I had an interesting phone conversation last week, which mostly involved me reassuring a new acquaintance that I am doing absolutely fine here! A lot of Oshika people comment on how lonely it must be for my poor husband with me here, but this new acquaintance said that even though she didn’t know me very [...]

Yesterday’s Valentine’s deliveries went really well! I spent seven and a half hours driving around the peninsula, delivering chocolates and sweets to everyone I came across. This is how I shared lots of love through gifts from Minoru Iketani, Hiroyuki Sato, Motoo Kato, Kaori Koyama, Miho Ishida, Miyuki Soejima, Keizo Tamagawa, Miyoko Carey, Izumi Iwanabe [...]

I HAD to share this wonderfully encouraging (although a little sad) message I received ….. “About your book for Japanese men — my feeling is that young men in Japan fear becoming nothing but a salary to their wives, as many of the men in the previous generation became. I have middle-aged women in my [...]

Patricia Nyiri-Kovacs is a Hungarian woman who interned with me during 2010 and 2011. She is a really lovely person who adores her little boy, Noah, and I looked forward to her coming in to my home-based office although I was always just a little bit worried about her home life. Sometimes you just have [...]