A Brief Distraction

We have been plodding along with the house and while the progress isn't exactly lightning fast, we are getting closer to finishing. Actually, getting closer to the point when we can say we are nearing the point of nearly finishing. The kitchen went in without any trouble despite my lack of optimism and looks really good. We lucked out with the kitchen since we bought it online and could only see pictures. It is a showroom model, so it came pretty much assembled and the fake wood grain cabinets actually look convincing. 

We have waterproofed the tub area of the bathroom and will be dropping the tub in permanently soon. Then we can finally finish installing the sub floor in the rest of the bathroom. 

This weekend I will be throwing up some drywall, framing some exterior windows, and working on the roof insulation. I won't have the help of my wife for a few days, since she will be taking care of the 8 new arrivals in our apartment. They arrived between 5:00am  and 10:00am this morning and aside from being quite noisy, will require 2-3 days of supervision to make sure they are all doing OK. 

Its Been Awhile

Firstly, apologies to all the faithful readers for the lack of posts recently. Between waking up at 5:00am everyday, working on the house for 5 hours, then working at the office for 8 hours, I haven't had much time to eat or sleep. Much less update the blog. Who would have thought that building a house would be time consuming?

Anyway, when we last left the story I was struggling with the bathroom and we were halfway through the insulation. For anyone expecting rapid progression in the last two weeks, please prepare yourself for disappointment. Or at least a slight twinge of doubt in my competence. 

I finished framing the bathroom floor and was all set for the plumbers to install the drain. This was my first experience with the subtle battles that rage unspoken between tradesmen. The carpenters had advised me to just build everything first and let the plumbers figure out how to put the pipes in. Sounded a bit odd to me, but what do I know about building a house?  So the plumbers arrive and look at the framing and tell me that it is in the way of the drain. I mention that maybe the could cut a bit of the framing away. Looks of utter puzzlement and confusion answered that question for me. So I dismantled the beautifully constructed frame to shave off about 5 cm of wood. Since then I have had in depth conversations with the plumbers and they have managed to finish all of the plumbing in the bathroom without any further complications.

On the insulation front we have finished almost the entire house aside from the roof. I still have to do about half the roof insulation but it is a fairly straight-forward process. The only annoyance is that it either involves crawling around in the attic on my knees or hanging precariously from a ladder, perched on a 2x10, over a 3-5 meter drop. 

The kitchen has arrived and I will attempt to put the cabinets in this weekend. I am sure that will provide plenty of fodder for the next post.

Carpentry is Hard

We are slowly making progress on the interior. Some days it feels like we haven't accomplished anything at all. I like to think it is because we are seeing the house everyday and don't notice the changes, but sometimes we really don't accomplish anything. This is due to the fact that carpentry is hard. It is easy to look at someone else building something and delude yourself into thinking you could do it. Nevertheless I am fighting through my incompetence and learning some new skills along the way. As you can see from the above photo, we are insulation pros now and have done over half of the first floor.

I am still fighting with the bathtub as little things keep popping up that have to be done immediately. Our chimney was installed yesterday, but before it could go in I had to install the fire proof frame and cut a 35 x 35cm square through the wall of the house. This involved sitting on a bendy, unstable board thrown across the open area above the living room. While using a circular saw, improperly I suppose, since I don't think you are meant to hold it upside down and manually pull back the safety. At one point I hit nail and the saw jumped so far I nearly dropped to avoid severing and artery. 

Despite my growing hatred of the bathroom, I am almost done framing it. The floor will be the hardest part, but once that is done I can waterproof the room. Then I won't have to look at for at least a month. Always look for that silver lining.

Slowly Progessing

We have almost completed the rough frame for the bathtub. All we need to do is wait for the plumbers to put in the rest of the pipes and finish off the concrete blocks. It took most of the weekend and a few early mornings to get it to this point, but everything seems level and the bathtub should slide right in. Honestly, we measured it. Twice.

On the outside the painter has put the first coat of stain on and is starting on the second. The color is a little darker than we expected, but it looks quite nice in the sunlight. He should finish up tomorrow or Saturday and then we are left to our own devices for the interior.

While we were working on the tub, my wife's father continued with the wiring. Our architect/builder decided to lend us a hand and put down the subfloor. We put in the insulation and he did all of the hard work. The floor is about half done and it will be another week or so before we can finish it. 

I took care of a few more little things as well. I screwed metal brackets to the extra supports in the interior walls for earthquakes and drilled some large holes in the walls for the ventilation system. Now our recently water-proofed house has eight 10cm holes in it.

The Parents are in Town

My wife's parents arrived last night to help with the rest of the build. My father-in-law brought a car full of tools and will be living in our tiny apartment for the next two months. We have decided to not charge them any rent in return for 60 days of backbreaking of labor. We are hard negotiators.    

We made some more progress on the bathroom and started to wire the house for electric. This weekend I will be concentrating solely on building the frame for the bathtub while everyone else continues with wiring. The goal is to have the frame done by Sunday night. Reality says it will probably take a week. 

Meanwhile the siding is about halfway up and will be done in a few days. I am excited about this, but once the carpenters are gone I won't be able to hit them up for advice every hour. It's a good thing I know them personally or they probably would have shot me with the nail gun by now. 

Bathtub Time

We started work on the bathroom today. First up was putting the insulation into the wall behind the were the tub will go. I suited up in my 300 yen paper suit for the job. Or as I like to think of it, my James Bond ski-henchman suit. The suit did a reasonable job of protecting me from the glass wool, but it was still an itchy afternoon. In an unprecedented event, I managed to cut the insulation to the correct size on the first try. Then, defying all odds and expectations, I cut the plywood to fit exactly. Hopefully, this trend will not be short lived. 

Once the plywood was up we put in string lines to mark the center of the feet on the bathtub. They are only faint lines in the photograph but tomorrow we will be centering the support bricks where they cross. Then we find out how off our measurements are when we put the tub in. 

Sayonara Glass Blocks - Hello Bathroom

We spent the day doing the final touches on the glass blocks. Now we never have to to touch them again. It is a great feeling. Only matched in intensity by the growing fear about the next project. I have planned out the bathtub framing on paper and we know what we need to do. The scary part is that if we are off by a few millimeters at this stage, we will be in a world of trouble a month from now when we start tiling. But what are the odds of that happening.....

Meanwhile, the professionals continue to put us to shame. They have started the siding and are cruising along like, well, like professionals. Damn them. The siding is Japanese cedar and will be stained a bit darker once it is up. Once they finish the siding, we will be completely on our own for the rest of the build. Expect progress to slow noticeably.

Busy Weekend

It was a very productive weekend for both us and the builders. The house is fully covered in Tyvek and all the windows are in. The siding has been stained and will start to go up next week. Meanwhile, we finally managed to complete the two glass block windows and even had time to put three glass block windows in next to the door. The glass blocks seemed like a great idea on paper, but in real life it is a messy, fairly difficult endeavor. Now that we have done it and made almost every mistake possible along the way,  I could throw up 50 of them in no time. I have a feeling that the rest of the DIY projects are going to go the same way. Just when we figure out the easiest way to do things the job will be over. Which will work out well in a few years (months perhaps) when we have to redo our less than perfect first attempt. The next mission is building the frame for the bathtub. We should have that done in a little under a decade.

Foiled By Rain

We arrived at the house early this morning to start our DIY project. First we wrapped the framing in water proof material and I got to use an electric staple gun. Good fun when I was in control, but watching my wife hand it to me with her finger on the trigger was a bit unnerving. No puncture wounds resulted and I can safely say we have achieved a new level of trust in our relationship. Next up was the angle grinder. I had to cut the the horizontal supports for the blocks with the angle grinder. My wife's father was reluctant to even send this tool to me because he feared for my fingers. However, I skirted certain injury once again and completed the job. A word of warning to other amateurs out there: don't touch the metal after you cut it with the grinder. Despite my background in science, which included such novel concepts as friction and conduction, I felt the need to grab the metal rod just after I cut it. A slight burn later and we moved on to the mortar.

8 blocks into the job and the skies opened up. We hastily erected a makeshift tent and called it a day. The forecast is not looking good for tomorrow so it will be Thursday before we can complete the glass blocks. 

A Lot of Progress

The framing is nearly complete and it is actually starting to look like a house. It is really exciting to see it start to take shape after months of planning. The roofing guys were here today and finished about half of the roof so that should be completely done this week. Windows will go in once the plywood bracing is finished and then we will have a water tight structure. Tomorrow we start our next DIY project. We will be installing glass blocks in the bathroom wall. We have all the materials we need, just none of the experience. It seems like a simple matter of mixing, spreading, and stacking so I am feeling cautiously optimistic. We will see how it goes tomorrow.

Circus Tents

The framing has started and the floor beams and a few sections of the wall are now in place. Work will continue for the next few days and by next week the frame will be done. While the framing was going on, we attempted the much simpler, but no less important job of preparing storage for the materials that will start arriving soon. Normally, you would just rent a pre-fab storage unit and be done. However, we opted for a more creative (cheap) option. We bought a large red tent on auction and some blue plastic sheets to wall it in.  All should be fine unless the typhoon season arrives early this year.  And we have the added benefit of being able to rent it to the local carnies on Sundays to earn a bit of extra cash. 

Lumber Has Arrived

The first shipment of lumber arrived today and the rest will be here tomorrow. The framing will start from tomorrow afternoon so we will finally get an idea of how our house will look. I am looking forward to getting my hands dirty, but it will still be a few weeks before I really have a chance to mess things up. In the meantime I can sit back and watch the pros in action before the reality of what we are attempting arrives with a vengeance. 

Scaffolding Erected

Without notice the scaffolding for our house has been erected. As we are managing the build, it is a testament to our organizational skills that things progress without us lifting a finger. Or we are woefully unaware of what is going on. The former is much more flattering but the latter is much more likely. At any rate, everything is in place for the framing to start on the 16th.

Most houses in the States are framed with 2X4's or 2X6's, which do not require scaffolding from the start. In Japan, it is common to build a house with large, pre-cut beams of wood. This requires the scaffolding to be erected before the framing can start since the walls are not lifted after completion. The beams are lifted into place once the vertical supports are installed. We will not be involved in this process (much to the delight of the carpenters), but I will be on site periodically to get in the way. 

On an unrelated note, our dog (pictured below) is spending the night with an award-winning Border Collie (in agility). If all goes well, we will have an apartment full of puppies in two months. Just to add a little more stress to the mix.

A Brief Delay

Now that the foundation is finished we can move on to framing. However, the framing has been pushed back until around the 14th of July. We had originally planned to use some local carpenters for the framing of the house, but they were unavailable so we lined up carpenters from a nearby town. Due to another project being delayed, the local carpenters are now available for our house but not for another week or so. It is worth the wait though since the local carpenters have more experience building in this area and they are cheaper. 

We have used this downtime to make final decisions on the roof color, the interior flooring, doors, and interior wall designs.  I have had to leave most of the decisions to my wife, since I have absolutely no interior design skills. She will be leaving most of the hands on work to me, even though I have absolutely no carpentry skills. There may be a slight flaw in this arrangement.

Foundation Finished

I have been a little lazy with posts lately, but I will try to update more regularly from now on. The final pour for the foundation is finished and we even had enough concrete left over to concrete the base of our power pole. Since the professionals were handling the foundation, it was done perfectly the first time around. The electric pole is my domain (or nemesis at the moment) so it took me nearly as long to do my part as it did for them to pour the entire foundation. 

I dug a hole with the intention of building a wood frame for the concrete. Since the plywood was too large, I fired up the circular saw for the first time on this build and managed to cut the wood and not my fingers. Impressed with myself, I strolled over to the hole and started to screw the boards together. For this I used my handy electric screwdriver/drill, a wedding present that makes an appearance once every 4 - 6 months and has a fancy laser-like light that points right at the screw head allowing you to use it in total darkness. Designed for nocturnal carpenters, I should have known better than to use it in broad daylight. 

I managed to slip the screw driver off of the screw head and shove it right next to my thumbnail. It made it in about a centimeter before I had the presence of mind to release the trigger. But the blood seemed to grease the screw a bit and it went right in after that. Job done.

Plumbing Work

The plumbers came around today and put the vertical pipes in for our hot water heater and bathroom. The floors of these rooms will have a concrete base so only these pipes had to be installed. The other pipes will go in once the framing is complete. 

Since we are doing the electric ourselves, it is inevitable that there will be a few small hurdles to overcome. The most recent problem was the length of the plastic pipe we buried from the power pole and fed under the foundation. It seems the pipe that we are going to feed the telephone line through was so short that it would end up below the concrete floor level, thus rendering it useless. After assesing the feasibility of building an intricate network of string and tin cans to replace the phone, I realized that I had some extra plastic piping. So with a little tape and a 30cm length of pipe, I ensured that we will be disturbed at least once a month during dinner by someone trying to sell us the latest green tea fad diet. This pipe will also be our conduit to Internet shopping, but at a much slower rate than I had hoped. 

Our little village has been subjected to a broadband Internet monopoly that easily rivals anything in China. The provider charges insane setup fees and yet they do not have the resources to provide broadband to everyone in our huge metropolis of 2,000 people. For the last two years, the entire village has been lobbying the national phone company, NTT, to come in and oust the oppressors. They have finally arrived and there are now multiple providers going door to door soliciting business. Free setup, free service for 2 months, the list goes on. But not all the way to our house. The area that can be serviced before this winter literally stops about 200 meters from our house. So it could be another year or two before we can illegally download music and movies at high speed. 

More Foundation Work

The work on the foundation continues and we are nearly ready for the second pour. The exterior frame for the foundation was finished on Tuesday and the interior frame finished today. The frame is basically Styrofoam held together with metal. While Styrofoam is not known for its tensile strength, it is very common to use it in Japan when framing a foundation. I think this is another occasion where a failure to hire a Shinto priest may result in disaster.

The Styrofoam will become a permanent part of the foundation so we will cover it in mortar and attach either stone or brick. 

Our self installed electric pole remained standing and the base is now a meter deep in concrete. We fed the cables under the foundation and they are now safe and secure on the interior of the house. Hopefully everything is set up correctly or we will be spending a lot of time chipping away at concrete. 

Foundation Continues

The rebar support for the foundation is now finished and the electric pole is still standing (thank you Shinto priest).  The forecast calls for rain tomorrow afternoon, but if it holds off the first pour for the foundation should go as scheduled. My wife is in Tokyo this weekend having a final look at wood flooring, wood paneling, and doors, so we are nearing the finish line as far as planning goes. Once she returns it will be a simple matter of calculating costs to see if we can afford the solid gold faucets and marble floors. If not, we may have to opt for something a little more affordable. Or sell a kidney.

Electric Poles and Toilets

The hole in the ground continues to expand and the framing for the foundation is nearly done. Today we attempted to install the permanent power pole and it went in without a hitch. Assuming the Shinto priest did his job properly, we will not encounter any high winds or earthquakes over the weekend and the concrete will go in on Monday. Normally, high winds would not be a problem, but the stabilization method we employed for the power pole is not exactly orthodox. As you can see from the photos, we used bits of the recently felled trees to support the pole until the concrete is poured on Monday. On the upside we provided endless amusement for the foundation guys, but on the downside I think they may now realize that I don't actually have any idea what I am doing. But really, how hard can it be to build the entire interior of a house? (Cue dramatic music foreshadowing imminent disaster).

On a side note, we now have a toilet. While peeing in the bushes up until now has been fun, I think the neighbors will appreciate our pale, blue outhouse.

Great Big Hole (Relatively Speaking)

There is great big hole in the land. Alas, no gold as of yet but they still have a bit more digging to do. Also, it seems a few more trees are going to meet Mr. Chainsaw to make room for our septic tank. I would prefer to keep as many as possible on the north side of the house, but a functional toilet and drainage system are nice as well. 

If the sun makes an appearance tomorrow, the foundation frame will be completed and the concrete will be poured on Monday. On the DIY side of things, we need to build a box for the base of the permanent power pole and dig the hole for it. Then on Monday we will put the pole up and fill in the hole with concrete. Sounds simple. I may even be able to get this done on the first try, but I'm not taking bets.

Electrical Plans Approved

My wife's father is in town from Kobe to finalise the electrical plans for the house. After a few beers and long debate about the best placement for a light switch in the bathroom, we were done. In what is becoming a pattern, the electric company rejected our plans this morning. So we made some minor changes and by the afternoon we had the plans approved. 

The foundation guys (technical term) were on site today to measure the exact dimensions of the land to prepare for digging. A few of the remaining trees must have mouthed off because they were laying on the ground when I got there. But my hammock trees still remain so there is always a silver lining.

The exact start date of the digging remains shrouded in mystery (odd for a country where not only the trains run on time, but even the buses are never more than a few minutes off schedule). I guess I will just turn up one day and there will be a great big hole in the ground. Hopefully with a vein of gold running through it. 

We Have Power!!!

After reinstalling our temporary power pole, the electric company arrived unexpectedly and connected the power. The electrician gave the pole a shake, looked at his friend, and then shrugged as if to say, "Screw it. This foreigner probably doesn't speak Japanese, its Saturday, and I don't want to come back again." In their defense, the pole does have a slight lean, but it is in no danger of falling over. I think. So after two attempts we now have the pleasure of paying two electric bills each month.

We Have a Kitchen

Our discount kitchen has been ordered and will arrive in 3-4 weeks. We couldn't pick the exact arrival date, since we aren't paying full price, but we can store it in the fancy rental container we will be getting next month.

As you can see it is rather shiny under the harsh glare of fluorescent lighting, but it should look a bit more subdued once it is in our house. We will be building an island as well to separate the kitchen from the living/dining area and to add more counter space. 

The Good, The Bad, and the Incompetent

We accomplished a few things this week and we are moving ahead on schedule.

The Good: We found a showroom system kitchen that fits our requirements exactly at about half the cost of a brand new one. The only difference being that this one is out of its packaging. The rampant consumer desire for new items in Japan works in our favor!

The Bad: I spent about 4 hours installing a temporary electrical pole this week. 1 blister, 1 broken hacksaw blade,  a 1 meter deep hole, 5.5 meters of pipe, and some wiring were all it took.  Only to have the electric company "suggest" (suggest = demand in Japanese), that the pole be installed about 1 meter further onto our property. So Saturday will be spent repeating the above procedure, hopefully with better results.

The Incompetent: Me and my abysmal knowledge of Japanese building codes.

On the upside, it won't cost anything but time and energy and in the end I can reflect on a job well done. Twice.

Chainsaws and Rain

I awoke on Saturday morning to a slow but constant drizzle. It looked like the trees would have to wait until Sunday. However, just as they gasped a sigh of relief, the rain let up and we were on site at around 9:30. I guess there is some merit to the paper shaking after all. The above photo is a shot of our land before the destruction began. If you look closely you can almost see the trees shaking with fear (it could be due to the wind, but fear sounds much more menacing).

Despite my desire to wield the chainsaw, I thought it best to let my friend take the lead. Besides, we still have a long way to go on this project and the absence of a thumb might throw a spanner in the works. You can see him on the right wielding the gasoline version of Excalibur, while I stand aside in my fashionable yellow ear muffs and over sized goggles. My main role was to carry the felled trees to the back of the property, coerce my office staff into helping on a Saturday (not pictured since they didn't show up until 11:00, but once they arrived they did an outstanding job), and to provide lunch. My wife prepared prosciutto and brie baguettes for everyone which was greatly appreciated and gave us the energy to continue our assault on the trees. 

50 odd trees later we finished the job around 14:30. The lot is clear at a fraction of the cost of hiring professionals. This week I will be spending every evening cutting logs and stacking them for use in our wood stove. In the meantime, we will host a BBQ tomorrow in repayment for all of the help we received today.

The gods are pleased. I think.

The ceremony went smoothly and as far as I can tell the gods were happy with their sake and raw red snapper. I only hope they were occupied elsewhere when I placed the pine sprig upside down on the shrine. The priest assured me it was fine, but these gods can be a fickle lot. It won't come to human sacrifice, but the local goats should be wary.

Now that the formalities are out of the way, we can get started on the house. The first step is clearing some trees to make way for the foundation. As you can see from the photos, our land is pretty much a forest of silver birches at the moment so it is not a small job. Our architect/builder suggested that we hire professionals to cut the trees down, since some of them are fairly large. But why spend money on professionals when you have friends with chainsaws? Besides, the goal of this project is to incorporate as much DIY as possible and what could be more fun than throwing on a flannel shirt and living the life of a lumberjack for a weekend!

So for the price of a BBQ and a case of beer (the only acceptable means of payment in Niseko), me and some friends will be felling trees in reckless abandon. My friend with the chainsaw assures me he can drop a tree on a dime, but nevertheless the neighbors have been warned. I hope the cakes we gave them will offset any crushed cars or broken windows that may result from this endeavor.

Paper shaking and some sake for the gods...

In a little over two weeks the foundation will be put in, but before that we have to follow a time honored tradition in Japan. The paper shaking ceremony! While not actually called that in Japan, it is the first thought that pops into the head of anyone not born and raised here. Before I can cut down any trees and before any construction can start, we must ask the gods of the soil for a get out of jail free card. 

Despite the lack of a stifling belief in religion, Japanese people still honor certain Shinto and Buddhist ceremonies. My wife still pretends to be out of the house when the Jehovah Witnesses stop by (Yes, they really are everywhere. And no, despite their convincing arguments based on the complexity of a tree frog's elbow joint, I have yet to be swayed to a belief in creationism), but she would not let construction begin without the ceremony taking place. 

In line with this tradition we signed the contract with our architect on the 30th of May (a good day for contracting) and the ceremony will take place on the 4th of June (the luckiest day for starting a new venture at this time of the year). So all in all, we have done pretty well. I am half expecting the house to magically throw itself together, but at least if we run into any problems I can hold my hands up and blame it on the Shinto priest.

The ceremony basically involves the priest chanting the address of our property, our names, and a plea to the gods to not strike us down with volcanic eruptions or a shortage of nails. Then a stick with some paper tied to it is shaken over our heads, some sake is poured on the ground, and the gods move on to smite some other aspiring home owner.

Wish us luck.

Plans are finalised

The house plans have been finalised and we will sign the contract with our architect/project manager tomorrow. Until then, here is some background information on Niseko, Japan and why we have decided to attempt to build a custom house.

Niseko is located on the northern most island of Japan, Hokkaido. This small, rural, farm town became a premier ski destination in the 80's during Japan's economic boom period. When the bubble burst, the ski resort struggled to stay out of bankruptcy for the better part of a decade. 

I first snowboarded in Niseko in the winter of 2000-2001. Back then, there were almost no foreigner tourists on the mountain, or Japanese tourists for that matter. However, Niseko receives up to 14 meters of snowfall every winter, which means bottomless powder for a full 3 months in winter. Needless to say, I decided to make Niseko my permanent home and began living here permanently from the fall of 2003. 

About the same time, Niseko was discovered by the Australian ski market and has seen a whirlwind of growth in the last 5 years. What was a sleepy, little ski town has become the hottest ski destination in Asia. This boom has led to skyrocketing realestate prices and swarms of developers throwing up condominiums on any piece of land available. Land prices in Niseko have risen faster than anywhere else in Japan and now rival land prices in Tokyo and other major Japanese cities.

We bought a block of land about 2km outside of the main resort village in April of 2007. After speaking with numerous house makers, we decided that we could build a better house for less money if we did some of the work ourselves. Japanese construction costs are quite high compared to countries like the US and Australia and material costs are staggering. Add to that the fact that most house makers will only guarantee their work for about 10 years and tack on a hefty markup on the material costs, it just didn't make sense to go the traditional route.

We have sourced a local architect, Harada-san, who has agreed to design our house and help us organise the tradesmen for fraction of the cost of  a normal house maker. In addition, as a builder in Japan he is able to get 30 -40% discounts on materials and he passes them onto us at cost. Because of this, we will be able to complete the house at about 30% less cost than going through a house maker.

Not being a carpenter by trade, it is a little scary to contemplate doing all of the finishing work on the interior myself. But we have an ace in the hole in the form of my wife's father. He built his own house and has just retired so he will spend the summer helping us build.

The foundation goes in around June 20th and the goal is to have the house livable by November 20th. Barring any severed fingers/thumbs/earthquakes this should be feasible.