So cheap in California!

カリフォルニアってとにかく物価が高くて暮らしにくいところと思っていたけれど、たまには”安い”ものもあるという”うれしい”発見をしました。なんといっても野菜にくだものが安い！とくにフルーツは種類も豊富。それに、肉や魚も案外安い。加えてブランド製品、たとえばトーマスのベーグルやダノンのアクティビア・ヨーグルトでさえ、前にバージニアで払っていた値段に比べるとかなり安いように思います。今日買い物に行って、カートいっぱいの食料を買ったけれど、シャーロッツビルならば軽く120ドルは払っている分量なのに、なんと79ドル！

カリフォルニアの消費税は7.25％でこれは全米でもちろん一番高い率。ついでに書くと、ミシシッピ、ニュー・ジャージー、ロード・アイランド、テネシー が7%で次ぎ、その後ワシントン、ミネソタ、ネバダが6.5%。テキサスとイリノイの6.25%が後を追います。バージニアは5%。カリフォルニアの 7.25%はどうみても高すぎだけれど、うれしいことに非加工食品には税がかかりません。普通多くの州が食品は非課税としていますが、バージニアは課税する数少ない州のうちのひとつ（食品の消費税は2.5%)。ウエスト・バージニア(同4%)とテネシー(同5.5％)が同じような州です。つまり、ここでは食品の元値が安いうえに非課税なので、とても安く感じるようです。

Everything is expensive in California, right? Well, that is at least what I believed until now. But to my surprise, there are couple of things I found so inexpensive in comparison to the price level I am used to in Virginia. First of all, it's grocery. The fresh produce is abundant and very reasonable. Other items like meat and fish are very reasonably priced, too. Even brand name products, Thomas Bagels and Danone Activia yogurt for example, are much cheaper than the prices I was paying in Charlottesville, VA. Today I went grocery shopping and purchased a full cart of food, for which I would be easily paying $120 in Virginia. The total was only $79.

In California, the sales tax rate is 7.25%, which it THE highest in this country. For your info, the second highest is 7% of Mississippi, New Jersey, Road Island and Tennessee, and then 6.5% of Washington, Minnesota and Nevada, followed by 6.25% of Texas and Illinois. Virginia's rate is 5%. California's 7.25% is gross by any standard, but they do not tax "unprocessed food items," thus I rarely pay tax on food I buy. Actually Virginia is one of the very few states that tax food (2.5% on food), along with West Virginia (4%) and Tennessee (5.5%) . Here in California, the prices are low to start with and there is no tax on it, so going grocery became my favorite activity.

Blessed day

今日は、以前にご紹介したローリング・ヒルズ・カブナント教会・日本語部の野外礼拝/カレー大会/運動会でした。歌を歌ったり、牧師さんのお話を聞いたあとで、8種類ものカレー（激辛から甘口まで）をたらふくごちそうになり、お腹がこなれた頃に運動会というプログラム。

Rolling Hills Covenant Church, which we had been to two weeks ago, had an outdoor worship today, so we joined them there. It was actually an outdoor worship/curry lunch/field day. We had 8 different curries, from extremely spicy to non-spicy, and it was fun to try a bit of everything. After lunch, we had fun with casual competitions of various field matches.




パパ（左からふたりめ）も綱引きに参加。これは40才以上のおじさんグループ（左・計10人）と40才未満の若手グループ（右・ハンデ付きで7人）の対抗。おじさんたちは検討し、勝利を収めました。

Daddy took part in a tug of war. He is the second from the left. This match was "senior" group consisting of ten of over-40 people on the left vs. "youth" group consisting of seven of under-40 people on the right. The result? Senior group won "with ease."




ママと娘の二人三脚。イチニ、イチニと声をかけながら頑張りました。南カリフォルニアの太陽を浴びて一日中外で過ごした気持ちのよい日でした。シャーロッツビルの日本補習教室の運動会のことを思い出しながら古い友達を懐かしく思いつつ、ここでの新しい友達ができる予感のする、希望のある日でした。

This is two of us in a three-legged race. We did just fine, singing one, two, one two... We were blessed with southern California sunshine and enjoyed the day so much. It brought us back the wonderful memories of those filed days we shared with friends of Charlottesville Japanese school back in Virginia. This was a day we spent, thinking of good old friends in Charlottesville, and wishing we make good new friends here in Los Angeles.

The first ride

やっと念願の自転車4台が揃いました。パパのはもうあったけど、あとの3台を新規購入。当初、Targetで全部買ったんだけど、どうも2台が調子が悪く、返品したのち今度はToysrusで調達。1週間がかりでやっと思い通りの自転車が揃い、みんな満足満足。さっそく、息子の通う中学校までみんなで行ってみたけれど、ちょっと怖かった。娘はまだ補助輪つきなので、がたがたした歩道にひっかかたり、大きな道を渡るときちゃんと渡れるか心配したり、歩道脇の家の車庫から車がバックしてこないか注意したり、はたまた疲れたよ。やっぱり当面、自転車は公園か海辺のバイクパスでやることにしよう。

Look at our bikes! We had to buy three bikes, since only dad had his. We first purchased three bikes at Target, but two of them were not up to our expectation, so we returned them and got something else at Toysrus. It took us a whole week, but now each of us has what we like the best. Eager to try the new bikes, we took a little ride to our son's middle school. It was just a mile or so, but oh how tired I got. Our daughter still rides one with training wheels, and it sometimes got trapped with uneven pavements. I worried so much if she was able to handle the direction when we went across a busy street. You also need to watch for cars backing up from carports beside the sidewalk. At least for a while, we'd better stick to parks and bike paths on the beach, we decided after all.

Guitar Center

息子の大好きな場所。その名もギター・センター。全米各地にあるらしい。ここのは、案外大きくて、あっちの壁もこっちの壁もギターで埋め尽くされている。数百台はあるんじゃないかなあ。しかもギターアンプもあちこちに何台も設置してあって、壁から好きなギターをはずして、好きなアンプにつなげて、好きなように効果をつけて、弾いて見たりできるからすごい。彼には夢のようなところらしい。200ドルくらいのギターならなんとなくまだ気が軽いけど、2000ドルなんてのもあるから、見ている親のほうがキンチョーしてしまうよ。最初に行った時は、汚げな長髪に刺青のにいちゃんとか、唇にピアスしているねえちゃんとか、真っ黒のTシャツにどくろマークのおじさんとか、とにかく異様な雰囲気の人がたくさんいて、ど、どうしよう！ってかんじだったけど、もう慣れたよ。そういう怖げなひとに限って、案外話してみるとかわいかったりするし。。今日は、6ドル50のピックを買って帰ってきました。

Our son's THE favorite place. Guitar Center. It is a big national chain. This one we have here is pretty big, and all the walls inside the store are covered with hundreds of guitars. There are also quite a few islands of guitar amps of various sizes and effects waiting for you to plug your favorite guitar. You just pick a guitar you like off the wall and plug it into one of those amps and adjust the setting to your liking and play it. It is his dream-come-true place. I can be smiling watching him if his pick is a $200 one, but I cannot be at peace if it is like $2,000. I would say it is pretty generous of the store to let them play around with those guitars.
The first time we were there, it was pretty intimidating since there were bunch of people with long hair which does not look like washed often enough, those with tatoos all over the body, those with lips pierced, those totally in black and those with T-shirts with those scary simbols like bloody skelton etc, but this time it was not that bad, since now we know how to commingle in the environment. Those people are pretty friendly and lovable once you interact with them. Today we came home with a box of guitar picks, which cost him $6.50.

Judy and Roger

引越しのとき、ダイニングについていたシーリング・ライトを一緒に持ってきてしまったので、当分の間、ダイニングには照明器具がなかったのだけれども、そうしたらやっぱり何かついていないと見栄えが悪いと家売り担当の不動産屋が言うので、さてどうしよう。。。そういっても私たちはもうカリフォルニア。。困っていたところ、お隣のジュディーとロジャーが付けてあげるから心配するなと言ってくれました。さっそくオンラインで器具を注文し、バージニアの隣の家あてに送ってもらい、すぐにロジャーが付けてくれました（そして写真まで送ってくれたよ）。これだけでない、ジュディーとロジャーときたら、防犯のために私が安物カーテンを窓に残してきたのがちょっと長すぎて床に引きずっていたら寸法直しをしてくれたり、これまた防犯のために夜だけライトがつくようにタイマーを設置してくれたり、家を購入目的で見に来たひとたちがたまにドアに鍵をかけるのを忘れて帰っちゃうとちゃんと後でロックしてくれたり、ドアの鍵の調子が悪ければ直してくれもしちゃう。バージニアにいるときもお世話になりっぱなしだったけど、いなくなってからもこんなにお世話になるとは思わなかったよ。本当にありがとうございます。

When we moved out of the house in Virginia, we took the lighting fixture in our dining room with us. We thought it was not a big deal, but according to the realtor who is working hard to sell the house, it looks much nicer if the dining room had a fixture in. Well, but we are 2,500 miles away on the other side of the country, what do we do? Then our next door neighbor in Virgina, Judy and Roger, kindly offered to put it up for us. I thus ordered a fixture online and had it shipped to Judy and Roger, and voila! Roger put it up for us (this is the picture they sent us over the e-mail).　　They have done so much for us. They hemmed up the curtains which I left on the windows for the purpose of crime prevention, since they were a little too long. They make sure all the doors and windows are locked whenever prospective buyers come to see the house. Onetime the lock was not working properly, and they fixed it. They put a timer on a lamp so that it comes on automatically during the night to make it look like someone lives there. Our house is getting a AAA+++ care. Sometimes I am jealous of our house, because it still has them next door and we don't.




ジュディーとロジャーのことをよく思い出します。これは、引越しのとき、子どもたちがプレゼントされたもの。子どもひとりずつの過去9年間の成長を写真集で綴ったものです。9年間の想い出がいっぱい。リビング・ルームのテーブルの上に置いて、時間があるとみんなでページをめくっています。

We think of Judy and Roger often. These are what our kids received from them when we left Virginia. They are very thick photo albums full of memorable pictures of the past 9 years. One for each child. Evey single picture brings back so much memory with it. They sit on the living room table, and we lose track of time in them.

Jacob's Crocks

これはジェイコブのクロックス。ジェイコブはバージニアにいる息子の親友。。でもこのクロックスはカリフォルニアにある。な~ぜか。。。

うちの息子は足グセが悪い。ちょっと裏庭に出ようと私のサンダルを探すと、すでに息子が履いている。。。隣の家にみんなで遊びに行って、さあうちに帰ろうとすると、息子が私のを履いてすでに帰っちゃった、、、ということしきり。私のだろうがパパのだろうが、足にはまればすぐ盗む。その悪癖が高じて、ジェイコブのクロックスをちょこちょこ拝借しているのを見たことがあったので、注意していたにもかかわらず、なんと、彼はジェイコブのクロックスでバージニアを出発し、はるばるアメリカ大陸を横断して、ここカリフォルニアまで来てしまった。

ごめんねぇ、ジェイコブ。でも、これ毎日履いてるよ。毎日ジェイコブのこと思い出しているよ。いつも一緒ね。

These are Jacob's Crocks. Jacob is our son's best friend in Virginia. These Crocks are here in California, however. Do you know why?

Our son is notorious stealing other people's sandals. I had so many incidents that I searched everywhere for my sandals for hours, and finally found he was using them. When we were invited for a dinner to our next door neighbors', I had to go home tiptoeing in his sandals, since he went ahead back home in my sandals. Well, but I did not expect he was this bad as stealing people's sandals across state borders (many of them)! He left Virginia in Jacob's Crocks, traveled across the north American continent, arrived here in California, and he IS still using them!

I am sorry, Jacob, that you had to give up your Crocks this way. But we think of you everyday. He goes to the beach in your Crocks, so we feel like you are with us playing on the beach.

City Library

もう9月だというのにまだまだ学校が始まらない。子どもたちは遊ぶ友達もいないし、いつも私と3人行動でそろそろお互い飽きてきたかんじ。ということで、今日はシティー・ライブラリに行くことに。めでたく会員カードもつくり、全部で5冊借りてきました。

It is September! The school does not start until 10th, however. Kids do not have any friends to play with yet, and three of us stick together all the time. You know the outcome, right? So we decided to try the city library for a change. We made the member card, and checked out five books.




びっくりしたのは、このシティー・ライブラリ、日本語セクション、中国語セクション、韓国語セクションなどなどなど（その他にもいろいろあった）が用意されていたこと。子どもの本から大人の本まで、ひいては雑誌まで置いてありました。

It was a nice surprise that they had separate sections for Japanese books, Chinese books, Korean books and several other languages. They had kids books, adult books and even periodicals and magazines in those languages.