Comments on: Rain, Rain and Rain

By: dan

dan — Thu, 28 Jun 2007 12:14:25 +0000

Amazingly Tomo has 5 children around his age (within 12 months) here in Bristol, all with Japanese mums. Yuko-san is not alone, for sure.

By: Gavin

Gavin — Thu, 28 Jun 2007 11:59:56 +0000

Thank you for the link.
I spoke to Yuko about it, and she was aware of it, but didn’t have any details.
She found out when a few Japanese wives ended up visiting the farm shop where she works. Said Japanese wives were most intrigued to see Yuko there because all of them were wives of Japanese men working at the various Japanese factories we have (mostly Bridgend way).
Yuko did find it strange speaking to them, because even though they were Japanese, she was not part of their ‘in-group’.

As you say, some of the kids in that school are those of the factory workers… and my understanding is that all their education costs there get subsidised by the company. Interesting to know though that there are some ‘hafu’, as I think Yuko would feel more comfortable in having others in the same situation as we would be in.

BTW, must find time to have a read of your blog now Dan. Nice to know another Brit is a sort-of-similar situation to myself.

By: dan

dan — Wed, 27 Jun 2007 22:55:24 +0000

Whoops, sorry Gavin, not once a month – twice by the look of it!

http://www.japan-foods.co.uk/new_page_620.htm

There’s a Japanese school on the site on Saturdays you see – used to be solely for the children of the Japanese workers at the factories in the valleys, but now has a significant number of “hafu” kids too (hence my interest, though we haven’t started Tomo there yet).

Hmm, when I asked if you escaped it, I meant “had you avoided it”. I spotted your IT credentials so I figured that you’d probably been “in the real world” instead of the unreality of ELT. You lucky person.

By: Gavin

Gavin — Wed, 27 Jun 2007 13:33:58 +0000

Kashiwa ehh… just up the road then (yeah, we were over in Joban Line Matsudo). We made the odd visit to Kashiwa… mainly to visit one of the cake shops there!

I worked for a Computer Software company (HQ in UK), and I did a stint in our Consultancy dept (I used to be, and have returned to our Software Development dept) for the AsiaPac region. So, was never really involved much with the ELT scene at all.
From experience, most foreigners in Japan are either ELT, IT related, Finance related or US Forces it seems.
Didn’t tend to mix so much with non-Japanese. Most of my friends were my wife’s old friends, and common Japanese friends of ours we made during my wife initial stay here in the UK. ‘Friendships’ with non-Japanese seemed to be via the web only for some reason (though the Sales Guy in my office was an Japanese-American… not that we got on that well).

We know about the Japanese-Korean place that’s in Cardiff. What’s this about a once-a-month supermarket though??? That’s news to us?? Would be great if you could get some details to us.

By: dan

dan — Tue, 26 Jun 2007 16:14:44 +0000

Grrr – so it YOUR fault my socks are soggy!
Interesting blog mate, been reading for a few weeks now. Used to live in Kashiwa myself (relevant only if you were in Matsudo on the Joban line – I’m sure there are others).
Curious to know what you did in Japan. Did you escape the ELT scene? I’m interested as I’m trying to get a handle on what it’s like NOT working in ELT as that’s all anyone I know does/did.
(Incidentally, I presume your wife is aware of the Japanese supermarket that visits Cardiff each month?)