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.

Karaoke (reprise)

Added a few more songs to my repertoire for the care home karaoke.

Last week kicked off with "My Way", then "Top of the World" and then forced Dear Son, by handing him the spare mic, to join me sweetly in the Neil Sedaka song "Close to You".

Las Vegas dates will be announced soon.

Our audience loved it. I think. Clapped along, bobbed heads, smiled when it was done.
That "My Way"...of course well known in Japan. In fact, at karaoke parties it is often the only English song many Japanese men will try. It also has a Japanese version.
But the lyrics. As I warbled my way  thru it to a room of elderly, I realized the lyrics are all about imminent dieing! "the end is near....the final curtain".

Anyway. Okaasan isn't near dieing. At all.
We've visited her twice in the past week. She is sleepy and pretty silent. But fine.
Yesterday, as we sat in the empty cafe area of the care home and hared a can of coffee she really didn't say anything, but looked from him to me and smiled, pulled faces, laughed.
Once she commented on the blue sky out the window, and twice  she appeared about to say something else - but it was gone in a moment. We prattled on about winter and snow, and can coffee companies and karaoke....

Corona Virus has arrived in Japan this week. Many more cases now, and worryingly among people who have had no apparent China contact.
We are washing our hands and hoping to stay healthy.
Of course, if either of us thinks we are at all at risk we won't go to see Okaasan, at all. For us (we hope) it would just be a week of bad sickness and then recovery. For her and everyone in that care home it could easily be fatal.



Meanwhile....here are some pictures of the winter festivals in my part of Japan.
Dear Son and I have enjoyed a rare winter of together time (he is still off ski work), so we've taken in ice and snow statues.



It's been fun to do this kind of stuff. 
I've also done a lot of teaching, a little bit of tour guiding and even the main voice of an upcoming NHK television documentary. If you see a programme about the head chef of the G8 Summit hotel in Mie. Her voice...is my voice!
It was a fun job to do, specially because there were many scenes of gorgeous food being tested and prepped. It was my 2nd main voice job for NHK. Hope to get more.

Anyway. Dear Son and I are off today on a road trip adventure. Camping car and skiing. Hopefully.
But a blizzard is coming, so we don't know how far we will go. Maybe even just our own parking area tonight, if it is very bad!
Maybe time to practice a few more songs for our next performance.

On top of the world...wooo...hoooo

Such a feelin's coming over me....
wooo hoooo!!!!

Karaoke star.
In the care home twice-a-month karaoke club.

We've been going to the Sunday afternoon club...in the staff canteen...with about 12 residents...listening and applauding performances of mostly enka - Japanese, ballads about missed hometowns, rain, bars, women who wait and snowy scenes...lost love, regret and unfulfilled lust.
All of THAT on a Sunday.

Okaasan really seems to enjoy. She claps along...we went to a concert event with two volunteers in kimono singing...and Okaasan loved that too...apart from the three trips we had to make to the toilet with her. The staff had given her an enema in the morning...and we got the results as she relaxed.

Anyway. Suddenly, the organizer of the club approached me yesterday.
Would I like to sing?
Ahhhh...my singing is best done and listened to with a lot of alcohol. Which wasn't available at 3 pm on a Sunday.
I scanned the karaoke machine for something I knew. For something this generation of audience would know...
Madonna? Maybe no.
Queen and Adam Lambert?
Disney songs?

Chose the Carpenters...On Top of the World.....
Which is how I came to be chirping along a la Karen Carpenter in a solo performance in the care home canteen. Dear Son completely refusing to help me out, even though he as a far better voice than me.....Okaasan head bobbing and swaying along.

The oldies seemed to love it...clapped along...it's a popular song in Japan...even people in their 80s have probably heard it somewhere.

I reached the end. Relief. Finished. Done.

Oh...........................da da....Such a Feelin's coming over me...

WHAT???
I'd pressed the Song Choice button twice on the machine.
Pressed by the organiser...I had to do it all a second time...


agggggggggggggggggggghhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh

I am thinking of some Sinatra next time..."My Way"???

Happy New Year!

YES!!!   Still here!!!

Somehow we slipped  from 2019 into 2020 and I never even blogged about it...furiously busy actually doing tour guide work over the so-called winter holidays and hardly time to change socks.

Okaasan. Fine. Hasn't got the influenza yet. Pretty lively when we go to see her.
Not much talking...and walking is shaky.

The last month or two we (or usually Dear Son) has taken her to the karaoke group that meets in the staff dining room of the care home. It is organised by one of the residents, and usually about 10 people get together round the big TV and a few of them sing songs with　microphone.
Okaasan claims she doesn't know any of the songs, but since the average age of the group is 80 and all Japanese, it&S a fair bet that she does know them. She nods her head in time to the music, even claps...and looks happy.

So good.

Dear Son has had some health problems this winter. Not serious, we hope. But he hasn't worked so much and so Okaasan has had weekly visits from him. With me occasionally. 
Near Year Day we went and had sweetened sake and chat. The care home had decorated the walls, finally! And there was special food on the menu.

So. Onwards into 2020. The Year of the Rat!

Really I should blog more. But working life is busy with the teaching and the guiding. So I hardly sit here calmly at the computer and think about this blog. But I WILL try harder this year to average more than once-a-month blog....