Preparing For a Baby in Japan

what's up everybody welcome back to the channel so today was uh today was interesting um my wife and I went to this uh baby prep school it's like a school here in the town that we live in um obviously this town that we live in offers this uh like pre parenting class on how to how to take care of a new baby how to how to bathe them how to carry them how to burp them how to burp them how to change diapers you know common things that uh struggles that we'll go through through uh with having a newborn child in the house and uh for me personally I've never spent a lot of time around kids I've never spent I've never really had any family members um that had children or really too many friends of mine that had children of themsel I mean I have friends that have kids but I've spent so much of my time overseas um on contracts that I've never had a chance to be around anyone that had kids so it was interesting to go there and see this class where there was a bunch of Japanese families in there there were no men I was the only father there everyone else it was just the just the moms and the babies and I've come to find out that actually pretty common especially when we go to like the gynecologist office the men are never there the husbands the fathers are never there because they're always working it's all it's me who's only the only one there I don't know it's like a different type of culture and Society thing here in Japan where the men are always working and the women are the ones going to these baby prep schools doctor visits um baby offices baby doctor clinics and these baby prep schools it's always for the most part it's always just the mom going there because the husbands are and the fathers are always working so it's every time I go to these places they're always surprised to the Japanese women or the uh the staff members that are there always surprised to see me there because it's not common in their culture the fathers to be there and uh I know that my wife finds that funny and she enjoys the fact that she kind of gets to brag about the fact that I'm there um her husband is there and able to help you know be more supportive then I you know I don't mean to sound disrespectful but I know more supportive of the fact that her husband gets to attend all these appointments with with her but the prep school was cool and um and the awesome thing that they did is they actually had uh because the the staff members there everyone's ja jaese no one speaks any English and my wife doesn't speak enough English and I don't speak enough Japanese to really communicate this conversation and these topics very well so something that the staff and the the build the the company there is they brought a translator uh there to just translate the whole conversation for me and was able to translate any questions I had for the staff which I thought was um very uh supportive of them to do um the awesome thing is it didn't cost us anything this is something that the city pays for thems the whole the whole class the is free they offer it once every month for new parents um up until the child is one year old you can attend these classes and uh meet other moms who are having children around the same age as yours or along their pregnancy for as long as the other women in that in that group so it's a great way for my wife to get around other moms talk about uh what they're going through with their pregnancy or what they're going through with having a newborn or you know up to a uh you know 8-month-old child for example something like that but it's uh it's just extremely supportive that they have this community set up for for new moms and you know I don't know I'm sure that we have something like this back in the States I'm sure there's baby prep schools like that in the States but is it free and is it are these baby prep schools as helpful as the one we just attended because it was full Hands-On I mean they helped us they helped showed us everything um it you know and they took our time with us we were there for an hour and a half which felt like enough time to really learn everything it felt like enough time to you know break the ice and really start to get a Hands-On with everything that we want that we need to learn and be prepared for I don't know what it's like in the States but I my only the only thing I can I can compare to is is what's happening what I'm going through here and it's just one of the reasons why I do enjoy Japan living in Japan as much as as much as I as I do because they have so many services to take care of their you know their local Nationals their their Community their their people they really go above and beyond as far as helping their own community and the thing about Japan is one of it's an incentive for them to offer these these services to their Community because Japan's population I think it's eight years in a row now that their population has declined from the previous year so eight years in a row it's declined from the previous year so these are incentives that Japan is offering to its community in order to encourage uh in in order to encourage moms uh and families to and families to have more children so everything's paid for I mean our my my wife every time we go to the doctor's office office we only pay a couple bucks I mean really it's like one appointment was 200 yen which is like a buck 50 uh one time it was 4,000 Yen which was maybe like with the currency exchange rate maybe $30 $30 and it's just for things that she's asking for for them to do that's not covered by the insurance things like um taking uh photos of the baby the uh the sonogram pictures um and printing them out and giving us those those uh those photos like that's that's not covered under the insurance that's something we buy ourself but you know it's nothing it's it's 30 bucks or two you know uh $150 one time so extremely extremely inexpensive basically in my way I see it it's free service but it's just one of the things that I really do enjoy about living here in Japan is they really take care of their of their community so anyways guys that's just something I wanted to talk about today is Japan has some really great incentives for for new families and encouraging for them to have them to have children um so anyways guys uh if you guys like this video thought it was helpful um you have any questions about you know having kids in Japan if you currently live in Japan and you have questions about it send me a message and let's talk thanks guys hope everyone hope you enjoyed watching the video see you in the next one

Channel: JWILL

Views: 16

Keywords: Japan, Japanese Culture, Foreigner Living in Japan, Benefits to Living in Japan

Id: Z53jQzyvJwU

Length: 6min 53sec (413 seconds)

Published: Thu Jun 20 2024