Ants in our Pants

Within a week of arriving, we had to get out of dodge. Nagoya is great, but having been flattened by World War II, it has zero aesthetic appeal. As my wonderful brother Josh has a place in Kyoto, we went to visit him and see the famous Aoi Matsuri (Hollyhock) Festival in Kyoto. Hollyhocks are literally woven throughout the festival parade. It is a festival that dates back to the 6th century. Although clearly not as exciting or beautiful as the roach motel, it was incredible to watch. We sat off of a gravel road in this lucious Kyoto park with light just dribbling through the leaves.

Click on the link below to see the photos... sorry if there are too many. The best are of the geishas towards the end.


http://www.kodakgallery.com/I.jsp?c=gbr2yrd.7k5zru29&x=0&y=97j7dz

Japan!

Japan rocks. it is fascinating. The way people dress, what they eat, their seeming obsession with germs and cleanliness, the tv shows, the cartoons everywhere, the hairstyles, the apparent whirlpool of anxiety that bubbles beaneath the smiling facade of the average Japanese... we are eating it all up.

Carlos is in school and is funnier than ever. He comes home with new tricks and funny things to say every day. His first week he came home, walked in the door, sat down and said "OK!", got up and sat down in a different spot in the apartment and said "OK!" and did that two more times in varying locations. I guess they do that before they have a snack at school... so he was letting us know he was ready for a snack or an activity or something!

The school is so sweet and bright and clean. You have to take off your shoes even to walk down the outside entryway... no dirt anywhere.

We have seen many beautiful and strange things since we got here. I am hoping to share some of those things in this blog. It will be simple with some photos and stories, maybe a video or two... but not much else. I hope you like reading it between refreshing your cnn.com or perezhilton.com pages. I am calling it the Deaf Anthropologist, if you did not already figure it out, because I have no idea what anyone is saying, so my concluusions about what is happening culturally are about as accurate as those would be from a deaf anthropologist... not so accurate.

Big Kiss to everyone.

Jenny

Now THIS is a Roach Motel

So... we arrive to our beautiful Japanese apartment. It is big enough, pretty enough, and well laid out enough to live in for six months.t is bright and has one of those toilets that you can heat up the seat, splash your rear with some warm water or get a jet-stream like enema. The place is fabulous, except for one minor problem....



Fortunately, we found some toxic gas to fog the entire apartment (what are a few SAT points for Carlos?) and the most beautiful roach motel I have ever seen. There is no roach anywhere that t not be excited to see this thing. I mean look at the features...








It has its own pet cat, the guy hanging out of the window is clearly having the time of his life. The curtains are lovely, and inside... there are fruit flavored multi-colored sprinkles all over the floor. What bug would not find this irrisistible? I can hardly stop myself from crawling in.

But now we are roach/bug free (only killing one or two a day...arigato goizamas, roaches.