It gave me a lot of inspiration to bring home for my own Japanese garden that I intend to start in the new year.

I also found that Nagoya loves Eggs…I saw one shop called “Bicycle Egg” (a bike store) and another called “Hallo Egg” (a cake shop)!! I loved all the “engrish” I found randomly.

The main thing I don’t like about Nagoya is that every day at least once there is someone burning off, as in burning rubbish or something and it becomes very smoky!

Heh.. To be honest, my wife is originally from Japan, so I’m going to get more than my fair share of native cuisine, but sometimes one just needs a big thick steak with a baked potato, and costco carries much of that sort of thing. It isn’t just a couple blocks away as it is here, hence figuring out the nearest one is a good thing.

My motivations for accepting the ICT is to learn the language – without being immersed in it, and needing to actually use it, it’s damn near impossible to learn.

Now if only this silly move were over with.. It’s entirely more of a pain in the butt than it should have been..

Merry xmas, eh?

I’d love to know where that wholesalers is but so far I can live without Costco (as we do in Australia lol) I find that it’s really not necessary to go beyond the Japanese stores for anything other than hair care, deoderant and toothpaste lol and for that we go back to Oz!

And just a thought sparked from the Costco mention and not directed at you specifically – more a clarification for the post. I know my advice is to “make a home” here and for some that means trying to emulate exactly what they had back home but that is the opposite of what I mean. You need to create a home in Japan so that you feel that while you’re here Japan IS home rather than constantly seeing yourself as “away from home.” That doesn’t mean kidding yourself that you are Japanese and trying to “go native” but it means making the most of what is around you and not constantly comparing everything to what it would be like “back home” and finding it wanting. If you are in a city in Japan, there is very little that you won’t be able to find and there are lots of things that are done slightly differently that you’ll actually find are different in a useful way. I think a lot of people don’t make that psychological jump and that is why they are often frustrated and hate their time here.

I think we need to start an english version of where things are on a google map. For example, for my own reference (and the fact that google maps doesn’t plot japanese addresses in english), I put together a location map of all the costcos in japan.

http://maps.google.com/maps/ms?ie=UTF8&hl=en&msa=0&msid=102096935502661532603.00045e92c7d7ef758907d&ll=34.831841,135.637207&spn=7.229109,14.150391&z=6

I met a couple who live closer to hongo station, and they have found a meat wholesaler in the area, where local businesses go to get their meat, and it’s supposed to be very reasonable.. I’m definately thinking that an english google map of places in nagoya would be very helpful for everyone.

Actually these are the kind of real world details ICTs/ICT wives would love to know – I’m have a flood of post ideas!