Starting to Plan for Tokyo

As you might imagine, Maria and I are having many conversations about our trip next year.

1. The first big question is where Maria is going to work. As part of the fellowhsip, the Council on Foreign Relations will place her in an organization relevant to her research interests. It’s not finalized yet, but it looks likes she will go to JICA - the Japan International Cooperation Agency - where she will analyze options and make recommendations for how JICA makes its international aid loans in the future.
2. The second big question is finding an international school for Kai. These schools are intended for expat families like us, so instruction is in English and Japanese (it would be way too overwhelming to throw Kai into an all-Japanese school!). The problem is that they are extremely expensive, with tuitions around $15,000/year (the number is even scarier looking in Yen: 1,700,000). But through Maria’s friends in Japan, we’ve learned about a few that are less expensive, so we’re chasing down those leads. One is the Doremi Garden Preschool, which, at the very least, has an awfully cute website (and if Kai goes there, I’d probably be the only dad on “Mommy and Me” days!). We actually have to nail this down soon, as the classes at these schools fill up quickly.
3. Once we’ve settled on Kai’s school, that will determine the part of town we live in, as I’ll need to take Kai to school on the train each day, and we don’t want it to be a long commute. Maria says it can be difficult for foreigners to find a nice place, as apartments rented to foreigners are typically rented only to foreigners, which means they may not be in the best shape. So she has also asked her friends to help us find places that are normally rented to Japanese families.
4. Then there’s our house here. We’re going to talk with a good friend of Maria’s to see if she’d like to live there while we’re away, and see if she can cover about half the mortgage (we’ve decided we’re not comfortable with the risk of simply renting the house to people we don’t know). That would make it financially viable for me to drop to part-time status, or even go on leave for a while.

So I’m imagining a typical weekday in Japan for us will go something like this: Maria will work 9-5, and I’ll be in charge of the boys. Eidan and I will ride on the train with Kai to take him to school in the morning, then if the weather isn’t too bad I’ll bop around a different part of Tokyo each day with Eidan until it’s time to pick up Kai. Then I’ll work for a few hours at night (which is when my cowokers in the US will be starting their day, so we can be online at the same time). For Maria, our six months in Japan will be mostly about work, but for me, it’s mostly an extended family vacation. All I can say is, I married well