Unusual Udon

Last week, while drinking coffee with my Language Exchange partners, I asked them about a Japanese dish: Udon. I really love this thick Japanese noodle. They serve it like we serve spaghetti: with different toppings. But it comes in hot and cold varieties. My favourite is tempura-topped udon. 

But I struggle when confronted with a menu with other types. It is a relatively inexpensive Japanese "fast food" that you can easily buy at roadside stops on expressways, as we

My favourite: Tempura Udon.

often do when we're travelling.

My friends told me of several versions, including:

• Racoon Udon (Tanuki Udon), which includes toppings of tempura batter (which look a lot like rice bubbles).
• Fox Udon (Kitsune Udon), which has a slice of fried tofu on top.
• Power Udon (Chikara Udon), which has omochi (chewy, pounded rice cake).
• Curry Udon (Kare Udon), which has a curry sauce added.
• Plain Udon (Kake Udon), with no topping.

All of the above come in a clear soy-based soup (made from bonito/fish flakes, soy, and mirin). 

• Fried Udon (Yaki Udon), cooked like a stir-fry. (That is, no soup.)

This wikipedia page gives many more specialised varieties.

Our family loves noodles, and our Sunday lunch tradition in Japan is our own version of udon and ramen. I'm a little embarrassed to admit to Japanese people what we do to our udon at home! But my language exchange friends are good friends, so I told them.

We eat our noodles (at home) with little broth, and add our own "Western" toppings. Including, cheese, ham, corn, and (believe it or not) tomato sauce (US=ketchup). I don't do the latter, but at least two of my sons do!

One of our boys doesn't like udon, so he gets instant noodles (ramen) instead and another boys likes to mix his noodles! Ramen and Udon in the same bowl (see the photo). Ouch!

We eat all of this with chopsticks, by the way!

It is a much loved tradition, even if it is a bit odd. I reminded my Japanese friends that they do strange things to Western food, and they agreed. For example, they said, "Fish eggs on spaghetti."

We'll miss this in Australia. You can buy udon easily enough, but the broth to cook it in is harder to find (and very expensive). Or that was the case last time we were in Australia. And it just doesn't taste right without the slightly fishy-salty broth that we cook it in.

Waiting

I'm feeling a bit at sea again today. I think I'm in a bit of a trough between peaks of excitement. There's wrestling, of course, the next meet is tomorrow night. But also coming up is: 

• the changing of bedrooms on the weekend (see yesterday's post), 
  
• an entertaining night on Friday to look forward to (the Seniors put on their annual Talent Show fundraiser for their March trip to Thailand), 
• and a fun Australia Day gathering on Sunday evening.

Plus I'm waiting. I've got someone interested in taking on the Managing Editor's position. Yay! But she and her husband are taking some time to consider it. I'm waiting.

I'm also waiting for a number of other things: people to get back to me on various questions related to the publication projects I'm working on, and waiting for the next round of submissions to come in for the magazine (due next Friday).

Then there's longer-term waiting to 

• begin packing up,
• know what will happen with this house, and our car,
• find out where we'll be living in Australia and what car we'll be driving, 
• find out how our boys fit into life there, and
• know what this next phase of our lives will look like.

I tend to thrive a little on excitement and the adrenaline of wrestling is clearly messing with my brain, but obviously our upcoming transition is beginning to work havoc as well.

There are things I could be or should be working on, but I'm really having trouble working up the enthusiasm to do so. Grrr. It's time to head to the gym and have lunch. Perhaps after that I'll feel more motivated.

Parenting isn't for wimps

I often say the above as I sigh at the end of the putting-them-to-bed rigmarole and drop into my "relaxing" chair. 

It occurs to me that to compare being a parent to having a job is nonsense. Having a child in your life is no more a job than taking care of your own personal needs is a job. You can outsource it, if you wish, but you can't easily quit it and move onto another, more savoury job. Parenting is a way more personal and emotional role than a job can ever be. These kids are an extension of me and there's no getting away from the fact that we're all flawed humans, trying (or not trying, as the case may be) to live a life together.


One boy
We've been trying to address a particular boy's needs and difficult behaviour with three different strategies over the last few months. For the most part it seems to be improving the situation, but every now and then we have another rotten moment (or ten). 

Had one this morning. Man it brought out the ugliness in me! I've been trying so hard to help our son, that it felt like a slap in the face from him and that all the care and extra stuff I've (we've) been doing seemed wasted. 

Thankfully we both took some time-out and he settled down before he left for school and was even able to hug me goodbye! I hate conflict so much, and I especially hate it when my child is rude and disobedient when all I'm trying to do is get him to school on time or teach him an important life skills, or protect his brother from being picked on or... (And yes, this is an opening for anyone who wishes to criticise my parenting, but I'd rather you didn't. Parenting has enough pain without those who don't have all the information to try to advise.)

Shifting Rooms
One of the things we're doing, I wrote about in this post two and a half weeks ago. We switched one boy into his other brother's room. This has worked well, with only one hitch, the room with two boys now in it is reasonably small, so the younger brother is kept awake by the light while his bigger brother does homework. So, the next move is to totally switch rooms. We'll put the youngest boy in the smaller bedroom on his own and the two older ones in the larger room, enabling us to position the desk and its light further from the bed. 

It's been an interesting process getting the boys to think about the furniture and where it will go. They wanted just to shift it all and try it out, but my instincts were to do a floor plan and measurements to at least get the larger furniture positioned theoretically. Maybe it was my upbringing in an Electrical Contractor's house (who had his own Plans Desk and always seemed to have a tape measure attached to his belt when he was working), that brings on my desire to pull out the big metal tape measure!

Thankfully we have a "long" weekend (for the students only) coming up with no wrestling to watch (except on Thursday night). So we'll have time to pack up the rooms and move the furniture. Which means dismantling the beds! I'm hoping that in the process we can go through all the toys and other junk that's accumulated in their rooms and do some pre-moving throwing out and setting aside to sell at Thrift Shop. On our minds is that when we come back next year from home assignment, our youngest will already be 10! That means he'll have outgrown a lot of the younger boy toys that we've gathered over the years.

Longer term hope
But I'm also hoping that going to all this trouble, only six months before we move out, will be worth it in create more peace in the longer-term in our family. I think that is one of the biggest challenges of parenting: living in the moment, yet keeping your eye on the longer-term.

Japan Photo #46

Here's a photo we took last year while on the road. What do you suppose is the reason for this structure over the road?

Wrestling Mums Club

There's a photo I wish someone had taken yesterday while we were at another wrestling event.

We had lots of family members supporting the team. One reason is because we were at the closest international school to CAJ, less than an hour's drive. Another reason is that the school (American School in Japan) was hosting a number of other sports events yesterday, including a middle school wrestling tournament, which meant there were a number of other CAJ supporters around who mightn't have come if it was just high school wrestling.

It was particularly exciting to have the company of a number of other wrestling mums. The photo I would have liked was of about half a dozen of us mums lined up on the bleachers (what do Australians call seating at a sporting event?) cheering for the team. I believe we made so much noise at one point that one of the usually unflappable referees turned to look at us in a break in the action! There usually aren't many women around these events. I've been getting around in rather a man's world, so it was great to have some feminine companionship. 

One of the new middle wrestlers was supported by his mum and two of his three big sisters and one of their friends (that's a total of four women!). The family is Filipino and none of them has ever seen much wrestling before this year, so they were a bit wide-eyed. Another mum and I spent some time helping his mum understand the rules (as I wrote back here it is very difficult to follow if you don't understand some of what's going on). I asked his sisters what their early impressions were and they said, "The gym is smelly!" She didn't understand why they got all sweaty. As my husband said, "She's obviously got no idea how hard it is to flip someone over on their back who doesn't want to be flipped over!"

But I was impressed by this new member of the "Wrestling Mums Club". The middle school wrestling was first up (we didn't arrive with the high schoolers until after 10am), followed by several hours of high school wrestling. She stayed, with her kids, at watched the high schoolers until 3pm, wanting to learn more about this sport her son is enjoying.

Gritty screen shot from a video from
yesterday.

The joy just kept coming with this informal "club meeting". A mum of one of the Senior wrestlers raved on and on to me about how good our son is and how she loves to watch him wrestling, "He's so entertaining!" It was a bit overwhelming and certainly something a man wouldn't do, but was wonderful for my happy mother's soul! 

Yesterday he had three bouts and won them all, two pins and one in a "technical fall" which is when the points between two wrestlers is greater than seven points, which ends the match. That means he's had 11 bouts so far this season and won 9 of them, 8 of them by pins. That is way beyond what I expected for this, his first high school season. We expected the level of wrestling would go up, and it has, but he's matching it fairly well. It does help to remember that most of the time he's not wrestling the top wrestler from a school, but rather the second or third best a school has in his weight category, because he happens to be in the same weight category as our school's best wrestler. But still, we're not unhappy. It's been a good "apprenticeship" year, a year to ease into high school wrestling, getting more experience, without being devastated by vastly superior wrestlers.

Yesterday's meet was a complicated one. All six international schools in the league were there, but they didn't all wrestle each other, it was a collection of nine duals, each school only faced off against three other schools. A dual is where one school wrestles against another. The dual concept is pretty simple, really, they run through the weight classes, with the representative from each school wrestling their opposite number. Our son's bouts weren't a part of that, they were extras tacked on the end to give the wrestlers who aren't the best in their weight class at their school a chance to "have a go".

Here's a list of the schools we wrestle against (and most of the other inter school activities happen with these schools too, as well as a girl's schools and some other international schools like Yokohama International):

American School in Japan (ASIJ)
St Mary's (Catholic boy's school)
Yokoda High School (US Airforce base school)
Nile C Kinnick High School (US Navy base school)
Zama High School (US Army base school)

In wrestling this year, St Mary's and Kinnick are the best schools, and it was very exciting to watch them dual yesterday. The St Mary's coach is usually very mild mannered and calm, but yesterday he was yelling and jumping and quite dynamic! And we had front-row seats: it was directly in front of where we happened to be seated. Lots of fun!

But you know, I could go and on. But I think it is probably time to call it quits. After all this isn't a meeting of the Wrestling Mum's Club!

Younger Siblings as Supporters

As we prepare to go to another wrestling meet today (leaving at a much more civil time, might I add, 9.15am), I'm encouraged by this comment from Joan on a post from last year:

This is our youngest son, helping with recording the video of
his brother's match.

 I wouldn't worry about the younger ones getting dragged to older brother's sports . . . I had two older brothers and always got dragged to their baseball games, and track and cross-country meets, and never felt less loved because of it. Bored plenty of times but not less loved! I think it helps show kids that family is important, and they're a family who roots for each other and rejoices together and encourages each other.

We were surprised last week when our middle son, in the exhausting aftermath of last Saturday's wrestling meet sighed contentedly and said, "Ah, finally a normal wrestling meet."

We hadn't realised that he'd been missing the familiarity of the format of the wrestling meets we went to over the last two years. Those meets were all early starts and mid-to-late afternoon returns. We certainly weren't expecting such a positive response as that to last Saturday's marathon. So, I'm encouraged. 

We don't have little boys anymore (8 & 11), but I do sometimes wonder about dragging them around to their brother's sporting events. I do remind them that I'm looking forward to going to their sporting events, when they get into middle and high school. That usually brings a smile to their faces. There's no doubt about it: we're a sporting family!

Refreshment: social and spiritual

Yesterday I went to an inter-mission women's prayer and fellowship day. That doesn't sound very enticing, just blandly put like that, does it?

I've gone to this meeting in January every year for the last four years and I never fail to come away from it blessed and refreshed. The organisation who runs it is called the Japan Evangelical Missionary Association (JEMA). 

This is the group who publish the magazine I manage. They are a voluntary gathering of various missionaries and mission organisations who work in Japan. Not all the missionaries in Japan are part of JEMA, but the major missions are. It is an unusual grouping of people. I wonder how many other countries have such a group? Can any of you tell us of some?

In any case, I've become more involved in the group as my boys have gone off to school and I've been editing Japan Harvest magazine. They hold several women's gatherings in the year, the biggest being the retreat I go to each year in early March.

It was on my calendar, so I went yesterday. But later I realised that there were two good reasons to be there:

1. To connect with friends from this network who I never see at other times. 

My job is fairly solitary, so I need to take the time to connect with like-minded others when I can. Yesterday was a great place to do that.

2. To refocus on the bigger purposes in my life. More specifically, to get a closer-to-God-sized perspective on what's going on for me. 

Regular daily life for us is pretty crazy busy and it isn't easy to step out of that to see the bigger perspective beyond the busyness. 

I was particularly encouraged by a focus on Psalm 23 and time to meditate on that and other Scripture. What's on my mind particularly is the LESS THAN six months until we're leaving for Australia. But in reading Psalm 23, my attention was drawn to one word, "Prepare". In this Psalm we read that God prepares a table for us.

You prepare a table before me in the presence of my enemies. You anoint my head with oil; my cup overflows (vs 5).

That lead me on to other verses about God preparing things for us:

John 14:3And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come back and take you to be with me that you also may be where I am.

1 Corinthians 2:9However, as it is written: ‘What no eye has seen, what no ear has heard, and what no human mind has conceived’ – the things God has prepared for those who love him.

Ephesians 2:10

For we are God’s handiwork, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do.

Jeremiah 29:11

11 For I know the plans I have for you,’ declares the Lord, ‘plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.

And later on an old favourite passage that reminds me of how huge God is, and that He hasn't and won't forget me, nor will He leave me powerless to do the things that come my way, including moving my family internationally.

Isaiah 40

26 Lift up your eyes and look to the heavens:
    who created all these?
He who brings out the starry host one by one
    and calls forth each of them by name.
Because of his great power and mighty strength,
    not one of them is missing.

27 Why do you complain, Jacob?
    Why do you say, Israel,
‘My way is hidden from the Lord;
    my cause is disregarded by my God’?
28 Do you not know?
    Have you not heard?
The Lord is the everlasting God,
    the Creator of the ends of the earth.
He will not grow tired or weary,
    and his understanding no one can fathom.
29 He gives strength to the weary
    and increases the power of the weak.
30 Even youths grow tired and weary,
    and young men stumble and fall;
31 but those who hope in the Lord
    will renew their strength.
They will soar on wings like eagles;
    they will run and not grow weary,
    they will walk and not be faint.

So, I came away, refreshed in my soul. I was reminded again that God goes before me. He's not surprised. In fact He's preparing good things for me. And even the bad things that will come my way, He's right there with me, as we're reminded back in Psalm 23.