5th letter
Wed. 6/21/06
So here we are, another week. While bryan’s family enjoys a week at lake powell we call a hotel room home. Blah. We were notified that our unaccompanied baggage is here – which is the stuff that we could send of under 750 lbs. by plane to get here within 30 days instead of 60, like the rest of our stuff. We weighed everything and thought we put it within 50 lbs. of the limit, but it ended up only being 536 lbs. oh well. We sent all our kitchen stuff and scrapbooks and a lot of the rest of clothes in that shipment. But it doesn’t really do us a lot of good now because we have another 2 and ½ weeks til move in. and our COMPUTER is in that shipment too, which is what I want the most. People told us fast-speed internet here was $60-70, but they just came out with a new service called DSL-light for $40, and your speed is just capped at like 1.5 megabytes. Anyways.
They sell alcohol and cigarettes in vending machines here. Kinda interesting. Legal age here is 20. and that’s it. No 18 vs. 21 for different sorts of products like in the U.S. but you can’t drive here til 18.
6 mos pregnant today!
We celebrated our 3-yr anniversary on Monday, june 19th. Bryan got the day off. Apparently they let you have either your birthday or your anniversary off every year. And seeing as his birthday is already passed… we went out to eat at a place off base called new miyaki. The waitress could speak English so that was really nice. I struggled with the chopsticks and decided I should carry a fork around with me. Bryan’s food was good – he got beef chopsuey. Mine was not – simmered pork over rice. Big ‘ol slabs of pork that tasted weird. What a waste.
We went to a fast food place called sukiya last Saturday, off base, and that was pretty good and decently priced. Not a big fan of “miso soup” – I think there was a lot of seaweed in it. It’s interesting, here when you’re ready to order you have this little bubble thing in front of you and you push the button and it makes a loud ring noise up on an electronic reader-board thing. Bryan likes it.
We were finally able to go to church on Sunday - that was SO nice. (last Sunday we went over to the main base chapel cuz once upon a time that’s where lds.org said it was when we first looked, but they weren’t there, just all the other denominations getting ready for their meetings and stuff). Cuz last week I found out that the branch president is on leave til july and has been pretty much since we’ve been here, so that’s why we haven’t been able to get a hold of him, our only contact. I kept calling the office # for the church at all different times and no one ever picked up. So Saturday we went over to the reception desk in the hotel to have them help us find the address that we had for the church (which was like 1-59-6 Hon machi…. Hmmm). They didn’t know. And one of them was Japanese. Very helpful. So she looks up the church and finds the office # - lo and behold someone picks up! She talks to them in Japanese for awhile and then hands the phone over to us and tells us he is American. So the guy tells us they’re right by the train station in town. With some prodding the desk clerk at the hotel told us how to get to the train station. Anyways, we drove there Saturday and obviously found it. The parking lot is tiny, but it ended up being a good-sized branch! (I’ll have to ask what the numbers actually are) Everyone just sort of has to block each other in when parking. They didn’t hand out any kind of treat or anything for father’s day. Which I thought was interesting. People were very very nice and a lot of them talked to us. Bryan thought it the nicest ward we’ve been to so far. It was really nice though – something constant in our lives. We may be in a totally different country, in a completely different atmosphere with the military; but the church, the gospel, is always the same. It’s awesome to be able to lean on that.
Monday I was a complete klutz. I fell down the stairs at this massage place we were checking out off base. My right ankle has developed more into a “cankle,” and it has swelled and bruised up like it would if I had sprained it – which I didn’t. man does it hurt though. I guess I missed the last stair before the stairs turn and keep going, and landed hard on the edge of the next stair, with the side of my ankle/shin. Ouch. Bryan was in front of me and missed the show. Later that night I was going into our room and it was dark, and I turned the corner and forgot about the closet door that you have to go around as well, and smacked my head right into it. Nice.
Then Tuesday, yesterday, at the boys’ softball game I was chosen to do the book, so I was getting the line-up from the other team and got hit by one of the softballs they were warming up with. Luckily though, I was turned and it hit me in the back – kidney area. Just great.
Our address by the way, which most of you don’t need, is:
PSC 76 BOX 6652
APO, AP 96319-0045
Yes just 2 lines. I guess it’s just like sending a letter within the states, so that’s all the postage you need. Psc stands for postal service center, just in case you were wondering.
2 wks from Friday we get to move in. someone has to be there from 8am-5pm. So that will be a real fun day for me, and we’ll have to check out of the hotel in the early hours. Sometime in that time slot they deliver your temporary furniture and if you miss them you get charged quite a bit. At 1pm an inspector comes and you go thru every little stain and all with him. Cuz I guess when you move out they charge per stain. Eesh.
I was thinking it might be nice to teach English at night if bryan ends up working swing shift. I’ve been talking to this girl at the softball games (wife of the guy bryan works with who runs the team) and last game I caught that she does that. I was gonna talk to her about it yesterday but she had her baby yesterday in the early morning hours. 2 wks early. But her boy was still 7lbs.-something. I’m sure she was excited – just last week she was talking about that it needed to be over and she wanted to be induced. She was pretty big.
It’s getting warmer – a few days it’s gotten into the 70’s.
Jenni was asking about the speed limit – no it’s not always 40mph – on base the fastest you go is like 30mph (and that’s for only one stretch of road between the main base and the north area – usually it’s only like 24mph and 18mph), and off base the fastest roads are only like 42mph – those are like the toll roads, which are like their freeways here I guess. Off base around town they have one speed limit: 40km – a whopping 24mph, but it seems fast cuz the roads are so dang small.
While we were waiting for new miyaki to open for dinner on Monday, we walked around town a bit. We went and bought a snickers at a circle k and the cashier kept saying stuff to us – HELLO WE DON’T UNDERSTAND YOU. The snickers was expensive! – 121 yen, which was like a $1, sheesh.
anyways, i'll stop for now. love you guys
julie, bryan, and the belly pusher
Wednesday, June 21, 2006
Sunday, June 18, 2006
6/18/06 - Bryan's email
hey there. so i guess i need to sit down and write an email since everyone thinks that julie is the only one that is doing any work around here. sheesh. i go to work for like 8 hours a day then i still have to come home and write all my peeps about what i did. I figure if i keep julie informed then she'll keep everone else informed. its a pretty good system.
i liked the picture of auden under the stroller. gotta start her out right. i'm excited to have my own, but mine's a boy so he'll like that kinda stuff. plus i won't have to worry about hair and dresses and jewelry. all in all its a better deal to have a boy. Sorry cody.
the jobs cool. we had a tour come through about 2 weeks ago. it was a bunch of cadets from the academy. bunch of punk kids. i think they were all seniors but they all looked way young. its weird to think that these kids will be the leaders of tomorrow. makes me think that i could do that job. the one girl came into the shop the next day because she is going to be a maintenance officer in good ol' wichita falls. but they came through and we ran the engine for them. then they let them go inside the actual cell when the engine was running with full after burner. well i tagged along so i could see. we had ear plugs in and ear muffs and it was still loud. its amazing the power that these put out. with the after burner these engines put out about 25,000 lbs of thrust. the amount of air they move is nuts!. when i was in the cell it rumbled all of my guts. it was litterally sucking the air out of my nose. thats the closest anybody can get to that experience without actually jumpimg in the cockpit. I can't even imagine what it would be like to fly one of those. awesome.
i'm sure julie told you all about our moving experince. it wasn't fun but i guess its par for us when we have to move. i expect that when the 7th of july rolls around it will be raining then.
i found out the other day that all of the training that i did in tech school i have to go over again here. its part of my upgrade training. i'm not too happy about it but it'll be nice to review a bunch of things so that i feel more comfortable with them. but i love what i'm doing and it gives me a lot of time to get the things done that need to be done.
so i'm ready for the kid to get here. I'm bored with julie already. i need to someone else to play with. just jokin' but i guess it'll be awhile before i can wrestle with him. oh well. julie gave me my "father's" day present. key word is father. it was some onsies, some burp rags, some bibs and a video game. she made me breakfast in bed too. its hard to enjoy a nice morning in bed when church is at 9 and it takes 10 minutes to get there. but it was good. tomorrow i have off and i think we'll just relax or maybe go get a massage. it'll be good.
I tried to get a hold of dad today too but no go. it went straight to voicemail. i guess by the time you get this it will be a week later. i hope you guys had fun and the drama wasn't too much to handle. i wish we could have been there. julie figured out the other day that it would cost us about $3000 to come back to the states. so we need to plan our time wisely. I'm sure we'll make it back some time we just don't know when right now.
well that about does it for this letter. I should be able to write some more next 'preparation day' :) i hope all is well and i'll write later.
peace out
Bryan
i liked the picture of auden under the stroller. gotta start her out right. i'm excited to have my own, but mine's a boy so he'll like that kinda stuff. plus i won't have to worry about hair and dresses and jewelry. all in all its a better deal to have a boy. Sorry cody.
the jobs cool. we had a tour come through about 2 weeks ago. it was a bunch of cadets from the academy. bunch of punk kids. i think they were all seniors but they all looked way young. its weird to think that these kids will be the leaders of tomorrow. makes me think that i could do that job. the one girl came into the shop the next day because she is going to be a maintenance officer in good ol' wichita falls. but they came through and we ran the engine for them. then they let them go inside the actual cell when the engine was running with full after burner. well i tagged along so i could see. we had ear plugs in and ear muffs and it was still loud. its amazing the power that these put out. with the after burner these engines put out about 25,000 lbs of thrust. the amount of air they move is nuts!. when i was in the cell it rumbled all of my guts. it was litterally sucking the air out of my nose. thats the closest anybody can get to that experience without actually jumpimg in the cockpit. I can't even imagine what it would be like to fly one of those. awesome.
i'm sure julie told you all about our moving experince. it wasn't fun but i guess its par for us when we have to move. i expect that when the 7th of july rolls around it will be raining then.
i found out the other day that all of the training that i did in tech school i have to go over again here. its part of my upgrade training. i'm not too happy about it but it'll be nice to review a bunch of things so that i feel more comfortable with them. but i love what i'm doing and it gives me a lot of time to get the things done that need to be done.
so i'm ready for the kid to get here. I'm bored with julie already. i need to someone else to play with. just jokin' but i guess it'll be awhile before i can wrestle with him. oh well. julie gave me my "father's" day present. key word is father. it was some onsies, some burp rags, some bibs and a video game. she made me breakfast in bed too. its hard to enjoy a nice morning in bed when church is at 9 and it takes 10 minutes to get there. but it was good. tomorrow i have off and i think we'll just relax or maybe go get a massage. it'll be good.
I tried to get a hold of dad today too but no go. it went straight to voicemail. i guess by the time you get this it will be a week later. i hope you guys had fun and the drama wasn't too much to handle. i wish we could have been there. julie figured out the other day that it would cost us about $3000 to come back to the states. so we need to plan our time wisely. I'm sure we'll make it back some time we just don't know when right now.
well that about does it for this letter. I should be able to write some more next 'preparation day' :) i hope all is well and i'll write later.
peace out
Bryan
Wednesday, June 14, 2006
6/14/06 - 4th Letter
4th letter
Wed. 6/14/06 - 11:10am Japan time
There are 10-20 earthquakes here every year. I felt my first one ever in my life Monday morning at 8:05am. Woke me up ‘cuz my bed starting rocking back and forth (we’re on the 4th floor of the hotel). It was crazy! Apparently they have their building on rollers here now. People feel them all the time and it’s not a big deal at all. I guess we’re on a huge fault line. I think this one was a 6-something on the Richter scale but it was in southern japan and then there was an aftershock nearby us in the ocean. I don’t know, I think that’s what bryan said his peeps said at work.
I found out last week that the total weight of all our stuff was about 4700 lbs. Our limit was just under 5700. so we were good there.
so monday we had to switch hotel rooms. but not only rooms, we had to switch buildings. now checkout is noon and checkin 2pm. but we had stuff in fridge and freezer. what the heck am i supposed to do with all our stuff in between, by myself, cuz bryan is at work. we had 5 suitcases, 6 bags of food, 2 backpacks, all his uniforms on hangers, etc. not only did we have a lot of stuff, but we were on the 4th floor and the elevator was broken. of course - it's us, and we're moving. that's how things go on our moving days. so we couldn't bring up the luggage carrier. bryan went and talked to the front desk during his lunch and they changed our checkout to 1pm and said they'd get housekeeping in the room we were waiting on as soon as the people checked out. then he went back to work at 12:30. at quarter-to 1pm i found out about the room being in another building. i called bryan at work cuz there's no way i could do this on my own, and they let him come home for the day. after bryan made several trips down the stairs with all our stuff and i could help him on the last load (our room keys were already deactivated so i stayed in the room with all our stuff) we went to the other bldg and our room was on the 2nd floor and no elevator in the bldg. needless to say by this time i was very frustrated with the hotel. we wondered why we couldn't have stayed in our room and whoever was scheduled to be in it, to be put in the room we were moving to...?!?! whatever. this other room is smaller, but the setup slightly smarter. i could only see the top half of my face in the bathroom mirror in our first room. honestly who puts mirrors that high!! there was nowhere to put your food and the bathroom was cramped. the view was kind of cool, but i forgot to take a picture of it, sorry. the room we're in now is $14 less a night (even though that makes no difference to us cuz it's reimbursed), the bed is smaller (full-size instead of queen -- we can't wait to get our bed!), there's no disposal!, and NO DISHWASHER!!!!!!!! ahhh i thought we'd had the last of that when we moved away from wichita falls! i told bryan we were going to go buy paper products for our dishes. cuz besides that, in the cupboards they only have 2 bowls and like 3 plates, etc. the bedroom was pretty cramped but with a little bit of furniture movement by me, it's do-able. we will be in this room almost 4 wks. yay.
bryan's typical work schedule right now is 6am to 3pm. on mondays, wednesdays, and fridays, he has physical training (PT) where they all run and whatever and he comes back home about 10 min to 7am or so and then has to be back at work at 8. then an hour lunch. so i thought that was kind of interesting - that they don't add hrs onto your day to accomodate for it, you just have less work hrs. how much "work" he's actually been doing though... i guess they can't do much with him yet cuz he has to attend a few safety trainings and stuff first. today he's at the maintenance safety training i think. but like i said before, they have a lot of down time, so they've been fixing mowers and weed eating and stuff. nice huh. starting the 26th he has FTAC (first term airman something) which all new peeps have to go to when it's your first base. it's 2 wks long. after that i think he might actually "go to work." he has 5 or 6 tests he has to do for his "upgrade" training that he has a month for each to do. (of course if he wants to study for his officer test he's got to do them in about 2 mos probably). but they've said he will most likely be on swing shift, which is 3-11pm mon-fri. maybe they stay til midnight i'm not sure. they have the same thing with PT days, where from 3-5pm they're exercising and then going home to shower. also, i've seen some of the swing shift guys at the softball games at night, so i think they let them go for that too! and then they go back to work afterwards. i think. but that's cool.
the "mongolian" restaurant that we went to last saturday (the viking), is NOT mongolian. it was very interesting. you have like this small circular grill built into the middle of the table and you go to an interesting-ly set-up buffet bar. where they had the raw meats for you to cook. they had like pork tongue and pork intestines...almost accidentally grabbed those before i read the label. they had other stuff that was cooked - like mini corn dogs and cinnamon noodles-(yeah what the heck i don't know). but they definitely had some good stuff - the regular noodles were gross, so it was mainly a rice thing. i'm not good with chopsticks so luckily they had some forks otherwise i would have starved to death. bryan resorted to a fork as well. so it was decent but not worth $15 each we decided.
bryan wants to drive somewhere this weekend, i guess his supervisor's been talking about some lighthouses or something, so we will see.
this whole baby thing is already making me physically uncomfortable, so i'm scared to find out how bad it's going to be the last 2 months. i guess i'm 23 weeks today. i need to get back into the gym cuz at night when i'm trying to sleep my lower back kills me and it's hard to find a comfortable position. my body takes forever to wind down and usually after laying in bed 2 hrs i can fall asleep. but there is a definite difference in the belly shape since we've been here in japan.
i think that's all for now. if you have questions let me know and i'll throw them in here - though i know it doesn't get much more detailed than this!
love you all!
julie and bryan and 17-weeks-left brock
Wed. 6/14/06 - 11:10am Japan time
There are 10-20 earthquakes here every year. I felt my first one ever in my life Monday morning at 8:05am. Woke me up ‘cuz my bed starting rocking back and forth (we’re on the 4th floor of the hotel). It was crazy! Apparently they have their building on rollers here now. People feel them all the time and it’s not a big deal at all. I guess we’re on a huge fault line. I think this one was a 6-something on the Richter scale but it was in southern japan and then there was an aftershock nearby us in the ocean. I don’t know, I think that’s what bryan said his peeps said at work.
I found out last week that the total weight of all our stuff was about 4700 lbs. Our limit was just under 5700. so we were good there.
so monday we had to switch hotel rooms. but not only rooms, we had to switch buildings. now checkout is noon and checkin 2pm. but we had stuff in fridge and freezer. what the heck am i supposed to do with all our stuff in between, by myself, cuz bryan is at work. we had 5 suitcases, 6 bags of food, 2 backpacks, all his uniforms on hangers, etc. not only did we have a lot of stuff, but we were on the 4th floor and the elevator was broken. of course - it's us, and we're moving. that's how things go on our moving days. so we couldn't bring up the luggage carrier. bryan went and talked to the front desk during his lunch and they changed our checkout to 1pm and said they'd get housekeeping in the room we were waiting on as soon as the people checked out. then he went back to work at 12:30. at quarter-to 1pm i found out about the room being in another building. i called bryan at work cuz there's no way i could do this on my own, and they let him come home for the day. after bryan made several trips down the stairs with all our stuff and i could help him on the last load (our room keys were already deactivated so i stayed in the room with all our stuff) we went to the other bldg and our room was on the 2nd floor and no elevator in the bldg. needless to say by this time i was very frustrated with the hotel. we wondered why we couldn't have stayed in our room and whoever was scheduled to be in it, to be put in the room we were moving to...?!?! whatever. this other room is smaller, but the setup slightly smarter. i could only see the top half of my face in the bathroom mirror in our first room. honestly who puts mirrors that high!! there was nowhere to put your food and the bathroom was cramped. the view was kind of cool, but i forgot to take a picture of it, sorry. the room we're in now is $14 less a night (even though that makes no difference to us cuz it's reimbursed), the bed is smaller (full-size instead of queen -- we can't wait to get our bed!), there's no disposal!, and NO DISHWASHER!!!!!!!! ahhh i thought we'd had the last of that when we moved away from wichita falls! i told bryan we were going to go buy paper products for our dishes. cuz besides that, in the cupboards they only have 2 bowls and like 3 plates, etc. the bedroom was pretty cramped but with a little bit of furniture movement by me, it's do-able. we will be in this room almost 4 wks. yay.
bryan's typical work schedule right now is 6am to 3pm. on mondays, wednesdays, and fridays, he has physical training (PT) where they all run and whatever and he comes back home about 10 min to 7am or so and then has to be back at work at 8. then an hour lunch. so i thought that was kind of interesting - that they don't add hrs onto your day to accomodate for it, you just have less work hrs. how much "work" he's actually been doing though... i guess they can't do much with him yet cuz he has to attend a few safety trainings and stuff first. today he's at the maintenance safety training i think. but like i said before, they have a lot of down time, so they've been fixing mowers and weed eating and stuff. nice huh. starting the 26th he has FTAC (first term airman something) which all new peeps have to go to when it's your first base. it's 2 wks long. after that i think he might actually "go to work." he has 5 or 6 tests he has to do for his "upgrade" training that he has a month for each to do. (of course if he wants to study for his officer test he's got to do them in about 2 mos probably). but they've said he will most likely be on swing shift, which is 3-11pm mon-fri. maybe they stay til midnight i'm not sure. they have the same thing with PT days, where from 3-5pm they're exercising and then going home to shower. also, i've seen some of the swing shift guys at the softball games at night, so i think they let them go for that too! and then they go back to work afterwards. i think. but that's cool.
the "mongolian" restaurant that we went to last saturday (the viking), is NOT mongolian. it was very interesting. you have like this small circular grill built into the middle of the table and you go to an interesting-ly set-up buffet bar. where they had the raw meats for you to cook. they had like pork tongue and pork intestines...almost accidentally grabbed those before i read the label. they had other stuff that was cooked - like mini corn dogs and cinnamon noodles-(yeah what the heck i don't know). but they definitely had some good stuff - the regular noodles were gross, so it was mainly a rice thing. i'm not good with chopsticks so luckily they had some forks otherwise i would have starved to death. bryan resorted to a fork as well. so it was decent but not worth $15 each we decided.
bryan wants to drive somewhere this weekend, i guess his supervisor's been talking about some lighthouses or something, so we will see.
this whole baby thing is already making me physically uncomfortable, so i'm scared to find out how bad it's going to be the last 2 months. i guess i'm 23 weeks today. i need to get back into the gym cuz at night when i'm trying to sleep my lower back kills me and it's hard to find a comfortable position. my body takes forever to wind down and usually after laying in bed 2 hrs i can fall asleep. but there is a definite difference in the belly shape since we've been here in japan.
i think that's all for now. if you have questions let me know and i'll throw them in here - though i know it doesn't get much more detailed than this!
love you all!
julie and bryan and 17-weeks-left brock
Friday, June 9, 2006
6/9/06 - 3rd Letter
3rd letter
wed. 6/7/06
so i forgot to tell you all that a couple days or so after we got here i finally recognized the baby kicking! and bryan felt it too, it was pretty cool. exciting. although sometimes the kicking creates very odd feelings in my belly. there's something alive in there!!! anyways, pregnancy going good, still need to make an OB-GYN appt.
bryan is at work right now. or most likely is actually being driven around by a co-worker trying to get more stuff done. he has to pick up a bunch of different things and clothing (uniform) for a deployment bag that he always has to have ready. like a chemical suit and helmet and stuff.
we went to our driver's license class last wednesday - it was an easy 36-question test. although they're kind of retarded and include questions about not swimming in the ocean by misawa because of fatal riptides. not exactly sure what that has to do with DRIVING. their stop signs are triangle and the wording on the signs are japanese, even on base. the highest speed limit on base is 50 kilometers per hour, which is what, like 30 mph. (you multiply the km by .6 to get mph). but usual speeds are 30 and 40kph (so-18 and 24 mph). very slow. lanes are smaller, even on base.
we finally bought our car today. ('91 surf/4runner) for the $1500. about time seeing as we've been here 2 wks today. we get a temporary pass for on base and then we go to an insurance agency off base and they do a title transfer and 2 days later we pick up our title from them and take it back on base to get a base decal. liability insurance for the year is something like 55,860 yen, which currently is uh probably about $530. i have my japanese driver's license but bryan has to go pick his up from his 1st sergeant because that's what they do for peeps 25 and under. i think it's gay. i think they do an additional briefing with them telling them not to drink and drive and shtuff like that. so hopefully he was able to pick that up today. parking when driving in the right side of your car is definitely different.
fri. 6/9/06
ok then. bryan is at work. i need a job. i was going to apply for one at one of the two banks here, and went online to do it on wednesday, and it's no longer there. CRAP. i'm not sure where i'm going to be able to work and the time i have left to work gets shorter and shorter every week!
the sun comes up here at like 3am so when we move into our place i think we'll have to get like 3 layers of curtains for how much light we want dimmed out. sheesh.
as of yesterday we were going to have to move to an off-base hotel on monday cuz they had absolutely no room for us here on base anymore. we were upset because here on base we have a kitchen in our room and movie channels and stuff and off base all we'd have would be a small refrigerator. so that very much limits on what food you can eat. then of course you're a little further from everything and we just have the one vehicle...etc. then i called finance to find out how much money they give us per day and they told me on-base rates and the off-base rates, and then i wasn't mad anymore about having to move off base for 25 nights til we get our place. off base they would have given us $183/day for food, besides being reimbursed for our nightly room cost. holy cow! multiply that by 25 nights and you're looking at about $4500! anyway, then they call us this morning and tell us they've got a place for us here in this same building, that we'll just have to switch rooms on monday. oh well. it will definitely be more convenient and we wouldn't have to go out to eat as much. but they still give us $86/day for food on base - still a ton. over the 44 nights total that we'll be in lodging, they're gonna give us about $4000 (not including the full reimbursement we get for paying the $42/night room cost). we're pretty dang excited about that (too bad it's $2400 less than if we did move off base on monday!). another chunk to put towards paying off the mustang! they gave us $1166 for travel pay for all the driving we did from texas to seattle, when it really only cost us about $450, so we made decent money on that too... besides the $1700 that they just gave us for moving, which is called the dislocation allowance and is intended to help pay for un-reimbursed moving costs and setting up a new household for your family in the next place. wow, which we had none of. so we're liking how this is turning out for us. so the $2500 we lost on getting rid of the civic within a week, isn't TOO bad in light of all that. so all of this is VERY very helpful in our goal of paying off the mustang within a year of buying it.
besides, i was worried that they'd only have japanese-style toilets in the off-base hotel. yeah- it's like a ceramic trough. you seriously squat over the top of it. it's camping all over again. i've never tried it, and not real excited to start. when we went to the mall in Hachinohe (30 min away) on one of the tours we went on, at first all i saw was that kind in the bathroom and i was getting a little worried, but found 2 normal toilets ("western-style") that they have if you have a little baby with you and they had a little seat in the corner right by you to strap your kid in. the hand dryers are different too. it's like a slot that you put your hands between.
bryan has been playing a little softball with one of the MXS (maintenance) teams. of course he has to borrow a glove and doesn't have cleats cuz they're still on their way with the rest of our stuff. the only shoes he'd allow me to bring for him were the new running shoes we bought right before we left. WANTED to bring his older ones too, but NO HE WOULDN'T NEED THEM. pshh. it's still colder too so i wish i would have packed my hoodies instead of only having a few jackets. it's still in the lower 60's. and apparently in some of the summer months it rains like half of the days. we have gotten conflicting reports on the weather here. when we first got here people told us how HOT it's going to be and how bad it is without a/c and to stock up on fans ahead of time because they're always sold out in the hot summer months. and then we heard from others that it's really only bad for 3 wks of the summer. but mostly we've heard it's freakin hot. but yet, it's june, and nowhere near as hot as what we've been used to living anywhere else this time of year. so we'll see.
the mall was just as expensive as malls we're used to i think. we went to a shopping place nearby misawa and had to have our tour guide order for us all in the food court. i got their chicken basket - you know, fried chicken and fries - so you think you know what to expect - no, GROSS. bryan got some noodle thing with a layer of eggs and unknown white stuff on the top. but he liked it. tonight we're going to go to a place off base called the viking. i guess it's like mongolian-style but everyone says it's really good. it's all you can eat but they have a time limit of 90 min. funny. they also have a russian restaurant off base that we'll have to try, and one italian place - but they say it's not really the italian we're used to as americans, that it's as close as the japanese can get to it.
oh yeah, also got signed up for a program called WIC (i think stands for women, infants, and children). where they give you basically 3 blank checks for each month to purchase a specified amount of milk, juice, eggs, cheese, beans/peanut butter...i can't remember what else. but that's cool. when the baby is born they give you separate checks for them too, for like formula if you want it and stuff. it's just a nutritional-type thing, so too bad it doesn't include diapers.
so just a quick way to explain what test cell is (where bryan is working), the people in maintenance in the back shop fix a problem and once they're done give the engine to test cell and they run the engine and make sure all is good. so just a basic explanation. the flight line part of maintenance is what it is - they're on the flight line, so they're most in the action i guess. which i suppose is why they're always gone. i hear like half of the year. but anyway, bryan hears that test cell only gets like 2 engines to run a week, thus all the downtime. which will be great for all of the studying he has to do this year.
oh - JENNI - one of the guys that plays on the softball team - his last name is woody and he knows you from south grand prairie high school (bryan was wearing one of the shirts you gave us) - i guess he graduated 3 yrs before you or so, but was around while you were playing sports there.
um, i guess that's all for now. talk to you all later!
julie and bryan
wed. 6/7/06
so i forgot to tell you all that a couple days or so after we got here i finally recognized the baby kicking! and bryan felt it too, it was pretty cool. exciting. although sometimes the kicking creates very odd feelings in my belly. there's something alive in there!!! anyways, pregnancy going good, still need to make an OB-GYN appt.
bryan is at work right now. or most likely is actually being driven around by a co-worker trying to get more stuff done. he has to pick up a bunch of different things and clothing (uniform) for a deployment bag that he always has to have ready. like a chemical suit and helmet and stuff.
we went to our driver's license class last wednesday - it was an easy 36-question test. although they're kind of retarded and include questions about not swimming in the ocean by misawa because of fatal riptides. not exactly sure what that has to do with DRIVING. their stop signs are triangle and the wording on the signs are japanese, even on base. the highest speed limit on base is 50 kilometers per hour, which is what, like 30 mph. (you multiply the km by .6 to get mph). but usual speeds are 30 and 40kph (so-18 and 24 mph). very slow. lanes are smaller, even on base.
we finally bought our car today. ('91 surf/4runner) for the $1500. about time seeing as we've been here 2 wks today. we get a temporary pass for on base and then we go to an insurance agency off base and they do a title transfer and 2 days later we pick up our title from them and take it back on base to get a base decal. liability insurance for the year is something like 55,860 yen, which currently is uh probably about $530. i have my japanese driver's license but bryan has to go pick his up from his 1st sergeant because that's what they do for peeps 25 and under. i think it's gay. i think they do an additional briefing with them telling them not to drink and drive and shtuff like that. so hopefully he was able to pick that up today. parking when driving in the right side of your car is definitely different.
fri. 6/9/06
ok then. bryan is at work. i need a job. i was going to apply for one at one of the two banks here, and went online to do it on wednesday, and it's no longer there. CRAP. i'm not sure where i'm going to be able to work and the time i have left to work gets shorter and shorter every week!
the sun comes up here at like 3am so when we move into our place i think we'll have to get like 3 layers of curtains for how much light we want dimmed out. sheesh.
as of yesterday we were going to have to move to an off-base hotel on monday cuz they had absolutely no room for us here on base anymore. we were upset because here on base we have a kitchen in our room and movie channels and stuff and off base all we'd have would be a small refrigerator. so that very much limits on what food you can eat. then of course you're a little further from everything and we just have the one vehicle...etc. then i called finance to find out how much money they give us per day and they told me on-base rates and the off-base rates, and then i wasn't mad anymore about having to move off base for 25 nights til we get our place. off base they would have given us $183/day for food, besides being reimbursed for our nightly room cost. holy cow! multiply that by 25 nights and you're looking at about $4500! anyway, then they call us this morning and tell us they've got a place for us here in this same building, that we'll just have to switch rooms on monday. oh well. it will definitely be more convenient and we wouldn't have to go out to eat as much. but they still give us $86/day for food on base - still a ton. over the 44 nights total that we'll be in lodging, they're gonna give us about $4000 (not including the full reimbursement we get for paying the $42/night room cost). we're pretty dang excited about that (too bad it's $2400 less than if we did move off base on monday!). another chunk to put towards paying off the mustang! they gave us $1166 for travel pay for all the driving we did from texas to seattle, when it really only cost us about $450, so we made decent money on that too... besides the $1700 that they just gave us for moving, which is called the dislocation allowance and is intended to help pay for un-reimbursed moving costs and setting up a new household for your family in the next place. wow, which we had none of. so we're liking how this is turning out for us. so the $2500 we lost on getting rid of the civic within a week, isn't TOO bad in light of all that. so all of this is VERY very helpful in our goal of paying off the mustang within a year of buying it.
besides, i was worried that they'd only have japanese-style toilets in the off-base hotel. yeah- it's like a ceramic trough. you seriously squat over the top of it. it's camping all over again. i've never tried it, and not real excited to start. when we went to the mall in Hachinohe (30 min away) on one of the tours we went on, at first all i saw was that kind in the bathroom and i was getting a little worried, but found 2 normal toilets ("western-style") that they have if you have a little baby with you and they had a little seat in the corner right by you to strap your kid in. the hand dryers are different too. it's like a slot that you put your hands between.
bryan has been playing a little softball with one of the MXS (maintenance) teams. of course he has to borrow a glove and doesn't have cleats cuz they're still on their way with the rest of our stuff. the only shoes he'd allow me to bring for him were the new running shoes we bought right before we left. WANTED to bring his older ones too, but NO HE WOULDN'T NEED THEM. pshh. it's still colder too so i wish i would have packed my hoodies instead of only having a few jackets. it's still in the lower 60's. and apparently in some of the summer months it rains like half of the days. we have gotten conflicting reports on the weather here. when we first got here people told us how HOT it's going to be and how bad it is without a/c and to stock up on fans ahead of time because they're always sold out in the hot summer months. and then we heard from others that it's really only bad for 3 wks of the summer. but mostly we've heard it's freakin hot. but yet, it's june, and nowhere near as hot as what we've been used to living anywhere else this time of year. so we'll see.
the mall was just as expensive as malls we're used to i think. we went to a shopping place nearby misawa and had to have our tour guide order for us all in the food court. i got their chicken basket - you know, fried chicken and fries - so you think you know what to expect - no, GROSS. bryan got some noodle thing with a layer of eggs and unknown white stuff on the top. but he liked it. tonight we're going to go to a place off base called the viking. i guess it's like mongolian-style but everyone says it's really good. it's all you can eat but they have a time limit of 90 min. funny. they also have a russian restaurant off base that we'll have to try, and one italian place - but they say it's not really the italian we're used to as americans, that it's as close as the japanese can get to it.
oh yeah, also got signed up for a program called WIC (i think stands for women, infants, and children). where they give you basically 3 blank checks for each month to purchase a specified amount of milk, juice, eggs, cheese, beans/peanut butter...i can't remember what else. but that's cool. when the baby is born they give you separate checks for them too, for like formula if you want it and stuff. it's just a nutritional-type thing, so too bad it doesn't include diapers.
so just a quick way to explain what test cell is (where bryan is working), the people in maintenance in the back shop fix a problem and once they're done give the engine to test cell and they run the engine and make sure all is good. so just a basic explanation. the flight line part of maintenance is what it is - they're on the flight line, so they're most in the action i guess. which i suppose is why they're always gone. i hear like half of the year. but anyway, bryan hears that test cell only gets like 2 engines to run a week, thus all the downtime. which will be great for all of the studying he has to do this year.
oh - JENNI - one of the guys that plays on the softball team - his last name is woody and he knows you from south grand prairie high school (bryan was wearing one of the shirts you gave us) - i guess he graduated 3 yrs before you or so, but was around while you were playing sports there.
um, i guess that's all for now. talk to you all later!
julie and bryan
Our 2001 Honda Civic!
Our civic! (civ-dawg) We had to let her go before coming to Japan since we could only store ONE car in government storage (Bryan's Mustang). Had to sell her in just a week's time...thus the $$ loss. (This is Bryan's parents' driveway in West Jordan, UT - in case you were wondering of course).
In case you're wondering why this car looks so much better than most of the other civics you've seen....it's the wheels. It's all about the wheels.Thursday, June 1, 2006
6/1/06 - 2nd Letter
2nd letter
ok it's us again. thought i'd write everyone a book again. i guess that it has been about a week since the last one. i'm trying to be good. besides this is kind of like a journal for us, so i thought about just printing them out and putting them with scrapbook stuff too. so let's see- we went to one of bryan's supervisors' house saturday night and got fed a nice meal. they live in one of the new townhomes on the main base and i thought they were very nice. compared to what we were getting at least. but they were cool. anyway, i was pretty jealous of his place after seeing what we were getting. they have a separate room for the washer/dryer and 3 bedrooms upstairs and not only a regular closet in the master but also quite a large walk-in closet as well (which we won't have). but i guess that's what you get when you're an E-6 and we're a lowly E-3.
yesterday (wed.) we went on a tour of the base and to the misawa international center on 2 buses with other new people from 8-12. at the center they went over all of japan and the major cities and attractions. it was cool. there's a lot of cool stuff - buddhist temples and shintu shrines (the 2 religions here), huge ice festivals and stuff, but all not very close to here. traveling is not cheap, and usually driving is not a logical choice (when you think that would be the cheapest) cuz of pricey toll roads. if you have to buy gas off base it's by the liter, and so translates to over $4 per gallon! on base the gas is about $2.50/gal or so. we found out that japan is smaller than california and only about 28% of it is habitable because of all the mountains, yet the population here is half of the united states! sheesh. doesn't feel that crowded here though, misawa's pop. is only about 45,000. the military pop. is 10,000.
the lexus' (or as bryan puts it - lexii - for plural lexus) here have the toyota symbol, just as all acuras just have the honda symbol. many regular cars are 4wd - like most civics we've seen. civics are called civic ferios. a nissan sentra is a nissan primera. anyway, all different names. although we have seen one toyota corolla-all wheel drive.
on the pajero we were looking at the guy came back and told us the naval officer would not accept our offer of $2300 and would only drop to $2700. we put forth our offer later that night for that amount and told him we would get our funds together. this was sunday. then we decided you know what, we don't want to spend that much money. so we retracted our offer wednesday night, and now we're gonna buy a '91 toyota 4runner (surf) for only $1500 (she was asking $1800), so we're pretty excited about saving $1200. plus car ins will be about $75 cheaper for the year and the annual road tax is just $75 instead of $190. it's gray with a perfect gray interior (except for behind the back seat in the trunk space area). pretty nice considering how old it is! but it's got its cd deck (since there's only one halfway decent radio station here), and a/c. it's actually an automatic diesel - there's quite a few of the diesels here but they're not as loud as probably what you're thinking. we were almost gonna get a suzuki escudo (already had a nickname of "scooter" for it) which kinda looks like a honda CRV but one didn't have a/c and the other had no stereo whatsoever. plus we got a better deal on the surf. so now we just gotta think of a new nickname. we are open to suggestions (no "- - dawgs" since that has already been used). i suggested "the smurf" even though it isn't blue.
today the housing lady took us to see the exact unit we'll be living in. so we met the people that are living there currently and saw how their furniture all fit in it and stuff and it looks good. it will all fit. the place looks good and i'm excited. it has a decent backyard (not a postage stamp) and there's a park right by us and we are at the end of a circle (like a cul-de-sac i guess). not sure if i told you but we will be in the north area, which is about 10 min from main base, but bryan's work is in between. living in a hotel isn't horrible, no - we like that we don't have to make our bed - haha.
for jacquie's questions - - if we move in before our stuff gets here they have loaner furniture we're set up with. and we mingle with the japanese a little yes - a lot of them have jobs on base. bryan is frustrated cuz in alterations they don't speak english and he thinks he is being overcharged but he can't talk to them about it. we have tv, just not all your regular options.
ok last thing. bryan will be working in the test cell is what it's called. there are 3 different areas he could have possibly been assigned to: that, backshop, and flight line. in tech school when he found that out and what each did, he wanted test cell.
anyway coming here someone else thought we'd be in backshop (cuz that's where his sponsor - the guy who picked us up) is. we also found out that if you're flight line you are always gone. always being deployed and sent to temporary duty locations and working 12-hr days 6 days a week. we were very afraid when we heard that cuz we didn't know for sure where he'd be at that point. anyway - test cell is apparently the cream of the crop and where everyone in backshop and flight line try to get to. so many people were very very surprised bryan was assigned there, and all told him he was very lucky. so we were pretty excited about that. they also said they're pretty laid back there and have a lot of downtime so that's cool too.
we went to a "beach bash" last saturday at the lake and that was cool. i think we'll feel more adjusted once we actually live somewhere with our stuff. and when we can find where the lds church exactly meets and have a car to drive there too - we really really want to do that. somewhere where it's always the same.
anyway, love you guys
julie and bryan
thurs. 6/1/06 8pm
ok it's us again. thought i'd write everyone a book again. i guess that it has been about a week since the last one. i'm trying to be good. besides this is kind of like a journal for us, so i thought about just printing them out and putting them with scrapbook stuff too. so let's see- we went to one of bryan's supervisors' house saturday night and got fed a nice meal. they live in one of the new townhomes on the main base and i thought they were very nice. compared to what we were getting at least. but they were cool. anyway, i was pretty jealous of his place after seeing what we were getting. they have a separate room for the washer/dryer and 3 bedrooms upstairs and not only a regular closet in the master but also quite a large walk-in closet as well (which we won't have). but i guess that's what you get when you're an E-6 and we're a lowly E-3.
yesterday (wed.) we went on a tour of the base and to the misawa international center on 2 buses with other new people from 8-12. at the center they went over all of japan and the major cities and attractions. it was cool. there's a lot of cool stuff - buddhist temples and shintu shrines (the 2 religions here), huge ice festivals and stuff, but all not very close to here. traveling is not cheap, and usually driving is not a logical choice (when you think that would be the cheapest) cuz of pricey toll roads. if you have to buy gas off base it's by the liter, and so translates to over $4 per gallon! on base the gas is about $2.50/gal or so. we found out that japan is smaller than california and only about 28% of it is habitable because of all the mountains, yet the population here is half of the united states! sheesh. doesn't feel that crowded here though, misawa's pop. is only about 45,000. the military pop. is 10,000.
the lexus' (or as bryan puts it - lexii - for plural lexus) here have the toyota symbol, just as all acuras just have the honda symbol. many regular cars are 4wd - like most civics we've seen. civics are called civic ferios. a nissan sentra is a nissan primera. anyway, all different names. although we have seen one toyota corolla-all wheel drive.
on the pajero we were looking at the guy came back and told us the naval officer would not accept our offer of $2300 and would only drop to $2700. we put forth our offer later that night for that amount and told him we would get our funds together. this was sunday. then we decided you know what, we don't want to spend that much money. so we retracted our offer wednesday night, and now we're gonna buy a '91 toyota 4runner (surf) for only $1500 (she was asking $1800), so we're pretty excited about saving $1200. plus car ins will be about $75 cheaper for the year and the annual road tax is just $75 instead of $190. it's gray with a perfect gray interior (except for behind the back seat in the trunk space area). pretty nice considering how old it is! but it's got its cd deck (since there's only one halfway decent radio station here), and a/c. it's actually an automatic diesel - there's quite a few of the diesels here but they're not as loud as probably what you're thinking. we were almost gonna get a suzuki escudo (already had a nickname of "scooter" for it) which kinda looks like a honda CRV but one didn't have a/c and the other had no stereo whatsoever. plus we got a better deal on the surf. so now we just gotta think of a new nickname. we are open to suggestions (no "- - dawgs" since that has already been used). i suggested "the smurf" even though it isn't blue.
today the housing lady took us to see the exact unit we'll be living in. so we met the people that are living there currently and saw how their furniture all fit in it and stuff and it looks good. it will all fit. the place looks good and i'm excited. it has a decent backyard (not a postage stamp) and there's a park right by us and we are at the end of a circle (like a cul-de-sac i guess). not sure if i told you but we will be in the north area, which is about 10 min from main base, but bryan's work is in between. living in a hotel isn't horrible, no - we like that we don't have to make our bed - haha.
for jacquie's questions - - if we move in before our stuff gets here they have loaner furniture we're set up with. and we mingle with the japanese a little yes - a lot of them have jobs on base. bryan is frustrated cuz in alterations they don't speak english and he thinks he is being overcharged but he can't talk to them about it. we have tv, just not all your regular options.
ok last thing. bryan will be working in the test cell is what it's called. there are 3 different areas he could have possibly been assigned to: that, backshop, and flight line. in tech school when he found that out and what each did, he wanted test cell.
anyway coming here someone else thought we'd be in backshop (cuz that's where his sponsor - the guy who picked us up) is. we also found out that if you're flight line you are always gone. always being deployed and sent to temporary duty locations and working 12-hr days 6 days a week. we were very afraid when we heard that cuz we didn't know for sure where he'd be at that point. anyway - test cell is apparently the cream of the crop and where everyone in backshop and flight line try to get to. so many people were very very surprised bryan was assigned there, and all told him he was very lucky. so we were pretty excited about that. they also said they're pretty laid back there and have a lot of downtime so that's cool too.
we went to a "beach bash" last saturday at the lake and that was cool. i think we'll feel more adjusted once we actually live somewhere with our stuff. and when we can find where the lds church exactly meets and have a car to drive there too - we really really want to do that. somewhere where it's always the same.
anyway, love you guys
julie and bryan
thurs. 6/1/06 8pm
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