R.O.M

 Here we are, 1/4 of the way through 2022 and keep finding myself thinking, "by golly WHERE IS THE TIME GOING!?" (A sure sign you are entering the latter part of your 30's)

The kids have finished their school year, we've all contracted and recovered from COVID (0/10 do not recommend), had a lengthy spring break, and are now ready for the new school year! (Japanese school years run on a "year round" type school system, and begins mid-April, and end mid-end March) and I keep wondering if they know enough to move on to the next grade because this past year went by so dang fast!  (No worries, their report cards show they are prepped to move on up). So now Cache is in his 2nd year of Yochien, Holland is in 2nd grade and Keane is in 4th grade (In American school they would be going into Kindergarten, 3rd and 5th grade in the fall).

The growth we've seen in the kids this year has been immense.  Everything from language ability, to managing stress and anxiety, to understanding cultural differences, and handling big time emotions have been improved upon since last spring.

1st day 3rd grade                      1st day 4th grade

1st day 1st grade                      1st day 2nd grade

1st day Yochien year 1        1st day Yochien year 2

When foreigners, especially base-associated foreigners, move to Japan (and I'm sure any other foreign country), there are often goals of traveling.  Lots and lots of traveling.  Because...when else are you going to get the opportunity to dive this deep into the beauty, culture, food of another country?  Well, when we chose to put our children in Japanese school instead of the American schools on the base that Andrew works at, we KNEW we were giving up a lot of those traveling experiences, for many reasons.

1. Japanese school is exhausting, and difficult, and the homework, which begins in full force in 1st grade, is extensive.  Often the kids need to just BE on the weekends, and not be expected to play tourist.

2. Andrew gets American holidays off.  Guess what?  The kids don't.  The kids get Japanese holidays off.  Guess what?  Andrew doesn't.

3. As a fairly rigid rule, you do NOT take your children out of school for vacation or travel. (We got some pushback when we took the kids out of school for Thanksgiving this past year, and honestly, probably won't do it again this year).

SO- While we do travel, and we have been to some magical places, we don't travel nearly as often, as far, for as long as many of the people that we know.

We do, however, get out and see our local area really well.  We love our little city of Iwakuni, and are feeling more and more at home here.  

Last weekend our neighbors asked us to do a Hanami picnic with them.  These are very common in the spring, especially when the sakura (cherry blossom) are blooming.  Andrew couldn't come because he was on his last day of COVID quarantine, booooooo.

They brought bento lunches for us all to share. 

 We also went down to the beach and played in the low tide rocks, searching for crabs and little fish.  The smallest things, like being able to sortta communicate with these beautiful neighbors finally, after 1.5 years, brings intense happiness.  Of course, the kids can talk without much trouble, and it still surprises the neighbors :D

 A couple weeks ago while doing a fun zoom activity for our church, we met, via zoom, a Japanese man that attends a congregation about 2 hours away.  We learned that his family owns a small dairy farm where they have both cows and goats that they tend and milk.  With the milk they make artisan cheeses and yogurts....and soft serve ice cream!

We asked them if we could come visit their farm sometime and they not only said yes, they told us we could have dinner with them and spend the night in their home.  

Friday late afternoon we began the drive up there and were greeted by the warmest, kindest family.  Our kids instantly hit it off, and we were able to help get dinner (grass fed beef hamburgers, because they thought we probably wouldn't like Japanese food.  They were surprised when they learned 1. our kids go to Japanese school, 2. they speak Japanese, 3. They eat school lunch every day and love it far more than any school lunches they've had elsewhere).

We sat down at a giant outdoor, homemade picnic table and had a fantastic meal.  

After cleanup, we went inside and basically found a child wonder land.  Their home, which is the upper level of a building that is their storefront, and where they process their dairy products, is a child wonder land.  There was a climbing wall, a hammock, and jungle gym, bookshelf stairs leading up to a loft, a fire pole to come back down, and a swing.

After a lot of playing, we finally went to bed: all of us on futons on the floor, lined up very close.  Indie thought it was play time, and we've learned she's not yet ready to be out of her crib. No way.  No how.  Not happening.

The next morning the family was up bright and early to attend to their farm duties.  Dad and 3 of their kids (they have 4 total) went to the barn and worked on milking cows and goats.  Mom stayed back at the house and was making yogurt and cheese, all in preparation for the store to open at 10am.  

Once we got up and dressed we went to the barn so we could see the animals as well.

We learned that Masanori, or Masa, lived in the United States for 2 years and in Australia for 1 year to learn dairy farming.  He then studied in both Italy and France to learn about cheese making.  During his studies he realized something: in large scale dairy farming the cows are treated merely as dollar signs.  He knew he wanted to be a dairy famer, but he wanted to do it on a smaller scale, and he wanted to treat the animals with respect and care.  He also wanted to have a good work/home life balance and knew that if he was milking 2-3x/day he would not have that.  SO!  He has only about 20 cows, and he only milks 7-8 of them each day, and only milks them 1x/day.  His cows are also entirely grass fed, which we learned means a few things. 

 They produce less milk, but the milk his higher bacteria count (the good kind of bacteria, guys).  

We learned that a cow's gut Ph is naturally neutral, but when they are majority grain fed, it causes the Ph to drop (i believe..), which decreases the gut bacteria, making the cow more susceptible to illness and infection.  In large scale farming, the cows are regularly on antibiotics, so they aren't sick, and can continue being milked.  Grass fed cows are able to maintain their natural gut Ph, get sick much less often, and are almost never on antibiotics.  Masa's cows produce 2-3 gallons of milk per milking, and are milked every other day, approximately.  A grain fed cow will produce up to 20 gallons of milk per day, and is milked every day.  

I was impressed with Masa's love for farming.  He literally told us, while explaining the cows to us, "I just love dairy farming!  In Japan, this is not common.  In Japan, we are rice farmers.  We are rice people.  But I found a love, and I found a way to bring something different, something new, to Japan."

He also told us that his goal was not to be wealthy.  His goal was to be able to provide for his family, teach his children the value of hard work, and create a product that people can enjoy.  Masa and Kunie, his wife, have created a beautiful life on their small farm.  

We took our kids and some of their kids to the park for awhile, and were not disappointed.  Japanese parks are like no other!

We headed back to the house/store/farm and had some goats milk soft cream ice cream which was....amazing.  Goat's milk is not my fave.  But dang that ice cream.

The kids were so sad to have to leave our new friends.  We promised to stay in touch and have plans to go to the beach together this summer, and skiing in the winter.

Just before we left, they brought us out a tray of their cheese and milk to take with us.  Cows milk, butter, wet mozzarella, dry mozzarella, camembert, fromage blanc, yogurt, guys we were in heaven!

And look at this mozzarella!  It's in the shape of a little pig!

On our way home we stopped at Costco in Hiroshima because we were headed past it anyways.  It's possible that was a very unwise decision.  Have you ever been to Costco?  Costco on Saturday? Costco on Saturday in Japan?  COSTCO ON SATURDAY IN JAPAN WITH 4 CHILDREN!?!?!?!  Sometimes it's important to really think about things before just willy nilly jumping in.  But at least we have some bulk chocolate chips and kimchi to hold us over for awhile.