How did I manage to do cooking all those years in Sweden without the number one most fantastic indispensable yet most simple kitchen utensil ever created? What I am talking about? Cooking chopsticks – long wooden chopsticks that have completely transformed my way of cooking and have me enjoy my time in the kitchen like […]
Children are really celebrated in Japan, a dear friend in Sweden pointed out when I explained about the 100 day celebration for our son. I felt it was a very accurate statement, and I found myself noticing that I had not thought about it myself for a long time – perhaps I have already been
At the same time as the second wave of Corona infections is unsettling Tokyo, a heat wave is sweeping through Japan. Even the nights are too hot for a walk outside with our baby, but being in a one room apartment day and night is also not ideal, so we have been taking walks underground
Whether it is my age or the humid summer in Japan I do not know, probably a bit of both, but since moving to Tokyo I have come in contact with skin problems I never had before. Those and the accompanying visits to the doctor, together with all the hospital visits that having a baby
Having been engulfed by the baby bubble, my awareness is now on things I did not think about before (and vice versa I am sure, like having to think really hard to know what day it is). Being a first time father, I have no experience of being in the Swedish baby bubble, so instead
With experience from living in apartments in Sweden, I have been amazed at the quietness of our neighbours in our apartment building (or mansion as we say here). Apart from the front door (I am sorry, I mean the metal sheet covering the entrance to our apartment) which lets through all the sound from anyone
When moving to Japan, I was used to almost never using cash. Many stores and other establishments in Sweden do not even accept cash – you need to pay with a credit card or more recently with your mobile phone. In that way, living in Japan feels like living in the days of my adolescence,
One week with a baby at home has taught me some new Japanese words. First comes lack of sleep, or 寝不足 [nebusoku], where the Chinese characters, kanji, mean something like “sleep non-sufficient”. (I really like the Japanese way of expressing this, although I do not so much like the experience in general.) The last kanji
Names. Names has always fascinated me. I remember when my little sister was born and I had a favourite name that I was trying to convince my parent’s to give her. I really loved that name, and eventually it became my sisters third name – that is how it is in Sweden, you can have
Is this the new normal now? To be afraid of people, to see a city shut down. When going to the supermarket I felt like I was in the middle of a zombie-movie. And I really do not like those – a half deserted town with stores closed and where people are slowly walking, hiding
These days, in times of social distancing and pandemi coping strategies, washing hands is a topic constantly talked and written about; in the news, among friends and family, on noticeboards and in bathrooms (I even saw a youtube video of the Governor of Tokyo showing people how to wash their hands, which impressed me greatly).
Tokyo is under state of emergency and my wife is on maternity leave from today – a beautiful symmetry in the middle of all worry and despair. She has dutifully been going to the office, taking great care to stay as safe as possible. お疲れさま my love. Now finally our maternity leave begins and we