Does your Grandma go picking fights with wild boars?
At the start of the year, we took a look a series of tweets from Japanese Twitter user Mohikan, who seems to be a firm believer in the theory that communication and discipline are both important elements in properly raising children. Every month, Mohikan, his wife, his daughter, and his son hold a family meeting to set goals and discuss their progress, with daughter Nagomi diligently taking minutes.
Six months later, Mohikan’s household is still having regular conferences, and it looks like either his or his wife’s mother has moved in, since “Granny” is now showing up in the monthly meeting reports.
First, let’s take a look at the organization’s performance in May.
Half a year later, Mohikan is still aiming at the same target every month: Keeping his eyes on the road while driving. For this period, his grade is a triangle, which in Japanese shorthand refers to mixed results or only limited success.
Likewise, Mom is still pledging to lose weight every month, with some added zeal making her May goal “seriously lose weight” Like Dad, she gets a triangle, so while she may not have slimmed down as much as she’d wanted, it looks like she at least lost a few pounds.
Nagomi, meanwhile gets a circle, indicating unqualified success, in the area of eating tomatoes, even ones from Dole (apparently not her preferred brand). Little brother Kazutoyo, though, only achieved a triangle for his progress in learning how to walk on stilts.
So far, the objectives all sound like the sort of challenges you’d expect an ordinary middle-class family to be taking on. But then we get to Granny’s goal, which was:
“Defeat the wild boar.”
We’ve got no idea what sort of contest Granny faced off against the animal in, but whatever it was, the tough old gal managed to not only win, but to win twice, recording a perfect 2-0 record against the boar, according to Nagomi’s notes.
OK, so what’s on the schedule for June?
“Goals for June:
Papa: Keep eyes on road while driving
Mama: Lose enough weight for the change to be visible
Nagomi: Recover my good eyesight
Kazutoya: Save enough to have some paper money
Granny: Don’t die”
The brief minutes don’t explain what happened to Nagomi’s eyes, but what’s more startling is Granny’s straightforward objective to simply continue living. As one commenter pointed out, it seems like something that should be well within her capabilities, given that she managed to beat a boar twice just a month ago.
Still, Granny seems to be all too aware that she’s not getting any younger, and the discussion topic for the family’s June meeting is a frank admission of such.
“Regarding when ‘the time comes’ for Granny:
She doesn’t need a gravestone
She wants us to remember her
She isn’t leaving any inheritance for us”
While this seems like a grim conversation to be having with young children, the cheerful drawing of Snoopy and Woodstock out for a stroll in the early summer rain suggests that Nagomi wasn’t traumatized by it. So while it might seem a little unusual to do something as regimented as making little kids attend formal family meetings, it looks like Mohikan’s unique take on parenting is also helping his kids maturely deal with serious issues.
If you goal for the month is to follow Casey on Twitter, you can accomplish it right now and take the next three weeks off.
Source: Hamster Sokuho, Twitter/@mohikan1974