Let me sulk in the corner and eat chocolate

November 2022

Daiso, its basically a $1 shop, but think Kmart standard as opposed to The Reject Shop standard. It’s also very similar to Bunnings in that, you go in for one item and come out with a basket full of items you didn’t know you needed. Well, Bob saw a packet of rice crackers that he was super keen to send to a friend back in Australia. It’s one of his favorite types of rice crackers and he wanted to share a bit of Japan with him. Sure, why not? We added it to the ever growing pile of items in the basket.

At home we popped the rice crackers into a padded postal envelope and headed down to the Post Office, kids and Okasan with me. At the post office there were address labels on the counter which Okasan looked though, she said we needed a particular one to send a parcel overseas, but she couldn’t find it, none of them looked right. I was use to writing the address on the parcel and sticking those green customs labels on, but Japan must do things differently. Okasan asked a clerk which label we needed to use. And so began the drama...

With Okasan as the middle man, I find out handwritten labels are not the preferred option anymore. I should go to their website and put the details in and print out a label. Argh! I have my phone with me but still don't have a Japanese sim card. I can only access the internet at home. Okasan didn't bring her phone. I just want to use pen and paper! It was clearly not the preferred way anymore but, almost painfully, they handed over an international address label combined with customs declaration for me to fill out. I fill it out and pass the parcel to the clerk. They put it on the scales and weigh it. Punching numbers into the computer I watch the screen. I know the rice crackers are super light so I’m not very nervous. ¥3,100. Crumbs. That’s over $30! After all this drama, do I just take it all back? But my heart is soft for my son who has moved across seas and left friends behind. I hand over ¥3,100. This is the first and it will be THE LAST ¥100 packet of rice crackers that I ship to Australia!

I take the information brochure on using their website for printing labels for international parcels. No doubt I'll be posting something again, it just won't be ¥100 rice crackers!

That night Shujin almost died when I told him how much I spent on postage… “Do you realise how many hours I had to work to pay for that postage??!!!”

I was very repentant and said I wouldn’t do it again.

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It’s 9:30pm and I’m pouring over websites, multiple tabs open, looking for flights to Australia or Korea. It felt like I had plenty of time before our 3 month holiday visa expired for Missy and I, but Shujin had his finger on the pulse and realised that we really needed to be organising something. Missy and I will need to leave Japan and come back in so we don’t overstay the holiday visas. We won’t be able to get the Certificate of Eligibility in time to apply for a long stay visa. Our visas expire early January… what terribly bad timing! Tickets are SO expensive for weeks either side! I’m annoyed with myself for not thinking about that when booking tickets to come to Japan. If we had of left Australia just a few weeks later it would have been so much cheaper for Missy and I to do a short flight out of Japan and back again!

Shujin suggested that I leave early December when prices are cheaper, and stay in Australia for 2 months so we can get cheaper flights back. Are you kidding me? Missy just started school!!! I didn’t want to pull her out for 2 months!! And I just got you back again. We were living separate for 3 months while Shujin was in Japan after his father’s death, and the kids and I in Australia. I really didn’t want to live separately again, and so soon!

Shujin’s stress was now also mine, and as I looked up every airline website I could think of, and kept finding inflated prices for the Christmas/New Year period, I was not only stressed, but depressed. It all got too much and not even tears released the pain. So I quit. I just couldn’t make a decision about what to do. Closing the laptop lid I wanted to close away the problems and not have to deal with them, but have them magically go away somehow.

I went to bed with nothing solved.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

It’s a cleaning day, again. With highs and lows. Highs because we cleared out stuff, but lows because we didn’t clear all the stuff I was expecting to! We attacked the last room to be done in our home, the tatami room. I didn’t expect to finish the room since we have to replaster the walls and replace the flooring. But I was hoping we might at least clear the room out so we could use it, and that would be awesome! We would be able to eat around a table rather than crowd into the kitchen, eating on the floor!

Shujin’s father was an avid photographer. He had several cameras and in order to protect them from the humid summers he had a special storage cupboard with controlled humidity. As we were cleaning out this cupboard Missy saw a film canister and thought it was chocolate! Instead of getting chocolate she got a history lesson, haha!

Somehow we got distracted and momentarily the tatami room was forgotten while we focused on the two fridges outside. We needed to move and throw out the old spare fridge which had a broken thermostat, and put the “new” old fridge in its place. But Shujin decided he didn’t want to chuck out the 30 year old fridge when we have two others... TWO! Like this house-built-for-two needs THREE fridges! He wants to keep it for storage, like rice.... Just throw out the damn fridge!

So now I'm sulking in the corner of the tatami room, behind the camera cupboard, guiltlessly eating my Aussie Toblerone chocolate. He’s outside trying to move fridges…

I’ll probably be grateful for the fridge one day… The room didn’t finish getting cleared out that day. And no, I didn’t share my chocolate.