Friday, March 24, 2006

Graduation Day

Gaudeamus igitur
Juvenes dum sumus
Post jucundum juventutem
Post molestam senectutem
Nos habebit humus.


Let us rejoice therefore
While we are young.
After a pleasant youth
After a troublesome old age
The earth will have us.


Vivat academia
Viva professores
vivant membrum quodlibet
Vivat membra quaelibet
semper sint in flore


Long live the academy!
Long live the teachers!
Long live each male student!
Long live each female student!
May they always flourish!









Lyrics:
http://www.newfoundations.com/Gaudeamus.html

Wednesday, March 15, 2006

off the line until april

Dear blog readers,



We are going off the line as March 15 until the beginning of April since the computer has to be returned to Yokohama National University and the internet connection will be shut off soon.

Anyway, as soon as we get on again, we'll be reporting to you on;

1. Aji's graduation ceremony -- March 23
2. Farewell parties with friends in Yokohama
3. Our departure for Jakarta--March 26

We'll freshen you up with news by April !!!

Monday, March 13, 2006

Wisnu with his many identities

Wisnu sometimes refuses to be called Wisnu. In a day, he might claim himself to be not Wisnu but : Wardhana, rabbit, robot, crayon, bus, captain.

He likes to be called Wardhana (his last name) sometimes, because he considers Wisnu is a predicate like the words : Ibu- aji - or Ade (little brother). The way he understands the words like Ibu or aji is that Ibu has a name. He often says:
" ibu-- kenny. Aji--sanjaya. ade--akira. wisnu --wardhana"
We still can not figure out how to explain this. As parents, we are still in the dark about this.

To wisnu, rabbit is very special-- it can jump fast, it likes carrot--like him (Wisnu will eat any food if we mention there is carrot inside). Beside that there is a Japanese kid song which goes "panda, usagi (rabbit), koala" which he loves to sing as he puts both hands on top of his head.

Robot to Wisnu is a very powerful creature as he watches the movies on TV how robust a robot walks, sounds and fights. Wisnu would open the kitchen drawers and look for boxes of food and pu those boxes in his hands, feet and on head to imagine that he resembles robot. He will walk around the house with those boxes and make bizarre sounds.

Wisnu learned the word crayon as he watches Baby Einsten DVD : Learning about the shapes. In that DVD, crayon can sing, dance and draw different kinds of shapes such as circle, triangle, square. He seems to be amazed to find out that in the real world he can really draw those shapes using a tool called crayon. Perhaps to his understanding, crayon exists in two worlds : movie and real world, therefore it's really super.

Bus? Anyone who knows Wisnu will no longer question why he likes bus. Since we arrived in Yokohama, his favorite word is "bus". Our guess is that he says "bus" to express his excitement of riding a bus . However, in other occasions when he actually means to say "cool" but do not have the vocab or understand the meaning of the word "cool" , he'll use the word"bus" instead. He has many collections of bus toys but the last one survived only the big HATO BUS as the others had come into tiny pieces as the result of his object of experiments. Wisnu wants to be called bus sometimes because maybe bus is very big and strong and has the potensials to make the passengers happy --at least in his imagination.

Captain is the word he uses for any hero he saw on TV. His favorite one is "Ichi chou mang" (japanese kid -like superman)--the hero which can make funny but super body movement on one piece of Tatami --which he sees on NHK TV station every saturday morning. Wisnu is more interested in the more-human-like hero compared to Ultraman or other anime. To him, a captain wears a kind of gown therefore he'll cover his head with Akira's blanket to get the feel of being a super hero.



From daily conversations, these are some samples how he uses these different personalities to defend his arguments or to give orders to us

Dialog 1
Ibu : Wisnu! Here is your breakfast! Let's eat together with aji and ibu
Wisnu : No! I am not Wisnu. This is robot.
Ibu : ??? Ok, Robot, let's eat
Wisnu : (approaching the table) itadakimas...
Aji : ????

Dialog 2
Aji : Let's change your diaper, Wisnu.
Wisnu : No. This is bus.
Aji : ???
Ibu : (whispering to aji) Call him bus
Aji : oh, Ok. Bus, let's change your diaper.
Wisnu : oh ya (smiling and running to the toilet)

Dialog 3
Ibu : Wisnu, you can drink the apple juice if you want, but do not play with it.
Wisnu : (pouring the juice into the glass and mix it with tissue)
Ibu : Wisnu, we still can drink the juice. If you want to play with the water, you can play in the bath tub.
Wisnu : no
Ibu : (looking at wisnu in the eyes and preparing for some more stronger expression)
Wisnu : This is NOT wisnu. It's crayon.
Ibu : ??? Wisnu or Crayon or anybody else do not play with the juice. Play with the water in the bath tub, not here. Now, you want to walk to the bathroom or I'll carry you there ?
Wisnu : (not responding)
Ibu : Wisnu.... (with the the warning tone )
Wisnu : This is crayon.
Ibu : yes, crayon. Stop playing with the juice.
Wisnu : (running to the bathroom )

Now, if we talk to him but he does not respond, usually we'll ask him "who's is this? wisnu or robot" and he'll let us now what to call among those identities.

Friday, March 10, 2006

Akira: on my own feet



Katanya bli Wisnu belajar jalan umur 9 bulan yah?
Kalo gitu aku mau ngebut belajar berdiri ah....
Kelihatannya gak terlalu sulit, cari pegangan, angkat pantat dikit...hoppp..



Karena anak2 di Jepang umur 8 bulan udah minum di gelas, aku juga mau coba dooong.

Walaupun belum bisa menghisap sedotan, tapi ngegaya dulu ahhh...




Aji sekarang pun kalo megangin aku minum susu, rada-rada kagok..hi..hi... maklum aku kan pengennya berdiri, mana masih belum stabil, jadinya minum susu sambil njot-njotan dehhh...







Nah sampai ketemu di Jakarta 2 minggu lagi yaahhhh...

Wednesday, March 08, 2006

Our mansion - we are going to leave behind

This is the place we have been living for the last six months. It's our second house to live as a family. Japanese call it mansion as it is made of concrete, whereas they call it apato when it's made of wood.

It's only 10 minute walk from Yokohama National University and 1 minute walk from Nishi Kamadai Bus Stop. Quiet environment, safe, clean, comfortable.


It's written PETITE MAISON RANCEL
but the Japanese read it as Puchi Mezon Rancel for the pronunciation adaptation--so then we write it as the Japanese understand it.



The apato is a five story building and has parking space. .Here is the snow from last winter which is an uncommon view for the Yokes (Yokohama citizens) . Therefore we are not the only ones who were rejoiced by the snow :)


We live on the third floor as you can see Ibu and Akira peeped at the window last winter



It's 3 LDK apato (3 rooms with living room, dining room and kitchen) for 68,000 a months which is quite a bargain for such condition and environment as normally they'll charge you 86,000 a month instead.
This one is the living room. We use it for watching TV and praying but lately aji moved his desk here as it's warmer and more comfortable compared to his study room. It has air conditon and heater. By the way this is where aji and the kids slept when ibu got a chicken pox. This room is connected by a door to the dining room.



This is our dining room, at the same time kitchen. We have a little fridge, a microwave and the stove. The kitchen set is simple but very useful.


This one is the second room-- bed room with tatami. We put futton to sleep during the night, but during the day time one of the futton goes inside the cupboard --if you see those two doors which are actually cupboard to keep the futton and all clothes.


The third room is used for Aji's study room. However, since there is no heater here, Aji moved his desk to the living room and this room ends up being storage room for our luggage, books, Wisnu's toys and every item we'd like to hide from the sight of the visitors.









Japanese typical apato usually separate the bathrooms and the main function rooms. If you come into the Japanase apato, you will find a small hall where unexpected guests like postman, delivery man could come in without being able to look inside the function rooms..


Like ours , guests could see only three doors on the right (one for shoes storage, and another one for toilet and the other one for the washing area) and one door on the right that we use for storage

If we open the door after the door way, this is what you see: the jungle ---oops sorry for displaying natural view of messy rooms!




This is the washtafel and washing area.




Here comes the bathroom. Small, but very convenient. It has shower and ofuro (Japanese bath tub). We take a shower before plunge ourselves in the ofuro. The good thing about this bath room is there is a mirror hung on the wall at Wisnu's eye level so that he can see his body reflection while taking a shower.



Here is the toilet. It's dry area--so that we make some adjustment : like putting the gayung there to wash up and the plastic bag at the corner for the kids' used pampers.

We still have 15 days to welcome you here... please feel free to pay us a visit!

Friday, March 03, 2006

Counting Down the days

Yup! Days are numbered, and it's 22 days away to fly back to Jakarta.


Challenge No 1. PACKING
We have not fisihed packing!!!! Books are still scattered, clothes we still wear, toys are still used, whereas those stufss should be sent away to Yokohama Port for shipping by March 21. We thought things could go simpler by sending stuffs through container but.... it turns out that we need to make lists of boxes, measure each and the weight should not exceed 30 kg. After that comes another list: the content of each box and the value. Pfff....


Second thing: omiyage--souvenir to bring home. Phew!!! It is really difficult to decide what and where to buy any at reasonable price (considering that we belong to non-income ones). There are always the questions: would the person like it and need it? What if the the souvenirs are written "made in china" or even worse "indonesia"? Are the receivers after the tag of 'made in japan' or 'bought in japan?'




Challenge No 3 : souvenirs for friends in Japan
They have been truly and execeptionally helpful. We have some stocks of little things from Indonesia but...how to wrap it like the japanese do (especially Japanese care about the wrapping more than the content)? What to be given? Which person should be given this --not that?

Challenge No 4 : things to be given away or to trash out
we have prepared the lists of things we are going to leave behind. For some electrical appliances, many Indonesian fellow need and want so that we need to decide who will get what. Then, for some other things no body seems to be interested, but to trash it out we need to pay to the garbage collector. But we could not decide as we are still hoping that some people would like to inherit them.

Challenge No 5 : setting up agenda
we will have to set up appointment to see;
- apato agent, to check the condition of our room (to ensure we do not need to pay for any damage)
- electricity, gas, water, internet company, to calculate the last bills
- friend to collect our tools for survival: fridge, stove, microwave and futton
the thing is the room should be clean and vacant which means things should be
taken out a day at the latest March 25.

Challenge No 6 : strategies for survival a day before departure
We are going to leave for the airport at 5.30 AM which means we will still need the futton to sleep and at least microwave to eat BUT we might not have the time to trash things out on that day. To stay in a hotel will be out of question, to eat out means we have to cut our legs and hands, to stay in someone's place with four of us means too much troubles for the host. *!?

Challenge No 7 : mental preparation to get back to Jakarta
It's not that we are not happy to be home--but things would be different in jakarta. Adjustment though unavoidable has never been easy. What kind of adjustment? Name it: life style (daily routines and schedules), the availability and convenience of public facilities such as transportation, shopping places with qualified items, free medical treatment for children. Not to mention the inexistence of things that Wisnu is familiar or accustomed to --Phew!!! He will have billions of questions and confusions over things back in Jakarta such as: Don't drink tap water now! Don't talk to strangers or accept any food! We can not find your favorite yogurt or buy nori or strawberry everyday now! Because it's Jakarta not Yokohama! (just get our finger crosssed and hope that Wisnu will not cry in frustration)

Hmm... things might not be that bad --maybe worse :)


Pictures:
http://www.seabox.com/
http://www9.ocn.ne.jp/
http://www.hasslefreeclipart.com/