Cabin Fever

One of the things I love about HIK is that the kids have outside play every day. Like many kindies within Tokyo the school doesn't have its own outdoor play area (we're on Level 3) but each class visits the park for 20 minutes or so EVERY DAY. Plus we get to enjoy the walk there, which often takes about 15 minutes in itself when you have 8 three year olds to get there! (Thank goodness for that 2:1 ratio!!)

This week however, we have been indoors. Not because of rain or snow or even the cool winter temperatures. In fact, this week has been fairly mild and still very sunny. And generally we take the kids out even when it's freezing .. as long as it's not raining we visit the park.

Nope, the reason we've been staying indoors is that "safe Tokyo" hasn't been very safe this week. Our school is in the Azabu-Juban area which is very residential and pretty swanky - lots of embassies and rich Japanese families. All of that has been disturbed by fighting between two rival gang families in Japan. On Monday in Nishi-Azabu, the head of one gang was shot in broad daylight, around 10am. On Tuesday there were two more shootings in other areas of Tokyo.

We were hoping to get back outside today but of course the school's parents have heard the news and have been frantically calling the school to ask whether their children are in danger. So we stayed inside again today. Better safe than sorry.

For a more in-depth look at what happened visit Stippy.