Happy New Year 2011!

We arrived home New Year's Eve at about 8:50pm. We raced to the grocery store to get milk, fruit, cereal, and bread for breakfast the next morning. Then, we went to our apartment to find that Santa had visited while we were gone! What a great way to come home from vacation. We stayed up late playing XBox Kinnect. We were laughing aloud to ring in the new year. We had decided to treat New Year's Eve as our Christmas Eve, and then New Year's Day as our Christmas Day. This turned out to be a wonderful plan. Phillip was off work until January 5. The kids were out of school until January 11, and Grandma was still here. We had a lot of fun. It was very difficult to tell Grandma goodbye on January 10 after a 2 month visit. We had explored parts of Japan and Australia together, celebrated Christmas and New Year's, watched kids' sports, plays, and musical performances. We shopped, played Encore and Pictionary, worked on a Great Barrier Reef puzzle (which is still not complete), explored Japanese, Korean, Brazilian, and Indian food, and simply had a great time. It really meant a lot to us that Grandma would make the long journey here and then spend so much time with us. So, saying goodbye was not easy. Grandma and Phillip had their bus tickets from Rokko Island to the airport. It is a 55 minute ride on the bus each way, so the plan was for the rest of us to say goodbye from the apartment. But, Jacob got his own money out to pay for the bus ride. He insisted on going along on the bus for those last few minutes together with Grandma. We all have very special memories of our time together.

For the kids, CA's 2nd quarter just ended last Friday, marking the half way point in the school year. All 3 children have done very well in all classes, and all seem to enjoy learning Japanese.

Jacob started his middle school soccer season on Saturday. He played at goalkeeper for 2 games and at midfielder for 2 games. Phillip and I spent 4 hours in the cold! They won all 4 games. He just started with a Japanese basketball club on Mondays and Wednesdays. The coaches only speak Japanese, but he is going with a good friend who speaks fluent Japanese. That should help. Jacob goes to Young Life (wYLdlife for middle school) on Thursday nights. YL is led by a wonderful young couple (Scott and Alisa) here on Rokko Island. It seems to be a good group of kids.

Matthew has a break from rugby until April. He is continuing with 2 after school clubs: baseball and dodge ball. Saturday soccer just ended. He leads a very busy life with school and friends. I commented to Phillip just watching him last weekend that Matthew's 4 best friends are Japanese, Korean, Indian, and American. He is learning from them, and growing to respect differences that people bring. What an amazing learning that I hope he remembers for a lifetime. I have enjoyed having them over to get to know them a bit as well. It is good for me, too.

Jessica continues to grow up before my eyes. She is reading at the highest level in her class, and her teacher consistently reports on Jessica's leadership. I have been fortunate to be able to substitute teach in her class a few times. How fun for me to get to know her friends a little better too. She is doing jazz dance club and just finished Saturday soccer. Oh, and she finally lost her top front tooth after Grandma left. We had tried to get that thing out since early November!

Friday is culture day in first grade. Jessica just completed a book for her culture day project. She chose to teach her classmates about Christmas in the US. My role in the USA booth is to tell the children about how America gained its freedom, and then to teach them "This Land is Your Land." (I have to teach it to 12 different groups!) One mom is wearing a coon skin cap and fishing. Two moms are bringing black eyed peas on tortilla chips, buckeyes, and chocolate chip cookies. You gotta love American culture!

Thanks to family and friends for your cards, calls, and email messages. We so love keeping in touch and hearing about what is going on at home! Just remember, "No worries, Mate!"

We had a very exciting 2010, full of adventure. Phillip's year was also full of travel. He visited Canada, Switzerland, Japan, China, Singapore, Korea, Australia, and Vietnam in the last year. Wow.

No January blog would be complete without a top 10 list. So, here is one from our family.

Top 10 events of 2010 for the Maloney family

10) January 2010: The Alabama Crimson Tide won its 13th NCAA college football championship. Phillip and I were at the Rose Bowl to enjoy it, and on the phone with kids at home in Cincinnati with Grandma. We were all screaming and jumping up and down!!

9) May 2010: 6th grade play and 6th grade graduation at Terrace Park.

8) March 2010: We had a wonderful spring break with the Bradys in Fort Myers... the last annual meeting for a while.

7) July 2010: We had a great time in Maui with Uncle Chris, Keegan, and Jack. This was our first trip to Hawaii.

6) August 2010: Jacob, Matthew, and Jessica started school at the Canadian Academy, making friends with students from Japan, Korea, China, Europe, Phillipines, India, Canada, New Zealand, Australia, USA ... literally from all over the world.

5) October 2010: Jacob pitched 2 complete tournament games, and scored the winning run in one game to lead his middle school baseball team to tournament championship.

4) August - December 2010: Matthew played rugby in an all-Japanese league, and did very well scoring, tackling, and becoming friends with his Japanese teammates.

3) December 2010: Everything about visiting Australia ...snorkeling in the Great Barrier Reef, seeing Steve Irwin's Australia zoo, feeding kangaroos, holding koalas, walking on the Harbor Bridge, touring the Opera House,...

2) November-December 2010: Grandma visited us for 2 months!

and the number 1 event that occurred in 2010 ....

1) July 2010: We moved to Japan!! It was a tearful goodbye, but we are very blessed to have this opportunity.

Peace and Love,

Tina

Merry Christmas Mate! December 31, 2010

The third and final part of our Australian adventure....

Our flight from Brisbane to Cairns was delayed, so we arrived in Cairns at the stroke of midnight to bring in Christmas morning. I am not sure, but I think I saw a sleigh and reindeer while we were making our landing! We arrived so late that the rental car agency left our van in the "car park" with keys under the mat. We loaded up and headed on the 25 minute drive to Palm Cove. By the way, Phillip loves driving on the round-a-bouts. I think he may run for governor of Ohio when we return using the platform of replacing all stop lights with round-a-bouts! Ha. It was dark and rainy. We found our apartment building, but Phillip and I could not get the after hours code to work. Good grief. It is 12:45am on Christmas morning. I did not want to call the Island Views emergency number. Then, I finally remembered that the lady told me “hash” before the code. Hash? Ahhh…. The number sign….. Alas, the code worked! Our tired bodies got a bolt of energy when we walked into our apartment to find 3 bedrooms, 2 family rooms, a kitchen, and a big balcony with grill, table and chairs, couch and a stunning view of the ocean. Who can sleep now? Well, we finally settled down around 2 something….

We found a church on Christmas morning. I always love to hear the Christmas story and sing Christmas songs together as a family. It is the best way to celebrate Jesus’ birth. We wanted to eat what Australians eat on Christmas, so our restaurant search began. Many restaurants serve a 3 hour, 7 course meal, full of seafood. The cost was between $110 - $140 per person. Yikes! So, we found a restaurant that serve these foods ala carte – just one course would be fine for us Americans!

Christmas Day in Cairns

On Sunday, we went to Tjapukai Aboriginal Park. We learned about the aborigines (think our Native American Indians). They showed us via performances of dance, theater, and demonstrations. We learned about their weapons, their laws, and medicines. Then, we all got to throw spears and boomerangs! Very cool. Matthew learned to play the didgeridoo, their musical instrument of choice.

On Monday, we took a beautiful 35 minute drive to Port Douglas. (We ended up making this gorgeous drive 3 days in a row!) We did a full day private tour. (Yes, the Maloneys did a private charter tour. With 6, we almost fill up the land cruiser any way!) Neville was a delightful man, and he connected with the children right away. He told them to call him “Uncle Nev”. We experienced the Daintree River, Daintree Rainforest, Mossman Gorge, Cape Tribulation. Amazing. We saw crocodiles, lizards, butterflies, and birds on our river cruise… We had a barbeque lunch in a jungle… The boys ate ants with Uncle Nev in the rainforest… We swam in the clear waters of the Mossman Gorge. It was definitely a full day! We saw lots of plant life, but we were surprised that we did not see many animals.

On Tuesday, Phillip, Jacob, Matthew, and I went on the Reef Sprinter to the Low Isles. Most of the reef tours are full day boat trips that include a long ride out to a reef, lunch, snorkeling, long ride back. The Reef Sprinter idea is to take a 15 minute speed boat trip out to the reef, snorkel for 1 hour and 45 minutes, and then take a 15 minute boat trip back. Home before noon! This is all about the snorkeling. It was very fun. We saw lots of coral, fish, and 2 sharks. Then, we picked up Grandma and Jessica to go into Cairns to see the marina and do some shopping.

On Wednesday, the entire family took that beautiful drive back to Port Douglas. Grandma was very nervous because she had never snorkeled before. We picked Quick Silver as it included an underground viewing area, as well as a semi-submersible vessel to allow all to see the fish and coral, even if you did not snorkel. The boat was huge with 3 floors. It took 1.5 hours to get out to the Agincourt Reef (along the outer edge of the Great Barrier Reef). We got our lycra suits on. Grandma took some time to put her face in the water, and then she headed out into the ocean with her snorkel buddies Phillip and Jacob. Matthew, Jessica, and I followed behind them. We had a great time snorkeling, enjoying the seafood buffet, going out in the semi-submersible vessel, and then snorkeling some more! We were all very proud of Grandma! On the boat trip back, we met a lovely couple from England. We talked the whole way back about cricket, rugby, the royal family ... they were wonderful with our kids. We found out that they had 5 children and 4 grandchildren, so no wonder they were so good with kids! It turned out that their apartment was right behind ours, so they rode back to Palm Cove with us. I love the wonderful people that you meet along each journey.

For our last day on Thursday, we took the Kuranda sky rail to Kuranda to see the rain forest, Barron Gorge, the cute little town, and of course, the wildlife sanctuary where Jacob, Matthew, and Jessica got to hold koalas. They are so doggone cute. Then, we got to pet and feed more kangaroos. We headed back via the Kuranda scenic sky rail. We picked up pizzas and ate poolside that evening. It was a lovely evening and a wonderful way to end our trip as we headed out to the airport on Friday morning. Wow. Two weeks just flew by.

Going to Australia was truly a dream come true. It is a beautiful country with friendly people. We enjoyed many of their sayings, like "G'day, Mate", "Nana", make sure your seat belts are"done up", etc. However, my favorite Australia saying is as much an attitude as it is a saying. "No worries, Mate!" We heard this from so many people. The great thing is that the people really mean it - Don't worry. Things will be just fine. So, our family has adopted "No Worries, Mate!" as our attitude for 2011. During this holiday season, we continue to be so very thankful for good health, safety, family, home, and the opportunity to have such wonderful experiences.

So from our family to yours, "Merry Christmas, and No worries, Mate!"

Peace and Love,

Tina

Crikey! December 24, 2010

Crikey!

As I head into the 2^nd part of our journey, I must say how much I have enjoyed being in an English speaking country. It was great to speak to people in English and have them understand us, and so great to hear and understand what others are saying… and to be able to read the road signs, and package labels, and directions, maps, TV, … Don’t get me wrong. The Japanese people are very friendly, and they all try to help you. It’s just hard when you do not speak the language. Being in an English speaking country added even more fun to our vacation. (Interestingly, we saw a Customs agent trying to explain directions to a Japanese couple. Jacob said, “That is us in Japan!” So true.)

We left Sydney on Monday afternoon and arrived at the Maroochydore airport in the Sunshine Coast just over an hour later. We headed to the Sebel Resort on Hastings Street in Noosa Heads. We had a 2 bedroom apartment, which would prove to be great for eating meals “in” instead of everything “out” at restaurants. We actually went to a Cole’s grocery store right away to stock up. Did I mention how nice it was to read the labels? :)

On Tuesday, we walked across the street to Noosa Main beach. It was lovely with some waves, so we had a great time. The boys played football along the beach and in the ocean. Imagine that!

On Wednesday, we loaded up and headed to Beerwah to the Australia Zoo, home of Steve Irwin, the Crocodile Hunter. This was a huge highlight of our adventure. It rained all day, but this did not slow us down! We started with a Warrior show that included some scary crocodiles and the whole crowd yelling “Crikey!” We saw koalas actually awake, moving around on branches, and eating leaves. We saw elephants, tigers, komodo dragon, skinks,…. But, …well, …is it possible to fall in love with a kangaroo? I think I did. There were 2 areas where the kangaroos roamed freely, and we were able to pet and feed them. There was “Roo Heaven” and “Red Kangaroo Heaven”. Wow. They were so cute and gentle. I think we may have taken 50 pictures just of kangaroos! One kangaroo even climbed up Jacob shirt. In the second area, we saw 3 mommy kangaroos and their little joeys. One joey hopped out of the pouch, turned around, and did a somersault back into the pouch. Simply mesmerizing. Steve Irwin really did a lot to protect the wildlife. It was evident in every inch of that zoo – it felt a bit more like an amusement park than a zoo. The animals have so much space to live a bit more like they should. We found ourselves sad that Steve Irwin died at such a young age, but his legacy lives on in his family, in the zoo, and in the wildlife all over Australia – all over the world.

The Australia Zoo - Home of Steve Irwin, the Crocodile Hunter

Roo Heaven

On the way home, we stopped at Target. Yes, TARGET!! It was so fun to find American type clothes (some simpler designs and bigger than a size 2 like they have in Japan!) We stayed a long time and found a few more Christmas items!

We saw some clear skies on Thursday, so we decided to hit the beach again. The girls (Grandma, Mom, and Jessica) also found our way to shop along Hastings Street. The street is filled with shops and restaurants. Just brilliant. (I picked up that word this week. I love it. You just have to use it sparingly for when something truly is brilliant.) On Friday, December 24, we packed up and headed to Brisbane to then fly out to Cairns for the 3rd and final part of our journey.

Peace and Love from Down Under,

Tina