"Special" Mobile Phones

Normally, mobile phones in Japan can be switched into English mode, so the menus and messages are in English. Unfortunately, the phones Proto Labs provided for Vicky and me are not capable of this. Helpful Japanese people keep telling us that surely they can be changed to English, and collectively, they have spent hours trying to switch them for us.

Today, the director of Dante's school made yet another attempt to switch Vicky's phone to English. She finally called tech support at NTT Docomo to find out what gives. NTT's tech support told her that our phones are special - they were designed for the elderly and the retarded! I'm not entirely sure what that has to do with English menus, but it gave Midori a good laugh when she told Vicky.

I think tomorrow I'll go see what a low-end mobile phone (with English) costs at the Kojima electronics store in Ebina.

Stepfather

I've been listening to the latest CD by the Seventh Gallery (Jim's band). Good stuff. I gave a copy to Ishikawa-san when we visited his house for Shichi-go-san. I was trying to explain that the music was recorded by my stepfather, so I had to look up stepfather in the dictionary. In Japanese, stepfather is Mama Chichi! I kid you not.

Shichi-go-san

Yesterday, we celebrated Shichi-go-san, a Shinto holiday for girls 3 and 7 and 5-year-old boys. Pictures and more info here http://picasaweb.google.com/grout7/20091121ShichiGoSan#

Enoshima

I took Vicky and Dante to Enoshima Sunday. Here are the photos:
http://tinyurl.com/enoshimaVD

Dark Out

Dante taking a picture out the balcony window at night.

Happy Together

Dante took this picture of his parents.

Our apartment seems spacious with nothing in it, but Vicky is wondering if it was wise to send seven boxes of junk from home. We just got them today, but haven't opened them up yet.

Hashi

Dante's first go at chopsticks. He did pretty well.

Yes, he's sitting on the floor at a towel-covered suitcase. But, since this photo was taken, we have bought a few cushions, so we're more comfortable when we gather around the suitcase for our evening repast.