Losing Track of Time

I’ve been putting off posting for a few reasons, the main one being that I’m currently pouring most of my energies into a complete revamp and redesign of Inner Child Crochet - and I’m continually convinced that I’ll have the preview for the new format finished ‘by the end of today.’ I would have it done, too, but though I finished the body of my code two weeks ago, I’ve spent nearly every day since then attempting to pound Internet Explorer into submission. (If you browse with IE, please, for the love of web standards and my sanity, switch to something more compliant.) I decided that it was time for a new theme - I created the autumn theme in an homage to the season that I missed the most - something a little less overbearing. I’ve also got more experience designing than I did when I created the site - over a year more - and I’m well able now to create something more fluid, elegant and functional than the site I built a year ago. With luck and hard work, I will have a preview page to satisfy your curiosity within the next week.

In other news, we had another earthquake on Tuesday. It was in the middle of the afternoon, this time: the boys were sleeping and I was in the kitchen, cooking. The ground started to shake and tremble, the dishes in the cupboards behind me began rattling quietly, and after a moment I looked up to see if a truck was passing by - but I knew that it wasn’t. It was too hard for that, and there was a subtle sensation of slipping sideways that not even the big earth-movers can produce. After another moment I turned off my mixer, wondering briefly if I should move to a doorway and whether the boys would wake up, but in the end I just stood there by my bowl of frosting and watched the world outside my window as though I would be able to see a harder quake coming. After a while - ten seconds? Thirty? A minute? I don’t know - the shaking stopped, though tiny shudders continued for a few minutes more.

I went back to mixing, strangely disturbed. Maybe this seems commonplace to those of you who live (or have lived) in earthquake-prone areas, but it’s not to me. I grew up in the Midwest. Tornadoes? Nooo problem. But earthquakes? What? The part that unsettled me most, I think, is that there was an earthquake and I just stopped, waited, and went about my business. (I probably didn’t have to stop, either, but I’m new to this.) If there’s a tornado, first of all you usually know it’s coming. You gather your family, your flashlights and your radio and go to a safe place - or, if there’s less chance it’ll hit you, you go somewhere with access to a safe place. If they’re farther away, you might go out to the Sonic for a Cherry Limeade (gee, I miss those) and hang out with your friends until the clouds start to thicken and then head home so you can sit on your sofa and watch tv, getting annoyed when they interrupt CSI with those pesky weather updates. With very few exceptions, it’s Not a Big Deal.

Two earthquakes in as many weeks has started me thinking that this may be a somewhat regular occurrence. But if Japan has a dangerous side, it also has beauty:

The cherry trees are in bloom, and I was stunned by how many of the bare branches we’d seen this winter suddenly pushed out blossoms. (Click on the pics to see better!)

Anyone more than marginally familiar with Japan and Japanese culture will have heard of sakura, but the full extent (and, in fact, the beauty) of the phenomenon cannot I think be easily grasped without seeing it.

There are cherry trees everywhere. Parks are planted full of them. In places, they line the streets on both sides. People have planted them in their tiny yards, public buildings are surrounded by them, and it’s difficult to drive for more than a minute or two without passing a tree full of blossoms.

I took the boys up to a fairly unfrequented hill yesterday: it was planted all over with cherry trees. We walked underneath them - the blossoms are beginning to fall now and when the wind blew we were sprinkled with fragrant petals. The smell of cherry blossoms is sweet and delicate: with so many together every breath we took was scented with the beautiful fragrance. Max and Charlie were delighted with the flowers, and patient with me as I stopped again and again to take pictures in a futile attempt to capture the moment.

The best part? Everyone we talk to concedes that the cherry blossoms here are “pretty okay.” For really good cherry blossom viewing, there’s a city about two hours away that our friends enthusiastically recommend. We didn’t go this year - their blossoms have already fallen - but I think we’ll take the trip next year.

I could take a thousand pictures in a thousand different ways and still not truly capture the sheer magnitude and beauty of these cherry trees.

Shakin’ things up

 We had an earthquake here the other night. Just a tiny one - personally I’d call it a tremor - although some of my friends living in multi-story apartments felt it more severely. Charlie had squirmed out of his blankets and cried because he was cold; I went to tuck him back in. While I was sitting with him to be certain he would sleep again, I felt a rhythmic thudding. At first I thought Greg had gotten out of bed and was pounding down the hall (our house has hardwood floors with a crawlspace underneath; if you’ve lived in a house like that before you know how heavy footsteps can shiver and vibrate the floors under your feet), but I realized first that it was harder than he would be walking and second that it lasted longer than it would take him to get from our room to the boys’. Almost as soon as I realized this, the thudding stopped and was replaced by a trembling that felt like a large truck was driving by (when the excavators go by it rattles the dishes in our cupboards, but I think it was fainter then that). And then, in far less time than it took me to write this, it was over.

So, that was my first earthquake. It wasn’t terribly exciting - I spent most of it being confused - and I wasn’t really sure it was an earthquake until I talked to some other people (although I thought it was). As an interesting side note, the Japanese don’t commonly use the Richter Scale to measure their earthquakes.

The Japanese “shindo” scale for measuring earthquakes is more commonly used in Japan than the Richter scale. Shindo refers to the intensity of an earthquake at a given location, i.e. what people actually feel at a given location, while the Richter scale measures the magnitude of an earthquake, i.e. the energy an earthquake releases at the epicenter.
The shindo scale ranges from shindo one, a slight earthquake felt only by people who are not moving, to shindo seven, a severe earthquake. Shindo two to four are still minor earthquakes that do not cause damage, while objects start to fall at shindo five, and heavier damage occurs at shindo six and seven.

If I had to guess based on that, I’d say that it was a shindo two. Several of my friends say they were woken up by it, but it wasn’t anything like hard enough to cause damage.

In yarny news, I think I’m learning how to read yarn content in Japanese. I went the other day to a hundred-yen store I hadn’t yet visited and bought some interesting yarn to play with. First was the ‘Silk Mable’ by hello! happy handmade! (I love Japan. It’s so cheerful.)

Which, as you can see, is 90% something, 10% something else. It was a good guess that one of those was silk, and an even better guess that for 100 yen it was the 10%. (A quick check against something that proclaimed itself to be ‘Cotton’ and ‘100%’ proved this to be correct.) To sum up, then, ‘Silk Mable’ is a 90% cotton, 10% silk fiber that looks to be about the same weight as size 10 crochet cotton thread.

Next I snagged a ball of ‘Zakka Linen’ (also by hello! happy handmade!).

Neither of those are cotton or silk; I guessed that the 18% was the linen. (I realize that I’m working on the assumption here that the content actually matches the English portions of the label, but it seems to correlate with my perceptions of the yarn and I’m not concerned enough to do a burn test.) A search of surrounding yarns provided a match to the 82% - a pile of big, bright balls of yarn that proudly proclaimed themselves to be ACRYLIC in inch-high all-caps. So the Zakka Linen is 82% acrylic and 18% linen, in about a fingering weight. (I think there’s only about 30 meters of it, though: enough for a good swatch to see whether I like it but not much more.)

I also bought a retractable tape measure shaped like a strawberry. Still 100 yen! (It measures in cm and inches - I checked before I bought it.)

And then I bought something for which…there is no explanation.

The color is really quite fascinating in person, and up close. When I picked them up I hadn’t surveyed enough wrappers to know what it was made of, but it was soft and fluffy in the thick parts, vividly colored, and interesting. These sat in my basket while I shopped for everything else, and though a few misgivings about the practicality of the purchase squirmed up (especially after I learned that I had three balls of superbulky thick and thin acrylic, each 20 yards), I went ahead and bought it anyway. They are performing some strange novelty yarn voodoo and I won’t be surprised if a project for them rears its lumpy head soon. Be afraid. Be very afraid.

Then we went to my favorite hundred-yen store (that would be The Daiso) and I made a much more respectable purchase.

It’s 49% acrylic, 48% cotton, and 3% polyester (that would be the small metallic thread running through it) although figuring that out was no great trick, since much of the yarn at The Daiso is also labeled in English. It’s fingering weight, and I have 800 yards of it. That’s enough for a summer top, or a shawl, and I might make either of it. The acrylic content softens the cotton considerably - I’ve actually seen a great many cotton/acrylic blends around here, with nice colors. I look forward to using them.

At any rate, I realize I haven’t shown a lot of projects lately, but I’m working on several behind the scenes that should be very exciting when they’re finished.

…so cold…

Okay, look. It’s April now. I’m pretty sure it should be spring. I realize that the past few years living in Texas have - dulled our acquaintance somewhat, but I’ve seen it before. This is very nearly the farthest north I’ve ever lived (I thought it was the northernmost home I’ve had, but a quick search revealed it to be one measly degree south of a previous residence), but it’s been a long time since then. I’m cold. We don’t have central heating, and you would really be surprised at the difference that makes. We’ve had friends on base say that they hardly ever turn their heater on anymore because it just doesn’t get that cold, and let me tell you I was shocked at how cold it was in our house when we moved from billeting. Sometimes it actually feels colder than outside! I mean, it’s not that bad really, and we’re all delighted (well, I’m not sure how the boys feel about it) to be able to wear sweaters, and use blankets, and eat soup - we’ve missed those things. It’s just that we don’t really have that many warm things (for use in the house, I mean. We knew we’d need coats and boots and things). I have the only pair of house-slippers in the family - a pair of fluffy blue ones with chicks on them that one of my sisters gave me years ago that have seen next-to-no use until now, their moment to shine! - Charlie steals them from me all the time and shuffles around the living room in them, bouncing gleefully. So many things have been like that, forgotten for years and now gratefully pulled from the boxes to be useful again.

That picture’s for you, Mom - click to make huge. Thanks for those. I suppose we could go and buy things like that, but the shopping here’s a bit weird and we’re not used to it yet. The BX doesn’t always have what you want, we don’t usually carry enough yen for more than lunch and a few small items, and aside from the fact that it’s difficult to find clothing for the tall or large of foot (we are both) the sizing is different. None of this would matter, of course, if we were determined to acquire these things, but we have a bit of a mental roadblock that I lay squarely at the feet of Texas.

We don’t believe it’s going to stay cold.

I remember several times over the last few years that I woke up, assessed the temperature outside, and selected a sweater or long-sleeved shirt as appropriate attire for the day. We had breakfast, went out on some errands, and halfway through the morning broke a sweat on the gentle walk between stores, or returned to the car to discover it was an oven. (Sometimes my mother’s voice clunks around in my head, saying practical things like ‘Wear a t-shirt under your sweater, then if you get hot you can just take it off…‘ ignore the voice at your peril, my friends.) We laughed when the news reported that Target had sold out of space heaters in a frantic run on the store because the temperature had dipped to freezing and the population of the city feared death by hypothermia. It was not uncommon in December for us to walk by someone in gloves and a heavy coat while dressed ourselves (quite comfortably) in jeans and a t-shirt - sometimes even shorts. As I read yesterday on a forum board (I cannot at this moment recall which), “Winter in Texas is beautiful - and if it falls on a weekend, even better!”

The snow is gone - for weeks now. Winter is over. To us, even though we barely realize it, that means that any day now it will get warm enough for us to go outside - if not in shorts (intellectually we know that of course, it’s colder here) - then at least without a jacket. It doesn’t help that spring here looks so much like winter there. Except for the rain.

Have I not mentioned the rain? I vaguely recall rain being a hallmark of spring - in fact - hey, April showers! But it’s rained nearly all day today, and it rained nearly all day yesterday, and it’s rained nearly every day of the past week, and it’s kind of freaking me out. Here’s a photo of the road next to our house:

Click on the pic to see the raindrops in the puddles! (I love my camera.) That was dry this morning, before the rain started. Perhaps it will be dry again tomorrow. That’s almost the strangest thing, that there’s all this rain but no flooding. (That’s not flooding. It’s just accumulating in the giant dips in the gravel road - actually, that’s the better of the two roads that lead to our house.) In Texas it would storm for 20 minutes and the water would be washing down the road for hours, carrying litter, garbage cans, and stray animals with it. Weird. Side note - look how green that grass is! Insane! And here we thought green grass was a myth perpetuated by the lawn care companies.

I know that next year we’ll be better prepared (what else is yarn for?) but right now my fingers are cold, and my nose is cold, and my toes are toasty warm in fluffy blue slippers! I really need to buy an umbrella. I tried to buy one today, but my brain classed it as an useless frivolity and it slipped out before I could get one. After all, I haven’t used one in years! Why buy one now? Sigh.

What can you buy with 100 yen?

Something interesting that you may not realize about Japan is that it’s mainly what’s called a ‘cash economy.’ That means (perhaps you’ve guessed) that if you want to buy something, odds are good you need to buy it in cash. There are some exceptions - big chain stores, for instance, and some places marketing specifically to Americans accept plastic - but for the most part you have to carry cash to shop off base. Another thing you may not know is that the smallest bill available is 1,000 yen (about $10). Anything smaller than that is in change. As a result, we quickly found ourselves buried in a mountain of coins.

Being crafty, like I am, I made a pouch for them - wide in the mouth with a big, flat bottom for easy change-digging.

Hundred Yen Pouch

Materials:

• About 20 yards (not sure on this) worsted weight yarn
• H (5 mm) hook

(US pattern conventions used.)

Note: do not join rounds unless indicated.

Rnd 1: Ch 2, make 6 sc in 2nd ch from hook. (6 sc)

Rnd 2: [Sc inc] around. (12 sc)

Rnd 3: [Sc, sc inc] around. (18 sc)

Rnd 4: [Sc 2, sc inc] around. (24 sc)

Rnd 5: [Sc 3, sc inc] around. (30 sc)

Rnd 6: [Sc 4, sc inc] around. (36 sc)

Rnds 7-8: Sc around. (36 sc)

Rnd 9: [Sc 4, sc dec] around. (30 sc)

Rnds 10-11: Sc around. (30 sc)

Rnd 12: Sl st. Ch 2, dc in same sc, dc in next st. [Ch 1, sk 1 st, dc in next st] around. (30 sts) Join.

Rnd 13: Ch 1, sc in each dc and ch-sp around. (30 sts). Join, finish off and weave in ends.

For drawstring, make a chain about 8″ long and weave through eyelets OR Ch 8, join in a ring w/ a sl st, ch about 12 inches and make a loop with the last 4″. Weave through eyelets, pass big loop through small loop, and pull to tighten.

Their money’s pretty, isn’t it? The bills are multi-colored; at first we had a hard time remembering it was actually money. Sorry I don’t have any bills to show you, but yesterday I used my last 1000 on a trip to my favorite hyakuen (aka, 100-yen store).

100-yen stores are like dollar stores, but full of nice things. Not everything in it is 100 yen - approximately one dollar, although on a good exchange day it can be more like 80 cents - but the majority of items are. I’ve bought everything from yarn to wooden toy cars to baskets there (all for a hundred yen each). This time I bought (among other things) some new socks

some felt, a package of wooden buttons, and some plastic animal eyes,

and some chocolaty snacks, of which only this photo of the empty bag remains.

These things are so good. They taste like…Cheetos would taste, if they were not coated in radioactive orange artificial cheese powder, but were instead saturated with real chocolate. Bliss. There are several different brands that make a treat like this, but I’d recognize that puffy chocolate texture anywhere! I wish I had another bag of them right now, but sadly, they are gone. As am I. See you later!

Settled in but Unsettled

Yesterday our internet service was hooked up, the last step in achieving functional normalcy of life. In a way, it represents the very end of our transitional period, and strangely, I found myself wishing that it could have lasted just a little bit longer. It was equal parts vacation, retreat, mad dash, and annoyance, but now that we haven’t got anything related to it coming up - nothing we have to wait for - I feel as though I missed a step on the stairs and life has told me, “Okay, go!” I didn’t knit or crochet much at all, I read more books than I have in a long time, and we spent more time together than we’re likely to get for months.

That’s the view off of my porch. Aren’t those trees lovely? The white stuff at the bottom isn’t snow (that’s been gone for a few weeks now), but little plastic tents they put over whatever it is they’re planting out there. I don’t know a lot about rice cultivation, but I’m pretty sure it involves flooding the field with water, so I don’t think that’s it. Maybe they’re growing cabbages.

We’re getting nicely adjusted to the Japanese city in which we find ourselves. We chose to live off base because really, that’s the point of us being here, isn’t it? To gain an experience? This is my first time being out of the US (I never even made it to Alaska or Hawaii) and I’m shocked at the difference in perspective that it lends. For example, we get the currency exchange rate on the radio about once an hour. When we were first preparing to move here last summer, a dollar was worth about 120 yen. In the month and a half that we’ve been here, it plummeted from 114 to 95 yen to the dollar - although it’s beginning to come back up a little. It’s interesting that we get a lot of the same information about the economy that I remember hearing in Texas, but a better idea of what it means to have a ‘housing slump’ or an ‘economic downturn.’ I don’t want to dwell on that today, though.

One side effect of living off base is that our house is more in the Japanese style than the quarters on-base. The houses built specifically for use by military personnel have been ‘Americanized’ but there are still some standout differences. We have a very nice little shoe room, for instance, where people can remove their shoes before entering the main house. (On the left there is a spectacular coat closet with many shelves which has, for once, given us adequate space for all of the shoes we own.)

When the movers brought us our things they were always careful to remove their shoes before entering. Off when they brought a box in, back on to go out to the truck. You haven’t seen dexterity until you’ve seen a man walking backwards and carrying one end of a sofa remove his shoes mid-stride using nothing but the toes of the other foot. I know I was more than a little amazed.

The house also features three very nice skylights.

While I’m not sure whether that’s an element of Japanese culture evidenced in the building or they thought Americans expected skylights, or they just thought it would be nice - I appreciate it. The sunlight here is not as strong as it is in Texas (woohoo) although it begins considerably earlier. They don’t save daylight here, and I’m told that in the summer we can expect sunrise around three-thirty or four am. These days the sun comes up about five-thirty, and I’m still looking for a better way to block it in the boy’s room because it usually wakes them up. Me too, to be honest, but I usually have the sense to roll over and go back to sleep. Not so a three-year-old convinced it’s ‘morning time’ and eager to get at the toys.

Another unusual aspect of the house - albeit one we expected - is the bathing arrangements. We have a western-style toilet, of course (thank goodness) but ‘western-style’ is not the same as ‘American,’ and it has some interesting features. My personal favorite is the heated seat. Between that and the little electric heater installed in the wall right beside your legs, a midnight trip to the bathroom is not that cold. Seriously, though, when we moved in, a toilet technician came to inspect it and make sure everything was working correctly. Here’s a picture of the remote, complete with helpful illustrations:

That’s right: we have a remote-controlled bidet. Some of our friends have warned that when visiting certain other friends, we should always check to be sure the remote is in the bathroom before using it. Haha. Anyway, the bathroom is the last thing I’m going to touch on today. It’s in a separate room from the toilet and is divided into two sections - one part with shelves, a sink, and a mirror, and the other with the shower and tub. I say shower and tub because, as you see, they are separate. You’re supposed to do all of your washing and soaping and rinsing outside the tub (there’s a covered drain in the floor) and then soak in the tub , which is markedly deeper than a standard bathtub. It took us about a week to get used to it, but it’s really quite nice. I’m sure it’s something we’re going to miss about our stay in this country.

At any rate, we’re here. We made it. And all that’s left is for us to find the routines of daily life after two months out of them and an ocean away from them…