Oddly major relief.

Just got pictures of our apartment. Hardwood floors, not tatami.

Oh, thank goodness. I was having nightmares about vacuuming.

Assignment details

So, we're in Okinawa-shi, about half an hour outside of Naha on the main island.

That's us in the fuchsia.

We also have information about the previous JET's setup. It is in an apartment, not like the pile of rocks surrounded by rice fields that HP led me to believe.

This is the image he painted. He may have been messing with me.

The good:
The apartment allows pets
The apartment has a parking setup
Near major facilities, like hospitals and
Near many parks and natural preserves
A working (albeit sometimes unreliable) bus system
We will be inheriting the apartment from a previous JET, so it will be somewhat furnished and she'd be willing to sell us her car
About a 2 mile walk from HP's grandmother's house
THERE ARE DOLLAR STORES

I WILL BUY ALL THE THINGS. KAIMASU YO.

The bad:
It's a 1LDK, so it's likely a two-room setup (although the setup for the standard 1LDK is this, which I find totally comfortable)
The rent is fairly high for a JET (though we don't know if the school will subsidize cost of living, which many do)
The key money is high (about $3k, but see the note above)

So, this is independent of the school. We don't know if the contracting organization will be covering any of it, or if they'd have a certain setup that they would be able to subsidize. Though if they did, the option they'd provide probably wouldn't allow pets.

Ughh. It doesn't seem like a huge problem, but until I get a steady income, money will definitely be an issue. And while we'll have things (like two fold out mattresses, fridge, rice cooker, table), there will be move-in expenses, obviously.

Money doesn't seem super dire, though. I mean, if one JET on her own could afford this and make it work, then two people working definitely should, right?

...Provided I don't cover the house in random Japanese dollar store merchandise?

Ugggh. I take that last post back.

No win.

No win at all.


Just got off the phone with my mother-in-law. We're in the process of planning the reception down in Virginia for her side of the family who couldn't make it to the New England wedding. Trying to plan around it is incredibly stressful for everyone involved, with the transit, hotel, party planning, work and trying not to upset anyone which is incredibly difficult when you're already strung out from all the other things. We've been playing phone tag for about a month now, and my parents were starting to get close to deadlines for planning their trip down. I called my MIL today to get some straight answers, and instead got a bombshell.

HP's japanese grandmother is in the hospital, and doing poorly. She's 93, and she's tired. And in Okinawa. If she gets any worse, HP and his dad will want to go visit her, and his dad has pretty much told him to be ready to go at any point.

This means that he probably won't be coming back before orientation. I lose him a month and a half early, and I therefore lose my main support for moving to another country, learning an entirely new language, and leaving my whole circle of friends and family.

This also means that he may not be getting his master's degree, as he's not scheduled to complete it yet. And that the reception in VA will be completely moot and all this stress and planning will go out the window.

This also means that I'll be packing up the entire fucking house by myself.

this is my face right now.

I should've seen this coming, though. I was doing ALL THE THINGS! to prep, and they were going picture-perfectly. I'd finished learning katakana and moved on to kanji, I'd gotten through another chunk of Rosetta stone, I was using Japanese in the home and in conversations with HP, the dog-prep was full of happy coincidences in my favor and I was so on top of things it was like I was some kind of motivational superhero with eyes that shot "YOU CAN DO IT" lasers.

I blame the JET orientation. It lulled me into a false sense of security by being full of cool, happy people who made this whole crazy idea seem totally feasible.

Assignment get!

Found out yesterday that we'll be in Okinawa-ken ( 沖縄県 ) ! 

Yay:

Near my new in-laws

NO SNOW

Coconut-flavored everything

Higher likelihood of an english-speaking vet

Being near the sea might take care of the tropical humidity

Shisa are goddamned adorable

Boo:

Near my new in-laws (OH GOD I HOPE THEY LIKE ME AND I DON'T MAKE AN IDIOT OUT OF MYSELF)

Little mass transit; will likely need a car

Anti-American sentiment might make becoming friends a bit tougher

High volume of English speakers means that it's easy to cheat and not learn the language

Farther away from mainland japan means less ease of sightseeing

Ridiculous heat

So I'm hoping for the best. Adventure time get!

Looking at airfare

Looks like United is the only carrier to allow carry-on dogs on international flights. That works fine for me - it's $125 to keep her in the cabin, $225 to check her in the cargo hold. And it's so worth it for her to not be in the big, noisy, terrifying cargo hold alone.

Now to talk to the vet about possible sedatives. Yes? No? The second leg of the journey is 11 hours, so I'm not sure how restless she's going to get. Maybe just stuffing a kong with something really difficult will be good enough.

I don't know how I'll survive

I just realized that they don't have girl scout cookies in Japan.

ADD TO TO-DO LIST: Make friends with a Troop leader before leaving.

Bringing Elsa to Japan: T minus 107 Days

The first thing you need to know is that I started this process back in November. And that's the advice I give to anyone thinking of applying and bringing their dog: start prepping now. 

If you know nothing else about my process, it's that I function well on timelines, and that's the one thing that the importation literature defines quite clearly. You miss so much as a day or a single sheet of paper, and the 12-hour wait period turns into a 6-month quarantine. Needless to say, I was totally on top of this since the day HP decided to apply for the program.

The other thing to note is that my vet's practice is awesome. I'm on a pet insurance plan, and though they only get pets who need to travel internationally every so often, they had procedures in place. And they bent the rules for me: because of my schedule, I could drop Elsa off in the morning, they'd do what needed to be done, and I could pick her up on my lunch break, only paying the supplies' cost. They never charged me an office visit fee, which saved me a lot of money.

Point the third: This can be damn expensive. As I mentioned in my "Here's the dog!" post, my dog is part of my livelihood, and not just a personal pet. I also was very cautious to budget a large chunk of money for unforeseen medical expenses her first year of life even before I signed a contract with her breeder. I'll be putting down how much everything cost me, but unless you have a similar arrangement with your vet, don't bank on getting a lot of breaks.

So, here's my timeline, based off of the (adorably illustrated) official guidelines in the link to the left. I gave myself some leeway, but not much.

--

11/17/10 - 287 days [DONE]
Elsa is spayed. While she's under, I have her microchipped.
NOTE: Make sure the microchip your vet uses has the International ISO (11784 and 11785)  standard or Japanese readers can't read it and it's worthless.
Spent: $50 on microchip.

12/10/10 - 264 days [DONE]
She's already had one, but Japan requires two rabies vaccinations after microchipping, no less than 31 days apart. So Elsa gets another rabies vaccination on her 3-week spay checkup.
NOTE: Most vets already do this, but the vaccine has to be killed-tissue in order to be valid. Still doesn't hurt to check.
Spent: $15 on vaccine.

1/11/11 - 233 days [DONE]
Elsa has her second mandatory rabies vaccine, 31 days on the nose.
Spent: $15 on vaccine.


2/15/11 - 198 days [DONE]
Elsa has her titer (measure of rabies antibodies, making sure the vaccines took) drawn. The vet draws and labels it for free, spins it into serum, and I put it in my cooler to bring to the UPS outpost.
NOTE: The only laboratory that Japan accepts in the USA is the Kansas State rabies lab, and they're just as much a stickler for paperwork that Japan is. Mislabel something, and your sample is worthless. For what it's worth, though, the staff are very friendly and happy to answer your bajillion questions.
Spent: $5 on ice packs, $80 for the titer, $120 for overnight mail.

2/15/11 - 198 days [CURRENT]
Wait six months. No, seriously. From the day the titer is drawn, the dog has a 180-day wait period in the country of origin. No trips to Canada, folks.
NOTE: The wait is at least 180 days, and the titer is good for 2 years, so if you wanted to get this done very early and just wait around comfortably, you definitely could.

3/3/11 - TITER RESULTS [DONE]
It could take anywhere from 3 to 10 weeks to get your serum antibody results, and they need to be at least 0.5 IU/mL to be acceptable. Imagine my surprise when Elsa's comes back 4.68, roughly 9 times as immune as necessary. Rabies lab called her "robust and resilient" with a laugh when I called to make sure I hadn't raised the Hulk. Guess that's what happens when your pup gets 3 rabies vaccines within a six-month span.

Back to waiting. Yayy.

Between 7/1 and 7/15 - T > 40 days
Notify Narita Airport that I'm importing the dog.
NOTE: The application, and instructions on how to fill it out in English, are on the linked website.

Between 8/21 and 8/30 - T 7-2 days
Have an APHIS vet fill out the Export Certificate and vet forms.

9/1/11 - 0 days
Get my ass to JFK Int'l and get ready to fly to Tokyo.

--

And that's the plan.

Elsa is small enough (six pounds, I'm not kidding) that I'm going to see if she can fly in the cabin with me. So, between her and my laptop, I should have my hands full for the long 12 hours it'll take to get to Narita.

I'll update on this process as it goes on, but for now, this is where things stand. I feel like such a boss right now.