NJOYE The Blog

Packing

Sat, 12 Jun 2010 16:48 +0300

We celebrated Kaito 8 years old birthday party yesterday. With his best friends in our compound, it was really nice. I organized a treasure hunt, bringing 2 teams to the beach, the house, the pool... Kaito had great time. I can't believe that when we came here he was only 4 years old...

We started to get organized for our move. Bye-bye the Hummer (miss it already), the Tiguan... and soon we will start to pack out staff. We are leaving in less than 3 weeks.

I enjoyed very much our time here. The pool, the sea, the friends, the work.

Sky is the limit

Fri, 04 Jun 2010 15:51 +0300

We have spent almost 4 years in Bahrain. When we moved here our little Takuma was a little 1 and a half years old boy. Kaito just started school. It seems a long time ago...

Now it is time for us to leave the Middle East.
Asia is our next destination. More to come shortly...

half cup

Sat, 20 Mar 2010 19:58 +0300

7 weeks...

It has been the longest time being separated. Me and our 7 years old Kaito in Bahrain, Yuki and our 4 (5 next month) years old Takuma in Tokyo. Time flies so it is rather ok, they will be back in a week time, but this is not the family life we were dreaming of.... Thank God we are happy to hear that Yuki's mom could go home 2 days ago, after spending 3 full months at the hospital. This is good news. But who will take care of her once her daughter is back to Bahrain ? Life is not easy...

I realize this is the first time I post a picture of the whole family (forget the aligator, this is not our pet), taken in Manila baby zoo earlier in 2009. That has been such a great family time, a contrast to what we are living now. But kids do enjoy individually. Takuma in Japan, going to Tokyo Disneyland soon. Kaito with me, playing golf, enjoying the pool, Formula 1 (my next post), his friends, school.

We can't have everything in life...

The Drs

Sat, 20 Feb 2010 15:26 +0300

The new year started with music well known to our ears, unfortunately.
Yuki's mother has been hospitalized before Xmas. Might be serious, might be benign, we do not really know yet. But Yuki had to fly to Tokyo 2 weeks ago, to accompany her to a new hospital (which is much better than the one where she had to spend a lonely and depressing New Year eve).
She is still weak, hence, doctors can not start the treatment yet. Once started they will be able to evaluate its effectiveness. Depending on the results, she might need surgery. We just hope she will be fine.

Yuki took Takuma with her. At least he enjoys a lot Japan and will start with the local school next week, which motivates him. His Japanese will improve a lot. Kaito and I, alone in Bahrain, are enjoying our time. I am all for him, so Kaito is rather happy. Golf, birthday parties, visiting friends, Wii.... this is good quality time for father and son. Just hope this situation won't last too long.

Island hopping

Wed, 16 Dec 2009 09:24 +0300

Christmas is already there… and 2010 is approaching.

We are back from a very nice trip to the Philippines, where kids enjoyed a lot their first snorkelling, walking in nature, seeing these little primate that are the tarsier and playing with butterflies. We spent a few days in Manila, enjoying a city that is much nicer that we thought, specially at this time of the year, with great food and wines and a nice shopping experience.
We then flew to Bohol island, home of the tarsier, and stayed in this great resort called Ananyana. This is a boutique resort with only few rooms and chalets for families. Even thought it was high season (nice air and sea temperature, no rain, blue sky), we were almost the only guests. One Swiss German couple and other lovely French family with 2 kids, and us. The food was great, the place really relaxing and the staff wonderful.

Back to school.... finally

Sat, 07 Nov 2009 18:24 +0300

Finally two kids are back to school. After their forced H1N1-prevention holidays, they are finally spending time at school, learning what they have to learn and playing with their friends. Routine is back, but we (and specially my wife) can breath.

In 3 weeks they already have holidays.

Our friends from Geneva visited us. We had great time. In 2 days they have seen everything to see in Bahrain (the south of the island, Bahrain fort, the Ritz and Trader Vic's, the souk and our favourite tailor, the malls, the malls, the malls...). They, and we, enjoyed a lot. We had fun, we spent time eating out at night at our best places (Bushido, MeatCo, TVic's) and driving around during the day. The weather was great, not too hot (even if we had a hot/mild October with temperatures always above 30) and we could swim everyday in the compound or the Ritz.

It was a great experience and for us living in Bahrain for now over 3 years, it was important to have our best friends visiting us. Thank you.

(no Swine) flu

Tue, 01 Sep 2009 15:11 +0300

I caught a cold. Had some fever, headache, soar throat, the usual symptoms. I decided to go to the hospital; my first visit to this hospital close to our place in Bahrain. At first it took me over 20 minutes to have my file open, as the lady who was operating the terminal had no clue on how to use the system and the computer. I had to chose a middle name (John ?!) as the system (or the operator) needed to capture a middle name. Same with religion and 2 phone numbers... Finally my file was created, and they all started to call be Mr John....

I spent a few minutes with a generalist who got scared when I told him the symptoms and the fact that I just came back from a trip from Europe. He wore a mask, then gloves and made a few phone calls in Arabic. I could here 'Swine flu' 'isolation' 'test'. It reminded me of some of these cartoons and movies when a guy checks in in a psychiatric hospital, claiming he is not mad, and ends up in noise proof isolation room. I spent the next hour doing a few tests in this isolation room and I could finally leave the place. Negative to swine flu, just a basic cold.

I visited this US military cemetery in Manila a few weeks ago. Very impressive place, full of emotions. It contains the largest number of graves of the US military dead of World War II, a total of 17,202, most of whom lost their lives in operations in New Guinea and the Philippines. On a wide terrace are two large hemicycles. Twenty-five mosaic maps recall the achievements of the American armed forces in the Pacific, China, India and Burma; they are well realized and represent a great educational tool. On rectangular piers within the hemicycles are inscribed the 'Tablets of the Missing' containing 36,285 names, read a few on this picture.

70 years ago today Hitler's tanks invaded Poland. WWII began. Time to remember.

Summer Delights

Sat, 22 Aug 2009 18:21 +0300

We spent our summer holidays in Europe, between Switzerland and France. It was really nice to enjoy the long summer days with my family and our friends. The weather was great and it was truly refreshing to see some green and the beautiful scenary the Alps offer.

Season Of Mourning

Sat, 04 Jul 2009 17:24 +0300

My wife's sister is gone. Sudden. Heart failure, myocardis infarction. This is very sad, she was young, had a son, was living with her mother since last winter. A year ago my wife lost her father, so obviously all our thoughts go to her and her mother who is feeling really lonely now. So Yuki is in Japan for 3 weeks, and then we go together to Europe to spend time with our friends and my parents. This will be nice and relaxing, specially after what my wife had to experience, and knowing that last year she and our little Takuma could not be with us in Europe due to her late father's illness.

F1 Bonanza

Sun, 03 May 2009 17:39 +0300

As if the financial crisis was not enough, here comes the influenza, aka swine flu, aka H1N1.

I was really sick these last days, bad caught, headache, fever. No Mexican girl... and only some travels to the Kingdom. Now I feel much better after antibiotics and some rest over this long (May 1) week-end.

F1 was fun. Not as crowdy as last year obviously, but kids enjoy and one of my wife's friends from Japan came to visit us.
Now we need to start thinking about our summer travel plans. Switzerland, Italy or France. Europe is not easy with kids, but the weather is better than here in the Middle East or Asia. Trying to find the right accomodation, to book the airplane tickets, the rental car, business as usual for the summer holidays.