now there is plenty of snow everywhere, or at east until last night. Because late last night it started raining and it kept pouring down all night. We woke up to a storm and all the powder snow as we knew it were gone. For a while we thought the ski trip was more or less over after just a few hours of fantastic skiing. But then it started snowing and it's been coming down huge amount of snow during the day. We had two hours of skiing in the storm before lunch, took a three hour break in the hot springs and souna and now just finished another three hours skiing in almost as much powder snow as we had yesterday. It is still snowing, three thirds of the system has been closed due to wind today and the forecast promise sun for tomorrow :-)

Small birthday

This week little Kai turned 6 months and we celebrated with eating cake. Of course, Kai couldn't really enjoy the cake though as he cannot eat food yet but he seemed happy anyway.















This morning he started to practice eating food so next time he might very well be eating the cake as well. If you would be curious what food is the first one to give to babies in Japan the answer is naturally rice. Boiled extra long time and mashed with water rice was the first meal served to young Kai. At first he didn't really understand the thing with using spoon but after a while he could get a tiny bit of rice down his stomach. And a whole lot went on the outside. But I guess that's the way it should be.

In a few hours I'll be getting on a flight to Hokkaido for a ski weekend in Rusutsu. They claim they have 220cm of snow and quality is powder so it's looking really good. Temperature has gone down to around zero last couple of days so I just hope that it's doesn't get any warmer now.

Spring around the corner

After a bit chilly beginning of the week with more rain (fortunately only outside, the roof really seems to be fixed now!) the end of the week provided very nice weather. We spent thursday-friday with hot springs and sightseeing in Hakone - a trip that now is more or less part of the "standard package" when we get visitors, which is kind of nice as I enjoy it just as much every time. This time of year is very nice to go to hot springs as well as it's not so warm outside just yet. Of all the times we've been to Hakone this time we got the best weather and a clear view of mount Fuji.















Yesterday we couldn't think of a better way to spend Niklas and Maritha's last day in Tokyo than arranging the first picnic of the year in Yoyogi park. We had around 15 degrees and mostly sun, very nice indeed after the cold winter. By coincidence there was a japanese festival in Yoyogi park yesterday so we got a lot of different good food and drinks for our picnic, better than the bento box from 7eleven that was the plan.















We could even find a few cherry trees that had started to bloom. Beautiful to see and a true indication that spring is coming. Would think that most trees will come to full bloom in about 2 weeks or so and then all parks will be crowded with people enjoying the cherry blossoms.

Today the three of us enjoyed another sunny day in the park after Niklas and Maritha had taken off to return to Sweden. Next weekend I'll be finishing off the winter with a ski trip to Hokkaido. Feels kind of awkward now when spring seems to be coming but it will be nice with one more ski trip before bringing out the shorts and flip flops.

Sleeping in the rain

We are slowly approaching warmer weather and more light here in Tokyo and leaving winter behind. It's been a bit tough month and a half, not due to the cold weather which compared to rest of the world is not that bad, but because our house is under reconstruction. With short notice, just after extending the contract, we found out that the house would have a 2 months long reconstruction going on. So starting from end of January we've had all walls covered with building stands and protection net blocking all view so it's felt a bit like a prison. In addition all the noise starting already 8 o'clock in the morning and people walking right outside our window hasn't made it the optimal place for Maki and Kai to spend the days but often have had to leave the apartment and stay out all day.















One of the worst part of the reconstruction is that our bedroom roof suddenly started to leak water. Not very nice in the cold rainy winter season in Tokyo. The big surprise though was that even after telling about this, which we thought was not only a great inconvinience for us but actually very serious for the building itself, the didn't manage to fix it. After a week of not raining it started leaking again last weekend when the rain came back. And of course it was during the weekend so no one was around to fix it.

Now they seem to have fixed the roof on the outside. After some sunny days during last week the rain is back outside but no longer in our bed room. They teared off the paper and paint though in the roof as a memory.



















As a small apology the owner of our apartment brought a box a cookies when coming to see the the leaking roof the other day. To bring something in situation like this is common in Japan and this is very likely the most expensive cookies we have ever had in a beautiful wood box. And they taste very nice as well.















Something good that has happened lately is that Kai has started to read books. It's not one of the famous classic works but it's a start.















And when Kai got a new bath robe with his name on from Maki's friends he was this happy!



Finally a video from when Kai tried out the "walking-bouncer" he got from Niklas and Maritha for the first time. He was quite unsure what to do! Speaking of Niklas and Maritha, they are on the way over to visit for a week and should be approaching Ebisu station as we speak. I will go with Kai and and meet them up now. Maki is at a "marathon" get together with friends south of Yokohama today and will be joining later this afternoon. Some 10 of our friends running half marathon and another 10 coming to meet up for lunch afterwards, guess what group of people Maki is in? The plan was that I would be running today also but a soar throat made me make the choice to stay home and act as welcome committee for Niklas and Maritha instead. So we are looking forward to a nice week with them!