Summer holidays and 36 degrees outside – what can top going to a cool (and cool) museum, exploring art, culture and history together with your 5 year old son? Well, I would say going with your son and wife! This summer we have had the chance to do quite a few things together as a […]
Summer holidays are here and so are summer colds. Even before the holidays started my son got a fever and while he has been sick, the two of us have spend our days indoors trying to make the time as interesting as we can. Since it has been 35 degrees outside, a week inside a
While the summer days in Kyushu are like a wet sauna, the evenings are actually quite enjoyable. Even going out with the trash after the dishes are finished is a pleasure, but nothing beats an evening trip to the beach. In July the water in the sea is on the warmer side but still cool
Following the watermelon story from last year, time has come for a new story. A few weeks ago I wrote about the Japanese mythological being kappa and a red fish that I saw in the pond close by where kappa is rumored to live. When I asked my son to make a story about them,
It has only been a few weeks since we went to play at the beach. This time the weather was perfect, like a beautiful Swedish summer’s evening. The sand was cool and the water inviting for a barefoot stroll at the edge of the calm sea. Evenings like this always bring a sense of rest
The weeks leading up to our son’s fifth birthday has been all about dinosaurs and Pokémon. Ever since we went for ice cream at the local shopping mall last summer and my son saw the Pokémon ice cream cakes they had on display, he has been taking about wanting to have a Pokémon birthday cake
Space has been a topic of daily conversation in our family the last few months. We have been talking about the space station, space ships, planets, asteroids and meteoroids, and our latest addition are black holes. Our son has taken a great interest in black holes, and he keeps asking me so many questions that
It was supposed to be a beautiful weekend, warm but not hot, clear skies and the air full of spring. Our son had got a pamphlet from his kindergarten about an event in a little seaside village where children’s activities as well as a chance to go for a ride on a boat were on
A little boy can find playtime everywhere, any time. Empty toilet paper rolls become bowling pins in the hallway. The slices of bread takes the shapes of boats, fishes, rockets and moons all while being eaten. The soap and schampoo bottles in the shower are being used as materials to make a sculpture on top
When I moved to Japan I got convinced that moving to another country will, like nothing else, make you see things you have never seen, think about things you have never thought about, experience things you would never dream of experiencing. And I was stuck in that belief until I became a dad. Since then,
Having devoted the last two posts to travel, why not follow up with a little pottery post. Arita is an town in Saga-prefecture, Kyushu, famous for its porcelain. The tradition of porcelain dates back to the 17th century and the Arita ware, particularly the blue and white porcelain, is a well known export product of
Picking up where the last post left off, on the second day of our little Oita week-end trip. After the first day’s hot springs and harmony, we embarked on a day with hot springs and hell. In Beppu, a town famous for its many onsen, there is a collection of seven hot springs called Beppu