Arigato Gozaimasu!

Thank you to all of you for the responses on our new blog. It was a decent first try and I hope to get better as time goes on!

Today is Friday (ALREADY - where did the week go?) Yesterday was the roughest day that I have had yet. It was a combination of many emotions and just so many things to be done, that I think I hit the limit of my patience. I am happy to report though, that with every tough day, comes a better day, the day after. So today, things seem to bemore even-kealed. (and thank you Jen for the long skype session - that helped!)

We did a lot of necessary business yesterday.
First of which: Brad went and signed the lease for our new home! I will send photos once we pick up the keys and get over there again, but a synopsis (some of you asked more about it): 3 bedroom, 2 full bathrooms, American Style Apartment (meaning that the kitchen has an oven and stove - the Japanese don't use ovens), American Washer and Dryer (again, they don't use dryers), huge wrap around balcony (the length of the apartment) and if I didn't note it enough in my last post - on the beach and walking trails. We will be on the third floor, we have stairs and an elevator - and I think we are the only people on the 3rd floor. The elevator is right outside our door. We also have 2 parking spaces (parking is prime here on Okinawa) and 1 of them is covered. I think we get to pick up the keys on Monday (after we pay everything in YEN - which has been an intersting process in itself... Brad stayed up late and called our bank in the states to have money wired to our new account at one of the banks here that deals in Yen and in Dollars... fun, fun, fun.

The other news of note: We called TMO yesterday (did I mention this already?) and both of our shipments are here, so we are planning to have those delivered first and our government furniture second (really, selfishly, I can't wait to sleep in my own bed!) SO, by this time next week, we should be in our new home, surrounded by boxes, happy mismatched government furniture, and a great view. WE CAN'T WAIT!

What else - oh yes. More big news. We bought our first car yesterday too! (I told you it was a big day!). The used car lots here are so funny. You basically go there, find one (or more) that you like, you talk to the lot manager, he gives you the keys and you can turn on the car (but you don't drive anywhere). SO basically, you are running it to see if it sounds okay and if the a/c runs cold. We found a few vans (a big car of choice here for families) and decided on a 1999 Toyota Enima (yes, like Enema). It is white (which was not my first choice) but clean and had double moon roof's (the girls liked that). The middle row of seats you can turn completely around facing backwards. It should be fun, fun, fun. (I'll send photos of this too next week). And for those who were wondering - definitely no where near as nice as our Honda Odyssey - we were so spoiled!

SO, after you pick the one you like, you try and get him to go lower (we got it down from $4500 to $3800 which included a 90 day warantee and a year of free labor). We has basically heard from others that most of the lots offer similar things for similar prices. YOu can definitely find good deals, but most things happen at a median price anyway. SO, we will shop and bargain more for Brad's car in the upcoming weeks, but for now we are happy to say we have a family car. We have a loaner car until Monday when our title and insurance stuff should come though. Then we will be all set. Yippee. The other thing of note: Our sales guy Hiroshi had yen coins stuck in his ears. I am going to try and get his photo next week too.

To do all of this stuff, our sponsor Sken let us borrow his car, which meant we had to drive it! We did successfully pick up our driver's license's and now we are legally able to drive! So far so good I suppose - Brad and I both had to help the other (while driving) when turning at times or missing a stop sign (it looks like a yeild sign here - red and triangle shaped). I think we will get the hang of it soon enough.

OH YES, I almost forgot. We also got our new cell phones. Unlike the states where almost every cell phone company offers you free phones. We had to buy our phones (the lowest price being $160) along with our plan. SO, it has been a BIG money week. (Note to those who may come here: Plan on spending some good dough out of pocket for set up costs: car, cell phone, rent and deposits). I am sure there are ways to get around some of it, but we didn't realize how useful a cell phone woudl have been say - last week.. until this week. We opted on the cheapest most basic version of cell phone (they have some crazy ones available here). Brad got mat silver and I got an obnoxious purple/pink, so I can find it wherever it may be. The girls love the color of course).

We still can't figure out how to change our voicemail message, so as of now, it is answered in Japanese and we have no idea what she is saying probably "okay this silly American can't figure this phone out, so leave a message!" We will likely be using these as our main phones (since once we are in our house, we will use our vonage phone and internet connection for phoning and skyping home!

We hope that all is well with you. If you have a few minutes please drop us a line and say hello. We LOVE to hear from you and makes us feel just a little bit closer to home!

Sayonara!