These are shocking facts about japanese childcare.

Thank you.

Yeah.

Mhm.

So it's almost been a year and a half since we gave birth to our son Wolfie and to say the least has been amazing yet kind of hectic raising him here in Japan.

And just a few weeks ago, he started for the first time public Japanese nursery school.

We've learned a lot about the process and experienced some pretty surprising and may be shocking aspects about Japanese childcare and wanted to share all of that with you in this video.

But like always before I start, if you want to see what I'm doing on the daily, check out my instagram account.

If you want to write the channel, check out this, should we emerged.

And if you have any questions about Japan over in Japan travels then check out my discord community and I couldn't do this video alone.

So Michael, can you join me?

Hi everyone.

Okay, Michael.

So one thing to note before we start is that we're not familiar with how childcare or nurseries work in your country, but definitely let us know in the comments which you think is better or worse.

Just to kind of give us some perspective.

So just a quick overview about childcare in Japan is pretty much broken up into two different categories.

You have jochen, which is kindergarten and then you have to weaken, which is nursery school, we are using grunt because four ft is one year old right now, but technically is in zero years old.

Class and pretty much if you want to go to a kindergarten or are you okay?

And then you have to be usually like from three years old.

So our only option here in Japan was to have him go to a nursery school.

The thing about nursery schools here in Japan is that there are so many and so many kinds types.

Yeah, let me just do a little study.

I still don't understand it.

So here's just some of the examples that you have like Minka Harlequin which is a licensed nursery, they're kind of broken up into public and private ones.

Then you have quit too many frequent calls to me.

So it's a government owned private nursery.

Then you have nine kohaku in which is authenticated nursery school.

Everything else that's not approved or licensed is a guy that includes everything else which is a lot of long.

In fact we're not using any of those licensed or unlicensed nurseries because we are using a nursery for kids on the waiting list because that one was closer to our house.

So basically we applied to one of those government sponsored nurseries and we had to wait to get rejected and this was kind of like our backup nursery and they let us in to this one just like looking at this list still it's so confusing, there's just so many starting age.

So one of the things that was quite surprising to me about Japan maybe not to you since you're from Japan is that nursery school start at such a young age from zero months.

Right.

It's like they have that available so that moms can go back to work as quickly as possible all over the world.

Yeah.

But if you look at the percentages and see that it's like over almost 12% uses it and then 33% is one year old and then it goes all the way to 40% at two and then all the way to 87% that are using nursery or kindergarten by the time they're three years old.

I think three kindergartens are offered free or like the entry is a lot easier than getting into liquid.

That's why the usage president pops up.

So in terms of asia like starting age, what did it spend more time with Goofy?

But because of all the corona situation, Wolfy hasn't been encountering a lot of people in his life and I think it's better for him to know more people see more people to learn to process better.

Yeah.

I mean I would take him to the park these days since we've kept him inside this entire time and we haven't really taken him out when I do take him to the park instead of playing in the sand and running.

He just like he just stares kids.

It's like he's like frozen stare and I think that's one of the decisions why we wanted to to get him started.

I miss him so much down play for him, nursery point system getting into a nursery especially if it is not private and its government authorized or sponsored or run.

There is a point system here in Japan to meet a certain total in order to be accepted.

It's more like the point system proved that you need help.

You need somebody's help to watch kids so you can't work or like you have to take care of your parents or you are injured or you're sick.

That's the point system is therefore basically you're saying that the people who need it the most will get the support.

So I think it's nice.

So like if you are disabled like you said or if you are like a single parent you need help then they're going to help you.

So first of all you get points based on your working hours.

If you're working eight hours five days a week you get 20 points.

If you're working hours four days a week, 16 points.

I don't know.

I think it is fair, especially for those people that really need it.

In our case we need help because we are extremely busy like working 24 hours.

But you can only say you work more than eight hours five days a week.

That's the max that you get right down.

So if you work more than that you don't get no points.

The amount of hours you work doesn't give you any more points.

What do you mean if you have grandparents living with you, then you get less points.

Get minus get minus points.

But it's interesting because grandparents sometimes are even more difficult than it has to be healthy.

Parents are living with you.

And another reason we're using the nursery you're using is if you can prove that you're using a childcare facility, then that's another point.

You need the proof from november to March.

If you don't have enough points and you want to try to make up points, there are like babysitters or bakers that you can go to to earn the points which will cost you 25 to $3500 a month for what like almost half a year you have to actually pay that much money to get into the system.

So there is a point total here, which I thought was kind of surprising.

Like, oh man, you actually have to meet a certain criteria in order to get nursery.

And I'm like well how much does that really matter?

But in fact it really matters really matters competition for applicants.

You want to go through one of the government supported nurseries, then you have to go to the point system but it's extremely affordable with licensed level of service.

You can't get into a lot of schools and with like Tokyo especially there's I think a limited amount of nurseries.

I mean there's like a ton of nursery is out there.

But still there is not enough to support the communities fees just to give people some reference to how inexpensive government versus private ones.

Like here's a list of prices monthly childcare fee is very depending on the municipality but are based on the family's total income calculated by using the family's income tax has shown in this chart for kids under three years old.

It ranges from free to a max of about $700 per month, but based on average family incomes in japan fees are usually around $200 or less per month for full time childcare, including meals.

So what ends up happening is a working families that have two high income earners or maybe just one really high income earner than they have to go to private childcare, Which is quite expensive.

I think $2500 to maybe $3500 per month.

That's why everyone wants to get into these like nursery schools that our government supported.

And we're lucky that we got in.

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Alright, let's continue on application.

The application process is so crazy.

This time I did everything was just easier for me to write japanese an application form in the application for me.

There's so much was it online or was it they change the system from next year application maybe because of corona.

But before that you have to go into the word office and you have to like book the session.

So how many pages it the stuff we have to figure out as a freelancer on seven pages, which is not that much you think, but it's just so much.

Thanks.

You need to write down and you have to put a thought on it.

Look at this one.

Page two men look signed.

I imagine this is the one that we need to fill out this year.

And in addition if you just found a job and then you need that should also make sure to prove that you just got hired.

If you're looking for it then you need another paper works.

If you are looking for giving birth you need the show measure as well.

Location document.

If you're handicapped you have to prove that as well.

There's like so many things that you have to add to prove that you can get another point.

We don't have points.

That's what you don't have anything else to help.

The application process starts at the end of november to get in in april.

That's when school year starts in Japan and you actually get to apply again Pinkberry.

So basically what you're saying is that you have to apply six months in advance and if you get rejected then you have to fly again a second time two months in advance.

But you have like almost no because people have already accepted but if someone says I don't want it then the person that has a higher point total like get in right?

But there are people like you only apply for that.

It's like that a and went to the waiting list going to our school let's say I'm not going to go.

Then this person the person who accepted the third.

So since we're on the wait list, if someone drops out then we would like yes they move us and we have no say on saying no we have to go oh I didn't even know that actually how we once you do get accepted then they don't just put you into the nursery.

They actually have you do this thing called was kind of like training for the nursery so you don't go full time right away.

You start off minimum hours in our case we served from two hours after that we upgrade to the lunchtime and make sure that he can eat.

If he can't eat he can just go straight home and eat with us.

And the way he's used to it then he's going to stay until the naptime and after he's used to it he's going to stay until the snack time which is at three and then play a little bit and so far.

So in our case we're supposed to do this for I called in all like two weeks but just four days into it.

Got sick and he has never gotten sick like he did going to nursery.

And I think it's kind of one of those accepted things.

Once you start going to a nursery we're going to just pick up lots of bacteria and viruses from other kids.

And we didn't expect to be out for almost two weeks.

Like looks at me like that because we had a rough couple of weeks.

I couldn't look at him like that.

Another thing that was so bad but sad was right after we started the, he got obsessed with me.

He was like mom, mom, he wasn't like that before then he got sick and he got even worse.

Yeah.

So you do have to kind of expect that when they start their attitudes my change and he felt the brunt of it.

But I also felt like he hated me.

Like I'd be like, well if you come over here and pick him up into the crowd and he's like mama mama, I just screamed like he would try to get away from me.

So that's another thing you just need to expect.

But at the same time it is nice in Japan that they do have this system where they don't just like fall in, put you into the nursery and like that's where you go and cry it out or you're just gonna have to deal with it.

They like slowly we'll walk you through it.

They were very accommodating so you're amazing.

Yeah, we're just really, really impressed.

Just be prepared that your kid might get sick things to prep once you do get accepted if they're going to have a list of stuff for you that I didn't expect how detailed this list would be and how thorough school is minimum because it's a temporary school but actual school they'll ask you a whole a lot, I don't know if this is common in other places in the world but they had like, okay you need to have a hat and the hat needs to have a rubber elastic band around it.

You have to have all of his shirts, can't have any goodies.

Everything has to have his name written on it, including all the diapers.

So you have to write 8 to 10 diapers every other day.

You have to have a certain size of bag for change of both.

You didn't because I think they hang it so you need to bring a towel they use for sleeping.

But like some school ask you to bring up a set of a little mattress and they bring back to wash every weekend.

Another thing that was quite interesting was the naming convention or when you have to write your name, the kid's clothes, you have to be like a specific size, like one centimeter size and you have to be an all here to Ghana it has a really long name.

I don't even know if his Sakis has enough room to write on his name.

Those of you that are international and they have longer names.

You just have to think about that.