I am back! How have you been?
A few months ago, we finally flew to my homeland, Japan. So I am writing this post from the house where I grew up!
It's been quite a journey. You have no idea how much bureaucracy and nonsense we had to deal with, thanks to our government still closes the border and sets a lot of restrictions for those who, even Japanese citizens, wish to cross it.
Contrary to the life in Europe which was almost back to normal by the time we left there, life here is very quiet under the state of emergency being repeatedly extended.
Due to that, the kindergartens are still closed for toddlers, kids' events in the community have constantly been cancelled, and my son hardly ever gets to meet new friends of his age.
Nevertheless, I am so happy to be home. Most importantly, our son finally met his Japanese grand parents and he can play with them everyday for the next ten months! I had never seen my parents this happy.
My son looks very happy, too. He loves staying with them. Maybe it's also been a good stimulus for him to live with multiple family members.
However, looking after this "born-to-be-wild" will soon be out of control. One second we let him free from our hands, he is everywhere. Even on the couch and bed whose surface are higher than his shoulders. He jumps up there so easily.
It will take another couple of months until he starts walking, but I already gave him his first sneakers on his ten-month birthday. Just wearing a pair of shoes made him look like a child, not a baby anymore.
Parenthood is a lot of work, but it's rewarding to see him grow up day by day, showing us things he didn't do just a few days ago. And look what he can do now with books, he turn pages by himself!
He stared doing this in the mid-August when he got this pretty picture book as a gift from a good friend of mine. The book features illustrations by Dick Bruna, whose Miffy series are one of the most popular children's books in Japan.
It teaches names of varieties of things, like animals, foods, vehicles, numbers and greetings in Japanese and English. It's a bilingual book but I made it trilingual for my son by adding Italian words to each illustration.
We will stay in Japan until next summer. No idea if the first word he speaks will be Japanese or Italian (other than "mamma" and "papà" that he already utters), but I already got him some books to learn Japanese alphabets. Yes, it's still early but it was irresistible. There are many great Japanese books for first learning that I want to write about in the future posts!
By the way, have you ever seen Japanese alphabets? My son plays with them (hiragana) printed on these wooden blocks.
Actually they used to be mine. Thankfully, my parents kept them in good condition over three decades. I remember playing with them a lot as a little one, and now my little one can do the same! Another treasure that I can pass to him from my childhood. This photo was taken on the day after we arrived in Japan. He loved it at first sight.
That's all for today. Alla prossima volta, buona giornata!
About today's book
Published in January 2020 by Kodansha