I did a Podcast!

Hi all. Just a quick entry to note that I was interviewed about this blog for a Japanese real estate podcast. You can listen here!

https://podcast05d680.podigee.io/62-building-a-home-in-osaka-japan-real-estate-construction-property?fbclid=IwAR1LSXgzRzUIOPAaE88DwxIlsMNhxmnBCIfC95w26y5dCmpl5X8zU-xohls

Many thanks to Ziv for taking the time to talk to me! You can find his website here! http://nippontradings.com/

A huge hole!

I went by the land on Saturday afternoon as it was a nice day and I wanted to go and visit a used car dealership not too far from where we are building. Yuko was working so I went alone, which is good because it gives me the opportunity to practice talking about cars for ages in Japanese. It's a tactic I would recommend for anyone thinking about paying for Japanese lessons. Don't waste your money!

The express train from Namba, which is kind of the main downtown area in Osaka and quite near to where we live now, only takes 18 minutes with no changes so, in no time at all, I was exiting the station at the top of the mountain and very quickly rewarded with a fantastic view of the city. In the distance, you can see the Osaka skyline (around 15km away) and the mountains between Osaka and Kobe. Here's a picture:

The view westwards from the station

It's about a six minute walk from the station to the land, the first part being flat along the top of the spur before a left turn down some relatively steep steps. At that first corner there is a very large old house with an overgrown garden and some animal posters on the fence. The house is unbelievably smelly, especially in summer. I have no idea what kind of mad zoo there is on the other side. Yuko and I usually just hold our noses and pick up the pace a bit.

A couple of minutes later and I was standing in front of the plot and, frankly, rather pleasantly surprised at the progress. There is now an even bigger hole where the parking place was, the steps have been completely removed and there is earth everywhere! The construction workers were discussing the back wall of the parking area, which it seems is now almost completely formed and ready to be concreted in.

What struck me on Saturday was what a massive operation this actually is. In Japan you see building plots everywhere but they are usually the sort of cookie-cutter flat plots with foundations being dug and neat piles of earth around the sides. Our builders looked more like they were relocating the actual mountain itself! 

It was a bit of a weird feeling to think that we instigated all of this. Even though we basically have no idea what we're doing, because of decisions we made and papers that we signed, now these men are digging a gigantic hole. Awesome!

Drilling Holes

Is it March already? It seems like just last week we were sitting down to Christmas dinner and yet already the weather is starting to warm up and everyone is getting ready for a new working year (the calendar of which runs from April 1st here in Japan). Updates have been a little thin on the ground over the last few weeks and there are a couple of reasons for that. Firstly, Yuko and I spent a couple of weeks in northern Spain eating all the ham and drinking all the wine we could lay our hands on. Secondly, due to schedule conflicts, the groundwork discussed in the last blog took forever to get started...but started it has.

Late last week, the contractors arrived to begin drilling the huge deep holes that will house the heavy steel pilings that will be supporting the land and forming a retaining wall around the steps and parking space. In total there will be between 6 and 8 pilings and a heavy metal 'sheet' that will be used to hold back the earth. It's quite a complex procedure that requires some pretty serious equipment and some very deep digging.

Since we were away when they commenced with the drilling, we weren't able to head to the site to watch, which was something we had been quite keen to do. Luckily, the building company had offered to take some photos of the work so that we could document it on the blog. I've put the three photos below for you to see.

We're hopeful that this is the last of any major deviations from the schedule and that we can get on with the more enjoyable task of actually building the house itself. Since neither of us is especially technical, it's really difficult to go into much detail about these complex engineering tasks other than to marvel at the huge machines and big pieces of metal. I think we should be able to provide a bit more interest and insight when we can get back to talking about things inside the house.

The pilings viewed from above

The big drill!

First pilings in place