Happy New Year...from a big social distance...

 

So - Happy New Year from one selfish British woman in north Japan, to women and their foreign daughter in laws - wherever you are!

It is hard...for all of us...but in the name of international understanding and family love...we gotta do it!

Well - you gotta do it. This year. I don't.

But these few winter days every year remind me of a time I did have to do it: the cooking, the celebrating, the one-woman show of This is Japanese New Year!

The lily bulb buying, the time Okaasan and I tried to cook New Year food together, the time I had lessons to learn how to cook it, coming back from skiing and trying to buy last minute stuff. The kitchen table conversations...the TV...and wine escape.

This year. None of that. Well, maybe wine...

Okaasan is in her care home, and they have one more positive case of Covid. This time a staff member. But that is good news, because since the first case 3 weeks ago we kept wondering what had happened. Searching the TV news for a cluster.

But if it is really only two cases in 3 weeks? That's amazingly wonderful.

But we still can't visit. So we are home - him and me - quietly eating to much and watching Netflix. Walks. A ski or two. Snow shoes. My new camera. Dozing cats. More eating. Wine.

Tonight HE is going to cook the soba/ I am just going to eat it. And wine!

Christmas 2020 - oh yeah....

 

So, this is Christmas.
And what have you done...

Happy Christmas from north Japan!

VERY unusually, Dear Son and I are together at Christmas. Ski teaching, as you might expect, is not a booming business at the moment, so he is home to sit and eat a mountain of food with me.

After all those years of lonely Xmas eating with Okaasan at the kitchen table, while he is away at ski resort parties...it was very very nice to have him home.

A friend came and dined with us. We were masked and had windows open...sat at distance round the big table in my classroom (which is the only room decorated in the house) and STUFFED ourselves on delicious, slow roasted pork, burned sausages, veggies and cheesecake!

It was great. I had one class on Christmas Day, but a favorite student - so it wasn't too hard. And after she left I got cooking, and created the kind of Christmas feast that Brits love. All piled up on the plate, covered with gravy. Nothing fancy or nicely designed about a British Christmas plate.

Christmas Eve I went to the lobby of Okaasan's care home and delivered a card and present (flower pattern nightdress and pink socks). We included photographs of us in the card, so that the staff who opened it with her would have something to talk about. A few days ago Dear Son called Okaasan, but he said the call was pretty hard...he was talking into the silence....and he could hear the care home staff making sounds to encourage Okaasan's engagement in the experience.

But, we hope she was happy to hear his voice.

So, Christmas at home. My part of Japan has got the Covid new case numbers under some kind of control again...we are down to about 100 a day...while Tokyo soars to over 800 a day...it's all a stay home holidays.

We cancelled our plans to go to Okinawa in January. Just seemed like a bad idea, because Okinawa as a group of islands has limited medical services and will, inevitably, be a popular destination over the holidays. So, we did the responsible thing. We might do a local trip in February, to enjoy winter scenes.

So. Feasted on roast pork and mulled wine last night. Friend left around 8 pm, and he and I were snugged down by the TV with full stomachs and wind-down.

His phone rang.

It was the care home...

Staff reporting that they have one case of Covid-19 in the care home now. So they will only be able to do basic services from now on, trying to limit contact between staff and residents etc. Reassuring that they will continue to do their best with Okaasan and her eating troubles.

A shock to get a late night phone call.

Not such a shock to hear the reason....not really....

Kind of relieved that it wasn't something more dramatic, about Okaasan in particular...like, that she'd seen a New Year food thing on Tv and used knotted bedsheets to escape and go shopping for lily bulbs?

And so. We hope they can contain the virus. It's a big building with 11 floors of offices and residents. But, as we all know, when this virus gets into a building with sick and old people the situation isn't good. Back in November they had two cases in the connected hospital. Now it's in the main building.

To eat or not...

 Okaasan's eating ranges  from 20-80%, apparently.

Some days pretty ok, and other times not at all. She's lost 7 kg in weight since last year.

The doctor, the nurse and the care worker have telephoned for discussions with Dear Son, and it seems that while they are worried - it isn't a crises level worry. Okaasan had put on weight in the past few years, because she sits around too much and now EATS BREAKFAST!

So 7 kg isn't a big loss, but of course any more would be bad. And they worry that she loses the automatic swallowing skill little by little.

WE suggested the Aloe yogurts that she loves, and we hope that helps. But really, as we can't be there in the care home - we don't know.

We also don't know how the Covid-19 situation is in the care home and its connected hospital. If it was Cluster No. 61 in our region a few weeks ago - and that is only my guessing - then that cluster is now buried way down in the nightly news information, overtaken by newer clusters. OMG - one hospital in Asahikawa, a big city 2 hours north of here, has over 100 cases now...

So. Maybe our home/hospital contained the virus? Maybe. No news is maybe good news.

In OUR lives, we had a stressy week with a sick cat who vomited endlessly and then stopped eating. And work stuff, I am doing product description text for an online shop and struggling to write about make up and health products - NOT my kind of writing, at all.

I am a writer, and adapting to a situation or requirement eachtime is hard. First I was in newspapers, at first news and later features. Then I did academic writing - again a big struggle to write long, involved sentences. Later I did tourism blurbs, and English-teaching texts. More recently, writing for Instagram and Facebook about travel.

And all thru I was doing more personal writing - like THIS! - at first long letters to my mother, then diaries, then short stories...and the world of blogging.

This recent job is writing text for selling face cream and wonder tea, made of seaweed....and  text about all the little taste and quality differences between rice brands. I am learning a whole lot about these products, while I write.

But it's a job. Gotta do it. Thankful, really, to have the chance to do it and earn money in this strange year.

Already December. Settling in for a quiet, stay  close to home winter.

Dear Son's digestion problems are improved, but still not good enough for a full schedule of ski teaching work. He is kind of semi-retired now, checking his stocks and shares and making money that way, mainly. My work is half what it was...although I picked up some extra teaching for a downtown company recently, that should help this winter.

We had booked a very discounted holiday in Okinawa for January, and we have until Christmas to cancel it for full refund. The Japanese government is forging ahead with this Go To Travel campaign, trying to boost domestic travel - while COVID-19 new case numbers surge in Tokyo, Osaka...and right here in Sapporo.

Of course, we will only go to Okinawa if we feel it won't cause more problems for hospitals on the islands, and that seems more and more likely. So we'll cancel. I've heard of people taking secret domestic trips - but that isn't me....

Onwards...

Other problems...in a time of COVID

 Early morning phone call - it's never GOOD news, is it?

Okaasan's Care Manager rang to report that she is having eating problems. Well, swallowing problems. She is losing weight fast and they wondered if we'd give permission to put her on a direct-feeding bag and tubes....

It's a common problem, I gather, for people with late stage dementia. There's a medical word for it, but basically it means the automatic act of swallowing gets weaker and there are increased dangers of food getting stuck/going down the "wrong way"/choking.

I've written before that we've noticed this past year how Okaasan stores a mouthful of saliva in her cheeks, and then it all spouts out when she attempts to talk or can't hold it in anymore. But, until now the care home was happy with her eating routines.

Now they are concerned.

We DON'T want her to have all the tubes and procedures to have direct-feeding. It isn't a pleasant procedure, and once on it - you never get off it. In fact, we both confirmed with eachother this week that if WE get to this stage - "please don't do it to me". It's got to be better to get weaker, sleep, have gentle end of life support and then slip away....if possible.

Of course, the care home is closed to family visits at the moment as Sapporo is one of Japan's latest COVID-19 hotspots. So we can't go in and try and encourage Okaasan to eat.

But we plan to tell the nurse to try aloe yogurts and the sweet sake drink that Okaasan loves so much, it won't be enough for sustenance, but maybe even SEEING the containers will jog her memory of pleasant eating experiences?

Hope so. And I HOPE we can get into the home and see her soon.

We don't actually know the Covid-19 numbers in the hospital/care home at the moment. There isn't any point in hassling the staff by phoning. On the local news "Cluster 61" was at 8 or 11 cases a few days ago. I think that may be our care home hospital. But don't know.

So...not happy news...

But, let's end with a positive! FIVE years ago, thanks to Google Photos for telling me this, we were down in the Saitama area visiting Okaasan's family for that big trip. She got to meet a brother before he died a few months later, and her oldest son...who also died a year later...and the three of us walked around her old home Kawagoe...the old shops, the shrines.

It was a stressful trip for us to arrange, but she enjoyed it so much. And it was the best timing. A year later - was it that? - she fell in the kitchen, broke a bone in her spine, went into hospital and her dementia levels went thru the roof...

But this day in November 2015....all was well....for a while (I seem to remember a stuck-in-the-toilet-incident at the Yokohama bus terminal...;-)

Annnd....Covid-19 is in the building...

It's arrived.

Into Okaasan's care home building - far quicker than we thought, and BAM! Family visits are suspended.

Only Monday this week they were saying: "If the local government declares another ranking up of the Alert Level etc"

Now they have two cases...well, it was two cases a day or two ago....

We got the letter yesterday saying that two patients in the hospital part of the care home have tested positive, and of course all visits  from outsiders would be stopped.

We don't know if the two cases are care home residents, or patients from outside. We don't know how serious.

The building is huge, half care home and half hospital. Different entrances, main elevators....but connecting corridors...shared kitchen? laundry? staff rooms?

Ironically, we chose this care home because it has the hospital. Easy for the staff to get Okaasan medical attention. Now that is a liability, in these Covid times.

In Hokkaido this week the cases have multiplied day by day - care homes, schools, bars, restaurants, shops...300..heading towards 400 cases day by day. TV is full of experts showing us how we can have heaters on - but must open windows and doors. It's cold, and wastes power. But we are trying to do it.

My friend, who caught Covid, is now negative and back home gently recovering and feeling weak. I passed a big city center hotel the other day and could see it being prepared as the latest quarantine-ready place for people who don't need to be in hospital. And another friend's husband's workplace has many cases.

And Okaasan's home.

Cross fingers that they can contain it, because we all know those terrible numbers of the spread thru a shared building community for the elderly.

Moving up....

 Moving up....an Alert stage in COVID-19 warnings.

In Hokkaido, October numbers for daily reported cases of tested people who showed a positive result....bloody hell, that's a mouthful.....(but I know somebody will jump all over me and say it isn't SICK people...it isn't risky to others people...it isn't...THAT BAD!)

Anyway, the daily numbers of 20....to 40...50...have now topped 200 for the last few days. Hokkaido is officially Covid-19 Hotspot in Japan. Even made No. 2 slot on the national news last night, after that other hot mess situation in the US.

It was inevitable, really. We became the Hotspot. Because we are cold. We are the far north of Japan, it gets cold here first. It snows here first. We close the windows and doors and start living inside, in dry air. So our numbers started going up, as the temperatures went down to 10C and the first snow fell.

Local government has moved the Alert stage from 2 to 3, and given the whole nightlife district of the city a 10 pm curfew. Actually Stage 3 doesn't seem to mean much, just be more careful...and think about only going to places that have got clear safety measures in place.

Then, yesterday a national government person said: "maybe Hokkaido should be taken out of the Go To Travel Campaign system".....this is the Japanese domestic travel boosting discounted hotels/flights/food offer that some of us have been using the last few months.

If they take Hokkaido out, that'll really damage the winter tourism business here, the skiing, the  dog sledding, the onsen hotels - we were hoping at least for some domestic visitors.

And he and I were hoping to go to Okinawa in January. We could still go, of course. In Japan nothing in COVID times is compulsory - it's all done at Request level. But as a teacher, responsible person etc etc I just couldn't go domestic travelling if the government requests us to stay put.

So. Okaasan.

Here's the sign in the Care Home. IF this region moves  to Stage 4 - Family Visits will be stopped, again.

Of course.

So we'd better get in some good, meaningful visits while we can.

We'd stayed away from her for two weeks, after our recent domestic get away down south - in case we carried any risk for her and the rest of the care home.

The last month she's been good, much more talkative. Actual whole sentences about fall...clothes...colors...food...it's been wonderful.

Like those scenes in the Robin Williams movie about mentally-gone people who briefly came back into  communicative ability - seeing Okaasan talk, even a sentence with 7 words in it. Is wonderful.

Amazing to think that just a short time ago - what...5 years ago? I would come upstairs here to the computer and whine about yet ANOTHER mind-bendingly long dinner time with Okaasan's long rambling stories, round and round and round...

One of you Dear Readers said: "there'll come a time when you'll be happy if she talks"...and yup...it's now. I AM happy that she suddenly says: "The autumn leaves at XX Shrine are very beautiful".

Just a whole sentence. It was wonderful.

And then she went back to the strange chin jutting movement, and then closed her eyes and almost slept...and then just stared...

So. We'll grab the chances to have more wonderful, hopefully for a while yet.

But we don't think it'll be long. The time of no family contact is a-coming.

* And in other news...a friend here in Sapporo got infected and had to　spend 2 weeks in an isolation hotel with three lunch boxes a day. I was shocked, because she has always been very careful. But she is young and lives downtown. 

Inevitably she meets other young friends, in bars and cafes...downtown.

She had mild symptoms, fever, nausea, tight chest feeling - so she wasn't in a hospital. But sent to a local hotel, to while away time until the tests were negative. She was a member of a cluster, I guess, because she was there with the friends who got infected at the same time.

She is better now and allowed home again. Where she is being  even MORE careful.

And HEY! Good news!

Trump lost.

Visiting again. For now...

 Our care home opened its doors again to family visits and we spent another 15 mins with Okaasan head nodding like bobbing-head toys, looking out the windows at a world she can't visit and doing our double act chat about the weather/the mountain/the tall building/the lunch menu/the Tv/my T shirt pattern/Okaasan's socks.

Luckily it's only 15 mins!

Oh I know, that makes me sound like a horrible person...but it IS a relief that we can only have short visits. Once a week.

I am a horrible person.

So, our care home dodged the Corona Virus case at a connected Day Service facility, it seems. But maybe another care home wasn't so lucky, or skilled. About 3 km south of Okaasan's home - there is a CV cluster at another home in the city. 24 staff and residents at the last count. No deaths.

It is SO near to our care home, and it is very likely that people from there go to the same day service facilities. Maybe that's how the infection spread? We are glad that we chose a place that has a basic day care room and services in the same building, and a hosspital. So Okaasan never needs to leave the building.

And this pandemic year - she hasn't.

She last went outside maybe almost a year ago? November 2019? We probably took her out in our car and wheeled her in the wheelchair downtown somewhere. Then winter came and it  got harder to move her wheelchair near the car and get her into the car. So we just visited and sat with her inside.

And then in February a Pandemic began and all chance to leave the building disappeared.

What's nuts is that SOME of the  elderly in her care home ARE leaving, to go by mini bus etc to day service places in the city for a few hours. But we are not allowed to take her out ourselves.

It's hard. But I do understand it. The less contact she, and anyone, has with the world beyond the care home doors - the better. But still, it is strange to think she has not been outside for almost a year.

Her mental and physical condition has gone down this year, although she seems basically content. Sitting in her chair and looking at the TV. Eating  what they bring her. Sleeping calmly.

October - in Japan several changes now, which may lead to an increase in CV cases. Foreign students and business people are allowed into the country now. Universities have started back, half in class/half online. Tokyo people will be allowed to use the government's discounted domestic travel campaign.

And the biggest worry in this part of Japan is the season change. Daytime it is above 20 C, and we can wear T shirts if it is sunny, but there were first snowfalls in the mountains and the nights are cool. We are starting to live behind closed windows and doors, so the air circulation in our daily lives in becoming worse.

But still Japan appears to have a better CV situation than so many countries.

Japan's daily new case average is 400-500. In the UK it is 5,000...

Even allowing for the low testing rates here, (you still have to be pretty sick to even get a test), those are staggeringly different numbers. Japan is a mask wearing, rule following, hand washing society...so that all helps. Japanese people don't hug eachother and talk loudly in public places. That helps.

But it is still an amazing difference.

Stay safe wherever you are, and let's hope for a safe winter.

Covid-19...a step nearer...

We all know it.

It's here...around us...somewhere...near...

Somebody at a day service center for the elderly here in Sapporo tested positive.

Somebody from Okaasan's care home GOES to that center.

The care home is stopping all family visits for now.

We can't see Okaasan again.....😞😞

Don't know if the infected person is a staff member or an elderly person, don't know if it's one, or many people, from the care home who attend that center, don't know if any of them live on the 10th floor with Okaasan.

But we accept the care home decision 100%.

Luckily, she won't know whether we have been this week or not. 

The news here shows a slight increase in positive cases in the city - mainly night entertainment places like clubs. But somewhere in the city a day service center for the elderly also has a case....and the chain reaction of that fact is happening.

In other, happier news...we had a 3 day trip in a camping car and enjoyed some early autumn scenes in Hokkaido. Had to change our plans, due to rain, but we spent quiet time in the central area I visit a lot when tour guiding. Visited places I haven't been to....learned a few new things about butterflies, wine making, dinosaurs and Japanese art...ate curry...friend fish...drank wine...had an onsen for the first time in 7 months...

My body?

 We had a family visit to the toilet yesterday.

First time in a while - when we are only meeting Okaasan for 15 mins a week, the chance that we'll be heading to the toilet together is less. Yesterday Okaasan actually said the word: "Toilet"....so off we went.

The three of us, plus wheelchair, were doing the dance of : chair/body/handbar/pull down pants/turn/sit...wait...and reverse everything again.

Okaasan could stand and hold the handbars, and with our big encouragement and physical support, she could turn and slump onto the toilet seat.

But slump was the word. If a sack of potatoes needed to go to the toilet. This is what it would be like. Very little independent movement or muscle use. Shocking. And sad.

In the past, if you ripped off some toilet paper and gave it to Okaasan, she did something with it - folding it politely..or rubbing it on the correct part of her body. This time, her hand held the paper....and did nothing at all.

Gently, taking the paper back, Dear Son wiped his mother's body. Returning the favor for all those nappy changes 60 years ago...

Returned to the wheelchair she just slumped. No attempt to push herself back in to the seat or sit upright. We hauled her into a sitting position.

But she made eye contact with us and smiled and did the goldfish pouting gesture with her mouth. A few minutes later, in her room, we washed her hands at the sink and when given the hand towel she made the motions of drying her fingers with it. And we praised her.

😟😭

But I just feel sad.

This disease, it reduces you so very much. This lively, smart woman - a whole life time of experiences - and now her brain doesn't give her the information of "I need to sit in a better position and should move my legs and arms".

Doesn't give her the information about what this paper is used for.

...................

September. Still hot this week. Two huge typhoons skirted round south Japan. Up here it's been hot and sunny. Our COVID-19 lives go on and on.

I work - but not so much. I meet a friend or two. Spend days out with the kayak. The Achilles tendon damage is getting better...a little. I can do ordinary day-to-day walking, but I still don't set out to do a big walk.

Garden time. Cats time. Watching Game of Thrones...now on Season 6...we recorded and are watching all the Bond films, in order. I do social media posts for the tour company. I am reading books.

My life feels like semi-retirement!

Covid-19 in Hokkaido has settled into about 5-10 new cases a day. Mostly here in the big city of Sapporo, and often among younger people connected to the nightlife area businesses. Or, a call center, or a hospital. There were more domestic visitors here for school holidays last month, now it is quiet again. Maybe foreign students are allowed to come back into Japan this month. Business visitors from some countries.

Next week we are having a 3 day local trip in a camping car, just sea and onsens, good local foods. In October we have another trip (hopefully), to the mountains of central Japan...THIS is the year to visit these places without all the foreign visitors, and the domestic bus tour crowds. We got good discounts on the hotel stays.

But if infection rates increase again, and government advice is to stop inter-region travel, we will cancel.

Such a strange time. 

Economically this isn't a good year for me - but with pretty generous government support money I will be ok. I am lucky. Hopefully, next year, foreign visitors will be allowed to come back to Japan and tour guide work will start again...for now I will just enjoy this quiet, stay home, spend quiet times.

I hope you are well, whatever you are doing in autumn 2020. What a year it has been...and as characters in Game of Thrones keep saying: "Winter is Coming!" and we wonder what Covid will do then.

Better visit...

 Okaasan MUCH better on our visit this week.

Sitting up straight, eye contact...eyes not all strange and filmy...

Still not much conversation, or actual verbal response, but eye contact, strange mouth opening and closing like a goldfish (does she think this is talking?) and smiles and waves.

We are relieved. Still we are only allowed a 15 minute visit, because it is the holiday season and there are other families and a big ban on people from out of state big cities , such at Tokyo and Osaka.

AND....get this....in such worrying times....when hospitals and care homes (and shared dormitories at high schools etc) regularly appear as COVID-19 cluster locations...this care home has decided to hold a Families Meeting this weekend! One of those 50-60 people crammed in a room listening to speeches affairs!

Like. Really?

At a time when you are restricting visitors to the care home, connections between people. Is is really a good plan to have 50-60 people from all over the region come to the building and cram in and out of the elevator? Sit together in a room for over an hour listening to speeches?

Really?

I put my foot down. Told Dear Son he shouldn't go. Stupid plan. They can send him an email or a newsletter. His time would be far better spent, prepping to come with me to a friend's small BBQ party....5 people from two families eating and drinking in a garden is a better use of time...and safer in Covid-19 times.

Post-party blaahs?

 Okaasan not  so lively this week.

Exhausted after the excitement of party last week? Suffering from the heat, although living in an air-con bubble?

Not sure. But, she was quiet and slumped to one side during our visit this week. Her eyes seemed somehow filmy...not quite focusing on us sometimes. Sleepy?

She did smile a bit and wave when we left.  But she wasn't so great.

We could only stay 15 mins. It's the main family-visiting/dead relative honoring festival in Japan now and the care home is being careful. Shortened visit times, and requests at the care home doors to NOT visit if you had come from OR recently visited: Tokyo, Osaka, Nagoya and Fukuoka etc

Hmm. I have read a bit about people's eyes before death, that they somehow go glazed or filmy, or watery.....maybe I am over-reacting. But I told Dear Son we should try and go and see her again this week. Didn't tell him directly why.

It's a quiet and very hot holiday week. I have some classes - online and in person - because some students said "well, I am not going away or having family to visit, so it's just an ordinary week!!". Kind of my feeling too.

I am meeting a few friends, for coffee in a park, or tea in a garden. And we have visited a local restaurant with a huge dining out discount. I've started watching Game of Thrones...eight whole seasons of that monster drama to keep me busy. i'm reading a book. I write summer greeting cards to old students.

Quiet time.

Our virus numbers are hovering around 10 new cases a day. In Tokyo it's 200-250 new cases a day. Tokyo people, poor sods, are having to stay near the city in then sweltering heat. Next year - maybe- the Tokyo Olympics will finish around now....

Next year. When will we all climb on planes again?

A pandemic birthday...

Okaasan has reached 90 years old!

Little Kazuko, the oldest daughter of the haulier's family of longtime ago Kawagoe, has lived thru three emperors, a war, a country's rebirth, a technological revolution....and a Pandemic.

Well, we HOPE she lives thru the Pandemic!

If she does, we can actually take her beyond the care home front door, into the sunshine. Out to a cafe or a little lunch of crab.

But for now we can't. So, 30 mins in her care home bedroom. Singing Happy Birthday and clapping. Masks and hand sprays.

We ordered a tiny cream pudding from a cake shop, they topped it with a biscuit iced with "Happy Birth-Day" letters and the date. We took in paper plates and plastic spoons, and napkins and had a 15 minute party in her bedroom.

Of course, the staff nixed the idea of lighting candles, because none of us wanted to test the care home and hospital sprinkler system. I stuck two tiny candles in the top of the tiny cake...in fact Okaasan probably can't remember is she had in fact just blown them out....and in Covid-19 times maybe not a great idea to encourage her to blow on the food the three of us were about to share!!!

And so we celebrated. She enjoyed it. Smiles and claps. Tucked into the cream pudding and scraped away with the spoon on the pot.

Then the staff came and told us "Time Up", another family were waiting for their allotted 30 mins of Visit Time. So we hurriedly packed up the cake plates and headed away.

Happy Birthday Okaasan.

So sorry we can't take you out to eat crab.

Rising cases of this disease in our region, up to 10 plus a day in this city...and worries about how the traditional hometown travel of the Obon Festival next week will impact it all. In fact, many Japanese people have cancelled their hometown visit plans.

It's a hot, humid summer. Wearing masks and sweaty....

But Happy Birthday Kazuko! You made it so far :-)

Hulu memories

Hulu dance was such a big, happy part of Okaasan's life...before she moved to live with us and then for a few years here, too.
Until the stress of not being able to remember the dance steps and all the training for performances that this so-called hobby group subjected their members to. Because it's Japan...and even an old lady hobby group aims for perfection.

Anyway. It was her happy activity.

We were wonderfully reminded of that on our care home visit this week. We forgot to take photo albums, and were wondering how to fill our allotted 30 minutes of visit time - because she doesn't talk or do more than head bobbing, lip pursing and eye rolling.

Somehow hulu dance came up.
I did a few comedy steps, waving my arms in the wave-pattern...swaying my hips...

Okaasan loved it. Laughed. Through back her head. Actually SAID 3 full sentences about the topic...laughed again.
Dear Son did some hip rolls and hand waves too. Okaasan responded with a little - FAR more realistic - hand ripple gesture.

It was delightful.
The staff laughed. We laughed. Okaasan too.

Of course, all the dementia how-to-books say this: that if you can find the happy memory/skill thing and even give a little hint of that - it will penetrate deep into the broken mind and reactivate the emotion of that experience.
Okaasan can't do or talk about hulu any more. She maybe can understand if we talk about it. But can't respond. But the gesture of me doing it - that triggered her and a full sentence emerged. 3 of them!

I see hulu moves in my future care home visits...

** NOT good news.
The care home is on the south side of the city's entertainment area.
Yesterday a new cluster of COVID-19 was discovered in cabaret bar - the young women who work there, customers...
I don't think the staff of the care home are going bar hopping after work, poor things probably have no energy, or money, for that.
But I DO worry that they may casually stop off in a local convenience store and sit at the Eat-in counter with a snack...where somebody from the cabaret has sat...and left their infection...

I know, I know. It's a long shot!
But still. It's all in the same walking distance area.
I read somewhere that big care homes have a greater risk, once Covid-19 arrives. Okaasan's home is big. 6 floors of old people...30 people to each floor....staff...

If it gets into the home there is little we can do. Can't move her. Can't bring her home. We would be shut out. Only the local TV news and phone calls telling us what is happening.

Visit, while you can?

We've done two more visits to Okaasan.
Sat in the lounge, sat in her room. 30 mins each time - it's long enough, to be honest - because she doesn't talk and hardly responds to what we say...so 30 mins of prattling about things is enough for our brains.

I think she understands what we are saying, but can't form any response.
And if the sentence is too long and complex...she just gets lost.
And of course, she can't see our mouths moving behind the masks.

But. But.
Yet another care home in the city has COVID-19 and the cases are mounting...10 one day...12 the next. Residents and staff.
How long will it be before our care home shuts the doors again to family visits?
We feel it might be soon.

So, we go on the weekly visits and chat away.

Meanwhile, some kind of normal in our area - businesses are open again and now there is a domestic tourism discount promotion campaign to get us all to travel a bit and spend some money. Japan is still banning foreigners from coming into the country - only 250 a day from the business community of Vietnam, Thailand, Australia and New Zealand. They will be restricted in movement and activity.

Sapporo city is always packed with foreign tourists. It is so strange to see it quiet.
I met a friend downtown on Saturday. We sat, in our masks, on a park bench in the city center. Quiet. The shopping area was like a midweek afternoon.

I can't imagine foreigners flooding back here for months and months...this winter?
But then we can't do all the open doors and windows...the air circulation....

What a strange world it is...still.

Hello stranger!

Here she is! Okaasan is BACK, in person, in the blog named after her :-)

First meeting with loving family after 4 months of care home lock down...got the lock down hair syndrome, and a bit uncertain about all this social excitement...

But back.

She was happy to see us, knew who we were and said a few words...laughed. Looked from him to me, smiling. Wasn't so communicative, but not bad. Pulled some funny faces for us and WAVED us "Goodbye!" right until she lost sight of us near the elevator doors.

A good visit.

The care home had it all set up:
Temperature checks
Facemasks
Spray down with some kind of sanitizer
Health questions about our recent condition.
Rules: no presents, no visit to private room, 30 mins only.

Slightly surprisingly, we were allowed to wear out outside shoes into the care home. 

It was strange to be back. Take the elevator upstairs to the lounge area and there was Okaasan, in her wheelchair at a table. We sat and prattled on about a world-wide pandemic, and masks, and summer and flowers, and hair and stuff...

I think she found the mask communication hard - she couldn't see our mouths moving to KNOW we were talking...and obviously it was a bit muffled. So her focus slipped off to the TV. But when the staff came over to chat, she looked from person to person.
They said she is fine...but recently isn't good at feeding herself. They feed her, and still there are lots of food drops and slips. They asked us to get a plastic bib apron for her. Walking also...not so good now.

But we MET her and could see her!
This summer she will be 90 years old....hopefully we can take her OUT of the building by then...out to enjoy fresh air and some kind of birthday celebration.

Visitation !!!!

We are going to MEET Okaasan! 🙋🙋

Letter came from the care home: family members can make a reservation to visit for half an hour only, only to the lounge area, wearing a mask etc

GREAT news!

I am guessing, that after the last letter about the continued-lock-down-till-mid-July, that some families complained and now they have relaxed things a bit.
There have also been some reports on Japanese tv about care homes using ipads and plastic screens to allow family visits.

So. We hope to get a reservation and go in next week.

How will Okaasan be? I hope ok...I hope she knows Dear Son and is perked up by our visit.

Watch this space. 

:-)

Dementia deaths

THIS is what I am worried about.

For Okaasan...and millions of others.

We hope she isn't really aware of the huge changes in life around her. But we don't know. And maybe it's a kind of comforting lie, the throw away joke..."well, at least she doesn't know whether we've been to see her, or not".

But I do believe, that at some level, she knows.
Knows that there have been less smiley faces.
Knows that there has been less variety in a day.
Knows that life is quieter.

If you have time, I recommend this read from the BBC News website

Dementia deaths up during pandemic

Care Home prison....

Hokkaido opens up again - shops - schools - art galleries - here we go!

Of course masked up and meeting everyone from the other side of a plastic screen. Washing our hands and spraying fingers and palms at buildings entrances.

Local governor still asking people to NOT travel between areas. So, I'm still doing little local trips. I feel the frustration of seeing people I know go beyond the city limits - this week even a very respectable, kinda famous tour guide shared her pictures on Facebook of a trip she made two hours out of Sapporo! I am sticking with what the governor has recommended, to protect local communities with less health care facilities.

But many people aren't.

 However, my Achilles tendon played up, so I really can't walk more than a few hundred steps a day. Stuck doing stretch exercises. I overwalked - 3 plus miles a day on city streets in my old trainers. And I don't want to go to a hospital at the moment...so being very very careful. Dear Son helped me go for a gentle local paddle in the kayak one day, he came with me to help load and unload the kayak from the car - then dozed in the car while I enjoyed greenery and solitude. He is a good man.

One of my English teaching jobs will start up again this month. The other, at a local hospital, looked likely to restart - lots of happy messages from students in the LINE group - and then 24 hours before the class start somebody in the hospital management realized this wasn't an "essential" activity with a non-staffer. And it got cancelled til next month.

It's ok. Hospitals are places that should be extra careful. in my city, Sapporo, there have been clusters at the big cancer hospital, a local hospital...and care homes...

Care Homes.

One infamous cluster here has 80-90 cases now. Deaths among staff and residents. A horrible case where nobody in the two floor building was safe from COVID-19. I CAN imagine the distress of families.

So, we weren't really very surprised when we got a letter from Okaasan's care home.

They are not planning to lift their lock-down until mid-July.

Mid-July!

If the situation in the city improves, they may review this. But basically that is what they are planning.

So, we can go shopping downtown and eat out in a restaurant, have a hair cut, even go to a karaoke box and sing.

But we can't visit our old lady.

Those February karaoke parties with Okaasan and her pals seem SO long ago now. The snow has melted, spring came and went...summer is arriving. And still Okaasan is stuck inside that building. Her bedroom, the lounge room, the toilet.

One of my students works at a hospital for head/brain injuries. There it has been locked down to family members etc But they are investigating ways of using an online "visit" system with Zoom or Skype. Allowing families to come into the ground floor of the building and screen-talk on a big computer with their loved one upstairs in bed. However, even the planning of it has thrown up all sorts of problems, to do with scheduling and staff time - even privacy for patients.

Two main problems: 

a) Patients aren't always awake or mentally able to do an online visit, when their families are waiting downstairs on schedule.

b) Families didn't understand HOW to use the technologist, so two staff members had to assist every time - one for the the patient and the other for the family.

So. We won't be seeing Okaasan until July.

Maybe.

.

Maybe

Stay safe and take care (if you can) of your loved ones.

Drive thru....Mother's Day...

Drive thru fast food....banking...COVID-19 testing...

Mother's Day.

2nd Sunday of May in Japan is the day to say "Thankyou" to the okaasan in your life for all her lunch box making and worrying about you. It's the day to give carnations, take her out to lunch and buy her a cute, pink cake.

Not in 2020.
Here we all are, not actually in lockdown - but in the Japanese version of Stay Near Home and Don't Travel Too Much. For me and DS this day would usually be a visit to the care home with flowers and small cake, a sit and a chat...or a wheelchair trip out to a local park to enjoy fresh  air and cherry blossoms.

Yesterday we did a Drive Thru visit.
I sat in the car, he ran into the care home entrance area with a card and a small cake in a bag.....and 1 minute later we drove away.
Hoping Okaasan enjoyed it.

The care home is still, of course, under No Visits From Non-Staff limitations. Which we, totally, support. I pressured DS to think what he could do...and finally he agreed to make up a card using old photographs from the family albums - he spent an hour or more on the computer making it and printing out better and better versions.
Looked lovely. I even got to use the rose sticker things I once bought for Okaasan's room decoration, but was unable to use due to the thumbs down from staff worried about sticky-things-on-walls rules.

We HOPE that a kind care home staff person will sit with Okaasan and look at the card with her, ask her questions about the photographs - prompt her to remember who these people are: "Is that your husband? Is that the son who died and you don't know about it?" (last one is a black joke...cos THEY don't know either about THAT :-)

On the way to the care home we bought some tiny cakes, and delivered it all in the Drive Thru. They will spray down the envelope and package and take it upstairs.

Strange times.
Families doing this kind of thing.

Thankyou for comments on earlier posts - I still can't find out why I am not allowed to comment on comments on this blog...something has changed in the setting and it's beyond my computer ability find out what...maybe I have to go onto Zoom to do that? Is this all a united-cross-platform thing now?

I WISH Okaasan's care home was more 21st century and proactive about setting up some kind of screen meeting system for families and residents. But they aren't. I guess there will be the usual photograph in a newsletter format. But no online, real time meeting. Japan is so frustrating in regard to that - a system doesn't change. 
I see it in DS' response too...he doesn't think about/want to do it himself and tell the care home staff to start using it with his mother - he doesn't want to give them extra work, be different, force a situation...
His thinking is that as there are 15-20 residents on that floor of the care home, if EVERY family started putting in electronic gadgets for communication and asking the staff to wheel the elderly in front of the screen at the necessary time...then it would really be troublesome and disturb their routine of mealtimes/medicines/physical therapy/cleaning/bedding changes/report writing.

Better to let the system, however bad it is, to plod on in its way. To accept a bad situation.

I can imagine in the UK or America, maybe many other cultures in fact, the families would be agitating for online communication - either telling the care home to set up a central system, or sending in iPads by the truckload to ensure direct communication with their particular elderly.

But not in Japan.
Okaasan hasn't been off the care home premises since November 2019. Apart from wheelchair visits 3 meters outside the snowy door of the home for fresh air, she hasn't been outside for SIX months. 
Shit.
Just writing that now. Makes me shocked.
Is that true? Did we take her out in the car this winter? We must have done???

Even in normal times she wouldn't have been out much, only from the care home door to breath fresh air...or a struggle to get her into the car and then we'd have driven her somewhere to be inside. A covered shopping center. I guess we did that?

But, if the weather was okay enough...by March we'd have taken the wheelchair beyond 3 meters and got her OUT. Somewhere.
Not in 2020.

Last night I talked to a UK friend and heard about two of her friends, whose mothers had died last week - sad, sad tales of last conversations by screen from a Covid-19 isolation bed and midnight drive across country for a final meeting. My friend herself recently travelled to Spain where her mother was dieing (not Covid) and it was a trip involving official letters of permission-to-travel, airport interviews and endless health checks. It was a depressing conversation, made me realise that the Covid-19 experience here in Japan is SO different. So free.

I don't know WHY Japan doesn't have the awful situation of many parts of the world. They aren't testing at all at the rates of other countries. But, even so, there aren't cold storage trucks parked outside hospitals and mass graves.

We can walk and shop....work (mostly)...home school...
New case numbers in my part of Japan (vast Hokkaido population 5 million) are down to under 10 a day now. In Japan it is 70 new cases and in Tokyo (9 million people) 22 new cases.....

If the numbers stay so low here in Hokkaido, I expect local government will relax restrictions later this week. Allow businesses to open again. Schools next month.

But. Care homes? When will they/we feel that is a safe thing to do? So many of the deaths are among the elderly. When will come the time when we can, happily, go and meet Okaasan again - laugh with her, hold her hands, sing karaoke, share rice balls?

When?

Still no meeting...

Another month...we haven't seen Okaasan.

My area of Japan is currently in our 2nd State of Emergency, much stricter this time with department stores and many restaurants closed. Schools closed. New case numbers in the double digits and scary clusters in care homes and hospitals.

Hospitals are such bad places to be at the moment.
The main hospital for cancer treatment in Sapporo has an outbreak of cases...care homes...call center...it's "only" 25-33 new cases a day in an area of Japan with 5 million people...but when they said on the local news that there are only 30 special beds left for isolation in this region...the situation looks bad.

One of my students has to go into hospital for a gyno operation this month. Should only be there a week..but with all the news about infections in theses places which we usually think of as safe... Last month a famous Japanese actress died of Covid-19. She'd had breast cancer operation in January, and was back home recovering - must of felt glad to have come thru the cancer scare....and then in March got Covid19. Awful.

So, we just sit tight and hope that the staff in Okaasan's care home are doing all the right things. NOT going to parties with friends and their sports gym (yes, some of THOSE are still open!)...hoping that they won't bring the virus into the building with 10 floors of elderly people.

When the phone goes, I dread that it's going to be "that" call, the care home staff telling us she isn't so well....and all that will lead to.

I'm also a little disappointed that they haven't set up some way families can interact/see their elderly - after weeks and weeks of this situation. A computer screen...a plastic sheet wall between us - just 5 minutes of waving and shouting"hi!".

The only reassurance is that Okaasan almost certainly doesn't know we haven't seen her in 10 weeks...

Our life is quiet and ongoing. My mood  goes up and down.
Mainly ok...specially now there is good weather and cherry blossoms. Yesterday we did bbq in the garden....just the two of us.
I have mainly online classes now. Easy to do with private classes for an adult. But this kind of communication is more intense and after a few hours I am exhausted. But, glad for the work. The Japanese government will pay everyone about $900 as an emergency support payment....which will help. 

I hope where you are has some signs of a return to some kind of normal?
Allowed outside yet? Can go in a car beyond 50 km? Allowed to eat out?

It's strange the things you really miss - the incidental things.
We've done two take out meals now - one a week. SO AMAZING to have food we didn't plan, shop and cook ourselves.

We've walked miles and miles in the local streets...round and round residential areas...keeping away from people by walking in the middle of the street, veering around a guy washing his car...a woman and her dog...

I guess we won't go back  to the carefree times of Before Coronavirus...the big events..the travel...for age and ages...

Ha. Sorry. I'm depressing myself reading this. We need an uplifting ending.
Here is a wonderful short video of the cherry blossoms in my part of Japan. It was made by Hokkaido Nature Tours, the  tour company I work for (will I ever work as a guide again????)...just lovely and soothing....

enjoy! And stay safe and happy.

Blog comment responses.

Hi Katya in Toronto!

Yes you!

Something seems strange with the Comment response function on this site at the moment, so just letting you know that I could read it and sending you thanks and warm vibes in response.

Amanda

Hey, there.

Wherever you are in the world. I hope you and your loved ones are doing ok.

Whether it is a lockdown, an advisory of stay home, a stay-near-to-home...or, of course, if you are one of the wonderful people going to work every day and battling this virus for the rest of us.

Winter and spring 2020....we never knew how these months would be.

But, we will emerge the other side of this. One day.

Until then, we connect with the world thru this computer technology, even more than usual and hopefully try to be kinder to eachother.

So.

Here in Hokkaido, north Japan...winter is turning into spring. I got out for my debut kayak trip this year, by driving with DS to a lake about an hour from home and while he ambled around the tiny village area at a safe distance from about 20 other people...I enjoyed the quiet and the calm of this view.

Yesterday, the Prime Minister of Japan announced State of Emergency in 7 big urban areas. Non-essential buildings and businesses should close, but it isn't a lock down. Restaurants can stay open????!!!! 

But not...izakiyas.....

Totally strange. What the fuck is the  difference?

Izakiya, maybe, is a small eating and drinking place..with tables close together? Oh, hang on, maybe that's a restaurant?

Who knows.

If the Japanese government was really serious about this they would just say: ALL eating and drinking places should close. You don't NEED to go an eat or drink out in the coming month. Go to work. Buy food. Go home and eat it. Supermarkets and convenience stores are open.

Anyway. I'm glad they are finally doing something. Now they have got the Olympics off the table, now the financial year has ended, and the schools have had their graduation and entrance ceremonies and new staff have joined their companies....now all of THAT seasonal stuff is done...

Ok. Let's try and stop the virus spreading and killing people.

My blog. My venting....

Us? 

Well, okay. Quiet time at and near home. About 2/3 of my regular teaching work. Skype lessons. Days at home to walk locally and watch too much TV. Baked  a cake.

No tour guide work for the foreseeable future.

We still can't go and see Okaasan. The care home called yesterday and and said they will ask a doctor to come and look at her foot skin condition. Better than taking her to a hospital.

Maybe we can go and see her later this month? Happily, she won't know when she last saw us. Good weather is coming and it would be nice to take her wheelchair out in the sunshine.

I keep in contact with friends and family in other countries. But I am so SO glad that my parents have already died and are not stuck thousands of miles away from me, where I can't help. A friend here...her father in the UK is in the middle of cancer treatment...or rather his treatment is on pause...so incredibly hard for her as she tries to go on daily life here of Japan. Of course, I still have family members in the Uk. But more distant family. 

So, when the British Embassy in Tokyo sent out a video message saying "if you want to leave Japan now, time is running out" and when British Airways announced they are stopping direct flights, a little British sad feeling went thru me. But not so much, because here...this house, this city, this country IS my home now.

Oh, and this man. And his mum.

And here we are...April 2020....a strange time.

Still here...

Corona Virus still here.
We are still here.
Okaasan still there...in her care home, where no family visits are allowed.

Dear Son called the other day, the staff said all is good.
Okaasan came to the phone for a brief chat. Well, I expect DS chatted and she listened. She knew who he was, so that's good.

Times like this - ARE there "times like this"? - dementia is a bonus. She doesn't know whether we have been to visit, or not. Her world is the right now - the TV, the drink on the table in front of her, the smiling face of a staff member.

Yesterday in Hokkaido there were no new cases reported...in a 24 hours time frame. But, of course it's still out there...today a few more people will feel bad and go to a big hospital and have a test...then the numbers will be back on the evening news.

The practice here is that if you are a low risk person, then stay home and self-quarantine. The beds and the tests should be for the elderly and sick.
Some schools are letting kids back on a rota system...certain grades for a few hours on certain days. Just gives the parents a break and lets the kids see friends.

But, going around in public you feel some areas are very quiet...and then into a supermarket...and life as normal.
We've walked a lot, shopped and eaten locally.
Our most risky trip was to Costco yesterday, suitably masked-up and using the sanitizer sprays everywhere. Lots of handwashing after that, before and after unpacking the shopping.

Europe and America are entering the CV zone now. My Facebook feed is full of it.

Funny how a month changes things. I sent my step-aunt in the UK an e mail this morning.
My last e mail to her was FEb. 15th...reassuring her that we were ok despite what she was hearing from Japan.
Now a month later, it is me sending HER a mail to check that she and the family are ok.

Stay safe and healthy, wherever you are. Handwash, handwash again.

Living in a State of Emergency

No....not my life with Okaaasan in the same house...which often FELT like a State of Emergency...

The real one. As ordered by the Hokkaido Governor 10 days ago.
Not compulsory, the authorities in Japan haven't gone the way of China...or Italy. 
Yet.

But we were all asked to stay home as much as possible. Refrain from unnecessary travel. Stay away from crowded places..unless we were foolishly doing the toilet paper craziness...schools closed, people working from home, grandparents suddenly working every day for childcare, baseball played in an empty stadium, pop concerts cancelled.

How is it for you, in your part of the world?

The Hokkaido case numbers have crept up over 100, still the highest infection rate in Japan. Hopefully this voluntary restraint period will change that...

Our life has become quieter...but not so different.
I work from home anyway. Dear Son is continuing his TV game show monitoring job. Interspersed with the beer tasting job. Then some shopping and cooking.

We have stayed away from Okaasan.  Apart from falling out of bed one night, she has been fine. The staff said she had no injury and was on the floor laughing when they went in.

Actually our MAIN concern has been one of the cats. A  fight injury (they scrap in the evening when they can't get out and burn off energy) turned bad and we have been to the vets 3 times, with a variety of problems. I'm on lack of sleep mode because of two cats, a barrier at the bedroom door...night time demands.

For me work is about half, or less. Kind of a peaceful time...but if this goes on for longer my finances will look bad. At the moment ok.
Some students coming.
Some students doing SKYPE class.
Some students cancelled because of infection concerns, or busy with grandkids.
No tours at the moment, anyway.

Luckily a large editing job for local government and a tourism leaflet. Very thankful to get that now.

And so...onwards into spring. Usually a hopeful month, spring coming etc.
Although this week is also full of memorial programs on TV about the 9 years ago north-east Japan tsunami/nuclear meltdown crises - another time when all Japan was battling through a disaster.

Oh. And yup, it'll be my birthday.
My birthday month in Japan....not always so good, really.

Stay safe and healthy everyone!

Corona Virus arrives....

Hokkaido, north Japan. My home.

A wonderful land of flowers, sushi, snow and nature...chocolate, cheese, foxes, eagles, onsens, beer...

And Corona Virus.

It arrived here big time last week. One day we were all goggling at the Tv when they said two men who'd worked in the Snow Festival had it....and now only days later there are 56? people who caught it, and two elderly people have died.
Yesterday the Japanese government announced school closures nationwide until April.
My community center classes have been cancelled and private students are switching to Skype...or cancelling. Thank goodness March is the quietest month for tour guide work here....

Hokkaido has far more cases than any other area of Japan.
Is it the cold? The influence of the 1.5 million people who came for 2 weeks for the Sapporo Snow Festival? Foreigners?

All around is quiet. Events are cancelling. Public places are quiet. Masks, hand cleaning sprays, gloves....it's a depressing time.

On Monday this week Okaasan had a fever of 39C

The care home got the doctor in from their hospital downstairs and Dear Son was informed, cut short his planned visit to her.

We fretted.

Next day her fever was down, she was eating and carrying on as normal. MAYBE nothing wrong, just a passing fever that she has sometimes.

Gosh. Hope it stays this way. Apart from the obvious concerns of CV, just moving Okaasan to a different hospital with different people and a whole battery of tests would be awful for her mental condition....

We have decided to stay away from visiting her. Just too much risk of us taking the virus into the care home. Risk to her and the other residents. We are a little surprised that the home hasn't banned outside visitors yet, like they do with Noro Virus.

I've stopped going to the gym. Lots of cute young men stretching and flexing for me to watch (it's mainly used by local high school and college sports guys)...but too worrying with all the shared spaces, sweat and stuff.

Going to do a WHOLE lot of walking in the fresh, hopefully virus-free air!

Yesterday, with no work suddenly, Dear Son and I took advantage of the sunshine and the Seniors Discount day at the local ski area...to ski...

Joking apart. It's a sad time here in Japan.

The third crises I've lived thru here.

The Fukushima earthquake, tsunami and nuclear meltdown.

The Hokkaido earthquake and electricity blackout.

Now: a virus that is hard to spot, can apparently come and go, is probably carried around by people with no-symptoms, very very bad for the elderly and sick.

Debate about wearing masks, or not.

Alcohol sprays

The value of closing all the schools - families all over Japan have a huge childcare problem now. Japanese companies are unlikely to do bring-your-kid-to work.

Yesterday we stopped off at a revolving sushi place. They had compulsory hand sprays at the door and didn't have the little plates on the counter for anyone to take.

But....I watched the young chef take a paper order from a customer...put the paper on the counter and then pick up the fish and rice he was making for someone...all in 10 seconds. He wasn't wearing gloves...

Human to human contact is so easy.

So, Okaasan can stay safely in her care home...Tv, food, day care hours on the 3rd floor, toilet trips...and hopefully stay isolated from all of this.

Where ever you are in the world, stay healthy and safe. Protect weaker members of our society from this thing.

Love and hugs, everyone.

Well, love and waves, maybe.