Well that's... dumb

Okay, so, the sale of walkers is banned in Canada. So are the walkers themselves, I suppose. (And by 'walkers' I'm talking about baby walkers here.) Walkers can't be sold in stores and it's even illegal to sell them at yard sales and all that.

Baby walkers are banned in Canada, and have been since April 2004... and I can't really see a good reason for it.

I've seen reasons for it online: babies in walkers have a higher risk of injury (pulling things over on themselves, reaching more dangerous objects that would normally be out of their reach, falling down stairs, etc), and babies in walkers learn to walk later than babies who don't use walkers.

... eh?

Now, I didn't research any of this, this is just stuff I came across on the Internet and thought was quite stupid. I haven't actually seen a baby walker in years, so I don't know if their design has changed at all from what I've seen growing up, but I've seen old pictures of babies in walkers and I never had any problems with them.

I had a walker when I was a baby, so did my brothers and so did some of my cousins. I have never once heard any stories about either me, my brothers, or my cousins having any of the problems mentioned above because of our use of walkers.

(Pictured: Baby!Me in a walker. Not Pictured: Danger or Injury)

The walkers that my brothers and I had as babies were basically the equivalent of a parent holding us by the arms to let us pretend to walk, except that there were wheels instead of parents and we were being supported by the lower body instead of the arms. We moved the walkers with our feet, so it was kind of like walking without actually walking.

There was never a higher risk of injury us because of the walkers, and here's why: our parents didn't stop supervising us just because we were in walkers. My parents didn't just put me in the walker and wander off somewhere where I wasn't in their line of vision (that's what the playpen was used for). I was supervised when I was in the walker the same way I was supervised when I was actually able to walk around for real when I got older. Actually, there was probably more danger for me without the walker than there was with one.

(... yeah I was weird)

When I was a baby I lived in a trailer that pretty much posed no danger to me walker or no walker (except for the furnace right there in the kitchen but I never had any run-ins with it... because my parents aren't brain-dead). My brothers, on the other hand, were born while we were all living with my grandmother. My grandmother's house was pretty much one story except for the small flight of stairs in the kitchen, a flight of stairs which was easily accessible to everyone there and was located right next to an even longer flight of stairs (that only one brother ever fell down and that was when he was much older) that goes into the basement.

Not once did me or my brothers, walker or no walker, ever fall down either of those flights of stairs. My brothers are twins and the two of them each had a walker, so that's two babies in two walkers wandering around and not once did they ever hurt themselves while using them. It's my belief that babies who get hurt while in the walkers don't get hurt because they're in walkers, but because their parents don't pay attention.

My brothers never once fell down my grandmothers stairs in those walkers because they never got a chance to. My parents, grandmother and any other adult present made sure that my brothers didn't go near the stairs. And even if they did somehow get to the stairs there was a gate there to prevent them from falling down.

So it's my opinion that the walkers themselves don't cause injuries to children, inattentive and unprepared parents do. Just like you wouldn't leave a toddler walking around unsupervised, you wouldn't leave a baby in a walker unsupervised.

(2 babies, 2 walkers, 0 problems)

So that's it for the first problem. Now onto the second one: delayed walking.

I have no idea if that's true or not. I don't really see how walkers could cause that unless the baby is in the walker all the time with no floor time or anything (but again, that's the fault of the parent and not the walker itself).

All I can say to that is that my brothers and I all had walkers. I started walking when I was 10 months old, and both of my brothers were walking by their first birthday.

Sunny Days... at 2am

I had to babysit from around 10:30 at nigth 'til almost 3:00 in the morning last night... this morning... whatever.

The kids I was babysitting (two cousins and some other girl) were all pretty young so the only television in the room was turned to Treehouse TV the whole time.

I could almost feel my braincells dying... I'm really starting to hate children's programming. I hate modern children's programming anyway, I've seen some of the shows that were on when I was growing up and most of them are still pretty decent. (And will someone please call CPS for Max and Ruby please? Where the fuck are their parents at anyway?!)

I know that I've long outgrown the age range for these programs, but I think they're just really bad, so it can't just be that.

Sesame Street was on at 2:00am (why?? they have an awesome show like that in their line-up and they only put it on at two in the morning?! I had to sit through some awful programs and then finally there's Sesame Street and it's on at two in the morning! I am pissed.) and it was fucking awesome. I laughed like a fucking maniac almost the whole time, it was hilarious. Major nostalgia moment, and it was a new episode too so it wasn't like I only liked it because I remembered seeing it when I was young.

Why can't more children's shows be like that? And why are most kids' shows done up in 3D CGI whatever? Did small children suddenly lose the ability to see in 2D? It seems like everything I see aimed at kids is 3D CGI these days. And shows that were originally in 2D (Mickey Mouse, Franklin, Winnie-the-Pooh, etc) are now CGI... and sucky (well, okay, Franklin isn't that bad now, it's pretty much the same as when I was growing up... but Mickey Mouse's Clubhouse makes me want to hurt things).

But seriously, we need more Sesame Street. They should run different episodes five times a day with reruns from the 70s, 80s, and 90s mixed in with the new episodes.

With the Light Volume 5

With the Light 5

Another school year might be over for Hikaru Azuma, but his mom has no time to rest. With both a new teacher and new classmates of different ages and varying disabilities ahead in fifth grade, Sachiko starts preparing for the difficulties that come with sudden changes to her autistic son’s routine. Despite her best efforts, Sachiko meets with significant opposition from the new teacher, and the Azumas have to cope with Hikaru acting out as a result of the stressful changes at school. Moreover, when the time comes for the family to decide on Hikaru’s junior high, the local education administrators seem to think that a school for the disabled is the best fit for Hikaru, partly because of his recent behaviour. But Sachiko, who has done her research, knows this isn’t the case. Will she and Masato be able to convince the authorities and specialists that they know what is best for their son? (from the back of the book)


We all say goodbye to Gunji-sensei in the beginning of the volume. It’s been a bumpy ride with her as the Special Education teacher, but she does redeem herself in the end. I’m almost sad to see her go, mostly because I know that what’s coming next isn’t good.

After that it’s spring break, where Masato stars in a silly commercial promoting the mushrooms made by his company. It’s the only time Azuma-san shows up in this volume. Some her friends are visiting her when they see the commercial and she’s very embarrassed about it when they recognize it as Masato. Then she calls Masato up to yell at him. Azuma-san is very obsessed with outward appearances.

When spring break is over it’s time for Hikaru to start the sixth grade (OHMIGOD it’s his last year of elementary school guys! Let loose the excitement!). Hikaru, Miyu, and their mothers go to the school a few days early to meet the new Special Education teacher. They arrive and meet the vice-principal in the Special Ed classroom. I don’t know how long that particular vice-principal has been working at the school, but we see him a lot in this volume where he never really saw him at all before.

We are then introduced to the new young, male Special Ed teacher. His name is Akamatsu-sensei and he is hands-down the worst teacher Hikaru and Miyu have ever had. It’s not apparent right away how horrible Akamatsu-sensei is; actually, he seems like a great guy at first. He’s fairly young, maybe around Aoki-sensei or Nishiwaki-sensei’s age, and he seems to know a great deal about autism without Sachiko having to explain it to him.

Honestly it looks like Hikaru’s last year in elementary school (sixth grade already!!) is going to be a pretty positive one, probably up to Aoki-sensei standards… and then Honda-san notices a few things that no one else, possibly including the readers, picked up on. For one thing, she notices that Akamatsu-sensei doesn’t bend down to the children’s level when he speaks to them; he also seems to use big words just to show that he can use them. There are also signs that he doesn’t clearly understand Hikaru and Miyu’s autism, he starts comparing them to Dustin Hoffman in Rain Man, for one thing, and he seems a bit disappointed when he’s told that they don’t have any super special talents.

There’s no time to dwell on this, though, because classes start a few days later. It’s April 6th and the first day of sixth grade for Hikaru. There will be two other students in Special Ed this year. They are both younger than Hikaru and transfers from mainstream classrooms. Before I get to them, I’d first like to mention that Akamatsu-sensei starts having a hard time from the beginning. He barely has all four children in the class alone with him for five minutes before he starts yelling.

I don’t think that Akamatsu-sensei is a bad teacher (even though I don’t like the man), but he has no business being in the Special Ed classroom. He’s a smart man and I have no doubt that he understands autism or any other disability he’s read about, but he doesn’t understand the children and he can’t handle them. It’s one thing to know that children in his class do certain things, but it’s another thing altogether to know how to handle these behaviours.

Akamatsu-sensei does a terrible job in teaching the Special Ed classroom because he expects all the children to learn the same way that the mainstream students do. What he fails to realize is that these four students are in the Special Education class because they don’t learn like the mainstream children do and need extra help. He also expects them all to work at the same level, which would be stupid even if they weren’t in Special Ed because all four students are in different grade levels anyway.

There’s something going on where the kids’ parents come in to view the class (like an open house or something) and Akamatsu-sensei is reading the children a story. He reads the story straight from a book without any visual aids or gestures or anything. There are three autistic children in the room and neither of them is paying attention because they’re unable to follow along. The only one who was listening was the dyslexic and Akamatsu-sensei gets mad at him for incorrectly writing something on the board. Then he tells the students to make a morning glory out of paper and gets mad when one of the new children doesn’t realize that he has to make a pretend morning glory (as opposed to making a real morning glory out of paper).

I could go on and on about how Akamatsu-sensei fails at his job, but I won’t because I don’t want this to go on and on. Just let me say that compared to him, Gunji-sensei is on the same level as Aoki-sensei. Yeah, think about that. Even Gunji-sensei was able to work with the children. Akamatsu-sensei was never able to get any real work done; he didn’t even take all the kids outside, not even to the gardens! He didn’t listen to what the parents had to say, even ignoring documentation from doctors (along with Principal Kouda, big surprise there). The Special Ed class was always in chaos when he taught and the year ended with virtually no learning taking place.

On to the new students! Iguchi Ryota is a fourth grader and was transferred to Special Ed from the mainstream class. He is very active and has problems with staying on task, paying attention, and personal space. He doesn’t have a diagnosis in this volume, but Shibusawa-san (from Sunshine House) believes that he might have ADHD and high functioning autism (possibly Asperger’s). Akamatsu-sensei yells at him a lot because Ryota is always knocking things over and forgetting things.

Kanemoto Tsubasa is the other new student and he was transferred out of the third grade mainstream class. He’s a calm, shy boy who doesn’t really cause any trouble for Akamatsu-sensei and can often be seen helping to look after Miyu. He has trouble reading and writing, but is completely normal otherwise. Like Ryota, Tsubasa doesn’t have a diagnosis when he enters Special Ed, but his mother does take him to a doctor on Shibusawa-san’s advice. Tsubasa is eventually diagnosed with dyslexia, but Akamatsu-sensei doesn’t believe Tsubasa’s mother when she tells him.

This volume isn’t all about how Hikaru’s last year of elementary school (!!) is probably just as stressful as his first; there are other things that happen outside of school. Like Hikaru being bullied. Yup, it’s finally happened. Hikaru is on his way home from school one day when he starts getting harassed by two junior high school boys. I just hated reading that part, the two boys are pulling on Hikaru’s GPS and nametag and trying to get money from him and Hikaru has no idea what’s going on. Luckily, Ishida-kun happens to walk by and sees what’s going on and gets the boys to stop. Unfortunately, Ishida-kun’s not enough to get the boys to stop completely. Sachiko goes with Ishida-kun’s mother to the school to get the teachers involved but no one will help. It’s pretty terrible that no one can control two 14-year-olds.

The events in the second half of the volume jump around a bit. It’s time to choose Hikaru’s junior high school and Sachiko and Masato have to practically fight the system to get permission to enrol Hikaru in the junior high they want him to go to. Hikaru also goes on a trip with some classmates but it didn’t go anywhere near as well as his first trip in Volume 3 (mostly because Akamatsu-sensei doesn’t know what he’s doing). There’s also some karaoke thrown in. And then Hikaru graduates elementary school.

It was wonderful to see Hikaru graduate. Compared to the entrance ceremony six years earlier it’s proof that Hikaru has grown so much since then. The book didn’t spend too much time on it because, well, nothing really happened. Hikaru graduated and then he went home. But Hikaru wasn’t the only one who graduated, all of his friends graduated too. So not only did Hikaru graduate elementary school, but he graduated with all of his friends. I so smiled big the whole way through that segment.

Hikaru’s time in this volume is pretty much over at this point, just a few other scenes of him (he’s learning to ride a public bus now). He also said a final goodbye to his yellow hat and backpack, so his elementary school days are officially over, this is important because his yellow hat has turned into something like a ritual to get him to school (since he was only supposed to wear it during first grade but ended up wearing it all six years).

The last big story in this volume is about Katakura Eri, a girl who went to school with Hikaru and who comes from an abusive household. She hasn’t really been featured in the series much until now and I don’t really know why she gets her own story in this volume, but whatever. I suppose it is interesting to see what she’s up to now since her family were kind of main characters in the first volume and we haven’t really seen them since.

With the Light Volume 4

With the Light 4

When staffing changes at Masato’s company get him transferred to a dead-end job in the middle of nowhere, more suffering seems imminent for the Azuma family. However, Masato approaches the situation with aplomb and comes up with new ways to pave the way for Hikaru and those like him to become “cheerful working adults”… with surprising results. Hikaru himself seems to be getting closer, bit by bit, to achieving this goal as the Azumas decide to foster their son’s independence in a variety of ways, including getting to and from school on his own. But when Hikaru encounters an old acquaintance on the way home and leads Sachiko to a horrific discovery, will the Azumas be able to return a favour and help out a friend in need? (from back of book)


Okay, this time the summary on the back of the book is pretty accurate. Sachiko does make a horrific discovery, but more on that later.

This volume doesn’t really feature Hikaru directly much at all. He only really shows up a few times just to let the readers know that he has an amazing memory (think Reid from Criminal Minds), that he’s advancing in his development (he walks to and from school on his own and spends a lot of time in the mainstream class now), and that he’s a total sweetheart (he is a very good big brother to Kanon).

This volume starts off with Masato going to work. He was demoted at the end of the last volume and it hasn’t really started affecting the story until now. First of all, there will apparently be a decrease in Masato’s salary, but money has never really been mentioned except in passing or as a reason as to why certain things can’t be bought, or whatever. The really big change in all of this is that Masato has basically been shipped off to a warehouse in the middle of nowhere (since some of the higher ups in the company are trying to get him to quit because they have no real grounds to fire him).

Working at the warehouse/office looks just miserable. Masato is confined to a small room with only a table and a window. There is no air conditioner to help with the sweltering summer heat and all the other workers either ignore him or aren’t allowed to talk to him. He isn’t given anything to do and the only thing he really has to work on is his laptop brought from home.

The upside to all this is that he has a lot of time to himself… and he’s certainly up to something.

We don’t find out until later what’s going on with him, but at the end of the first chapter Masato says that he’s finished working on something and it all seems pretty important. He keeps going to his new office every day, much to the annoyance of the two higher ups there who are just waiting for him to quit, until he gets a call from his old work partner Tanigawa saying that big changes are going on at their old workplace.

Masato takes advantage of this new opportunity and manages to get himself back into his old company in a good position. His first order of business is to take the warehouse he had been demoted to and turn it into a place that would hire people with disabilities as workers. This volume talks a lot about disabilities in the workplace as Masato and his new employees learn about how to smoothly run a company and turn a profit while working with people with disabilities.

This part of the volume is awesome because I don’t think a lot of people (me included) really think about people with disabilities having jobs. Then Masato and co. take a fieldtrip to a company that has been employing disabled people for over ten years. We’re shown how a company like this might be run, and what kind of adjustments would have to be made for everything to work effectively.

This is a pretty big deal for Masato. Not only is he about to start managing a company where he expects a grand majority of the workers to have some sort of disabilities, but this is kind of a glimpse into Hikaru’s possible future. Hikaru won’t be in school forever, so companies like this are very important if he is to become a cheerful working adult when he grows up.

After the workplace arc is over, it’s time for Hikaru’s AAPEP evaluation. The AAPEP is to evaluate his functional skills to see what he can already do and what he still has to work on. There are forms for Hikaru’s parents and Gunji-sensei to fill out concerning Hikaru’s skills and when and where he uses them.

Hikaru goes to Sunshine House to be evaluated by a psychologist named Soejima. Soejima-sensei has Hikaru do a number of different tasks: sorting things, playing basketball, asking for food, following orders, working through distractions, and other things. He does pretty well (there’s no tantrums or crying) and the results allow Hikaru’s parents and teachers to create a personal curriculum for Hikaru.

It’s getting close to Christmas in the second half of the volume. School is going well; Kanata seems to be under a massive workload, and Hikaru still wanders as he walks home from school on his own. There most likely won’t be a repeat of Hikaru’s Adventure (from Volume 2) since most of the neighbourhood kind of watches out for Hikaru… that and he has a GPS tracker on him.

It’s on a detour while walking home when Hikaru is found by Oki-kun. The two meet while Hikaru is looking at an outdoor Christmas tree (he still loves shiny things) and then they are found by Sachiko. Oki tries to run away when Sachiko shows up and he almost gets hit by a car. When Sachiko checks him over to make sure that he hasn’t gotten hurt, she discovers bruises all over Oki’s torso. She invites Oki to come back home with them and then takes him to the doctor, where they find out that he has a fractured rib.

No one’s really seen Oki since Volume 2 and this is the first time he’s shown up since he left. He looks like he’s doing better than before: he’s put on some weight and he’s dressed appropriately for the weather. It would seem that all is going well for him, until Oki goes back to where he now lives and we see that not everything is as it seems.

Masato goes to visit Oki and discovers that the school where he lives is terrible. It doesn’t specify how many children are actually there (I think there’s only four or five that are shown, but there are more), but there’s a poor teacher-to-child ratio. The principal is totally clueless as to what’s going on, one of the teachers believes strongly in corporal punishment (with a baseball bat), another seems to be there just for show, and the only sympathetic one we see seems to be in way over her head.

Luckily, it’s Masato to the rescue and CPS, or whatever the Japanese equivalent of that is, is called in to help. Oki-kun’s arc wraps up on a positive note. This arc moves away from the subject of autism to shed some light on child abuse and abuse happening in institutions. There’s even a brief scene where Sachiko talks to Masato about her almost abusing Hikaru when he was younger and how lucky she felt that she found support and was able to change her ways.

The last major thing that happens this volume is that Kanata moves away. Even since Volume 1, I never thought of him as a major character since he doesn’t really show up much. However, he seemed to start appearing more often as Hikaru started to spend more time in the mainstream class. Until this volume I didn’t realize how close Hikaru and Kanata were, but the reality is that they are childhood friends (like Hikaru and Nobuaki, or Hikaru and Moe). It was really sad to see Kanata leave, and Hikaru took it pretty hard, but I don’t think we’ve seen the last of him.

Although this volume didn’t feature too much of Hikaru, it did bring to light pertinent issues related to Hikaru, such as work after leaving school and abuse.

At the end of every volume so far there’s been a text preview for the next volume. This volume is different because it also includes some actual pages from the next volume. I think this works better to make you really want to read the next volume because the preview mentions graduating.

…

Hikaru’s almost finished elementary school!!!

It’s his last year! Are you excited? I’m excited!