Domesticity
In keeping with the Japanese fondness for giving apartment blocks trendy, western-style names, our two-floor block of four flats is called Champs Logis B (Champs Logis, I found out from an online French dictionary, means something like ‘home fields’). Its sister block next door, Champs Logis A, consists of eight smaller-scale apartments, and the rent for these must be miniscule, as we’re only paying 45,000 yen a month (about £350) for what’s called a 2LDK: two ‘living’ rooms – one…