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So, I’m home again in Japan, and I have (almost) overcome my jet lag. Having to deal with all the things that accumulated over the last weeks did help with that one. I’m ready to go again!

Back in Austria, a friend of mine asked what I missed about Japan, and I didn’t really have an answer. Mostly because it was just a holiday and my return was already fixed, the question was difficult to answer. Maybe it’s green tea cookies? Japanese put matcha powder into so many things that are not available in Europe at all. Sushi is okay by now, in the bigger cities at least, even though really good sushi places are still rare (try the tuna fish first: If this is good, the rest will be just fine!).

One thing I could find in Austria which I did not expect was yuzu. Yuzu is a kind of citrus fruit with a very strong smell and distinctive flavour, and all the foreigners I have met love the taste. Yuzu grow only in Japan, Korea, and parts of China, so imagine my surprise when I saw a “Latella” (a whey based drink) with lemon and yuzu! I was slightly disappointed by the taste because the lemon was a bit overpowering, so the yuzu flavour didn’t get out fully. However, it’s a start. And who knows, when I’m back next time, they may even sell the drink in the proper winter season instead as “summer edition”…

I’m back, both figuratively and literally speaking.

The thing that happened at the end of May was the death of my grandmother. I spent the last three weeks in Austria taking care of her funeral and related things.

My grandmother was 99 years old, so her death did not come as a big surprise. Although she had had some episodes before where she was weaker than usual (in particular around Christmas two years ago), we all more or less expected her to live and celebrate her 100th birthday next January. But, not so. She fell asleep for good on May 24th. And with her, my family is gone. All I have left now are relatives… The realisation of what that really means has not yet hit me. In fact, I feel strangely detached still. I guess the pain and grief will catch up with me whenever I am ready. Not sure when that will be, but for now, I’ll keep up my life as I have laid it out for myself here in Kyoto.

Happy New Year of the Dog everybody!
I wish you a wonderful and successful year to come!

Whew, I’m almost done with my business meetings, only one more next Tuesday, and from then it’s up close and personal… Still stuff to do, as I wrote in my last post, but that i will do from the privacy of my desk. That means, that I will keep to myself for a while, and will take a break until at least the end of the year, maybe even one week longer. Until I’m back, I wish you all, as usual:

Happy Holidays to everyone!
I hope you’ll have a nice time, regardless of your plans.

It’s December again, time for an advent calendar counting the days until Christmas. I completely forgot making my own this year, but thank goodness my friend who visited me last year has a new version of his nerdy “curiosity calendar” up and running. This year, for the first time, it’s in English, so it is accessible for everyone – enjoy!

https://advent.morr.cc/2017

Spring is almost here; the sakura are not yet in full bloom, but it can only take one or two days more. I will post pictures as soon as it happens, I want to visit the Botanical Gardens for hanami this year.

Last weekend, I have done my spring cleaning; and I have moved my laptop back to my office and my futon back to my bedroom. It was nice to consolidate the apartment at the beginning of winter, but it is equally nice to spread out again. So far, it is still too cool to keep the windows open for a longer period of time, but in two or three weeks, the temperature will rise again.

Today, after my final meeting I had to go to Kyoto station because my external keyboard broke in the morning. There are not that many Ns in English language, but it is nice to have a full alphabet… Anyway, I did not know that there was a museum on the seventh floor in the big Isetan department store at the station. A friend of mine said I absolutely have to go and see the exhibition of Yoshitoshi, a very popular woodblock artist from the Edo and Meiji periods. Yes, it was worth it! The amount of detail in the prints is fascinating, and the colors are still stunning! If you are in Kyoto right now, the exhibition is until 23rd of April.

Just before the end of last year, I did my tax return for the time I spent in Germany. I have five years to do them, so I was just in time. In 2012, I had spent about 5.000 EUR on my grandmother’s move to a nursing home, and I expected a hefty return because of that.

I received the tax return a few weeks ago and, what do you think, how much did I get back? Nothing. Nothing at all; in fact, I even owe the German government 4,32 EUR on taxes for 2012. The reasoning for this was twofold: First, that my grandmother’s move was “not extraordinary” (sure, since she’s 90, she’s moving every 3 months, her final hobby…); and second, that the government kind of expects people to take care of their immediate family, another way of saying: Your private problem, honey.

I am furious. Because let’s assume that I spend 50 EUR on somebody to unclog my toilet. Or 500 EUR on membership fees for a church. Both I would classify as private problems as well, but in Germany both are perfectly deductible. Heck, the church taxes would probably be deducted automatically without any further input of mine.

So, I waited until I was not fuming quite so hard anymore, and after having a not-so-good day already last Monday, I made a phonecall to the tax office. Of course people were unfriendly – it’s part of the job description of a German government employee – but after some 10 minutes of back-and-forth we might have found a way of recouping at least some of my money. Maybe.

I have already filed an appeal, thanks to them accepting emails (one good thing of German government), and now it means: waiting. For at least half a year. Who knows what’s taking them so long, but I hope for the best. Nothing else I can do anyway.

In the last few days I have been amusing myself with watching YouTube videos. Well, that’s nothing extraordinary, obviously, so let me be a bit more specific.

Just in case you missed it, the United States of America have a new president. And his motto in the election campaign was “America First”, and now that he’s actually in charge, this is what he is planning to do. So far so good, but you see, if America is first, the question is: Who is second?

Thank goodness the world has come quite far, so there will be no war about this, but rather an advertisement campaign targeting Donald Trump using short YouTube videos. The first video was made by the Dutch, then the idea was taken up by Germany, and since then, many European states have followed suit, as well as some from Africa and the Middle East. You can find all the videos that have been made so far on this website:
http://everysecondcounts.eu/index.html

Of course, the whole thing is very tongue-in-cheek, with the video producers both making fun of Donald Trump (“You know Slovenia, the country where you bought your wife from…”) as well as their own politicians (“Our president Ahmadinejad, the inventor of the alternative fact…”). The Australians get the fastest laugh by starting their video with “This is a message from the government of Australia. Please don’t hang up.”

I would love to see more of these videos, some of them are really funny. The Brits are suspiciously absent so far, maybe their comedians have too much to do with the Brexit, that’s probably a full-time job. I would be very much surprised if the Japanese made a video though, it seems to me that their humour is not of the satirical kind, somehow. Anyway, here’s the video made by Austria, have fun!

 

Finally, after literally months of election woes and live discussions and back-and-forth of unpleasantries, the new president of Austria has been inaugurated today. He will be in office for the next six years and I am confident that he will do a good job, after all, I did vote for him…

Now the country can go back to what is hopefully a more united politics and government, and with some luck, the next governmental elections will be in 2018 as planned, and not earlier. I am not sure I can get through another nasty election so soon after this one…

 

Happy New Year of the Rooster everybody!
I hope this will be an exciting year for all of you!