Jan. 2, 2012

Thanks to Nick and Maren for letting us know the right way to say "Happy New Year."  Among friends, it's "Akemashite omedetou."  More formally, it's "Akemashite omedetou gozaimasu."  (Click here for pronunciation.)

Also, I meant to include a link to another blog when I sent out that mass email earlier.  When we announced our transfer to Tokyo, questions about our trip to Kenya this summer immediately dried up.  We never got to share (bore) most of you with our pictures (and there were literally thousands of them).  Well, my sister-in-law (also named Jen, but with the last name Donnalley) wrote a blog about the family safari.  It's at donnalleyfamilysafari.blogspot.com.  Check it out if you get a chance.  It was an amazing trip.

Kindle mishaps:  First, Greer left her Kindle on the plane when we landed in Tokyo (in her defense, I have to point out that she WAS sleeping).  However, we called the airline the next day, they had it, and they sent it to our hotel (740 yen for the delivery, quite the deal).
Second mishap:  I relied too much on the fact that she had a Kindle.  ASIJ (American School in Japan) sent us an email in December about the first day of school in January.  In the email, they recommended we obtain a copy of The Master Puppeteer by Katherine Paterson and have Greer read the first 6 chapters.  Well, as you might imagine, December was somewhat busy, so I just told myself we'd buy the book for her Kindle when we had the chance.  Today, I had the chance.  Only it's not available on the Kindle.  Or the Nook.  And I can't really get it shipped to us in the next few days.  And the English-section of the bookstores here aren't very large (not that we were expecting them to be).  So I think we'll be showing up Monday at school as "bad parents who don't make sure their children do their homework."  Hopefully, we won't be the only ones?


On the positive side, today we made our first friends here in Tokyo.  One of Drew's Exxon colleagues, Rodney Webb, and his family moved here in August.  This is their second stint in Tokyo after a couple of years in Houston.  We met them near their house in Akasaka, close by Roppongi Hills, and took the subway to Hibiya-Koen, a very nice park.  There are a lot of gingko trees in the park, which I was told look amazing in the fall when the leaves change color.  They have 3 children, a boy in 3rd grade and 2 girls in 5th and 7th grades, which fits quite well with our 4th and 6th graders.  The kids played on the playground equipment while the adults talked, at least until we all got too cold.  Then we headed back towards their house, with a stop at a grocery store, where Whitney helped us find the detergent (grocery shopping is definitely going to be a challenge).  We need to do laundry as soon as we move into our apartment.  As you might guess from the iced tea story, we would rather wear quite dirty clothes before we do any laundry at the hotel.  We visited at their house for awhile, had dinner, and then headed back to the hotel.    

We forgot to take any pictures today. :(

Japanese word of the day:  san  (click to hear pronunciation) means "three"