Japanomie

I am, possibly, back

2011-01-24T17:32:00.000+09:00

I stopped updating for quite a while because in my second year, I felt less at the mercy of my total incomprehension of everything Japanese, and thus less compelled to write exploratory essays about life here. But now that I'm in the midst of the dead of another gray, damp, and uninsulated winter, I'm feeling a bit draggy and thinking that keeping a blog again might be helpful. I might go with shorter, more slice-of-life entries than before, though. We'll see! For now, here's the view from my desk at school:

And an example of the relentless cuteness of Japan. Here's a photo of a dessert I got at an Italian restaurant a few weeks back. We may all suffer constant discomfort until the spring, but at least there are sugar snowmen.

Guest post

2010-08-13T15:26:00.004+09:00

So What's the Deal with Rick Moody?

A Lookings Institute report from the field.

English education

2010-07-02T14:33:00.000+09:00

English education is compulsory for all Japanese students from the first year of middle school through the end of high school. And yet, if you visit Japan, you'll find almost no one speaks English. Let's talk about why!

First--the education system. Most Americans are used to hearing about how the East Asian countries whoop our asses at math. It's true that students here are doing fairly sophisticated calculus that Americans might not encounter until college, if at all. (I dropped pre-calc halfway through my junior year of high school and never looked back.) The stereotypically Japanese method of rote memorization and practice, practice, practice is probably well-suited to math and science, and basically any subject where you can commit accepted facts, and how to apply them in accepted situations, to memory.

What I find troublesome is that this same method is used for language learning. I teach the first year reading classes, and their textbook consists of chapters that are basically stories or articles on a particular topic that also introduce certain grammar points. I teach them pronunciation of new vocab and phrases, reading comprehension, and some writing. There is very little speaking involved, and no creative work from them--they are not asked to apply the English they learn to making their own sentences or dialogues, for instance. Not to mention when an ALT isn't present, English classes are conducted almost entirely in Japanese.

The English exams are exactly what was covered in class--the stories are reprinted with phrases missing for the students to fill in, and basic questions about the content. So basically if they pay attention at all or do their homework, they should have no problems. In fact, the composition portion of their last test was an assignment I'd given them in class, corrected, and returned--so all they had to do to pass was memorize the corrected version of their homework and re-write it for the test. Now how on earth will they know what to do if they're approached by a foreigner who needs directions somewhere? Maybe one of their readings included a "giving directions" dialogue, but unless that dialogue is word-for-word what this random foreigner needs, they won't be able to help. Never mind actually going to a foreign country themselves and trying to navigate.

Second--the culture. It seems to me that it is unbearable for a Japanese person to make a mistake. They believe in practice makes perfect, never mind that what they are practicing might not be particularly useful or applicable to real life. Jonathan has told me about how the basketball club at his school will do the same drills ad infinitum until they are flawless, but are utterly unprepared for the chaos of an actual basketball game. So it doesn't matter how flawlessly you can do a particular maneuver on the basketball court, or how good your pronunciation of the word "ubiquitous" is, if you are unable to improvise in a random, real world situation.

This focus on very specific perfection means my students are mortified if I ask them a question they weren't expecting in class, because that means they haven't rehearsed the answer and so may make a mistake. It seems to me the bulk of language acquisition happens when you are verbally trying to express yourself, making mistakes, and learning from them. But if you are so humiliated at the idea of garbling grammar or mispronouncing a word, you're obviously too inhibited to speak naturally, right? Part of the aversion to learning this way may also be that most Japanese people are not used to interacting with foreigners with imperfect Japanese language skills. As a New Yorker I'm accustomed to communicating with people with heavy accents and broken English, both of us trying our best to understand. Whereas in Japan if you mispronounce a single syllable in a word you may get looks of total incomprehension. They're just not used to bridging that gap. The students here think it is the height of hilarity when I make a mistake; yesterday in my English club the kids were cracking up that I'd written けんど (kendo) instead of けんどう (kendou), the correct spelling. I was like, I didn't laugh at you when you spelled lacrosse "rakkros." (OK, I laughed in my head.)

Anyway, it is may be seen as ethnocentric for a foreigner who isn't a real teacher to criticize another country's methods... but the proof is in the pudding. Odds are that if you meet a Japanese person who can speak English, it means they spent some time living in a foreign country, NOT that they gained their fluency within the Japanese system.

Daily Life

2010-06-17T14:12:00.000+09:00

I feel like taking a break from writing about special occasions in Japan, which while very fun always feel like a "You had to be there [to appreciate the ridiculousness]" kind of thing. Don't worry, though: the DVD I'm bringing home of Jonathan performing Beatles songs with two senseis for the annual Culture Festival should give you a taste of that. For now, let's address some matters of daily life, shall we?

Cooking in Japan
I, and maybe some other people, tended to think of Japanese cuisine as rather refined, light, and healthy. But after buying some Japanese cookbooks, that has turned out not to be the case. Home cooking here is fairly simple and often yields pretty hearty stuff. The holy trinity of Japanese cooking is sake, mirin, and shoyu, which serve to up the sugar and sodium content of everything, and based on my daily bentos at school it seems that the Japanese can katsu-ify anything; there is a TON of fried stuff. I can get absurdly cheap (by New York standards) fish, sashimi, and sushi at the supermarket, but there's also karaage (fried chicken), katsu (fried pork cutlets), tempura, and so on. Another popular and easy recipe is curry, which in its Japanese incarnation is a sweet brown glop, and there is tons of white rice with everything. A lot of JET girls (apparently known as "land whales" by some of the JET guys, who frankly should not be talking) gain weight quickly. Winter means heavy stews or nabe, which is a hot pot you can put pretty much anything into.

I cook a lot of rice bowl dishes including gyudon (beef and onions in a sweet sauce) and oyakudon (minced chicken and scrambled egg.) I also have recently come upon the multifaceted wonders of my rice cooker, which can be used sort of as a crock pot or to steam vegetables and even, apparently, can bake cakes. I make my own Japanese curry with ingredients as odd as green apple and a dab of peanut butter (trust me, its good) as well as tempura and katsu. When I'm lazy or broke, the frozen meals options at the supermarket surpass what we tend to have at home; Jonathan is particularly obsessed with their champon, a Chinese noodle soup with seafood. Another easy thing we love is only three ingredients: a stir fry of the thin sliced beef or pork they sell here and kimchi over rice. Now that it's summer I'm trying to learn lighter things, such as a peppery seared tuna with wasabi dipping sauce that I made the other day.

Needless to say it's far easier to just cook Japanese. Favorite Western dishes have to be modified or Japanified, especially considering none of our apartments have ovens. I find myself most missing pizza, Mexican food, real New York deli sandwiches, bagels and lox, and anything with cheese. (The best you're going to do here are expensive and microscopic blocks of cheddar, or sliced cheese product [American cheese, basically.]) Probably the thing I'm most looking forward to for my upcoming visit home, other than seeing Catticus, is stuffing my face.

The heat
Now that it's June it's a steam room outside. Working at a high school means no skirts that end above the knee, no sleeveless shirts, and absolutely no cleavage. Also, Japan is so eco-friendly that schools turn on the air con by the date rather than the temperature (I had the opposite problem at the onset of winter) which means profuse sweating simply from sitting still until July 1. Because of the dress code, back sweat, underarm sweat, and the dreaded in-between-boob sweat is unavoidable. To deal with this I've found the best clothing policy is a tank top or camisole and a light flowy shirt over it; the under garment absorbs perspiration and keeps nicer clothes from staining. I also use these Biore wipe things that cool you off and leave a light powder behind on your skin to prevent your face from becoming an oil slick. Unfortunately they also take off makeup, necessitating a bathroom re-application trip, and the movement this requires of course starts the sweat cycle over again. Help. The craziest thing is that Japanese women are so deadly afraid of having any contact with sunlight that they walk around carrying parasols and wearing long gloves to prevent their arms from burning. AND they never look sweaty. If I didn't already feel like my Westernness makes me an ogre here, I do now.

Cuteness

2010-05-28T14:46:00.000+09:00

I've been a bit of a sourpuss in my last two entries so I thought I'd write about the interactions with Japanese people that actually brighten my day rather than make me feel really awkward.

I feel like the most charming things happen outside of the classroom--one is the elementary school kids that Jonathan and I pass each morning on our walk to the train station. Since the school year started in March and a new crop of students started heading to the school near our jutaku, we've encountered a more emboldened gaggle of kiddies than in the past. It began with one boy shouting "HARRO" and "GOOD-O MORNING" to us; then some of his friends joined in, including one little girl who is so cute I want to eat her. Then they started reporting the weather to us--I guess they only got as far in their monthly ALT visits as a few adjectives, so instead of "Today is sunny," they tell us, "Kyou wa sunny desu!" Yesterday we corrected them that it wasn't actually sunny, it was cloudy ("kumori") and they were shocked to find we speak Japanese ("Nihongo de shaberu?!?") Then this morning we saw two of the boys waiting for us and clearly planning something. When we passed one of them asked us, "Tomodachi ni narimasen ka?" which means, "We're becoming friends, right?" So we told them of course, and they were very pleased. I'm looking forward to what they'll ask us on Monday; their ridiculous cuteness gives me a little boost at the beginning of a long day.

I think I've mentioned cleaning groups before, which is something I also look forward to. Every day at Japanese schools there is a 10 minute cleaning period during which, theoretically, students and teachers clean designated areas together. What usually happens is the teachers clean and the students run around shrieking and enjoying their brief period of freedom. But since I'm a lazy American, I don't clean either, so I spend the time chatting with my cleaning group, invariably an ever-expanding clique of girls (once they realize I don't make them do anything, they invite their friends.) Yesterday they came tearing up the stairs screaming "ALANNA, WE HAVE MANY QUESTIONS!!!" Basically anything I tell them about myself is greeted with an "IIIIII NAAAAA!" as though I promised them a limitless supply of cake and cute shoes (based on the consumption habits of the young Japanese woman, these seem to be the most treasured products.) I've had a few different groups at this point, and so far they've been: 1, The Naughty Group, who always wanted to talk about sex; 2, The Gamblers, who taught me a million different Japanese card games, and 3, The Girly Girls, who like to discuss Gossip Girl and what my (entirely imaginary) wedding will be like. It's a small part of the day but I'm able to get to know some of the students beyond, "Harro I am fine sankyuuu" and blank stares in response to questions about their English reading assignments.

Korea vs. Japan

2010-05-18T13:55:00.000+09:00

So it's probably not fair to compare Seoul to the Fukuoka suburb I live in, which, although near a city is in a part of Japan rarely reached by foreign tourists, but I couldn't help doing just that when Jonathan and I visited earlier this month. We both felt that our experience in Korea was closer to what we expected visiting a foreign country to be like--there are language difficulties, many things are unfamiliar and challenging--whereas Japan has defied our expectations in often seeming more like an alien planet. Impenetrable etiquette aside, things like this happen to me in Japan: people literally slow down in their cars so they can turn and get a good stare at me while I wait for the bus. A stranger runs up and snaps my photo when I am posing for a friend in front of Kumamoto Castle. On visiting day, parents come into the classroom where I am teaching solely to take my picture, then leave. A group of young men come into the ramen shop where we are eating dinner and spend the entire meal looking at us and making comments to each other; we have no idea what the hostility level there is, because there is never direct confrontation. I think the most draining aspect of being here is not the work, which is almost embarrassingly minimal, but the constant awareness of my sticking out so dramatically and people's behavior confirming that I am not in fact being paranoid--at best everyone notices me and is curious; at worst they are resentful that I am here bumbling around their town speaking English. I suppose it's a worthwhile experience to be a minority somewhere if you haven't been before, but I don't think I particularly needed to be enlightened as to the difficulties of, say, new immigrants to New York--I was aware at least intellectually that it must be very difficult indeed.

Even Tokyo has this aspect; there are organized anti-foreigner groups that demonstrate publicly and even in that huge and diverse (for Japan) city the neighborhoods are still relentlessly Japanese; there is very little familiarity. (If you go, don't expect to find an "East Village of Tokyo" or any such thing.) This may be because Japan generally does not allow foreign franchises (save apparently for McDonald's and Starbucks) and doesn't even allow foreigners to own businesses without a Japanese partner. I don't necessarily blame the country for resisting the forces of globalization and wanting to preserve "authenticity," but it is a bit strange coming from such a major participant in global economic forces, one that so readily incorporates foreign ideas (but then, of course, Japanifies them).

Korea, or at least Seoul, on the other hand, seems really eager to be considered a "modern country," to be welcomed into the global power fold (whatever that is). Maybe that's due in part to the massive American military base there. In any case, it had a savvier, more New York feel to it, with hip college neighborhoods, aggressive street hawkers speaking Korean, English, and Japanese, men who look less likely to blow away in a strong wind, etc. AND great international restaurants. Jonathan and I were super thrilled to find a delicious Greek place in Itaewon, the uber-foreign neighborhood. There is Krispy Kreme and California Pizza Kitchen and Outback Steakhouse. Not that I crave mediocre chain restaurants particularly, and they are outnumbered by Korean barbecue and bibimbap and juk (delicious porridge!) but these things made me feel less conspicuously other. It's not like I'm saying all countries should have these things--I don't feel entitled to be made comfortable anywhere I go in the world by the presence of friendly American franchises--but visiting Seoul did highlight for me how completely bizarre I am often perceived to be in Japan: "Every day in America--BIG STEAK?" "Do you have four seasons in your country?" "Do you argue with your family in English?" (Actual questions from Japanese people.)

Not that your average American high school student knows f*ck-all about Japan, but it occurs to me that the kids' world here is very, very small. The centuries-long tradition of insularity and the obsession with preserving Japanese culture has made it so that for many young people, America is a fantasy land, and anyone who can speak English fluently is an awe-inspiring miracle creature. At least, that's how it is for the kids in the Fukuoka burbs, where every foreigner you see is surely an ALT, imported here to open the world just a little--and then, of course, go back to their own country.

Transferring

2010-04-26T12:33:00.001+09:00

As I think I've mentioned before, the Japanese school year ends in March and begins in April. (No break for you, students!) At this time every year, teachers, office staff, and administrators may be transferred to different schools. It's not a guarantee but it seems that if you've been at a school for 3 years or more, the odds are good that you will have to move. People seem to get no say at all in where they're sent, though allegedly the higher powers at the BOE take commuting times into consideration.

Quite a few teachers I was friendly with had to go to new schools, unfortunately, and I haven't yet had enough time to get to know the teachers who replaced them, so work feels a little lonelier than before. One of the teachers who left sat next to me and would talk (and talk, and talk) to me every day, whereas now I am abutted by two non-English speakers, so I'm kind of unintentionally antisocial.

I also have new supervisors at both my home school and the blind school--the new guy at the blind school is fun because he's fresh out of college and energetic and isn't set in his ways about teaching at all, whereas the new woman at the high school has very specific (and in my opinion, boring) ideas about team teaching. Something JETs are continually forced to accept is that there is very little they can do to change the Japanese methods of teaching English... we aren't "real teachers" and we aren't in any way a long-term fixture in the system, so we kind of have to tag along and make the best of it most of the time. (The "methods" often involve rote memorization and repetition that I feel does nothing to actually teach English in a way applicable to real life... but maybe that will be another post.)

I think one of the major advantages of this transfer system is that no school will be stacked with amazing teachers where another one gets screwed--something you often see in the States, as seasoned teachers have the leverage to choose high performing schools in affluent areas, whereas newbies get sort of counter-intuitively dumped at failing schools in troubled areas, thus perpetuating the problems of said area. In Japan pretty much any school a student attends will more or less have the same quality of staff as all the others. While schools range from vocational to high academic, teachers can be placed anywhere in that range, regardless of their skills. It seems a pretty egalitarian system, but on a personal level I'd think as a teacher it probably feels really Big Brotherish in its elimination of any control you have over your professional life.

For JETs it's nice because we stay in the same place as long as the school doesn't cancel our contracts, so if we're stuck teaching with someone we hate we know it won't last forever, and we get to try a variety of teaching styles based on who we work with each year. But right now I definitely feel the same awkwardness I experienced when I first came, before I got to know some of the teachers here and the rhythm of each day became more natural--I'm back in the sticking out like a sore thumb mode of being the clueless foreigner who hardly knows anyone.

Special Days

2010-03-09T12:27:00.000+09:00

It's graduation season, which has led to a host of "special days" at my school. (My school's name is two words, both of which start with Ch, so let's call it Cha Cha School.)

I've heard the reason that the Japanese school year begins in April is to coincide with the blooming of the cherry blossoms. Can anyone confirm this? I hope it's true, because that's just precious.

Anyway, Cha Cha School had its graduation earlier this month, and despite the jaunty school name, it was one somber affair. Before the ceremony even started, it was dead silent. Seriously, none of the parents were even speaking to one another. Once things got rolling, each student was addressed individually and had to leap out of his/her seat with a "HAI!" And the standing and bowing, oh my Lord. Possibly 20 times we did that, at the start and end of each speech. And before speaking, each person had to bow to: the Japanese flag, the people on the right, the people on the left, and the audience. Of course I couldn't understand a word of any of the speeches but I'm guessing they all amounted to, "Well done," and "Wasn't Sports Day great?" At the end, the students left by class in a single file line. First the boys (SEXIST!) then the girls, 50% of whom were weeping. Which like... you WANT to stay in Japanese High School? Buh? Strange form of masochism maybe?

Probably the funniest part was the immaculately dressed and coiffed parents with... garishly colored bedroom slippers on their feet. (Indoor shoes required.) This is a hilarious Japanese phenomenon. Dress code is super important, but it's totally cool to wear your power suit with Crocs. Nice shoes are for outdoors.

Today is also a special day: junior high students come to take Cha Cha School's entrance exam. Students have to be accepted to high school, and it's this whole intense process bla bla, but then they often choose which schools to apply to based on their uniforms, so, you know. Very serious stuff. Anyway, the teachers are all UBER stressed out because apparently if they make any kind of mistake with test administration and/or collection, the BOE will have them drawn and quartered. Having nothing to do, the following conversation transpired:

Me: Oh, can I do anything to help? Like, I could grade the English exams or something...
Teacher: Well... if we make any mistake the Board of Education will punish us.

In other words, they won't let me help because they think I'm likely to eff it up. Since I'm a native English speaker and all, I'm much likelier to make an error grading the English exams than the Japanese teachers... oh, wait.

So yeah, today is test day and tomorrow is grading day, also known as Two Days of Bullshitting Around Online and Getting Paid For It for me. Not too bad!

Another cool thing about special days is that we can order special bentos. Now, I have no idea where these come from, but they're way awesomer than our usual bentos, and if I wasn't too embarrassed I'd have taken a photo of the one I just probably grossly consumed. Maybe there's a Special Bento Shop that eagerly awaits Cha Cha and other schools' events so they can bestow upon them their wares, I don't know. But they're definitely the best thing about special days.

Kanji lesson from a complete Japanese novice

2010-02-16T14:59:00.000+09:00

I'm really impatient with learning grammar and have a much better memory for vocab, so with my ample down time (students are taking exams now and don't need my foreign clown services) I've been studying kanji. I enjoy this for a few reasons: it feels sort of like art, albeit within very strict parameters, and therefore something even a simple drawing-impaired person like me can do. Basically just like cooking--if you can follow recipe instructions, you can make something regardless of how uncreative you are in the kitchen. I've also been meeting with the calligraphy teacher here and doing a lesson exchange (she teaches me calligraphy and tries not to laugh, I teach her English and try not to laugh) and learning kanji in a very "JAPANESE CULTURE" sort of way.
Another study incentive is that I am tickled by seeing how Japanese words are built with kanji. Sometimes it seems really simplistic and silly, as in:

大人 (otona) -- This means adult, and has the kanji for big (大) and the kanji for person (人). So, adult = big person.

火山 (kazan) -- This means volcano, and comprises the kanji for fire (火) and mountain (山).

But then sometimes words are made of kanji combinations that I find quite poetic, as in:

空想 (kuusou) -- Daydream; fantasy. 空 means sky and 想 means idea.

里心 (satogokoro) -- Homesick. 里 means village or one's parents' home; 心 is heart.

赤道 (sekidou) -- Equator. 赤 is red and 道 is road.

It makes me wish I could somehow read Japanese novels or poems in the original, to see how having metaphor built right into the very words of the language impacts the authors' choices. I've noticed in the few translated Japanese books I've read that the writing seems straightforward to the point of being almost stiff, but I wonder if that's just a failure of rendering already-descriptive and evocative kanji words into English. You know what I mean? Maybe Japanese writers feel less compelled than, say, your average American MFA student to aim for particularly brilliant lyricism in their sentences because it's already right there in each word (sky idea, red road, etc.) Maybe someone who actually knows Japanese and isn't a total poser like myself can enlighten us.

I leave you with my (so far) favorite poetic kanji compound: 無口 (mukuchi) which means laconic and is made up of the kanji 無 for un- or without, and the kanji 口 for mouth.

I am definitely with mouth, though.

Quick thought...

2010-01-20T09:19:00.000+09:00

One of the children's shows I watch in the morning as I'm getting ready for work is called "You Gotta Quintet" (I know) and features puppets playing classical instruments and singing songs. Today, one of the puppets covered Sinatra's "My Way," in Japanese. But since "doing it [one's] way" is totally not how things work here, and since I still don't really speak Japanese, I was left to wonder how the puppet version of the song might translate...

"I did it in a way that would preserve group harmony"? "I did my best to fulfill the goals we have collectively decided upon"? Or simply, as Jonathan suggested, "I did it our way"?

Another pop culture-y thing I wonder about is J-horror films, which allegedly are uber-scary. But I can't imagine Japanese ghosts are all that vicious... like, there's no way they lose their intricate system of courtesy and respect for others just because they died. I imagine a Japanese ghost wandering into a room, startling a living human, and responding with a bow and a "SUUUUMIIIIMAAAAASEEEEEENNN..."

Hence I'm not too concerned about hauntings in my apartment, even though it's super old and creaky. American ghosts--now those are something to worry about.

Kawaii Culture

2010-01-13T14:24:00.000+09:00

Most people know that Japan is obsessed with cuteness, considering its major exports are Hello Kitty and girls dressed like Victorian dolls. But having lived here for going on six months now, I think I'm beginning to understand some of the complexities behind it.

First, make no mistake--the cuteness thing is not an exaggeration. I haven't found any vending machines of schoolgirl panties yet, but when I graded class papers on New Years resolutions, I found that easily 50% of the female students wrote, "I want to be very cute girl." And even though I'm hardly a novel presence here, almost every time I say hello to a group of girls passing in the hallways, I hear them squeal, "KAWAIIIII!" as soon as I'm out of sight.

So what are the criteria for being kawaii? From what I can tell, the principal element is silliness. Specifically, the kind of innocent, helpless silliness associated with youth. Things I've done that are considered kawaii include wearing mismatched socks and mistaking the Japanese word for cheap (yasui) for the word for vegetable (yasai). Clumsiness is kawaii, to the extent that girls will often pretend to trip and fall in front of boys, and there is even a word for such imposters (which I unfortunately forget), who are generally recognized only by other girls. Wearing oversized clothing so that you appear extra small seems to be a kawaii thing to do. On our daily walks to the train station, Jonathan and I have noticed a young woman who rides an absurdly small bicycle, who is always cutely hunched over it and wearing extremely high heels. And when we visited Osaka, upon exiting the subway on a particularly cold and gusty night, a group of Japanese girls proceeded to run spastically into the wind, shrieking, which set off additional groups who presumably saw this as an excellent and very kawaii idea.

Kawaii behavior falls into two camps: unabashed silliness, and intense, straight-faced seriousness which is applied to being silly. In the former, I'd place the girls who ride the same train as Jonathan and basically go into giggling paroxysms of joy every time they see him. He reports seeing their heads collectively bent forward as the train pulls in so they can stare out the window at him. And when he gets off at his stop, they wave frantically, again clustered at the window, until he is out of sight. Extremely cute! In the serious camp, I'd place Hunchy, who pedals her teeny bike in her precarious shoes with an expression of deep focus and determination. Also, very cute.

So what are the roots of kawaii? It seems to be designed for men, although it has expanded and morphed to the point that girls can be seen acting like this all the time, whether or not a man is near. But we are talking about a country where not too long ago, women were expected to walk ten paces behind their husbands, a country with a commercial of a baseball player watching TV and grunting "o-cha" at his hovering spouse, who duly obeys him, and that isn't even the point of the commercial. Jonathan and I have noticed a kind of pigeon-toed walk many of the women here do, which upon some investigation I've discovered is based on how girls had to move back in the kimono-wearing days to keep their garment from flapping open in the front, and is now considered a cute and demure way of moving. Many women also tend to cover their mouths when they giggle, and giggle at every attempt at humor that a man makes, regardless of how feeble, since supporting their egos is pretty much the universally done thing--which may explain why so many Japanese men seem downright afraid of me, because I wouldn't know better than to just look at them blankly when their jokes fall flat.

All this leads to a slight conundrum for me, because I'm aware of the outrageous sexism upon which kawaii-ness is likely based, but I nevertheless am very entertained by it! Every day, I see Japanese girls doing something adorable and hilarious and I can't help but laugh and want to pet them on their heads. And, I am regularly rewarded for my own apparently kawaii nature without even trying. So, here I am, benefiting from and enjoying the fruits of a system that to American eyes is terribly outmoded and offensive. My sisters, is it time to turn in my feminist card?

Re-Entry Shock (not a pornographic term)

2009-12-16T09:30:00.001+09:00

When I first came to Japan it was like a dream for quite a while, to the extent that I became a bit uneasy that my life was going to feel like Inland Empire for an entire year, which, while the film is quite lengthy--a year is a long time to more or less not have your head attached to your body. But the unfamiliarity-induced depersonalization wore off gradually until I realized I woke up crabbily to my alarm each morning and dragged myself down the familiar route to the train station just like any American working stiff (albeit an American working stiff with a regard for the environment that prevents car ownership.)

What I'm saying in an extremely overwritten (or maximalist, for DFW fans) way is that even though I still can't say much more in Japanese than "Cold, eh?" I got used to Japan. Which also means used to bowing for pretty much everything, ranging from "thanks for selling me that gum" to "I'm deeply sorry for killing your child." (I haven't killed a child.) Used to (actually, quite fond of) the massive black crows that fly overhead in the morning, cawing, "HEY! I'M A BIG FUCKING BIRD!" Used to politeness to the extent that true feelings are rather pleasantly unreadable... as far as I can tell, everyone thinks I'm just great! And so on.

So the first thing that happened upon my brief return to America, literally, in LAX, was that someone was really rude to me--an airport worker, who just could not deal with my confusion about which line to wait in at customs. And then, in the airport waiting room, I looked around at the overweight, tired, mostly-recent-immigrant crowd waiting for flights to come in from Mexico and the Philippines, and I thought: "This is a country that does not take care of most of its people." That's not new information, and though the Japanese do look uniformly more healthy and purposeful than Americans, they also have one of the highest suicide rates in the world, so, but I was able to see things through more Japanified eyes than before, and the scene was quite jarring. Also, filthy--this also is a country where people don't care much about clean public spaces, either.

Basically, things run less smoothly, something I unthinkingly tolerated before, like for instance when the 7 train would just stop between stations and sit there for like 15 minutes, which was a bit nervewracking since its an elevated train bobbing in the wind over Queens Boulevard, etc etc. It makes sense that that's what happens in a country with a much more individualistic, every-man-for-himself, murder and devour the person on the ladder rung above you and don't feel guilty about it because you must be your own first priority in this cutthroat society, live the dream ethos. Whereas Japan is all about the group harmony--for example, when people go on vacation they statistically spend far more money on omiyage for their office mates than they do on souvenirs for themselves. And that's just one instance among, like, infinite ones. I'm not even saying Japan's way is better--like I said, pretty high suicide rate, because what do you think happens if you don't fit in with the group and don't at least have recourse to a culture that actually admires and venerates outsiders, outlaws, rebels without causes, etc.? It's just noticeably different, that's all.

Also, the food in America is embarrassingly huge. Exhibit A:

My stomach, for the extent of the trip, kept screaming "WHAT ARE YOU DOING TO ME???"

Not to say it wasn't a nice time. Well, it was a weird time, because, L.A., and I yearned a bit for New York and its precarious and inefficient subway system.

Upon returing to Fukuoka (route: LAX to Narita, airport bus from Narita to Haneda, Haneda to Fukuoka, subway from Fukuoka airport to Hakata, train from Hakata to Futsukaichi station, cab from Futsukaichi station to home sweet squalid home) I was aware in a strange way that everything had been continuing to happen as usual in my small Japanese town all along, and that despite the hellish travel the world is actually pretty small. It seems obvious but I think one of the benefits of travel is how it reminds you in an immediate and hard-to-define but very sharp way that life goes on.

Otenki

2009-12-07T10:06:00.000+09:00

So, it's been a while and I have about a month's worth of anecdotes to share, which I may do in separate blog segments because I am lazy. First up, we must contend with...

THE COLD. Fukuoka is not actually that cold, relatively speaking--so far temperatures have been hovering around the low 50's most of the time, 40's in the morning and at night. Problem is, Japanese housing does not have central heating or insulation. The reasoning behind this, from what I've read, is that homes are designed with the blazing Japanese summers of death in mind, to let air and breezes in, since one can always just bundle up in winter. But anyway what happens is, it's the same temperature indoors as it is out. 50 degrees may not sound so bad, but come talk to me once you realize YOU CAN NEVER GET WARM.

There are inventions that deal with this: one is the kotatsu, which is in fact delightful. It's a table with a heating unit underneath and a space to put a heavy blanket that traps the heat. So people kind of burrow under it and get nice and toasty. There's also clothing you can buy at Uniqlo called Heat Tech (pronounced "heat-o tech") that supposedly is made of magical fibers that keep you warm. There are also kerosene heaters, which I've decided not to go for since I'd probably burn down the building if I used one.

Luckily, my air con unit also functions as a heater, and keeps my living and bedroom warm enough. Unluckily, if I get up in the night to pee, there's a thirty degree drop once I leave the bedroom, and the toilet seat is without fail freezing to the point that I'm afraid my butt cheeks will stick to it, like Jim Carrey's tongue to the pole in Dumb and Dumber. Waking up and noticing a need to urinate leads to an inner battle of wills, as I try to ignore the urge and go back to sleep, knowing that if I don't, it will be some time upon returning to my futon before I warm up again enough to drift back off.

Another issue is that Japan is so annoyingly environment-conscious (or perhaps stingy with electric bills) that the prefectural Board of Education would not let Fukuoka public schools turn on their space heaters until December 1st. Because we know it's cold by the date, not the temperature. And, my vice-principal insisted on leaving the windows in the staff room open because the Japanese are morbidly afraid of influenza (more on that some other time, maybe) and think that, I guess, uncirculating air will lead to mass infection and the school shutting down, and, horror of horrors, A DROP IN PRODUCTIVITY. So before I left for a trip to L.A. (more on that later, maybe) working hours were sort of like being a nomad living in a yurt on the snow-covered Mongolian steppe, or something. No amount of heat-o tech could save me.

But now it's December 7th, so we know it's cold, and the heat is on.

Favorite quotes so far

2009-11-12T17:58:00.001+09:00

OK, I must introduce this with the disclaimer that I am NOT making fun of my students. I think learning a language is incredibly hard, and I understand how nerve-wracking it is for them to be tortured with English questions by me. I just find their English to be often really endearing, and sometimes, kind of poetic. So here are some of my favorite quotes from students so far--I post this not so we can all be like HAHA WHAT MORONS but more so that you can see how cute and funny my daily life here can be.

"Thank you for your every ESS action." --A note from one of the students in ESS (English speaking society), the club I run two days a week.

"I want to make love." --A girl from my cleaning group

Me: "What did you do last week?"
Student: "Yes, I what."

"What do you like Japanese food?" --I've been asked this by multiple students AND teachers, with this specific sentence structure

Me: "Americans think Japanese, Chinese, and Korean people all look the same..."
Japanese student: "Ahhh! Stereotype!"

"I would like to visit Kyoto. I hear the area is abundant in natural resources." --This is funny because of its flawlessness

"First, I sleep all the morning, awake after, I lay motionless on the floor for thirty minutes." --From an answer to test question, If you were given a one-week holiday, what would you do?

"Club activities enable students to have joy." --Answer to question about why clubs are necessary to school life

Me: "How was your holiday?"

Student: "It was enjoy."

And the winner...
"If I could use magic, I want to eat jewel meet. This meet is the best meet of the world's meet. This meet contains various energy that we need to grow healthy. But we cannot get this meet because this meet is fancy." --Answer to test question, If you could use magic, what would you do? I have no idea what jewel meat is.

Foodies!!

2009-10-29T18:10:00.001+09:00

Last night our Japanese class went out together for 和食 (AKA washoku, tradish Japanese food.) One of the teachers taught us etiquette, which was kind of hard to keep in my brain considering there are like 500 rules for chopstick use alone. I could get into it, because it's pretty interesting, but instead let's just move on to what everyone really wants to see: the food porn...

This was our starter. Look how beautiful the presentation is! The food was very seasonal, from the garnishes (maple leaves!) to the produce and fish. With something like this, you are supposed to eat consistently in one direction, whether it's right to left or left to right. Also, if something is too big for one bite, turn the bite mark side of the food toward you when you put it back, because apparently looking at someone else's bite is gross.

This came next. I'd describe it as kind of a Japanese ceviche, i.e. raw fish with some citric element. With bowls this size, you should pick them up in one hand and eat out of it with chopsticks in the other hand. If the bowl is large you must leave it on the table.

Shrimp, eggplant, and something else delicious but not identified to me with a really awesome miso paste at the bottom.

I'm skipping the soup we got after this because while it was delicious, it was not very photogenic.

Some kind of creamy deliciousness with pork in it. The ginger stick was a garnish, which I discovered when I briefly attempted and failed to eat it. (Not very biteable.)

I am also skipping a meat course and a rice and miso course because again, very good, but they didn't make for interesting photos.

Dessert: persimmon (called かき, kaki here) and a sweet potato cake. Like I said, very seasonal.
JEALOUS???

Interview!

2009-10-21T09:32:00.001+09:00

Viv emailed me some questions about life in Nihon to answer on this blog, and since I love talking about myself, I dutifully (though perhaps occasionally, obnoxiously) responded:

Q: Okay, let's jump into everyone's favorite topic: food. What are the best and grossest things you have eaten in Japan so far?
A: The ramen here is out of control awesome... I also really like yakitori. On the weekends the supermarket near me has a nice bento selection and also pretty good sushi and sashimi, so one of my great pleasures so far is buying bento and eating it while watching some illegally downloaded episodes of Mad Men. I also like going to izakayas, which are pubs that have little Japanese tapas--everything from fried chicken to raw horsemeat (seriously). As for gross, there are occasional mystery objects in my school lunch with soft or gummy textures that don't really do it for me. I have yet to try the notorious natto, made from fermented soybeans, which apparently tastes rotten.

Q: Besides Catticus, who or what do you miss most about the U.S.?
A: I miss bagels. I would murder a small Japanese child for an everything bagel with cream cheese and lox right now. Oh yeah, and my family and friends.

Q: Do you constantly feel like a character in a Murakami novel? If so, which one do you most resemble?
A: I should hope not, because all Murakami character seem to me to have some form of low-grade autism and/or find themselves in horrific situations, like watching a man get skinned alive. But I guess I most resemble the talking cat from Kafka on the Shore.

Q: How is the dollar doing over there? Are the Japanese as obsessed about the Recession as we are?
A: The dollar is almost historically weak against the yen, which makes it nice for me when I transfer money home. I can't really tell how concerned people here are about the economy because I don't understand anything they say on the news, and everyone I talk to is a co-worker, thus employed. They do seem to think Americans have it worse right now.

Q: Do you have cable TV over there?
A: Nope, just five basic channels I get for free. I often leave the TV on in the hopes I'll absorb Japanese knowhow through osmosis, but it's not working. I do have a favorite children's show--Zenmai Zamurai, about a boy who spreads peace and averts crises by throwing dango into people's mouths.

Q: Why won't Jonathan join Facebook?
A: It's a time suck, and his time is better spent watching NBA highlights.

Q: If you had to categorize your overall experience in Japan as "working" or "vacation," which would it be?
A: Well, I definitely go to work every day, but the pace is so easy for me I feel a little guilty to even call it work. I think what ends up being draining is the constant feeling of being vaguely on edge, because I attract attention wherever I go, and never know when a seemingly small task is going to become a huge hassle because of the language barrier. So in that sense, I don't feel like I'm on holiday. On the other hand, I have way more free time and money than I'm used to having.

Q: What's the deal with those used underwear vending machines? Has anyone explained this phenom to you? Is this an aspect of Japanese culture that just gets highly exaggerated in Western media or is this brand of "interest" explicitly common?
A: I'm guessing it's super exaggerated because I haven't seen anything of the kind. The Japanese are definitely obsesssed with cuteness, and no one's cuter than schoolgirls, but I can't imagine a sexual attraction there because they are SO immature. The teenagers here, generally speaking, seem a lot younger and even less physically developed than the teenagers in America. Blame it on the hormones in our food or our Puritanical/oversexed culture, I guess, but the schoolchildren here are more like... children.

Q. Given the opportunity, would you live in Japan 4-EVA?
A: Definitely not. I love it so far, but I also know that I could NEVER be considered an insider, no matter how long I lived here or how fluently I spoke the language, and I think that would get super lonely after a while. On the one hand I enjoy my outsiderness, but on the other I'm sure I'd get sick of relating to people at a more superficial level than I could do with even just a select few at home.

I finally get my act together and update

2009-10-17T10:22:00.000+09:00

I realize I haven't written yet about the school for the blind where I teach once a week, so I thought I'd take you through my day there, which is a strange combination of busy, boring, and super interesting...

I take the bus for about 15 minutes to get there and then walk a ways off the main road--the Fukuoka Blind School is actually two schools, a high school and a combination elementary and junior high school. The schools are surrounded by small farms and mountains. Sometimes during breaks from classes I just stare out the windows, because it's really gorgeous there.

My first class is just one student, a first year JHS. My supervisor, who is also blind, and the student seem to spend most of the class arm wrestling! The student is stubborn and will just refuse to say things in English until the supervisor like, physically bests him. It's the kind of thing that wouldn't go down in American schools, of course, and probably also in regular Japanese schools, but I think because of the students' blindness, a lot of physicality is OK. I often find myself doing a lot of tactile things with them, too, to help them understand new words or phrases. And actually, the role of teachers in Japan is a lot more like that of parents. Students spend more time at school than they do at home, and the personal and educational spheres are not separated. If students are seen acting out in their communities, there are repercussions at school. My role ends up being a bit more like a friend, since I'm an assistant teacher and not responsible for any discipline, and students know that when I'm in class they'll be doing less studying and more fun, interactive activities. Hence, the warm reception whenever I'm there.

My second class is two students who are not only blind, but also have mental retardation. It blows my mind that despite this, they are learning English. They're also the most enthusiastic students and are pretty much beside themselves with excitement whenever I talk to them. Nothing delights one of the students more than telling me, when class is over, "SEE YOU AT LUNCH TIME!!" Haha. He loves that he can communicate a bit in English.

The next class has two first-year JHS's. The girl, I swear to God, pops out her glass eye during class to freak me out. Seriously. I look over and hey, there is an empty eye socket! Awesome! I try not to react since that's clearly what she wants, and it probably also wouldn't be helpful to make her feel like a freak, but damn. The boredom comes in because these students, since they're new to English, have a VERY limited vocabulary and need my supervisor to explain a lot in Japanese, so I just end up kind of zoning out when that happens. Unless of course I'm confronted by a removed glass eye.

After that is a class for two students who supposedly have "social problems." They don't exhibit this, really, except they both are extremely quiet and shy, but also very sweet. I should mention that the students who are completely blind use Braille typewriters, on which they type both Japanese and English Braille, which is super impressive to me. Some students have limited vision--I suppose they are "legally blind"--and use large print textbooks. I help them with their writing since my supervisor is totally blind. He also has an absolutely gorgeous seeing eye dog, a black Lab named, of all things, Taft (after the U.S. president) who makes me miss Smokey!

At lunch time I eat with the other teachers and students. My supervisor is the only one who speaks good English so he ends up translating for me and the other teachers so we can talk a bit.

Fifth period is two second year JHS boys with limited vision, who both seem to have massive crushes on me, haha. One is an incredibly talented pianist and plays "air piano" all class.

My last period is the most fun. I teach two elementary students with a young woman who is not blind. They are ridiculously adorable. A recent lesson was teaching them the names of body parts, playing Simon Says, and singing Head, Shoulders, Knees and Toes. The boy student is so serious. If I ask him, "How are you today?" he stops and thinks really hard about it so he can answer honestly. So cute. The girl student apparently went blind as a result of brain cancer not long ago, but amazingly is a sweetheart and is always in really good spirits. It sounds cheesy and maybe condescending to talk about these kids as inspiring, but I am so fascinated by how well they navigate the challenging aspects of their lives that most people take for granted (e.g., something as simple as getting up and opening a window can, of course, be treacherous for them). They even play blind table tennis!

After classes, I have about forty-five minutes before it's time to go. I go to the staff room, where an English conversation class has somehow developed between me and some other teachers. They bring snacks and English-Japanese dictionaries, and I try to teach them new phrases. This week we were talking about Halloween and then different monsters, and I was explaining werewolves and how they only change during the full moon. One of the teachers says, "Some of the people here--always werewolf!!" Hahaha.

So, overall, being at the blind school is pretty damn awesome. It's something I never imagined doing and wouldn't ever have if not for JET.

And now, I leave you with a picture of me and some ninjas, taken last weekend when Jonathan and I took a day trip to Kumamoto Castle, one prefecture south of us.

I don't know what my point is

2009-10-03T17:29:00.001+09:00

Happy October! The weather is becoming a bit more reasonable, by which I mean wearing long sleeves would not be a completely batshit insane thing to do. We had a week of nonstop rain but today was about 75 and sunny. I have to say I'm a bit homesick for New York autumnal detritus, i.e. sweaters and thick fuzzy socks (I call them "woobies") and crunchy leaves and a new television season. Jeanette and I had a tradition of having a Fall Night where we'd eat Greenmarket pumpkin pie and carve a pumpkin and watch Nightmare Before Christmas, because we were pretty much gay old cat ladies when we lived together. Actually I was a lot like Jack from that movie when I first came to Japan, running around and singing, "What's this? What's this???" Sometimes I still react that way to the contents of my lunchtime bento, except I say "Kore wa nan desuka?" (これ　は　名　ですか)

I've been taking Japanese language classes for a couple hours every week and it's made me remember how dorkily thrilled I get at being a student. Seriously, I'm an overachieving brownnoser who gets super excited whenever Yumi-sensei says, Ii desu ne (いいですね)(roughly, "It's good, isn't it!) at my hiragana . It's been satisfying to some previously-neglected area of my brain to learn a new alphabet, even though I still read and write it at the painstaking speed of a kindergartner. I think it's the same feeling of small, tangible accomplishment I get after I successfully cook something (it happens!), having an effort yield immediate visible results, which of course is the opposite of what happens when I complete a writing project and send it out into the ether to be judged. A form letter rejection received months later doesn't yield much of a sense of, Yes! I made something!

On the other hand, whenever it begins to dawn on me how distant the ability to communicate in Japanese some approximation of what I'm actually thinking at any given moment is (and it's hard enough in my native language), it can be tough to not wonder what the point of all this expended energy is when the most I can do at the end of it is say something like, "I take the train to school," or "It's very hot and humid today." Which also leads to the aforementioned pleasant ability to indulge in greater solitariness, or let's face it, just plain laziness, when it comes to talking to people.

I also can't even begin to explain the weirdness of communicating in slow, belabored English at school all day and then coming home and reading, like, Virginia Woolf or Don DeLillo, as I've done recently, or work on a story of my own that I know I'll never be able to share in any way with the people I spend the majority of my time with. The copious free time at work (it's midterm time for the students so I have no classes), the linguistic isolation, and the sense of tremendous distance from everything known may add up to writing that may never have come about otherwise. It's strange--I've known a couple struggling writers now who've abruptly come into success, as though they just flipped a switch, shortly after they left the States. We'll see...

Indulgences

2009-09-27T18:04:00.002+09:00

The other night, we were settling in to dinner at an izakaya in Hiroshima (which we visited when we had a few days off for Respect for the Aged Day and the Autumnal Equinox, which are, awesomely, national holidays) and I announced for not the first time how much I love Japan.

"I think I know why," Jonathan said. "I think you like feeling like an outsider."

I'm aware it's pretty tired and possibly narcissistic to talk about how I've just always known that I was Different. Like yeah, you are totally the ONLY PERSON IN THE WORLD who has experienced feeling out of sync with her surroundings. It's the same as the people at Sarah Lawrence who'd tell you, they just had that gut feeling ever since they were pooping their diapers in front of Fraggle Rock that they were meant to be writers. YOU DON'T SAY.

But anyway, yes, I've long been, at least in my head, a visiting alien who no one else seems to realize is an alien, and therefore really unfairly expects to function as efficiently and stoically as the natives. Probably this is partly self-mythologizing; if you ask me, middle school was two years of hellfire and torment, but Viv has told me she thought I seemed to her kind of socially successful.

Travel allows people who feel this way, I think, to have the surprisingly fulfilling experience of having their inner impressions of themselves, maybe for the first time ever, confirmed by the way they are perceived and treated by others: they are quite clearly running along a separate plane, minus the risk of being punished in some way by the dominant society for their failure to just suck it up and do what they're supposed to. It's really liberating but I wonder how much one really "grows." I'm not sure I buy the idea of using travel as a vehicle for self-expansion.

For instance, in Japan, I can (in fact, I really have no choice but to) indulge my frequent desire to be completely antisocial and standoffish. I don't have to interact with store clerks, waiters, the mail man more than through a few gestures and an arigatou gozaimasu. There's even a JET-coined phrase for the way foreigners can wantonly disregard rules: gaijin smash. As in, Oh, were we supposed to buy the train ticket back there? Well, I'll just gaijin smash my way through the turnstile! Looking so obviously different from everyone else (seriously, two children stopped what they were doing today to point and stare at my hair) means I'm not expected to know ANYTHING, and in fact, this cluelessness seems to qualify as fulfilling the JET Programme's goal of "grassroots internationalization." It's why they're reluctant to accept people who have spent a significant amount of time in Japan before: they want you to be as AMERICAN (or Australian, British, whatevs) AS POSSIBLE. And then when you do something culturally appropriate, like give omiyage after a trip, they're all like, "HOLY SHIT! YOU KNOW A JAPANESE THING!!!!!"

So, I'm not sure how much intrapersonal development is happening when I can basically just be as weird as I feel like being, since Differentness is already expected. It feels a bit like when you have a pint of Haagen Dazs or something that's calling to you despite the fact that you're kind of getting to be a fatass, and you tell yourself you can have a few bites and be satisfied, because you're an adult, you totally have self-control, and then you realize you're already halfway through the carton and then you're just like, Fuck it, I've gone this far, why not just KILL IT?

Anyway, here's a photo of us gaijin smashing our way across Miyajima island:

Tenpaizan

2009-09-14T09:07:00.005+09:00

Yesterday I took Jonathan to a park in our town that I'd visited before, and we went for an impromptu hike.

There were a lot of these. I tried my best not to complain.*
*Lie.

On our way up we came across this shrine.

Which was guarded by at least seven cats. Kind of spooky!

Of course, this hideous tailless one was the most friendly.

View from the top! Our fair city of Chikushino and surrounds.

Behind this shrine we saw a lady feeding the cats. So I think they're not so much special holy Shinto cats guarding the shrines as they are waiting there for the visitors to come and feed them.

The Safety of Objects

2009-09-08T14:41:00.002+09:00

For someone who supposedly fiercely objects to materialism of the Long Island variety (e.g., BMWs as sixteenth birthday presents {not to mention Sweet 16s and Bar/Bat Mitzvahs that rival society weddings in scale}, constant additions to the house because God forbid we don't have a sunroom, the plasma TV, the Victoria's Secret heart charm bracelet even though {or I guess because} everyone in the ENTIRE WORLD has one, etc. etc.) I seem to place a lot of stock in particular objects. Really, I find myself imbuing them with a near-mystical status.

For instance, everyone in Japan has something called an inkan (or a hanko, why there are two names for this I don't know) which is a personal seal, embossed with the kanji for your family name. This is used every day, for everything from official documents to signing in at work. Jonathan and I both got inkan with the katakana for our first names, but with his he got a nifty little inkan holder as well, whereas I got the small paper bag it came in and soon became ridiculously self-conscious of it, as though it were shouting to the world "HELLO I BELONG TO A CLUELESS GAIJIN WHO WILL PROBABLY USE ME WRONG-SIDE UP BECAUSE SHE DOESN'T EVEN KNOW WHAT KATAKANA ARE SUPPOSED TO LOOK LIKE." Hence my mission to find the most lovely inkan holder in all the land, because surely that will make me blend in! It's not like I'm the only person in a 100-mile radius with huge blond hair, right??

So, I found one, and it is quite pretty and all, but really. I still don't know how to speak Japanese. It's not like now I understand what the hell anything at the supermarket is. And yet I forge on in my Japanalia-collecting mission, because a part of me really believes that as soon as I have all the stuff people have here, particularly the stuff they don't even think of as being unique cultural touchstones that comprise the quotidian rules that are completely baffling to a foreigner, I will cease to be a foreigner.

Which is extra silly because most of the time I don't even mind being a foreigner. It's actually pretty fun. I was reading the Jet Journal, a publication seemingly designed to convince current program participants that there is something seriously wrong with them if they are not THRILLED with the world intercultural exchange 100% of the time, and in one of the entries a teacher was complaining about all the special treatment. I KNOW. He just wanted to be regarded as another member of the staff.

This might indicate something really gross about me, but I uh... don't at all mind special treatment. I was treated unspecially often enough in the past, oh, 25 years to really relish the fact that students start grinning wildly when I enter a classroom (even if it's just because jeez, my boobs are WAY bigger than what they're used to.) I like that at the party for teachers after sports festival, I could totally hang and smoke cigarettes with the P.E. teachers even though it's ordinarly considered unladylike, because I'm a foreigner and we Do Things Differently. I like that a random old man stopped me yesterday and asked where I'm from, and then told me in Japanese "New York" kind of sounds like the term for "taking a bath." I definitely like that other teachers take me out to lunch and give me treats and stuff, because very few things make me happier than free food. I'm sure the novelty will wear off soon, so for now, bring on the red carpet, Nihonjin.

This completely non-sensical post was brought to you by Suntory Coffee.

Watashi wa eigo no kyoushi desu!

2009-08-27T15:22:00.003+09:00

I finally began teaching this week! This was a relief--even though before I had no classes, I was still expected to be at school every day, and it was a struggle to keep busy, to say the least. I also felt pretty awkward and useless, stationed cluelessly at my desk while all the other teachers rushed around. So I feel more a part of the school now, although I'm certainly not treated like an ordinary teacher. The students make me feel like a rock star! Now I know what it's like to be a certain male professor at Sarah Lawrence College, only this attention is for like, being blonde as opposed to offering piercing literary insight into the human condition. I'll take what I can get.

So for this first week, I had to give a self-introduction lesson to all the first-year high school students (the equivalent of American tenth-graders.) By Friday, I'll have done more or less the same lesson nine times. (Remember Ferris Bueller? "Nine times?" "Nine times.") The benefit is that it allows me to get a strong sense of what works and what doesn't, but it also means the first class' students are guinea pigs and the last are TOTALLY LUCKY because by then my lesson is PERFECTION.

I structured the lesson as a Q&A session, putting the students in groups and having them come up with questions to ask me. Please enjoy a sampling of their work:

How many dates do you go on in a week?
How long is your skirt? (I really didn't understand this one, since the length of my skirt was visible to everyone.)
Do you love me?
Who is the most handsome in the class?
Has anyone told you that you look like Hermione from Harry Potter? (I have been asked this, seriously, in EVERY class. I have no idea.)
Is your hair natural?

So, pretty adorable so far. The cutest thing, though, happened outside of class. In Japan, high school students have a brief period every day in which they are expected to clean the school. (Imagine a school proposing this in America: can't you just hear the outraged screams of the parents already?) Today, three girls approached me and asked if I knew where the Language Lab is. I do, but I let them lead me there because they clearly wanted me to go with them. I followed them into the room to see no less than thirty third-year girls excitedly waiting for me. I made small talk with them for a bit until one girl with excellent English, who was clearly the planner of this event, asked me if I would come every day.

"Sure," I said.

"Tomodatchi!!!!" she cried, (it means friends) and everyone started clapping.

Oh man.

Though the difficulty of getting through each day through a combination of the slowest spoken English possible, excessive smiling, frantic flipping through Japanese dictionaries, and mime has been challenging to the point of making my eyes twitch involuntarily (yes, really), if moments this hilarious keep happening, I'm going to love teaching in Japan.

Oh, and I've trained more or less the entire school to yell "Peace out!" at me whenever I leave a classroom.

First shrine evahhh

2009-08-23T21:43:00.004+09:00

Click to enlarge...

Street leading to the shrine in Dazaifu

Before you enter the shrine, you wash your hands here

Prayer service in the shrine

Making some treats!

Common Ground

2009-08-17T10:04:00.002+09:00

Communicating with Japanese people who speak very little English is at once a nervewracking and elating process. You find yourself desperately trying to follow their questions by tone, body language, and the few words that happen to be familiar to you. When you finally encounter something known, some shared experience, no matter how mundane, you're thrilled--"You like basketball?!? No way, I also like basketball!" It's the most simplistic form of interaction, but also somehow fulfilling.

Today the principal invited me to his office to eat figs he had just picked from his garden. The English-speaking office lady popped in to assist us occasionally, but it was definitely a struggle to communicate. So when I heard him say "daigakko," I was like college! That means college! And probably overzealously rushed to tell him I went to American, then Sarah Lawrence. He and the office lady didn't seem to understand that I went to grad school to study creative writing. Which is fine, because I don't really understand it either.

When he asked me about my family I attempted to explain that Julian is trying to join the Secret Service. He associated that, like most people do, with the guys who guard the President, and from there we somehow wandered into a discussion about the movie The Bodyguard, and then Whitney Houston. Turns out the principal is a big fan of "I Will Always Love You." Or maybe not--like I said, you find yourself becoming strangely excited about things you don't ordinarly care about, just because someone from a different culture speaking a different language also knows about it.

Which is why I was quick to name drop basically every Japanese thing I know when I first met the principal--everything from Hayao Miyazake movies to Haruki Murakami to the Sapporo snow festival. Just to be like, I know you think I have really weird hair and I am always sweating because I'm not acclimated to your country's ridiculous humidity and I still don't really get the whole indoor-outdoor shoes thing, but hey! I've seen My Neighbor Totoro!

Making friends...

2009-08-11T14:45:00.006+09:00

Oh man, I am so blown away right now by the kindness of the Japanese people I've met. I don't mean to generalize--I hate it when someone says, "Oh, I love (insert here) people," since it's about as ignorant as saying you hate an entire group, and gushing over a whole population makes me sound like an idiot, basically. I've definitely experienced Japanese people who seem straight-up frightened and weirded out by me for no reason. But the majority of the people I've spent time with here have been warm and tolerant and friendly to an extent with which I'm totally unaccustomed.

Yesterday I met the school nurse, who excitedly told me her daughter loves America and would be coming in that afternoon to meet me. At 2 pm I was led into a small room where I spend the next two hours drinking coffee and chatting with the nurse and her super cute daughters, in my slowest English sprinkled with the few random Japanese words I know (read: sugoi, kawaii, atsui, arigatoo), aided by their electronic Japanese to English dictionary. It was my first time interacting with Japanese people in a non-professional/non-drunken setting, and it was exciting for me in a way I usually don't feel about human interaction. I often find unfamiliar social situations really draining, since frankly, I don't like people very much, but this was so fun! And sort of hippie-dippie in a "we're all just people, no matter where we're from" way... it's amazing how much communication can occur between people speaking different languages.

Today I went to lunch with them and the Japanese history teacher here, and the nurse treated me. This is another thing--I've lost count of how many times people insisted on paying for me as a "welcome to Japan!" At lunch, I learned some slang and how to tell students to shut up, which will probably come in handy once classes start. I also tried to teach them as many English phrases as possible, but people keep giving me the feeling that my presence alone is enough. At first I wondered if everyone was sort of taking pity on the hapless foreigner, but I don't think that's the case--they're truly interested in getting to know me and acquainting me with their culture.

And as soon as I got back to school, another teacher brought me to her aunt, who is a tailor specializing in yukata. Yukata are slightly less formal kimono that are worn at Japanese festivals and holidays--I saw quite a few at a fireworks festival I went to last week. Being dressed in a yukata is quite the process, with lots of layers and wrapping in an extremely precise way to create perfectly straight lines down the body. It took probably 15-20 minutes, and then I was photographed inside and outside in the yukata, with the aunt, the teacher, two cousins, and a cousin's baby (who was wearing a baby-yukata!) I'll post the photos as soon as I get them. Again, throughout I felt nothing but warmth from the aunt, and even though she spoke no English we kept laughing and--it felt like--conversing through gestures and random phrases. I don't think I can do justice to how fascinating the experience was, not just for cultural value, but for the fact that all these people took all this time out of their day to share honored customs with a complete stranger.

A cynical person might say that the reason the Japanese are so curious, tolerant, and kind to foreigners is that their country is under no threat from them--Japan has essentially a homogenous monoculture, and no worries that I know of about immigrants stealing jobs away or diluting traditions. This is probably partly the case, honestly. But I think patience and generosity are also valued here in a way specific to Japan--there's this universal understanding of preserving "group harmony" as essential, far more important than prioritizing individual needs. The American idea of individual freedom often is interpreted as every man for himself, which doesn't exactly lead to a co-worker taking time out of their busy schedule to make sure you have nice towels and things for your apartment when you move to a new place. And again, maybe that's just because there's less urgency here to compete, because everyone has more or less the same sort of cultural background and value system. I'm not sure. I'm not even saying this way is superior--but so far, I have to say that from a selfish perspective, it's been amazing for me.

Example of a yukata

Living sitch

2009-08-04T09:53:00.003+09:00

Sooo, my apartment. This has been a comedy of errors so far. Japan has blindingly fast internet, cell phones with the technology to build a new race of humans, and... showers with heating systems that require hand cranking. Or at least my apartment does, as its part of a group of buildings called kyo-something (I forget) jutaku, or teacher housing, seemingly inspired by the movie The Lives of Others. That is, vaguely East German and at least twenty years old (without having been updated once!)

So, for hot water, I have to put on the gas and then turn a hand crank. Then, since my shower head is not mounted to the wall, I sit down in my deep, narrow tub and try to evenly spray myself with it. The water temperature choices are Siberia and ninth circle of Hell.

The washing machine is on the balcony and doesnt so much agitate the clothes as grind them against the sides, wantonly shredding them to bits, in cold water. Also all the controls are in Japanese so I just guess. Theres no dryer so I hang the clothes from a line on the balcony. I put them out last night--wish me luck that theyll dry some time in the coming weeks, since the humidity makes life here sort of like walking through caramel. Sweaty caramel.

But seriously, pretty fun so far. I owe my firstborn to Grace and Karl, our neighbors and members of the considerable Pineapple Mafia (that is, people from Hawaii) that lives here. Without their cars, their Japanese skills, and their know how on setting up a Japanese apartment, Id be dead of starvation, dehydration, and not knowing how the hell to sort the garbage here.

Im also pretty delighted with the food so far, and got to try Fukuokas signature dish--ramen, which is made from pork bones, which leaves eaters with a distinctive smell that Ill call, uh... pork bones. Very OISHII though!

OK, Im at school right now so I feel a bit weird being ironic about Japan from a Japanese teachers lounge. SEE YOU!!!!

Oops

2009-07-31T13:57:00.002+09:00

I cant even begin to explain all the weirdness. I may still be jet-lagged, because I sort of feel like Im in a dream. Also, Im at school using a Japanese keyboard that doesnt have an apostrophe key. Please rest assured that my basic punctuation skills have not deteriorated.

Here are a few hilarious mistakes I have made.

-I went to have my photo taken and I was told I shouldnt show my teeth when I smile, so they had to re-take the photos. Apparently teeth in photos is a no-no! Thanks Mom for always chiding me to smile bigger in photos; you have offended the Japanese by proxy.

-There are indoor shoes and outdoor shoes. I change into different shoes when I get to my high school, which are what I therefore wear for most of the working day. So, I figured outdoor shoes dont really matter and I wore some flip flops to walk to school today... very bad. A teacher took me to the bank to set up an account and was basically like, you better not do that again. Seriously.

-There are no discernible street signs and towns are definitely not neatly gridded. And since everything is in Japanese, its nearly impossible for me to remember how to get anywhere... Ive been too scatterbrained and overwhelmed to recognize landmarks much at this point. This is to say, both days so far I have been clueless as to how to get to school from the train station. Today I wandered long enough to get the courage to go back to the station and ask, and I bumped into a student who took me to the school, haha. In broken English and Japanese I learned he liked the Yankees, so as a thank you I gave him this baseball keychain I brought from New York as an omiyage (souvenirs people returning from vacation or arriving for the first time give to their co-workers). It was pretty cute.

-I did not bring enough omiyage for all the teachers. With the help of my desk neighbor, Tanaka-sensei, Ive been sneakily trying to give omiyage to some of the teachers without alerting others to the fact that theyve been snubbed. OMG everyone is going to hate me.

Why Japanomie?

2009-07-22T23:53:00.003+09:00

1. Because I like making up fake compound words.

2. I previously thought "anomie" meant a sort of dissociative depressive state, but thanks to Dictionary.com I discovered it can also mean

a state or condition of individuals or society characterized by a breakdown or absence of social norms and values, as in the case of uprooted people.

which sounds a lot like what I'll be going through upon arriving in Japan. Not in a bad way necessarily, though the unfamiliar etiquette concerns me. Everyone says the Japanese will be understanding of the cultural faux pas I will most certainly commit, but honestly: if you were serving a Japanese guest dinner, and they were very loudly and ostentatiously slurping their soup, wouldn't your reaction be more, "What's the deal with THAT guy?" than "Oh, it must be because they have some sort of custom in Japan in which slurping your soup is a compliment to the chef," the latter actually being the case?

That is to say, I am worried about the limits of folks' open-mindedness with regard to my inevitable brash American trampling all over their way of life. But! I'm sure my humiliation will be tempered by the ensuing comical blog posts I get out of these experiences, for your (all my hundreds of readers, har har) benefit.

Wish me luck!

Love,

Alanna