Hiroshima

From the beginning, our time in Japan was loosely divided up into three parts: Tokyo, travel and Hiroshima. Even with three extra days in Osaka tacked on at the end before we fly out, Hiroshima really signalled the end was near for us. Time in Tokyo had played all sorts of tricks on us, slow and fast at different times and then suddenly over at the start of August. The weeks of traveling around and exploring new parts of Japan were more steady, but so action packed that they flashed by. 

As we took the shinkansen to Hiroshima I was all kinds of emotional. Not only wrestling with the "Japan is nearly over" feeling, but also getting my head around a month in a new city. Was Hiroshima the right place to finish our trip? It was so much smaller compared to Tokyo; would we have enough things to do? Was our new house going to be ok for Steve to work in, or would we have to come up with another solution for that? 

So much unknown. I tried to rest knowing it would all work out (God is good, all the time!), but it was tough. Made tougher when we got off the shinkansen and as we were going down the escalators, realised that Rachel had left both her wallet with train pass and water bottle on the shinkansen. It was now speeding off to Hakata. I was confident we could get it back, but the first step when I talked to the person at the information desk was: "Please call this number." 

Goodness did that phrase strike fear into our hearts every time we heard it. Japan is still so reliant on phone calls and they are honestly so difficult for us to make. Not only that we would have to try to have a conversation in Japanese without any visual prompt or gestures to help with understanding, but even before that, we'd need a phone that could make a call. Even with roaming on my phone, it was yet to connect successfully when we tried. 

I left the information booth armed with a set of phone numbers to call, and a QR code that would give me an online chat. The helpfulish person at the desk had said it should/would be found and kept at the station in Hataka for three days. (She also suggested we could go get it ourselves. Hakata is an hour and a half on a shinkansen down to Kyushu, which is an expensive way to get $15 worth of stuff.) After that she said it would be given to the police as lost property. If we could get in contact they should be able to arrange it to be posted back to us. That was very phone call dependant. 

I may have cried that night trying to sort out how I was feeling, but our Hiroshima apartment was quite spacious and had enough double beds for everyone which helped improve things somewhat. What the apartment wasn't was equiped with a desk for Steve to work at. We'd kinda figured that it would be a juggle from the photos, but the reality of not really have a second space (like a big enough coffee table for the girls and I to be at) meant that work from home wasn't really an option. 

Luckily, it seemed to be sorted fairly easily, since a quick google for co-working spaces near Hiroshima station gave us a few options, one of which seemed very straightforward. Monday morning rolled around and Steve spent some time working at the dining table (and on the lounge) while I battled the online chat to register Rachel's lost things with JR West. It took an hour and a half, and I needed to put in a phone number. I decided not to risk using mine, and asked my homestay sister if she would mind taking the call. 

After sorting that, Steve and I went together to find a doctor to look at his hand. This was the check up that would tell if the extra two and a half weeks of bandaging had finally helped the break start to heal. I was keeping my expectations very low, not wanting more disappointment after Takamatsu. 

We actually had the easiest time yet of finding a doctor to see us though. Our Hiroshima house was two streets away from a private hospital, so we figured we'd start a search for a doctor there. The hospital said they'd see us straight away and after filling out forms, we went to wait at the doctor's room for five minutes before Steve was seen. A quick chat and an x-ray and in twenty minutes, the doctor was saying he was happy with the progress and Steve could start exercising the hand. We very cautiously told him that we'd had that advice before and it was too soon. 

He was confident, but said to keep it bandaged and come back in two weeks for another check. It did look like healing was happening; praise God! We went off to Hiroshima station to check out the co-working space for Steve. It was a little hard to get set up initially (you needed an app that you couldn't get for a non-Japanese phone) but Steve found some work arounds and managed to get in. The space was new, clean and simple. 12 small cubicles with screens for people to connect to, private meeting rooms, toilets and a very basic kitchen (sink with hot and cold water). 

Even though commuting was a bit of a downer (and having to make packed lunches!), it was hardly the end of the world. All up it usually only took Steve a half hour or so door to door. After having lunch, I left Steve to finish his day's work and went home to the girls. On the way my homestay sister messaged to say that the JR West team had found Rachel's lost property and were happy to mail it to us (at our expense). I was so thankful. I went home and wrote a bunch of signs to stick up (our apartment was on the second floor of the building) to help the post guys. We needed to pay the postage in cash when the items were delivered, so I got my Yen ready too. 

Tuesday was a home day as we waited for the post to arrive (success!) and did some more homeschooling. The girls were pretty good at getting stuff done though, so the next day we went back to Hiroshima Station to the Pokemon Centre and to have lunch with Steve. 

Okonomiyaki is what Hiroshima is known for. This cabbaged based dish is different all over Japan. In Tokyo the style is called Monja. Osaka have the basic "cabbage pancake" situation that most people recognise, but in Hiroshima, they add noddles (either soba or udon) to the whole thing. It was delicious and the girls approved. 

Manhole covers of Hiroshima dedicated to the various types of okonomiyaki

The rest of the start to our Hiroshima stay was finishing off the homeschooling, and breaking up our days at home with excursions out. Rachel asked to go to the beach, so we found one on an island out in Hiroshima bay to swim in. 

It was a warm day, but the water was so cooling it was worth trekking out there. The beach was zero sand, just broken shells, so not the best to walk over. The girls sketched the landscapes after our swim. 

It was good to be cooking at home again, despite the fact that our Hiroshima apartment was less than equiped. For the third time in Japan, I went out to the 100Yen store and bought spoons and butter knives. There was also very strangely no rice cooker here, so I've learnt to make rice in a pot (thank you Nagi from RecipeTinEats!)

Steve randomly bought some sake from the grocery store one night. This one (below) is called maboroshi, which means illusion and was delicious. I struggled to get enough of my school work done as well as home schooling the girls, so he took the girls out one Saturday into town and they had fun exploring the kids science centre and planetarium. Having to get my head around all the work needed for Term 4 was a huge reality check for me. The end was truely near. 

When I had started home schooling the girls in Imabari, and looked at the list of things they needed to learn and get done, I wasn't sure we'd manage it all. Somehow though, by the second week of Hiroshima, all of their work was done and assessments sent off to their Australian teachers. They also worked hard on presentations for their classes, so they can share all about Japan when they get back too. 

Quicker than I would have liked to admit, two weeks rolled past and Steve went back for a check up on his hand. In and out in a half hour and we had the good news that the bones had visibly started fusing. The doctor said that it was time to take the bandage off and carefully start using the hand again. Almost couldn't believe it! 

We celebrated with a walk and some delicious cream puffs from the local bakery. Despite my worries at the start, Hiroshima has been a nice little place to be. It's much slower paced than Tokyo. Trains are less reliable but still efficient means of transport. There is enough space on the road to have an actual footpath most of the time, which makes it even easier to walk around. The weather has been hit and miss, lots of rain while we are here, but it's beautiful none the less. The rivers through Hiroshima city, the mountains around it and the clear blue sea are all stunning. Only a few weeks left now. 

Broken Hand Sadness

This happened back at the start of July. Steve went to BJJ as per usual, was doing a drill and put his hand down awkwardly. It hurt a bit, but not too much, so he wondered if he had just jarred it. After a week of resting, it was not feeling better, but had started bruising up, so off he went to find a doctor. Should I mention I was away at my language teacher course? Not just in Saitama (about an hr on the train), but actually away on a one night trip to the other side of the country, Kanazawa (more on that soon), and I had accidentally taken the passports with me. Whoops! Talk about stress! 

The Japanese health system is different to Australia, and there seem to be specific doctor's clinics for bone injuries, so there were a few different visits to start with before he found the right place. Sophie had been to a doctor already because she had a virus/cold in June (lost her voice and had a whole week off school!). Steve started there, but that was a kids only doctor. They sent him to another local doctor who was literally across the road from our house. They were a general practice and didn't do bones, so they sent him to another place near where we did our major groceries. 

Steve then managed to navigate all the forms with some broken Japanese, a hefty amount of Google Translate and photos of the passport and visa. Whew. Honestly, Japanese people are usually so strict about paperwork I was worried they wouldn't accept the photos. That itself was a miracle. They took an X-ray of his hand (left) and found he'd broken a bone connected to his ring finger. 

It was a small break and the bones were pretty close together, so they put a splint on it and bandaged it up. The advice was to come back in a week and check on the progress. The girls did some serious stepping up to help Steve out while I was away finishing my language course, and they all got through ok. There may have been trips to the local ramen restaurants to help as well. No judgement!

Steve went back a week later and the second X-ray showed some fusing - progress! The doctor was happy with things and just said to come back again before we left Tokyo for a check up (two weeks to go at that point). He also said that when the hand was unwrapped at night for a shower, Steve could do some light movement exercises to help keep the joints moving. The plan was to have the hand checked in another two weeks when we got to Takayama, which would hopefully be at the end of the six week healing cycle. 

We were all really hanging out for the final doctor's visit. Steve was great at not using his hand too much, and being careful of it. There was no pain, so we were pretty sure we were going to get the all clear. In the heat of summer, the bandaged hand had been super uncomfortable for Steve, not to mention the impact on the travel. 

Being in a new city for the final appointment, Steve again had to go through the rigmarole of finding the right doctor, this time only going to one place before the sent him on to an actual hospital. The hospital came with a doctor who had studied in the States and spoke some great English. This was such a relief for Steve who could finally ask lots of questions. 

It was also a small victory though, because when they x-rayed the hand, they found the break had in fact not healed, but gotten worse. It's likely the advice to do the light movement once a day was the contributing factor here. I can't describe how frustrated and disappointed both Steve and I were when we found out. Not only were we in for longer with a broken hand, but if it doesn't fuse, now we are also expecting surgery and then likely an extended rehab period to get the hand working again. 

Since Steve broke his hand on the 1st of July, this means that about three months of being in Japan will be spent with a broken hand. I know it's not the end of the world, but it's certainly been less than ideal. I broke my own hand way back in 2007 and I can remember how frustratingly slow the rehab progress was. At least Steve broke his left hand and not his right like I did. Not much we can do but be thankful for Australian health care for when we return. 

If you're the praying type, we'd love to have you praying for us. We are trying to manage as best we can, and rolling with the punches when it comes to adjusting our plans, but it's been frustrating. This was definitely something we didn't see coming when we decided to do six months in Japan. We will be in Hiroshima in a week and when we get there, Steve's off to find another doctor/hospital to have regular check up visits until we go home. Let's hope the next x-ray has better news than the last one!