Visiting son and family abroad

It would be a terrific shame for these children not to be bilingual. My DH’s sister met and married an Italian and moved there in 1968. When he died 3 years ago he could scarcely utter a word of English. Their children, now in their late 40’s only speak Italian, never being spoken to in English. Poor sister never worked, her only role was to provide 3 meals family meals a day and she has quite poor English herself now.

So is your son fluent in Japanese?

I may have missed it but have you visited them before as it all seems strange to you. Such a pity that the children are not being brought up bi-lingual as their early years is the best time to learn. My son's wife is Russian and the children have been bi-ligual since they started to speak. It's my son who is the lazy one who doesnt speak Russian. When we visited in November and her lovely mother was over from Russia and can speak some English so if there was something she couldn't say she said it in Russian and my 8 year old grandson translated into English. Perhaps you could get a Japanese to English dictionary and start using simple words for things around the house to talk to the little ones with. Hold up a book or other item and get them to say in Japanese and then you say the English word. They will soon catch on and you will learn some Japanese too. Enjoy the rest of your holiday

I experience similar feelings when visiting my son and each time after around 3 days I am desperate to get home, however, we have to stick it out and after another few days we seem able to settle down. Get out and about and enjoy the little ones whilst you can. The trip will be over all too soon and then you know how much you’ll yearn to hold the little ones again. It is difficult but not impossible. Enjoy the rest of your stay.

My knowledge comes second hand from close friends who have taught in Japan- there's a huge emphasis on education over there with lots if kids doing extra hours after school so it's possible that your dil has to put the hours in as well, and especially at a boarding school.

Riggie

I learned about Japan in my Year 7 Social Studies (course encompassing geography, history, sociology, political science, anthropology, and cultural studies). At that time, it was very common for children to attend juku, or additional lessons after school. It was an expectation that children would do well at school and be able to get into a good university. At that time, children were put into school at age 1 and some people were saying that was too late!

Not surprisingly there is a very high depression and suicide rate in Japan. If DIL is working at a residential school it is quite possible she is dealing with non-academic issues for the children as well as academic ones.

Shirley I do empathise as I too have family who live abroad, in the USA.
It’s hard staying with anyone for any length of time, not wanting to be a nuisance in someone else’s house, and perhaps feeling that you’re a stranger to your grandchildren. (That does get better as they get older).
I haven’t really any advice except hang in there! You say your DiL is lovely and has arranged for you to all stay somewhere this weekend.
I hope you enjoy your family time together

I find the Google Translate app to be very good. You can get audio translate on it too which helps with pronunciation.

Your son must be linguistically very talented to hold down a job as a company director, in a language which is so difficult to learn.

Thanks everyone for your kind words. I think I misled you as my son and DiL both speak English to the children. However they spend a lot of time with their Japanese grandparents who do not speak English. The children are fairly bi-lingual but obviously prefer their mother tongue as anyone would. I think I was just having a bad day. Perhaps jetlag combined with hormone tablets (post cancer) I have to take was not a good mix. I am enjoying our time very much and DiL was able to eat with us yesterday. Thanks everyone for your kind words

Lily65 thank you. My son is indeed a very talented linguist speaking 6 languages fluently. He has worked his way up in a Japanese company so no mean feat. He got a first class hons in Japanese studies at Durham so we are very proud of him. He is also a little on the autistic spectrum - high functioning - which makes life interesting at times?

Shirley......Wow !!!

So happy for you, we all have our off days. Enjoy