And the papers want to know whose shirts you wear

Now it’s time to leave the capsule if you dare

We’re in! I’d already done the work of getting the spouse visa so the immigration official didn’t really have to ask for anything else. She printed off my “Foreigner registration card” and off we went.

My in-laws have been great in setting us up in the spare flat that they have. Could not have asked for a softer landing when moving to a new country. Since we have an address to our name, it was off to the local council office to get ourselves properly registered at that address. Address registration papers in hand, it was off to the bank to open an account. I guess I’m so used to opening most accounts online that it felt like a bit of a faff to have to sit with a bank employee for about an hour while she went through opening our accounts. But still, we walked out with account opened and cash cards in hand. Not too bad for being in the country only two days.

The next step to getting set up in a new country of course is to get a mobile phone. Nozomi was going to get a new handset, so it was fairly straightforward. I didn’t fancy carrying around two phones, so I had brought a dual-SIM phone with me. The shop staff had no clue, but called the network support who thought it should work. Long story short, it didn’t work despite an hour of sitting there and going through every setting option. We had to go back the next day and explain the same thing to another person in the same shop. Turns out the Japanese don’t really do 14 day cooling-off periods, and cancellation like the UK so it looked like I would have to pay a cancellation fee. Another hour later and quite forcefully explaining that the network staff had told us it would work, we managed to get the contract cancelled without paying a massive fee.

Some more internet research informed us that it was one particular network - au Mobile which is extremely fussy about what phones it allows on to its network. So we crossed them off the list and then had to find a cheap alternative on one of the other networks. DoCoMo is the one with the most options compared to SoftBank. SoftBank currently only offer their network themselves. DoCoMo on the other hand, have companies piggybacking on their network and reselling the service. So there is a lot of competition and some good offers. The nearest shop where we could get a SIM was about an hour away. Since I’ve resumed work, that would have to wait for the weekend.

Meanwhile, the in-laws had arranged an evening out for an onsen (温泉 - Japanese hot spring) and dinner at the hotel where my sister-in-law works. Now the onsen might take some getting used to, maybe more so for Indians than for someone brought up in the UK, but I do really enjoy them now. There are separate men and women sections - you go in, and there are rows of washing areas. You wash yourself first, and then with the little wash towel to cover yourself you head to the baths. These are all shared, and you get in (leave the wash towel on the side or on your head) and soak in the lovely hot bath. The first time I went to one of these I felt a bit awkward, but got over it fairly quickly. It’s less awkward than some gym showers in the UK where you have showers about 2 feet apart.

One thing we’ll have to find a solution to is what to cook! I’ve been absolutely spoilt living in the UK with the range of groceries available. We used to cook a range of food from all around the world. Maybe it’s the small town we’re in at the moment, but there is very limited choice in the supermarket for anything other than Japanese cuisine. And while I’m not sure about people saying Japan is expensive in general, the vegetables certainly seem to be expensive. In the week we’ve been here we’ve had pasta one night, and I made an aubergine curry last night. But trying to manage breakfast, lunch, and dinner with Japanese ingredients is proving to be difficult. Things we take for granted, like wraps, are not available and neither are lentils. Hopefully Tokyo will have more choice, but I suppose it will push us to be more creative in what we cook :-)

In other things to get set up, Nozomi had to get herself a new computer since she likes desktops and couldn’t cart her old iMac over from the UK. It needed replacing anyway, since it was quite old and not quite up to the job any more. I tried to persuade her away from the fruit company but she’s quite used to OSX so a new iMac it was. As you can see, she is quite pleased with it.

Well, what do you know! We found another supermarket near us that has chana dal, red lentils, and chickpeas! Nozomi also saw some naan in one of the other supermarkets. There isn’t a wide range of autumn veg though, so we’re on a slightly carb heavy diet at the moment.

Saturday was off to get the SIM card sorted so I now have a working Japanese number. And I have data so I can join the other travellers on the trains in having my face buried in my phone rather than risk eye contact :-)
Sunday was a nice sunny day and Nozomi suggested we go to a local mountain that I wanted to visit. Luckily for us the in-laws have a spare car so a 30 minute drive saw us at Daiyu-zan (大雄山). Nozomi has been to Daiyu-zan before but never in the autumn. We were treated to some fantastic colours amongst the temples and towering cedar trees. It’s a beautiful place that’s well worth a visit any time of year.

Seems like a long post, but it was a long week! Not much has been happening this week apart from work. We’re off to Tokyo on Saturday to view a couple of flats so more updates to come. It’s going to be such a massive shock to the system looking at tiny little Tokyo flats.