Rigdon Review: Our Adventures Abroad

 We've spent the past several weeks getting settled into the house.  Finally, last week Thursday evening after the kids were in bed, and in between them getting up 73 times a piece for a drink, a snack, a bandaid and to discuss the upcoming election in order to avoid sleeping, I blurted out, "We are doing something this weekend.  We are going to go and see something." I then offered to plan it all, and didn't want to tell anyone what we were doing.   Last Saturday we awoke up (anticipated) rain.  No problem, my plans were solid "Ok in rain" plans (plus it was supposed to be clear by 11am).  We got up, got ready and were out the door by just after 9am.  The PLAN was to hop on a train, take it 20 minutes north, hop on a ferry and go visit the nearby island of Itsukushima, often called Miyajima island (Shrine island).   How the morning ACTUALLY panned out: I got us on the train. Headed in the wrong direction. We got off on the first stop. B...

 It's been a hot minute. Life's a whirlwind, not just for us.  We know that.  We aren't  immune though, that's for sure. As previously mentioned, we were in a hotel for a LONG time.  We stayed in a hotel for 10 days prior to flying here, and then we got the experience of 14 days in quarantine in a hotel.  Following that we had to stay in that hotel until we found a place to live.  Which...took awhile. Lots of hoops to jump through, guys.  Isn't that just how it is when you are dealing with the U.S. government?  "But wait!  I thought you were living off base in Japan?"  Ah yes...but because our contract is through the U.S. Gov, we have to take 12 extra steps to do everything.  As we have gone along, I am understanding more and more why these checks and balances are set up, buuuutttttttttt still....everything takes for.eh.ver. Example?  This story was big news all over Japan.  And it was a family that was supposed to be...

 I mentioned previously that our definition of adventure has changed since embarking on this journey (which began months before we arrived at the airport to take off).  We have decided, as a family, that we have to look at the ENTIRE experience as an adventure, even if the adventure sucks sometimes.  Even if, occasionally, it is a bust.   We had a bust this last week. Monday, Labor Day.  American holiday but not a Japanese holiday (obviously..?).  BUT...with a Super Typhoon Haishen coming our direction, our prefecture closed public schools, so Holland also had no school that day. The typhoon wasn't expected to hit hard, really we were supposed to get a bit of wind and rain, so we decided that as long as it stayed like that, we would go to Hiroshima (45-60 minute drive).  Keane has been wanting to go to a Pokemon center since he found out we were moving to Japan, and there were a few other things we thought would be fun to check out. The weather co...

Long before we even arrived, we knew that we would have two very different options for our children to attend school in Japan: 1. The DODEA (Department of Defense Education Activity) schools located on the base.  These schools are American style schools, they are top of the line, the resources they have are incredible and no expense is spared.   2. Local Japanese schools, located off base.  Here the children would have all classes in Japanese, they would attend a "Japanese as a second language" class, but other than that, it would be an all in type of situation. Andrew and I thought a lot about this, and before coming we thought that for our family and for our situation we would really like the kids to go to Japanese school.  Our intentions for coming to Japan were and still are to have an immersive cultural experience.  On the base, you don't even realize that you are outside of the United States.  We decided, however, to wait to make the final decisi...