Prime Minister Mario?

It was a surprise to see Japan's Prime minister participating in the closing ceremony in Rio posing as Mario. I didn't actually see the closing ceremony till hours after it happened, so I had some warning via social media. But I wasn't the only one surprised:

TOKYO — 

Japan on Monday reacted with a mix of surprise, delight and cynicism at the sight of Prime Minister Shinzo Abe dressed up as video game icon Super Mario in a comical cameo at the close of the Rio Olympics.

Social media immediately lit up as scenes of Abe wearing a Super Mario costume proved jaw-dropping to Japanese watching the spectacle on television half a world away.

“I was impressed to see a national leader sacrificing his reputation and showing up in cosplay at this world event,” posted a Japanese-language Twitter user. “He is great.”

Most had apparently never conceived of the normally blue-suited and politically conservative Abe and the moustachioed Mario merging into one. 

“I never thought of having Prime Minister Abe play Mario, let alone him emerging from plumbing,” another Twitter user said. (see the rest of the article here)

Another article by the BBC gives various other perspectives, including Twitter requests for Pokemon to be a sport in 2020! But this article does highlight the clues we got as to how Japan might approach hosting the next Olympics. "full and shameless advantage of Japan's pop culture icons". 

But there was also an emphasis on technology, with the appearance of robot-dressed actors. Just like most well-known countries, Japan is known by various stereotypes, including robots, technology, anime, manga, and not to forget sushi. So I guess I shouldn't be surprised that it is these that are used to promote the country.

Surfing the net doing a little bit of research for this post, I came across a quote about Tokyo2020 from Hikariko Ono, a spokesperson from the Tokyo 2020 Olympics Committee:

"Everybody can experience hypermodern living and respect for historic values in Tokyo" (from here).

Well, I don't know about hypermodern living. Perhaps some visitors in down-town hotels will see that. That wouldn't be typical Japan, though it is the image that they want to project to the world, but I guess the Olympics generally aren't about giving visitors a typical experience of the host country. 

From the same article it does sound like they have very grand, futuristic plans. We'll see how much of that actually happens:

"Japan is known internationally for its technological innovations, so Tokyo 2020 organizers are aiming to launch ambitious tech projects that will boost the economy and wow crowds."

In writing this, I found the Tokyo2020 website. Interesting, including where venues are planned. Many of them around the bay near and even on the artificial island we visited a few weeks ago. I've never been living in a city that has the Olympics coming. It will be an interesting four years! Already we're seeing lots of train stations undergoing renovation and renewal. I imagine we'll see a lot more of that in the coming years. 

We've enjoyed the Olympics for the most part. Though we did see some lamentable behaviour from coaches and athletes. (A bizarre one that I don't think has received much air time was a bronze medal wresting match where a Mongolian wrestler didn't wrestle to the end and was penalised so that he ended up losing. His coaches stripped to their underwear in protest. Hmmm. Bad sports!)

We enjoyed the wrestling generally, though. Did you see the plush toy that the coaches were using for signalling they wanted to protest a decision? 

I'm glad to have my life simplified again so that I'm not fighting between the desire to watch more Olympics and get work done. Though I must say I'm looking forward to seeing a bit of the Paralympics, I hope that Japan's national broadcaster is as liberal in their coverage of it as they were the Olympics.

Unplugged parenting

Today I realised again how anti-screen our parenting style is. We actively discourage our boys from spending much time watching TV, or on computers. We don't only have strict guidelines on how much time they can spend on these things every day, we have actively encouraged them over the years to develop interests that don't need to be plugged-in. And we've never bought them toys that are screen-based.

This began quite young, when we restricted TV to only one hour at a time, and only at certain times of day. That's faded out as they've become busy at school. These days they don't usually watch TV during the week and only occasionally on the weekend. As the years have gone on, internet usage has been given rules too.

But I realised today that having more than one child is definitely an advantage in this regard. When a Japanese mum of a young teenager and only child asked (in regards to the upcoming coming three weeks break from school), "What will they do, if they can't be on the internet?" I had lots of answers, but some didn't apply to her.

Our boys will be out getting exercise, playing board games with each other, and playing with their Lego, NInjago, action figures etc. They'll also be reading and perhaps doing crafty things. I'll be asking them to help me cook meals too.

Our teenager has developed a number of non-plugged in hobbies/interests including: Rubics cube, collecting dice and manipulation puzzles, learning various knots, working out (for wrestling), logic puzzles, and he is a voracious reader. He's also recently been creating an Australian version of Risk in his spare time. This boy, of his own volition, has spurned Facebook, which, I believe, is where a lot of his friends (at least the girls) are spending their time.

One of the reasons we steer the boys away from the internet and from TV is that it cripples their creativity. It also produces behaviour that isn't very helpful. A few weeks back they developed an obsession with a internet based game. Their behaviour was disrespectful and they couldn't think about anything else except getting to play that game. I banned it for a week and things improved significantly around here. That obsession has faded, thankfully.

Our guys live life at a pretty high intensity, we don't need anything that will add to that intensity. I guess every parent has to figure out what works best in their family. We've found a pretty good balance for us. We'll see how that progresses as our boys get older.

I have new stuff

I'm not sure why, but I have some difficulty owning up to the fact that we have some new "stuff" that I'm gaining a lot of pleasure from.

• Is it a missionary thing? That we have to always have second-hand stuff (you know, the old "used tea" bag syndrome)?
• Or is it a reaction against the materialism that so encases our societies?
• Or is it that I secretly feel that having (and enjoying) new stuff is an ungodly thing to admit? Something like the ancient gnostics who believed everything non spiritual was inherently bad?
• Or perhaps it is this song:

Well I'm now going against my feelings and I'll tell you about the stuff we've got.

David's mum wanted to give us a big gift when she was here. She ended up buying us a new digital TV (our old TV was a dinosaur and because Japan is now totally digital we haven't been able to watch live TV for some time). It's 28 inch and is wonderful. But we still can't watch live TV. Our antenna needs to be changed, so as I type I'm hearing the antenna guy outside replacing our antenna (thankfully at the expense of the landlord). By the way, what a terrible job, climbing on people's roofs: stinking hot in summer, freezing cold in winter! So soon we'll be able to watch Japanese TV. I don't even know what's on these days, it's been several years . . .

When we went to Costco, just after our camping trip back a few weeks, we finally found a Stick blender. We were given one for our wedding, but had to leave it in Australia because Australian electrical goods need 240 volts and the Japan's network only gives out 110 volts. And up till now we haven't seen separate stick blenders (apart from a food processor which we already have), or they've been too expensive. But now we have one. David made smoothies the other day with it. Today I made myself an iced decaf coffee and also blended the home made tomato sauce (US = ketchup) that I whipped up. It's terrific, the stick blender, I mean! But I'm sure that the tomato sauce will be great too, it smelt delicious.

Broken over-the-ear headphones

New ear buds.

Yesterday I did some shopping for Fathers day and another family birthday. While I was out I also bought myself some snazzy ear buds after my fragile over-the-ear ones broke on our journey to Australia. My new ear buds have a retractable cord and different sized rubber bits. So you can choose the size that fits your ear canal. Makes sense! I've always had trouble with ear buds because I have narrow ear canals. By the way, ear phones are wonderful things for long train journey like I'll do on Monday to our monthly OMF prayer meeting.

And I got interrupted in my posting by the antenna man who got busy discovering that most rooms in this house (think four out of our six rooms, not including bathroom or toilets) had outdated TV outlets. Ancient, if I read things correctly. They were finished installing the antenna a loooong time before they finished sorting out all the outlets! But now we seem to have access to a lot of stations, even a free satellite disk that the "ABC" of Japan provides. We shall have to explore this.

So now you know about my new stuff. Do you ever feel embarrassed about owning new stuff or is that just my special weirdness?

Before After Japanese house transformation

I know compact living is common in Japan, but I haven't seen inside many houses, and usually only larger houses. If someone lives in a tiny house it is pretty unlikely that you would be invited inside to see it. 

So I was intrigued when I stubbled upon this blog last week, with an interesting link to this YouTube video. It shows a Japanese TV show called "Before After". It is a reality show in the style of Backyard Blitz and others like it in Australia, where they fix up someone's house. This show seems to specialise in tiny houses (probably helps their budget). 

On the show I've linked to, there are four adults (parents and two adult children) living in a very tiny house, a house that makes our current house look like a mansion. The mother is the only one who has normal sized (or placed) bed. The transformation is quite something. Some pretty amazing space-saving devices are employed. Not the cheapest of options, but amazing nonetheless.


However, they are still living in a tiny space. I wonder how many Australians would be content to live there?

 

Identifying with Margaret Houlihan

We've been watching M*ASH recently. It provides a much needed comic relief some evenings and a good excuse to sit down and do nothing for a bit. My apologies if you've never seen it, I'll assume today that you know what I'm talking about. If you don't, then I do recommend that you get your hands on an episode and try it out, it is timeless.

The other night we watched an interesting episode where the 4077 did an exchange with another unit. Hawkeye and a nurse switched places for a few days with another doctor and nurse. The nurse turned out to be Lorraine, a good childhood friend of Margaret Houlihan. It is a bit shocking when first Margaret "loves" Lorraine, then turns on her and "hates" her. Lorraine confronts Margaret, asking why she's changed from the fun-loving girl she knew. Margaret finally confesses her dilemma. That she is head nurse and has forced herself to be professional and in control in order to fulfil the responsibilities on her shoulders. She says she's forgotten how to be anything else and has no friends in camp. 

I understand how Margaret felt. How hard it is to change from being responsible to having fun. I find it hard as a mum to do this. Our boys get out of control too easily when the responsible ones (i.e. parents) join in the fun. It can really drain the joy out of you.

On another realm I understand the challenge to figure out what it is to be a 'professional'. The other day I was chatting with a friend/colleague about my recent OT volunteer work. I expressed a little surprise at the positive responses to my assessment reports on children I've seen. My colleague, said, "But of course, they are the opinion of a professional."

Sometimes is it hard to view myself as a professional. I guess that comes partly from being out of the profession for so long. I remember feeling like this as a student. Like I had to put on a different 'persona' to go to work. I think that feeling faded as I got used to it, but it is back, just a little.
I love it that this comedy has such a depth to it that I can identify with some of the struggles of the characters.