Growing Up Fast

“When am I going to turn thirty nine?”

“What is wire made of?”

“What is inside the toothbrush?”

“When is tato’s hair going to grow long?”

“When am I going to turn two hundred and fifteen?”

I can officially say that Mark is my little Mr. Why at age four.  His questions are so entertaining sometime. And his favorite one is “Am I behaving today?”. It is a true fact that he is trying really hard to be the “obedient” child.  So while I am in another room disciplining the big kids about something they were doing, all Mark wants to know at that moment if he is in trouble or not.

His first questions EVERY day are: “Is it morning now?” and “What day is it?”.  He knows that he goes to school (playgroup) every morning except Thursday (well, and weekend), and he always tells me how much he wants to stay home with me. Of course, by the time we are at playgroup he forgets all about wanting to stay home, but still, it is so sweet that he misses me. I will definitely miss him when next fall comes and he is at school full time.

One thing I need to work on is taking more pictures of my everyday life with kids! So here is a couple I snapped the other week. Mark, the policeman.

This uniform belonged to Alex who was so into police officers when he turned four. This guy, actually, doesn’t dress up very often, he is more “playing with animals/dinosaurs/bad guys/cities and pretend” kind of guy. Cannot wait till we can play outside more!!!

Guess who else is growing up? Yes, our Alex. He is seven and half now, but by the way he looks, you’d think he is ten. I still have to keep reminding myself that Katya and Alex are NOT the same age. Alex still loves to cuddle with me, endures all my hugs and kisses and enjoys me tucking him in at night. Right before he falls asleep, he loves to talk about one thing—planning of his birthday. His birthday is not until July…and we’ve been talking about it for several months already. This year he is hoping to have a big bowling party on base (with some American and some British friends), have a piñata in a shape of the planet Earth and a cake that looks like a flag of the Maldives.  He also talks about his one-on-one time with Robert ON his birthday, when just the two of them are planning to go to an amusement park.

Alex loves to dance and I wish I could give him an opportunity to be on the stage somewhere. He’s got quite the moves…

Soon his class is going to put up a production at school, so we’ll see how Alex does-haha. I believe he has two lines.

Katya took these pictures of him, so I am not even sure what he is doing here.

And Katya, of course…oh, Katya. “Sugar and Spice”—that is so Katya.  Some moments of her playing and helping nicely around the house I want to cherish in my memory forever (and I want HER to remember that she does like her brothers and parents).  Other times, I have to stop her and point out what is happening with her mood or attitude and take a deep breath hoping for a lot of patience. She is the sweetest girl! She is also very good at sensing what is right and what is wrong, and that has been a great challenge for her at the new school. Some cultural differences between kids she used to play with and the kids that are her classmates now are very drastic, so she is bombarded with some of the negative influences at the moment. She has been getting better and better though at being able to ignore those things that sour her day and try to focus on her new friends. Some days she really wants to go back to the American school, and we absolutely understand why….our Misawa school was just such a safe friendly environment, surrounded with the sweetest memories for her. We hope that this year Katya will be able to start making good memories at the village school as well, and it will only get better before her Year 6 (5th grade).

Well, there was a quick update on the kids. They are happy, healthy, fed and loved.  And they all want to see you come visit!

Lyana. 

The Original York

Two weeks ago, our search for adventures led us to the City of York, two hours north from where we live.  I have heard from a number of people how beautiful this city is and how it is definitely worth a visit. I found out online that in February, York holds the annual Viking Festival with events planned for two weeks. So on Feb. 23rd, we took off for York.

We’ve got to start getting up earlier and leaving earlier on our daytrip days…we used to be out of the house by 8-8:30 am in Japan making the most of the day. I think it will be much easier to do when the sun is up earlier too. Anyway, we got on the road a bit later than anticipated…and right at the motorway exit to go to York from the main road, we got stuck because of an accident. Everything was shut down (I hear that happens all the time here…not just a lane is shut down but the whole motorway).  So we spent almost an hour sitting in traffic. We finally got to York at 12:30 pm.

It’s difficult to write about York in just a few sentences. York is a VERY old city. It goes way back to 71 AD when Romans arrived into the area. They did not name it York though, they named it Eboracum.  Alex and Mark actually found a column that remained in downtown York from the times when Romans ruled over this area.

Then came Anglo-Saxons and stayed there between 400-800 AD

Finally, on November 1, 866 AD, the Vikings invaded York. This date may well have been chosen with care. It was All Saints Day, an important festival in York when many of the town’s leaders could have been in the cathedral, making a surprise attack even more effective.

They changed the name of the city Jorvik, and soon transformed it into the capital of a kingdom of the same name, roughly corresponding to Yorkshire today. The name of the kingdom was Danelaw. Their neighbors from the North (the Saxons) and the from the South (English kings) attacked constantly. Then finally, in 954, the last Viking King was defeated and York has become part of the united Anglo-Saxon kingdom.

That is until William the Conqueror marched in with his Norman soldiers…but he comes from another era, so no room for him in this post.

All the kids wanted to see in York was the VIKINGS. And we saw plenty.  The first thing we did was catch the “Viking procession” through the streets of York. Here are some Vikings getting ready to start their march.

Then a group of them stopped to make sure people could take pictures.

Mark is always the one who gets the weapon for the pictures.

I told Alex when he grows up he is probably going to be the size of that guy behind Robert.

This is Alex’s warrior face.

We walked along York’s beautiful streets just soaking in the atmosphere of this northern town.

The kids wanted to make Viking coins. So we let them-well, they actually only used the hammer one time and the rest was done by the guy in charge of making the coins.

After a very nice lunch of sweet and savory crepes, we headed to the Beard Competition. But first, we had to stop and take a few more pictures.

The beard competition had three parts—one for kids, one for women and one for men. Apparently, this is a big deal around here because many kids showed up with their hand made beards to impress the judge with their creativity.

You can see a few women here.

By the time the men’s turn came, Mark looked like this. So I had to walk around with him inside some stores to warm him up.

Katya and Alex stayed for the whole competition (almost an hour) because they thought it was quite interesting. The men had real beards, and the guy from Finland won. And somehow we did not take any pictures of that part…

Festival events were coming to an end because it was 5 pm. The only thing left was a battle show (which would have been really cool, but expensive for all of us) in the evening. Maybe next time we’ll stay late for it.

We had to see the most beautiful building in York of course, York Minster. So we walked over to it and decided that we will have to definitely visit York on another day, hopefully when it’s warmer.

York, we’ll see you again soon.

Spring Is On Its Way

Today is February 23rd.  It is not even spring yet, and it certainly does not feel like spring is coming at all.  The temperatures are just a couple of degrees above freezing, but my body feels soooo chilled to the bone every time I go outside, especially when there is no sun.  I cannot wait till it warms up! And I cannot wait for nature to wake up! I am excited to see what our back garden will look like when it’s covered with lush green leaves and beautiful purple flowers again.

The magic thing about winter in England is that the grass stays green. It never turned brown! The ground is very moist all year round, so the grass looks almost the same even when it is freezing outside.

And about two weeks ago (beginning of February), we started seeing snowdrops popping up everywhere in the back garden. 

I guess it happens a month earlier here than it does in Ukraine. I remember growing up, snowdrops (or pidsnizhniki, literally translated as “under snow (flowers)”) were always ready for picking and selling right on time for March 8th, International Women’s Day. So all moms and teachers always received snowdrops for that special day.

In some locations, having this much water means the snow has melted and it’s getting warmer. Not here. This just means it rained for a day and the water has nowhere to go…this is our golf course again. 

Oh yes, I am excited that we survived (well, just about) our first winter here. We have been spending a lot of time inside of our house, that is for sure, so I am happy we picked a house that has a decent area downstairs where we can hang out.
Till next time,
Lyana.

Barcelona: The Beach, Some Paella and the Magic Fountain

Sounds like the title to a Steven King thriller, eh?  Nope.  It’s just another day in our Barcelona holiday (Brits don’t say ‘vacation’). 

It was a bright, sunny day (actually everyday was bright and sunny while we were there) so despite the gentle chill in the air, we decided to make our very first trip to the Mediterranean seaside, or in other words “we just wanted to say we went to the beach”.

So we put on our shades (actually only Lyana was smart enough to pack shades) and headed to the beach.

The kids were all to happy to roll up their trousers and play in the sand.  “You can get your feet wet, but don’t you dare get your clothes wet!”

“What did you say Dad?”

Coincidentally (not) we brought along extra clothes.  We had a hunch there might be some “accidental” wettage.

The best thing to do after a long, fun afternoon at the beach is finding a good place to eat dinner.  That may sound easy, but then you might not have been to Barcelona before where almost every restaurant’s kitchen is closed between 4:30 and 8:30.  And it just so happened that the restaurant we wanted to go to fell into that category. 

But that didn’t get us down (much).  I asked the worker at that restaurant if he could recommend another place for good Paella.  And he did!  He told us to go around the corner and we’d find a place called [insert name here when you think of it] and tell them that Hugi (that was the guy’s name) sent us. 

And that’s where we went.  You’ve probably heard the saying that if there’s locals eating at a restaurant, it’s a good bet that the food is good.  Well, I think it should go a little further than that, because earlier in our trip we went somewhere that had locals, and it wasn’t very good at all.  My new mantra is that if there a a LOT of middle-aged, definitely non-tourist locals playing dominoes and having a good time in the restaurant, than it’s probably a good place to eat.  That certainly played true here.

We ordered several tapas (basically al a cart appetizers) and some paella.  We were turned off by the paella we had the other night, but we decided to risk it and try again. 

I put this chicken thing on Katya’s plate and at first she refused to eat it, until she realized it was just a ball of chicken/cream cheese-like goodness batter-dipped and fried.

Whenever you order paella, the waiter will want to know how many “servings” you want.  He’ll tell you the minimum, and unless you are dining alone, then the minimum is never one.  Logically, one would be enough for my family, but they wouldn’t allow it.  They were nice enough to allow us to order just two servings, though we had a family of 5 (kids don’t count as much, I guess).  Each ‘serving’ of paella, by the way, cost 19 Euro!!  

And that’s what this monstrosity is: two servings of seafood paella.  Mussels, Prawns, octopus and squid, and maybe some other unidentifiable sea creatures, but who’s checking anyway.

It smelled delicious.  It looked delicious.  But how did it taste?  Was this pan of food worth 38 Euro?

Katya wasn’t so sure at first (just like the chicken thing earlier) but when she actually TASTED it, she liked it.  And if she liked it, then that’s the best food critic rating you can get.

Please don’t play with your food.

 

After dinner, the plan was to head toward the Magic Fountain for the famous show where the water fountain goes in sync to music.  We thought it was up a mountain, so we planned to ride a cable car to the top where we would see it.  As you can see by this picture, this is not a cable car.  We arrived at the cable car tower seven minutes after they closed.  

At that point we started up a conversation with a couple of rickshaw drivers nearby and we asked them for directions to the Magic Fountain.  Good thing we talked to them because as it turns out, the fountain is NOT up the mountain at all, so had we arrived on time to the cable car, we would have ended up in the wrong place. 

Anyway, we hit it off with the rickshaw drivers, as they were both British ex-pats, and we ended up hitching a ride with them (for a nominal fee, of course) and they took us to the metro station we needed to get to the fountain.

Along the way we spotted this lobster statue.  I’d never seen a statue of a crustacean this size before, so I snapped a quick photo for all of you blog readers.

This was the road we traveled along. Just a picturesque, palm-tree lined traditional-looking European look.

Short 15 minute ride, but well worth the money paid.  Ironically, when we went to Thailand, the land of rickshaws, the only “rickshaw” we rode in was in the back of what looked like a miniature Toyota pickup, but not much bigger then these.  At least these rickshaws were powered by human energy (pedaling hard).  The one in Thailand worked on Petrol.

We hopped off the rickshaws and headed up the street to the metro station.  Along the way, we met our old friend Christopher Columbus (that’s him on top of the column).  Hey kids, why don’t you pose like the Columbus statue and I’ll take a picture!  Yep, that’s them posing like Christopher Columbus.  Sort of a jazzy disco version of Columbus.

Perhaps I was the last person in the world to learn this,which is funny because like most of you, I’ve seen these living statue street performers in cities all over the place.  What I didn’t know (until our trip to London several weeks ago) was that they will change position, usually doing something funny for the kids in the process, then allow you to take your photo with them ONLY if you place money in the bucket.  Otherwise, don’t take a photo of them.  They don’t really appreciate that.

Don’t worry, we gave this guy some change.  And in return, he gave my child a revolver. 

Finally we made it to the Magic Fountain, found a place sitting on the stone steps in front, and waited.  7:30 rolled around and the magic began.  You, too, can experience the magic. 

1) put on some Beethoven

2) turn all the water taps in your house on to full blast

3) with all three fountain pictures (see below) showing on your screen, blink really fast while alternating between each of them for 15 minutes.  Voila! your very own Magic Fountain.

Actually, the fountains were pretty cool.  It was also cool to witness the hundreds of the people who showed up to watch it, and that was just the first show of the evening.  The shows continue every 30 minutes well into the night.

These . . .  are my children . . . usually.

And this is me and my sweetheart . . . always. 

Roberto

Barcelona: Park Guell

Where were we?? Oh yes…So we had one more day left in Barcelona. We had to plan out our itinerary for the day carefully in order to hit last minute must-dos on our list.

In the morning, we headed to Park Guell. It is the most important park in the city, as it was designed by Gaudi, of course, on request of Guell-guy. Originally, the area was supposed to turn into a serene estate for the rich, that’s why it’s a bit out of the city’s center. Unfortunately, the idea fell through and the only three houses that ended up being built there were Gaudi’s, Guell’s, and their lawyer’s. The park was a nice refreshing walk up and down the hills with some unique architectural designs—a good break for kids, but nothing out of the world unbelievably fabulous (at least I, Lyana think that).

One the most valuable tips we got from our guide from the previous day was that when going to Park Guell by metro, get off at a metro stop called “Vallcarca” and not the next one. That helped us a lot because otherwise…I don’t know if we would have survived the long walk from the metro stop to the park entrance without whining (from Robert).

Instead we did this:

Oh no, these are not tilted pictures.  This is truly how steep the streets on the way up to Park Guell. How is this better than the other possible route?

This is why it’s better-ha! Half of the streets had escalators! So fun !

Looking back at the street.

We got to the top entrance of the park, looked at the map written in Catalan and decided on a route not really knowing where we were going.  A few steps ahead we saw something that we had never seen before! haha Cacti with writings on them!!! Katya and Alex thought that was pretty amazing, of course.

The view on top was fantastic with clear skies and the whole city in front of us. The kids made it up the hill just fine.

La Sagrada (it has to be mentioned in each post at least once, you know?) is towering over the rest of the buildings.

Morning sun.

I am not sure what this monument was for. It was located on top of another small hill that had only steep winding stairs leading you to the top. I actually was too scared to go up…but Robert and the kids did it (I think I am beginning to suffer from fear of heights or something).

Making our way through the park we came across a place to rest.

A very interesting “passage way” where we were unsure which way was up or down or what. Fun for the kids.

That’s the passage way, made to look like the columns are actually palm trees, growing out of the ground.  Gaudi used a lot of natural elements in his architecture.

We came out of the “tunnel” and headed for an open area with a nice view, and this Serpentine Bench.

This technique of breaking tiles and then putting them back together is very Gaudi. It is gorgeous in real life.

Another nice view of the city in the background. I guess we were supposed to make a wish if we sit on it (I found that out too late), so make sure you do, when you go. The bench was a bit cold, but very comfortable.

We had a quick snack on the bench of crackers and mandarin oranges.  And, let’s say, one of us spilled a whole bunch of crackers on the ground. The best thing we could do is step on those spilled crackers to make them small enough for all the pigeons to eat.  Free pigeon food for kids to run around with.

The open area is great for children and

funny little green birds. Or should I say great for children who CHASE those birds.

Right by the main entrance to the park, you can find the famous DRAGON (or lizard). Very busy spot to take pictures, so this picture is a masterpiece considering the fact that we had to fight for our spot in the sun with a dozen of other people taking the dragon picture.

And here are a few more from the same stairs but opposite the lizard.

This is how busy it was, and that’s during an off-season month. So go early in the day.

Part of the entry design—houses with frosted roofs that look like they are from “Handsel and Gretel” fairy tale.

And finally, we found a Magic Ball that let us pick and choose which child we wanted to appear.

Or if we wanted to see all of them at the same time, the Magic Ball could do that too.

Okay, fine. For real, Robert was just having fun with the camera.

We spent almost two hours at the park, and that was plenty.  We walked a good fifteen-twenty minute downhill from the park towards the metro station, stopping on the way to pick up some bread, cheese, meat and fruit for a picnic style lunch. The kids couldn’t wait for our next stop that day—the beach.  So go find your sun glasses before you read our next post.