Moving In!

Where the Osaka Boys (and mom) move into their new home North of Osaka.

So we finished the move today! 

And Marcus finally got his dream bunk bed.

South Osaka was amazing and super good to us. Marcus loved his school (LOVED) and responded in a way I dreamed. His answers to questions in Hawaii: “Nothing” and “no one”; became long stories about who did what to whom and how they all worked it out at the end. I couldn’t ask for more. On his last day of class his classmates all wanted pictures (all 8 year olds here have cell phones, most newer than mine). The classmates followed Marcus home chanting that they wanted to come in the house. It was everything we hoped for.

Unfortunately we had to move.

The Gang.

We were staying at a space themed vacation rental in a bad part of town. As one friend described, “Did you want easy access to crack?” But with this move tall buildings gives way to a semi-country charmed kind of life.

The new town, Toyonaka city is definitely not “Country-country”. But we are the final stop on the train line. The area is all housing, but not five minutes away is forest. Deep forest. I can’t wait to explore.

After arriving at the house today (I’ll have better video when I get better internet) Marcus, Max and I went for a tour of the area. I’m used to walking through deep city and using that as an excuse to find new bars or restaurants to explore. There were none. NONE. This area is residential. We did though pass 6 different parks with playground equipment. This is what I said I wanted for the kids, country life with easy access to assorted parks. Toyonaka fits the bill. The next step is getting Marcus a gang, so he can hang out with them without us watching him at the park. I think 8 is old enough.

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I probably had my first gang at 10. Whatever 5th grade is. We had playground equipment and we all lived within earshot of it. Whenever two would play, all of us would know and skip out of the apartments. The community had gates, but it was a huge community with multiple playgrounds, but my playground gang was the best.

My parents were very lenient, probably based on the theory that we were mainly safe behind the gate. We hardly went to the other side of the complex. But the rule was “no going outside the gate” so of course that’s all we did.

The leader was Mike with his younger brother Timmy-call-me-Tim. Two mop top blonde kids. Mike was a proto-athelete and must have ended up playing some type of varsity sports. Mike is the one who got the “five minute flu” as both of his parents worked and came home to find him eating chips and drinking soda. Tim told us about that one. It was Mike’s sleepover where I first saw Nightmare on Elm Street. Our Wolverine was Joey. Raised by a single dad, Joey was chicano and slightly older. It was Joey who invited all of us into his house, turned the lights off,while his parents were away, and blasted a new song titled “Fuck the Police” which started me on this career track.

We used a three man catapult slingshot to shoot water balloons at neighboring buildings. We snuck past the gate to the am/pm to stack the soft serve ice cream until it fell out of the bowl. Together we bought the LA X-PRESS as if we were the Mossad on a mission. Some adult newspaper sold from newstands in Los Angeles and hid it at the top of a staircase under a loose rug. We didn’t know what to do with those papers, we just knew we weren’t supposed to have them and for that reason we needed them. It was a simpler time and that was my gang.

Joey moving away broke up the team. He made a skateboard launch ramp by hand for Tim as a going away gift. The first time we all used it, everyone took turns launching from it. On my turn the board did not launch. Instead of riding up the curve the nose went straight through the wood, destroying it. The first time we used it. I looked behind me, saw their jaws on the floor, tossed my board over the fence and slid through the the slats and ran like hell as the gang gave chase. The next time we met, it was forgotten but moving away and Jr. High had predetermined the ending already.

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I want Marcus to have friends to play him music that changes his life. To show him movies I don’t care to see. To teach him when it’s time to stop talking and run. A dad can’t do all of that. In Hawaii I feel like that wasn’t the track we were on.

I talked to a mom in Toyonaka the other day. She said at 8 years old the boys have to walk to school by themselves. They have to! I’m excited for it.

I’m hoping whatever new gang he finds is close like the one he had for three weeks in South Osaka.  Japan is both notorious for bullies but also for being interested in foreigners, and you never know which will control. I think the smaller school was good for him in that way.

Next week he’ll have that anime moment of “Hey everyone, the new exchange student starts today, please be nice to him. Why don’t you say a few words to introduce yourself to the class?”

And that’s when the next chapter of his story begins.