Tea bags and chocolate - Becky from Japan tells us what she is really missing in her latest expat diary:

For the past few weeks I have been invaded by my Dad which was really nice as I was able to get some nice goodies, plus I haven't seen him for a year, so that was nice too! The funny thing was that Dad brought two suitcases with him, one and a half was full of things for me! So he had to travel very light.

I have been buy things on the internet and sending them to my Dads house for the past few weeks, so that he could bring them over to me. I was definately in need for some new clothes, as I am unable to buy clothes in Japan. I'm too tall and too well built! But then again, anyone with feet bigger than a size 4 and a clothes size bigger than a 10 would probably have problems! So I'm definately not on my own.

There was also a shopping list as long as my arm for him to bring. The main thing was tea-bags. The Japanese love to drink tea, but it is very different to our own, and I do really miss it. So Dad arrived with nearly 600 tea-bags, that should last me for a while! Another thing was hot chocolate, the Japanese version isn't very sweet, and also tastes very powdery. At the moment it is too hot to drink due to the weather, but when it snows in the winter its something I really look forward to. But the main thing that filled my Dads suitcases was chocolate! I do miss English chocolate. The Japanese are not very big on chocolate, they tend to like to eat dried squid and fish as snacks! Not something I tend to eat, I can tell you!

It is very strange that things that you miss when you live away, the food, places and definately your friends and family; and it was really nice to have some things from home.

Becky Gardner

See also | ex-pat directory

Becky's previous diaries 1 | 2 | 3