HI, ladies!
It is Tuesday, January 27, 2009, and has been rather warm.
Plum, thank you for your writing on this Blog in Sydney in spite of your unimaginably hectic days! You might have so little time, but take care of yourself as much as your daughter and two little princes.
Last Sunday I took a STEP test. Greatly thanks to Alice’s lessons, I could feel a little easier than the last time at reading section. On the contrary, listening section was rather difficult, because I had little time to choose correct answers. I found those questions required both listening and quick-reading skills.
Sunflower, your parodies of President Obama’s speech were fantastic, weren’t they? I like them!
So, see you next. Bye!
8 comments:
Hi, ladies!!!
It’s Tuesday, January 27, 2009 today and it showered in the morning and early in the afternoon, but it cleared up and eventually the sun came out and now it is quite sunny in Sydney. It is light until around 8 o’clock, since it is summer here.
My daughter, her sons and I left home for the East Garden shopping complex, which is 5 or 6 minute drive away from her flat, just to buy some vegetables, some fruit, wipes and few other things at around a half past ten, but we got back home at almost 4 o’clock!!! The main reason why it took such a long time to do the shopping was that she bumped into a couple of friends, who were almost of her age, being married to Australian men and having three small children respectively, in a room for breast-feeding and they talked, talked, talked there. One friend has three sons, perhaps, three years, two years and a half year old. The other has a two year old daughter and week old twins, girl and boy.
I have met several friends of hers here this time, and all of them have two small kids or more, which gave me the impression that Japanese mothers were contributing to the increase of the birth rate at least here in Sydney, most of them are married to local men though.
My life here at the moment is extremely unpredictable—I don’t know what is going to happen next, but I think I am beginning to enjoy this chaotic lifestyle, which is uncanny to myself. Kenjin, nearly three months old, sometimes smiles to me and appears to try to talk to me, moving his tiny lips, which are incredibly so cute.
Yujin, one and a half years old, loves to watch Australian or Japanese DVDs for small children, with me holding him on my lap. He sometimes asks me to dance with him, to the tune of music from the DVD, and so I dance with him in the way he likes, answering his request.
Yoji, my daughter’s husband has just come home from work, and so we are going to have dinner together. Goodbye, my precious friends. I really hope all of you are having a good time in Japan.
Hi, ladies!!!
It’s Wednesday, January 28, 2009 today and it’s has been a beautiful summer day in Sydney. The sky was just blue without any clouds, and I was totally enchanted by this lovely weather.
Thank you, Cherry, for letting us know about the test you had on Sunday. Listening comprehension is always difficult, isn’t it? But I am very happy to hear that you were less nervous about the test, which is wonderful.
During the daytime I was only with Kenjin, since my daughter and Yujin were gone to a northern suburb to visit a friend of hers (my daughter is very good at making friends and it seems she has friends all over Sydney). So I had a lot of time to think, simply feeding him at intervals of 2 or 3 hours, changing nappies whenever necessity arose, and cuddling him whenever he became grumpy and cried, although I had no time to do something else.
I just thought to myself how predictable my life in Nagoya was. In the morning I do whatever house chores I have to do and then, sitting at the desk, start the day’s work. When lunch time comes up, I stand up, fix lunch for myself and eat it, watching CNN.
Following that, I again sit in front of my PC and do my afternoon research work. When evening comes, I rise to my feet and begin to get ready for supper. What a mundane life it is!!!
Here at my daughter’s place unexpected happenings occur so abruptly that I have to be very careful. The other evening, when I was handing over Yujin to my daughter in the bathtub so as for her to bathe him, possibly I was not careful enough: No sooner had I got my hands off him, believing that I had handed him to her, Yujin slipped and fell into the bath water. Of course instantly he started to scream. Oh, my goodness. What am I supposed to do?
Anyway, my daughter picked him up quickly and so he stopped crying. I was relieved that he did not hurt himself.
Every day I have new experiences like that, and sometimes they tire me out, but I am still OK.
How about you? Are you having a good time, my precious friends? Sleep well and have some sweet dreams…
Hello, Cherry and my Friends.
I enjoy reading an everyday story of Plum struggling with her little grandsons, Yujin and Kenjin in Sydney. I also admired active, powerful and energetic mother of Urara who had a wide rage of friend network.
It is really true that once women become mothers, they grow stronger.
My daughter-in-law, Yuko gave birth to a boy this afternoon. She was caused artificial labor by intravenous drip because her due day has already passed over a week.
My son was ready to join and help his wife when she was on the verge of having a baby. We rushed to the hospital, which is five minutes’ drive from our house, to meet our grandson who was still in a deliver room. He was sleeping comfortably just next to his mother in a delivery bed. His name is Taiga (大嘉).
Later my son told us that he was so moved to see his wife exerting all her powers in pushing her baby. We’re very pleased to see my son growing into a responsible father. And I'm very happy to see Yuko to be fine after her delivery.
Plum, thank you for Miho’s blog site. I successfully accessed hers, enjoying reading her English messages. I suppose she must be a very talented woman. I’ll try to make contact with her.
I’m now doing all I can to create my essay. I’d like to express how and why Takeko desired to build a higher educational institute so earnestly and passionately as an acting president of Buddhist Women’s Association.
I challenged to translate some important part from a prospectus made by her, which highlighted the urgent necessity of women’s university with the spirit of Buddhism.
There were few universities based on the Buddhist principles advocated by Shinran. While there were several universities with the spirit of Christianity in Kyoto and Tokyo. She seemed to have a tremendous responsibility to contribute to the nation and society through building an academic institution focused on Buddhist creed.
I was presented a beautiful yellow potted orchid named "Fortuna", which decorated my study room. Yellow is my favorite color,givig me a great deal of energy.
Good-by, my precious friends.
See you tomorrow.
Did I make a mistake?
My comment is gone.
I found it. It was in the post you wrote on January 13. Excuse me.
Dear Cherry and friends
Cherry, thank you for telling us about the STEP test. I'm keeping my fingers crossed for you.
I'm glad to hear from Plum. I heard BBC tell the temperature in Australia is 40 degrees today. Please keep cool.
Sunflower, thank you for mentioning our website. Please tell your friends the address:
http://uk.geocities.com/nagoya_wsrg/
I hope they will enjoy reading our essays.
Yesterday, I gave a presentation about my report and submitted the report to prof. Ueno. She sent us e-mail today, telling our reports were not done yet. We're going to meet again in the middle of next month and give presentation again.
Last night, I met Shibuya san who is one of the representatives of Sankaku Planet which manages Tsunagaretto. I told her that NWSRG will have a talk show on March 8th. She remembered it, saying sorry about the system trouble that happened when we made a reservation for a room. However, she advised me that we might have to make sure that it is reserved. Cosmos, could you check it out?
As for Essays, our group meeting is this Friday.
Talk to you later.
Good night.
January 29, 2009 1:32 AM
Let me make an excuse. I posted there because I was checking the title of the book Rose mentioned.
Seems I bought the final one sold for one yen. Sorry for that, too.
Hi Cherry and friends,
It is Thursday, January 29, and a beautiful and gorgeous morning without any cloud, which makes me happy just like Plum, of cause the temperature is a big difference. But according to the weather forecast, it will be getting warmer in the daytime like in Spring.
It is so wonderful to hear from Plum about the busy life in Sydney. I was wondering about your health because I heard the news of heat wave over Australia. But I’m relieved to know that you are enjoying the fine weather and very active with your grandsons. How exciting it is to take care of small children! I can imagine how fast your time is flying. I’m waiting to hear the next story, what kind of unexpected new things will happen to you.
Congratulations!! Sunflower. It’s great that both mother and baby are healthy. Now, you have two cute grandsons, your daughter’s son and your son’s. And you will have one more grandchild in March, won’t you? You must be very excited.
I’m going to see my mother-in-law in the hospital this morning and then go to work.
Have a nice day, my precious friends.
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