I Japan Go

I Moved!

2011-08-14T23:03:00.000+09:00

It has come time for my blogging efforts to move. I mentioned in my last post that I would be moving to a new website—any hopeful self-employer needs a site in this age of the almighty Internet. I've imported this blog and my blog from France (the one that started it all) to their own subdomains for easy access. I'm really excited about the handy little features I can use and am still playing around with the bells and whistles, but the important stuff is all there.

The main site, petunkalunka.com, will mostly deal with my jewelry and creative projects. All my future posts about my life in Kameoka will be on ijapango.petunkalunka.com, so remember to redirect your links and RSS feeds to ! Please stop by and let me know what you'd like to see (I'm going to put up another morning dance video, eventually. Promise). Or just let me know how I'm doing.*

Anywhatsterwho, I need to clean for my houseguest tomorrow, so I'm off to get that finished before bed. Catch you all on the flip side, by which I mean at my new site.

*At running a website, not at life in general. I think I'm okay at life

This Is Now Relevant

2011-08-10T00:24:00.000+09:00

I wrote this post when I was but an ignorant youth. Now it's real. This blog will have a new home at ijapango.petunkalunka.com. It's still a work in process, but the great part about the transition is that I can publish from behind firewalls. You know what that means: No Work FOREVER!!! I kid, I kid. I'll work when someone is looking.

Makes a Girl Feel Good

2011-08-01T18:26:00.000+09:00

I was featured in an Etsy Treasury called "Natural" by DanuJewelry. It doesn't mean I've sold anything (or that I ever will), but it's still really, really nice.

Secret Project

2011-07-20T11:06:00.001+09:00

I'm working on something new. I shan't say what, but it sounds like a ukulele, smells like Vietnamese food, and feels like glass.

Clawing My Way Back Up

2011-07-11T16:44:00.003+09:00

…from that horrible test. You know that stress dream (that I've actually never had) about waking up one morning and having a huge final exam for a class that you never attended? Taking the JLPT N3 was like that, but without the dreaming and knowing that I should remember the crap on it because I'd just spent two months studying for it. Since that day I've been recovering, but culture fatigue and a hectic social agenda make it slow. Here's a quick update on the good parts of the last eight days in no particular order.

Lots of time with people I enjoy
Calling my family when I feel like it, just to play them the part of the Hallelujah Chorus that I figured out on the ukulele
Chatting with Hannah
Kim-Chi fed me soup.
Home party with Nanami, Teresa and Dara
Hanging out with Dara and Michie.

The rest is in picture and video form.

The mini watermelon plant in my container garden is bearing a fruit.

This isn't me, but my brother is pretty dang good at the piano, na?
Check out his site at http://barroncp.com/

I made up a new salad that is perfect for summer. There's crab in it.

I made a lightbox from a cardboard box and leftover craft paper.

It isn't perfect, and neither are my photography skills (especially since dropping my camera in a koi pond), but allows me to get the job done. It's for helping my to take pictures of jewelry for my Etsy shop.

Like this necklace

And this necklace

And these earrings

Plus there has been a lot of this:

You can't see it, but I'm not wearing any pants.

Moral: God is dang good to me.

DANG YOU, JLPT N3

2011-06-09T08:09:00.001+09:00

Everything is on hold until the evening of July 3rd. Everything. Except for work, which means I really should get a move on.

On The Menu

2011-05-20T19:42:00.001+09:00

This weekend is for:

Spring Cleaning (yeah, I'm just now getting started, and I took a week off already)
Working on the Ganbatte Times, because there's still an article about taxes on our homepage
Gardening. The only plant I've kept alive for the last two and a half years has finally blossomed, which makes me think that maybe my thumb is greener than I first thought.
Adding titles and captions to my photos in iPhoto (which will help me get that big Vietnam post together. No falling down on the job like with posting about Trinidad)
Studying. The JLPT is on July 3rd, and despite plans and lists and good intentions, I've only cracked the books open once. Yipes.

My internet is currently down, because sometimes my modem just decides it doesn't want to work for a month or so. Instead of scrambling to get it fixed, I figure that this is a way for God to tell me to quit spending so much time watching action movies and clips of Whose Line Is It Anyway online. I'm going to use this minimal-web-access interim to knock things off of my To Do list and enjoy being in my apartment again. See ya, kids.

P.S. Below are some photos. Enjoy.

One of the best Bananagrams sessions I've had, despite losing to Sarah RT

My only photo of cherry blossoms from April

Taiwan! Part 2

2011-05-15T17:14:00.001+09:00

Taiwan! Part 2, a set on Flickr.

Still working on that Vietnam post. Also, sorry, Facebook readers, because all of these photos are on my Flickr account.

Taiwan Part 1

2011-05-15T17:13:00.001+09:00

Petunkalunka's photostream on Flickr.

I'm working on a big Vietnam post, so for now please enjoy the photographic evidence of my short vacation in Taiwan, right after my long vacation in America.

15 Hr. Countdown to Vietnam

2011-04-29T22:38:00.000+09:00

Guess where I'm going for Golden Week? Hint: Not to a place called "15 Hour Countdown To," but it is in the title. Last year for Golden Week I didn't do a dang thing. This year I'm taking Margaret Mann with me, we're going to Saigon (okay, Ho Chi Minh City), Hue, Hoi An, and hopping over to Cambodia to Angkor Wat. We leave tomorrow and we'll be gone until the 8th.

Kim-Chi taught me how to say numbers 1-10 (which I kind of forgot) and how to say "excuse me/sorry" (which I remember) in Vietnamese. I bought one of those money belts to stick in my short—nothing more appealing than a foreigner pulling dong out of her underwear. I'm not being as gross as you think I am; the dong is the Vietnamese currency. I am prepared to roll up my pants. I am in the long process of doing laundry. All I have to do is pack and clean the newt tank. So why am I writing this?

Return from the Blahs, or I Love Maple Bread Right Now

2011-04-08T13:23:00.001+09:00

The cherry trees are in bloom, the weather is warm enough that I can no longer leave my milk on the counter overnight, and I finished my taxes. Welcome, Spring.

I'm posting this while at work, but when I get home tonight I'll add photos of random things that I've been doing lately. Uploading photos to Facebook is so tedious. All the tagging and the captioning just takes too long.

Yesterday, for the first time in a week, I had company at the office. Teresa left for Australia last week, the day before all the staff changes on April 1^st. The honorably Kim-Chi has returned from her journey to the motherland, so now I have someone with whom to ack ack ack. We're going to prove to the rest of the new staff just how annoying I can be. Tee hee hee and har-de-har all the live long day. Also, I have had coffee but no breakfast. My hands tremble like nervous hamsters.

I am on a slow climb up from a serious case of the Blahs. The Blahs are those periods during which one has no motivation to do anything, and so withdraws from society and actively refuses to do anything that could be considered productive or good for oneself. I had a disabling period of blah during most of March. Dishes piled up, dirty laundry was strewn everywhere, I ate in my bed and spent my evenings watching crap on YouTube.

Recently, however, I have been doing at least one Very Productive Activity every other day. I did dishes. I did some laundry. I cleaned the newt and fish tanks. I responded to emails. Mind, once I take the time to sit down, usually when I'm too hungry to ignore my stomach anymore, all hope of productivity is lost. I tend to get fixated on things, be it entertainment or food or music, for a period of a month or so. My most recent fixations have resulted in the following: I eat maple bread toast for dinner at least four times per week, supplementing the carbohydrates with fresh mandarin oranges and carrots (or a head of locally grown lettuce, yesterday). I watch clip after clip of daytime dramas from Europe on YouTube while drinking rose wine [in moderation, Mom]. Then I go to bed. Suffice to say that my dreams are full of Dutch, Argentinean Spanish, and evil twins (which I do prefer over zombie apocalypse dreams).

In order to fully recover from the Blahs, I need to set a goal that doesn't involve exercising every day or learning Japanese (because that would just be setting myself up for failure). Don't worry, I don't need any suggestions. There's a man at my church who was classically trained as a tenor, and once he learned that I can tickle the ivories a bit he challenged me to play something for him. I worked up Rachmaninoff's "Prelude in G Minor" and played it after Sunday service last summer. It wasn't great, and the man was almost brutally honest about it, but he respected that I at least tried. He was supposed to return in kind. I requested a song in French, because Lordy knows I don't understand Italian.

Dear Keith (the tenor in question) travels back and forth between the U.S. and Japan, so there hasn't been an opportunity for him to fulfill his promises of song until now. He's back in town and I put the pressure on. He waffled and tried to get out of it, but I offered to help by playing the accompaniment for Camille Saint-Saens' "Claire de Lune." In fact, I as good as swore that I would work it up in three weeks so that he could sing it on Easter Sunday. There it is, folks. I have a goal: Camille Saint-Saens' "Claire de Lune" for voice and piano. I have until the 24^th to get it under my fingers.

A Week In Summary

2011-04-01T15:25:00.001+09:00

This post is full of links.

I am the only municipal JET in Kamoka right now. The other two ALTs and the CIR are off visiting family or Australia, making good use of the down time between the end of the school/fiscal year and the new one coming in a couple of weeks. This leaves me a lot of time to do nothing, which I have done with a voraciousness and determination unmatched by all but the most diligent slackers.

I have collected more Craigslist Missed Connections ads for further mockery. I have looked up doing my taxes. I have asked my Ganbatte Times coeditor to write an article on doing taxes, which he did. I started to fill out all of the information on TurboTax, but then I got a little confused and gave up. I printed out information on my taxes. I learned that "snuck" is dialectal and "sneaked" is the correct past tense of "sneak."

Fear not, parents and friends my parents' age. I have done some mildly productive things, as well. I did my dishes. I washed my sheets (after I let a neighborhood tomcat into my apartment and my sheets smelled like cat butt). Takemura-san and Miyake-san, my supervisors*, asked Teresa and me to help with some stamping and organizing of papers, which we did with glee. I did some research of purple prose for that book I'm writing about vampire wizards and girl pirates.

I was subsequently distracted by one of the worst, most purple of prose descriptions of a woman I've ever read, plus one snarky artist's rendering of that description. This is a link you want to follow, people. Sample quote: "'You are quite beautiful, Princess Bronwyn,' Spikenard sang, with his sardonic grin and eyes as violet and as hard as amethysts."

I imagine that Spikenard has Grape Kool-Aid mouth and sardonic eyes.

Another quote: "Her buttocks were fresh-baked loaves; they were ivory eggs; they were the eggs of the lonely phoenix. They were a fist."

That sounds like an playground insult. "You're a stupidhead egg butt, Jimmy Jones!" Don't feel sorry for Jimmy Jones. He has a fist for buttocks.

Then I started scouring the internet for reviews and examples of the worst romance novels to be found. This search brought me to the "Studies in Crap" column on pitch magazine, which featured the following: http://blogs.pitch.com/plog/2010/12/unicorn_vengenance_studies_in_crap.php

In case you didn't read the title of the book, it's Unicorn Vengeance. Read that title aloud to yourself, slowly, letting it sink into your brain, and then click through to the article. I had to pretend that I was sneezing into my scarf at work so that I didn't look like I had free time on my hands.

If you try to find other reviews of its kind elsewhere on the Internet, be forewarned that your time is wasted. The best I could find were the worst romance novel covers and the worst quotes from romance novels. It made me wish that someone else would make it his or her life's work to read the worst romance novels ever written and mock them. I'd do it, but I have my pride, you know. Any volunteers?

All this writing has made me thirsty. I'm off to refill my water bottle and do some lunges in the bathroom to get the blood flowing back into my lonely phoenix eggs.

*Today, April first, is the day when all the staff changes around, so Takemura, that big brotherly gem of a man, is no longer my co-supervisor. Now it's a lady named Kobayashi (Little Woods) who speaks English well. The end.
--
Laurel Ryan

Dear People Who Make Action Movies/TV Shows,

2011-03-27T01:48:00.000+09:00

I'm all for female empowerment, but you know what no woman can do? Outrun a man while wearing sexy high heels. Yes, the short skirt/jeggings free us for movement. Booty short and hot pants also cut down on wind resistance, so on some level I can understand why the sexy lady spies wear them everywhere. Were I a sexy spy, I'd probably have a closet full of booty shorts.

Nevertheless, running up or down stairs, around corners, over uneven pavement, or on recently waxed or polished floors while in three inch heels is essentially taking one's life in one's own hands. Then, subsequently taking that life and dangling it over the edge of a cliff. Running on such surfaces while being pursued is equivalent to throwing one's life over aforementioned cliff edge into the gaping maw of that hole monster from Return of the Jedi. There is no chance of survival.

In order to prevent this gross misrepresentation of female spy protocol in my favorite movie genre, please tell the wardrobe department to find the ladies larger purses. This way, once they've taken down the target/blown up the building/have had a surprise run-in with the sexy male enemy spy, the female spy can change into her sensible running shoes, throw her Louboutins in her purse, and get a move on. Otherwise, quit giving your lady spies sexy heels with ankle straps. That's just endangerment. At least let them kick the heels off mid-flight.

Sincerely,

A Concerned Fan

P.S. How are all of those secret government agencies always so well funded? Given the current global economic situation, I think we need to see some concern about budget cuts and layoffs.

Craigslist Filler

2011-02-27T23:17:00.005+09:00

Read this out loud in the exact manner it was written.

You're welcome.

By the way, anyone else glad that February only has 28 days, one extra at its most annoying? To all the wonderful people born during this month, I apologize for the expression, but not the emotion. February generally sucks.

The Kobe Luminarie

2011-02-23T22:55:00.001+09:00

This annual light-up commemorates the Great Hanshin earthquake that rocked the city in 1995. It’s a beautiful tribute to all the lives that were lost during the tragedy, though as it has grown it’s become more and more festive through the years. The name was taken from the Italian word for lights, and has become one of Kobe’s most popular events. According to one foreigner’s blog, there have been complaints that the funds put towards this commemorating would have been better spent aiding the victims and their families. I’ve found no information that confirms this claim, but I do know that it was first intended to be held in Tokyo rather than Kobe, and began just eleven months after the earthquake devastated the area and stole over six thousand lives.

I’d heard about this light festival from Paulette, former Kameokan ALT extraordinaire. She had attended during her second or third year in Japan, and had returned with beautiful pictures and tales of buildings made of light. I’d read a review on Hiroshima’s Wide Island View that while the illumination was beautiful, the crowds were terrible. Since I was planning to stay in Japan during Christmas I wanted to mix some of my favorite parts of Christmas with Japan’s winter offerings. Not many people decorate their homes with Christmas lights, so I reckoned that the Kobe Luminarie could substitute for the pleasures of driving around Tulsa and seeing the colorful lights strung on houses and trees. Plus, I’ve never had a problem being in a crowd provided that I’m not in a hurry. All I needed was a travel buddy.

Hello, Margaret.

Margaret and I had both expressed our desire to do more short trips to the surrounding areas; we’ve been afraid of settling in too much and thereby missing much of what Japan has to offer us during our short stay here. We’d wanted to go to Kobe, famous for its Chinatown and beef, but we’d both felt that we needed a better reason than food to make a day trip. The Kobe Luminarie, though it had become a little cheesy over the years, gave us something more to do than eat.

Travel from Kameoka to Kobe takes between two and three hours, depending on what train one takes. This was no quick hop into the city. I had a busy schedule, few free weekends, and Margaret had a tight schedule between her weekend work schedule, conferences, and leaving for the U.S. to spend Christmas with her family. We had only one weekend when we were both free, and Margaret’s boyfriend had expressed interest in joining us for the trip. We settled on Sunday, December 12^th, the day before the event ended, and invited dear Dara Han along to complete the party.

When the 12^th arrived I was pretty pumped. I had set a goal of More Day Trips and I was sticking to it. The four us made a merry, slightly silly party on the way to Kobe. Dara had been to the Luminarie before, so she knew at which stop we were to get off and the general area of the Chinatown. Atsushi had his new iPod Touch, which had the handy function of a 3G network, ergo he and Dara became the casual tour guides of the bunch. None of us had eaten much, so our first stop was Chinese food.

Chinatown was packed. It was no surprise—the illumination began when the sun set and we arrived at dusk. Still, the general mood soured a bit with the frustration of trying to navigate the throngs of people with their bags and children and strollers. Again, I don’t have a problem with being in a crowd, but I do admit that it was tough to stay together and even harder to figure out where and what to eat in the midst of it.

We didn’t get very far into Chinatown itself; the crowd and hunger and snappy attitudes prevented us from forging ahead into the area’s heart. We finally stopped when we realized that most of the stall offerings looked the same. I can saw with confidence that our moods improved significantly when we put food in our bellies.

The pictures won't stay on the same line if I put captions on them, so I'll just tell you what they are. From left to right: Margaret is waiting for her food (and I for mine), Dara is enjoying the delights of some kind of meat on a stick, and Atsushi is first readying himself to shove food in his maw, then clearly has completed his mission in the second photo. I couldn't even tell you now what I ate. I had to go look at Dara's Facebook photos to remember that I had a "Chinese Burger," which was basically a steamed meat bun sawed in half. I would like to state that I've said before that "steamed meat bun" just sounds kind of gross. Nevertheless, if my words tasted like a steamed meat bun, I would eat them all and ask for seconds.

Despite Dara's generally photogenic features, my camera refused to capture her.

Margaret does not like crowds.

Margaret and I both got these red bean paste-filled fried dough balls covered in sesame seeds. I have no idea what they were called, but they were awesome. Margaret almost got to enjoy hers before some lady jostled her, causing the delicious sesame thing to tumble to the grimy concrete. Poor doll.

We stopped at the local Tully's for a coffee energizer and a bathroom break before getting in line for the lights. It was just getting dark as we got in line and the crowd was already thick. I have to hand it to the organizers of the event—they had put guardrails through the streets to ensure that no area got too crowded, and were letting the attendees go in shifts. We were shuffling along to the sound of some pleasant, airy song (that I assumed was something akin to, "Oh, the lights keep you close in me heart, illuminations are the stars of my winter" or the like) when Atsushi started laughing. He told us to listen to the words more carefully. Rather than an angelic tune about remembering the victims or some popular winter tune, the song in fact was urging "Please don't stop here. Take pictures later. Keep walking, if you please." Oh, Japan.

The long line and the waiting in shifts took us through the shopping district in downtown Kobe. Having been rebuilt so recently, the place looks vastly difference from millenia-old Kyoto. A lot of the architecture made me nostalgic for my time in France, and darn me if I didn't renew my vow to someday go back and spend at least a year in that country. On a side note, I forgot that I was once one of those study abroad kids who hated it when other Americans, specifically, gathered around and yammered in our native tongue. I had reasons for it, but yes, I was one of those kids.

Moving on.

We finally got to a point where we turned the corner and the crowd came to a halt on its own accord. Nobody was paying attention to the move-along song. We were all taking pictures of the beginning of the lights, which looked like this:

These structures lined the entire arcade between the Patagonia and Chanel-type stores. Had there been no people around it might have taken us about ten minutes to walk down the whole thing. There was also a long section of this

after the arcade. Then, to top it all off, there was this light castle at the end with a gazebo inside. Just. Look at it.

See all that black stuff at the bottom? Those are people. We didn’t go in because we were a) unwilling to fight the crowd to get to the middle of all that mess, and b) ready to head back to ole Turtle Hill. We about-faced and headed for the stalls of food. There was a girl working a taiyaki stand wearing a taiyaki hat.

Taiyaki is a read bean paste-filled pastry shaped like the fish hat. It's good stuff, and is the same kind of festival food that a funnel cake is.

We wandered around a bit until we found things we wanted to eat. Dara found candy grapes and strawberry daifuku (hard to explain. It's a Japanese sweet). I found a candy mikan, or mandarin orange. Think about it. A juicy, ripe mandarin orange that has been dipped in orange candy. It's an awesome dessert.

It was delicious until I dropped it on the ground. I still ate the part that hadn’t touched the cement (but only when Margaret wasn’t looking, because she is easily disgusted).

The end of this tale is that we clowned around on the way home and returned to Kameoka early and happy.

Good day to you, sirs and madams.

I Wrote This

2011-02-10T17:47:00.001+09:00

http://tourist-blog.com/2011/02/osaka-travel-guide/

It says the author is "admin" and I didn't get paid for it, but I'm totally published on someone's "test project". It was an apology for quitting a not-yet writing gig for which I was going to be paid $0.002 per word, just like someone for whom English is a fourth language. I put almost no effort into it and shortened the length just so that it would be less appealing to real people. Still, I'm going to find rewritten versions of it all over the Internet.

If you go to the link, don't click on any of the ads. That's exactly what he wants, that website owner. Don't do it.

DIY Disaster/Modern Art

2011-02-08T06:20:00.001+09:00

I was blogging this as I went, so be prepared for a bumpy ride.

I've been searching for a light fixture for my bedroom since I moved in. I am broke, broke, broke, so buying the ones I find on design blogs aren't an option, and I've made a mistake at a store before. The mistake was only $40, but now I have a ceiling fan that I can't use because I wasn't specific enough when asking how the thing should be installed. Lesson learned. Nevertheless, the desire for centerpiece lighting in the bedroom remained.

The other day when I accidentally had a day off in the middle of the week, I was cruising design blogs and found this post on a modern chandelier made of wooden dowels, one on a chandelier made from drinking straws, and a faux-capiz shell chandelier made of wax paper and ribbon. I had just run out of parchment paper, had no wire and only 36 drinking straws, but a modern chandelier for under ten dollars? Why, that was right within my budget—free if I improvised a little and "made it my own." I didn't want to spend any money, but I had neither wooden dowels nor wood glue. What I did have was plenty of electrical tape, an abundant supply of waribashi (disposable chopsticks), and a fluorescent light. Let the art begin.

I found that I had enough waribashi to make nine hexagons, with four mismatched pairs remaining. I figured that I could do a vaguely spherical sculpture to hang over the light.

I decided to use the mismatched pairs to make the top brace. I wanted to still use six chopsticks, but it seemed a little tedious to get the proportions right, especially considering that I was determined not to measure anything. I settled on a triangle and reasoned that I could adjust the structure as needed.

FYI

Attaching the hexagons to the brace was a little trickier. I didn't want the chopsticks to touch the light, but I didn't have much else to use, given that the only sturdy wire I had was being used to hold my dress shirts in the closet. I wasn't sure if electrical tape would prevent the weight of the chandelier from pulling any sticks attached to the brace perpendicularly from simply slipping out. Wrapping some electric tape around the top of chopsticks that hadn't been broken apart solved the problem. I could clothespin them over the top, then…figure out the rest. Also, after not having enough straws to make this chandelier, I figured I'd try to jazz up the chopsticks and electrical tape with some straws attached by picture-hanging wire. I'm a classy broad.

Look. Jazz.

After attaching the second hexagon I realized that I'd have to do the rest like Michelangelo did the Sistine Chapel—staring at the ceiling. I had no way to suspend the light fixture, so there was little else to do than reattach it to the ceiling. Since I'm blogging this as its happening, let me just say that I know it looks everything that is the opposite of good. Work in progress, and possibly there will be spray paint involved later.

Well, now it's starting to look like a lopsided pile of pickup sticks as opposed to the modern, clever fixture I had [kind of] envisioned. I think I'll make one more ring, take it out and spray paint it, then figure out where I'm going from there.

I found a can of wood stain that a friend had given me over a year ago. I figured that since I hadn't used it yet, I might as well make the chopsticks look like they'd been carved from old dorm furniture. It was very orange when I finished. I'll probably hate it.

This is what I made and ate in the meantime.

I do hate it.

However, I am not a wasteful person. I spent a lot of time on this fugly piece of crap, so I am going to save it. After another review of this straw cluster chandelier I opted to combine what straws I had with the mini-monstrosity that I had created. If I make it ugly enough, someone will think I did it on purpose and call me a genius.

There was a long pause when Margaret and Dara came over to have dinner. They both claimed that the cubist birdcage wasn't as hideous as I thought. Dara later helped me cut straws though, and claimed that when I attached them it looked cute, like snowflakes. I'm going with that. My friends are nice.

Ladies and Gentlemen, I present to you "Caged Bird in Snow," my latest installation piece. I can make you one for $7,500.

Update

During my unexpected visit to America I stopped by Hobby Lobby. I bought a large glue gun (the only one I have is tiny) and wood glue sticks. I came back to Japan, went to work for one day, and then went to Taiwan. I returned from the Land of Smiles on Monday, January 10 at about 6:30 p.m. After dropping my suitcase on the floor I hauled the space heater into the bedroom. I watched one episode of Psych while I dismantled my postmodern birdcage light fixture. Then I used hemp string to hang the fluorescent light from my desk. I shoved a large piece of cardboard underneath, heated up the glue gun, and stayed up until 2 a.m. making a new light fixture. Et voila.

The downside is that I’d have to take it apart if one of the bulbs ever burned out, or if I suddenly wanted to spray paint it. I do want to paint it. I’m not really the type to think ahead. Nevertheless, I have a passable, mostly free light fixture. It looks like a nest, but I don’t have a name for it yet. Feel free to leave suggestions in the comments.

Oh, Hello, Christmas.

2011-02-04T09:33:00.001+09:00

Now that I've gone through Thoughts On Death I feel that I can talk about my Christmas vacation on a lighter note. I took no pictures of the actual vacation part, so everything you see here was pulled from one of my relatives' Facebook accounts.

I was having trouble with my inability to be home for Christmas. I cried big ugly sobs one night for no other reason than hearing Jo Stafford's child say, "You sing it, mommy," on her album Happy Holidays: I Love The Winter Weather. It's a fantastic record, by the way. Trips to America are expensive, and after the incredible summer vacation in Trinidad and the U.S.* it would have been fiscally irresponsible to go home again. I knew that in my head, but my heart was breaking.

However, once I had given all that homesickness to the good Lord-y, I came to terms with baby's first Christmas away from home. I made plans with ALTs stuck in Japan for the holidays. I was going to make mochi with some girls from my calligraphy class. I was going to go to Taiwan after the New Year with Kim-Chi. I would clean my house, organize all of my school papers, and write. I went all out on Christmas presents and shipped them home. I made my own Christmas decorations and several batches of winter cider. I was an adult, dangit, and I would not forget the joy of Christmas just because I wouldn't be in Oklahoma on the 25^th.

All that changed when my grandmother passed away. Suddenly I was rushing to pack, clean my house (thanks, Dara and Kim-Chi!) and catch a plane home. The sadness of my loved one's death cast a pall on the occasion, but I was going home!

The first couple of days are blurry now. My sister and I managed to sit together on the flight from Dallas to Tulsa, and when I slept off my travel she went out and got a new job. I got to see some of my favorite people in the world, ate way too much at every meal, and attended my grandmother's funeral. My siblings and I performed a short interpretation of The Nutcracker twice. I heard my parents rap at least three times (and misguided my mother on how to "throw down"). I told my family what I'd decided to do for life, helped serve communions, helped fumigate our house, and wrote a song with my siblings in honor of our cousin's birthday. It was busy.

Any Christian worth his or her salt knows that Jesus was born in spring, and that the wise men didn't find him until he was a toddler. Those nativity scenes are pretty bogus. I know that Christmas was a holiday created in order to give Christians something to celebrate during the solstice festivities. I don't blame old Pope Julius for it. The end results are awesome. You know, after caroling stopped being a drunken, mischievous affair and the church quit outlawing it. Point is, I love the reason Christmas was created. I love what Christmas ideals are now. I love Jesus, I love my family and friends, and I love giving presents.

I did discover that I could spend Christmas away from home and still love it. I still think Karen Carpenter sang it right. There's no place like home for the holidays.

*I'll finish those blog posts someday, but I lost my notebook on an airplane. Many of the details and dates are gone.

Note: If you want to see the pictures full-size you can a) click on them, or b) send a Facebook friend request to my aunt.

Goodbye, Eddie Davis

2011-02-02T07:04:00.000+09:00

On Monday, December 20^th I awoke to the sound of my alarm. I rolled over and grabbed my mobile phone, intending to press the snooze key, but was surprised to find that a text message awaited me. It was dated that day at 3 a.m. and read simply: Grandma's in heaven. Left about 11:50.

Oh.

That was my first thought. Oh. Grandma had been less than 24 hours short of her 100^th birthday. My family had planned a party. There was to be a newspaper article about her. She'd received a certificate from the governor.

Then I thought, Oh, no. There would be no party. Worse still, I'd never see her again. There would be no more notes in the mail in her shaky, aged handwriting telling me about the weather and how old she is. I'd never again come home and kiss her weathered cheek, never help her down stairs, never hear her tell the same stories over and over (they never got old). I'd never see her wink at me when she was sneakng candy, never hear her proclaim her hunger for something sweet, never hear her hack in the bathroom, never hug her, never hear her telling me how she prays for her grandchildren—my heart hurt.

Let me clarify. My heart hurt for me and for my family, for all of us left behind. I shed tears because of a temporary separation during which Grandma will be separated from any physical plane that I can see or touch. I don't talk about my faith much on this blog because I believe in evangelizing through my actions (and I don't enjoy being attacked for believing in things other than Almighty Science). My grandmother's death, however, merits more than a passing mention of how I deal with seeming tragedy as a Christian. My grandmother was nothing if not a faithful believer in Jesus Christ. I wouldn't do her honor by ignoring that.

We didn't "lose" my grandmother. Yes, she was old, but that doesn't diminish the hole left in our family. Of course my family is sad about that. What we're not sad about is that Eddie B. Davis is exactly where she wanted to be. My grandmother has been telling me for years that we never knew if we'd see each other again. She was ready to go, and she knew, just as I know, that once her time on this earth had ended that paradise awaited.

She told me in the summer, "I just pray that I go to sleep and Jesus takes me home." It sounds cute when I repeat it in her accent. To those who consider Christianity a means of brainwashing or a haven for the illogical masses, this just sounds like the charming, somewhat morbid ramblings of a senile old lady. Consider this: by in large, what humans fear the most is death. Horror films aren't about how people are super frightened by a scary thing. Horror films are all about how people die, or are at least in danger of it. Grave danger, even, because I'm punny. My grandmother, a 99-year-old woman from nowhere, Texas, looked death in the eye and welcomed it. She knew that her god was stronger than death, stronger than any pain that she felt, stronger than the gradual degeneration of her cells, stronger than the void she would leave behind when she left, and stronger than any grief we would feel because of it.

That's an amazing kind of conviction, I think.

I became a Christian at the age of six, when I was far to young to understand everything that commitment meant. I remain a Christian because there is nothing seen or unseen in this world that is stronger than my certainty that Grandma had it right. I'm no unlearned idiot (summa cum laude and a lifetime membership to Alpha Chi, heifers!),* and I don't discount science. When I read that Pluto was no longer a planet, I believed it. If someone were to find the missing link between the velociraptor and a bantam rooster, I wouldn't cry fowl.** It doesn't disprove my worldview. However, when someone tells me there is no afterlife and no all-loving, all-powerful, all-knowing being that loves me and cares for me, I shake my head. Ah, if you knew what I know.

Death and I aren't strangers. I remember being shocked in college when a friend told me that she had never been to a funeral. I think I've been to as many funerals as I have weddings, and I'm no stranger to wedding cake, either. I don't say this to brag; it's nothing of which to be proud. Semi-frequent funeral attendance nevertheless has given me fair chance to sort out how I feel about death in general. Do I want to claim a religion that includes a hell? Do I want to be a part of something that Darwin claimed is the opiate of the masses; am I using religion as a crutch to deal with the reality of death? I'd be lying to say that my faith never wavered. There have been a few of those funerals during which I thought angrily, Why, God? Couldn't you have done something? Why let young, good people die? I've had some intense study sessions researching what my religion says about the matter, and equally intense reflection during which I figure out if I want to ascribe to it or not.

You're likely in awe of my intelligence and studiousness. I'm pretty amazing, what with my philosophical musings about death. I mean, I took Philosophy 101 in college Pass/Fail (passed it in spite of falling asleep twice during the final, natch), so I pretty much know all there is to know about the subject. Duh. I skimmed excerpts from many books and articles during that class, so again I emphasize my encompassing knowledge of philosophy. It comes with being a genius.

The burden of my genius is realizing that I'm rambling. If you're still reading I expect you've forgiven me on account that this is a personal blog and not an essay on grief and coping. I'll be kind and wrap it up within the next paragraph.

I don't mourn my grandmother because I know as sure as I know I'm breathing that she's jitterbugging right where she belongs. My grandmother left a legacy. Her descendants received a powerful sweet tooth, broad ribcages, and only my siblings escaped the gene for being barely at or slightly below average height. She also left a legacy of faith. We talk about a "legacy of faith" in the Christian community, but the short version is that Eddie B. Davis was a Christian through and through, and convinced us that she would be nothing good with out Christ. Ladies and gentlemen, my grandmother was good.

* This means nothing in the world. Also, my college was small.

**I think I'm making my father proud—him and every old man who's ever told a crappy joke.

Craigslist Filler: K My Name Is

2011-01-29T07:31:00.000+09:00

This one is from a young woman, to let you all know that I'm an equal opportunity mocker.

The Most Narcissistic Post Ever

2011-01-26T23:03:00.001+09:00

26 on the 26th. It's my golden birthday, heifers! Many happy returns to me.

And many MOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOORE.

Craigslist Filler: Angry Defender

2011-01-17T16:47:00.001+09:00

I'm having a little trouble embedding the audio of my melodious voice onto this thing, but if you manage to click on it, it's totally worth your time. If you're reading this through Facebook, you probably won't even see the button.

P.S. There were no pictures. I don't know what this guy was talking about.

Craigslist Filler

2011-01-14T22:34:00.004+09:00

I have a lot of updates to finish. A trip to Kobe, the light fixture I made, how I got over Christmas away from home and then got out of it, Taiwan—it's all coming up, but slowly. In the meantime, I recorded myself reading Missed Connections posts from Craigslist to use as filler. And I made a video to go with it, because I don't have a screenshot of the original.

I have a backlog of these gems from when I was bored at the office in July. Forgive the terrible sound quality. It's too cold to get out from under my kotatsu to set up the good microphone, so I used the crappy one on my hand-me-down Skype headset.

This one below doesn't need to be read aloud. Just click on it.

These aren't even the best of the bunch. Enjoy your filler, ladies and gents.

Holiday Update

2010-12-31T02:01:00.002+09:00

I type while seated in my childhood room. There's a quilt over my legs that was made in 1932 (which I know because the quilters embroidered their names and the date on their individual squares). The clock reads 10:01 but I haven't moved from bed since I awoke two hours ago. A slick hip hop beat slides from my brother's room through the library and under my door. I imagine it's either Jurassic Five or Collective Effort, perhaps Johnson & Johnson. He might be working on his own beats; our cousin Shara gave him a few tips on mixing songs in different genres. Barron has sat me down a couple of times to show me exactly what she meant by one technique or another. I like to think that all three Ryan children have equal musical talents, but Barron has a patience for learning the technique that I don't possess. He's also perfectionist enough to stay with something long enough to get it right.

My mother is in the kitchen. I know it's her and not my father because everything is open and shut with a little extra force. If my mother were a cartoon character, she'd be a small creature like a rabbit, or a squirrel, or a terrier, something energetic and quick. She's in the process of reorganizing and cleaning. My grandmother passed away on December 19th, the very reason why I'm here rather than in Kameoka, and had been living in the master bedroom downstairs. My parents moved back downstairs, fumigated the entire house yesterday, and my mother washed every scrap of linen. Mom is a multitasker, which means she and I don't always work well together, and always has a To Do list. Correction: she always has multiple To Do lists, and if her children are at home we get a list of our own. My mother has her own kind of grace and sophistication, but it wasn't until I was in college that I'd heard her described as "cute." "You're mom's so cute," a friend told me after my parents visited me, I think in reference to the way my mother sat on the couch with her legs tucked beneath her. I come by it honestly, I guess.

I can hear my father's voice. Oral Roberts University is on break right now, so Dad's usual daytime commitments are at a minimum. He told a family friend last night that he works like a dog until Christmas, then takes it easy through New Year's. We call the room where all my father's stuff is the studio. I'm only just realizing how rare that is; my father doesn't have an office. He has a studio. I think the only delineation, though, is that there's a keyboard. If I walk past the room, Dad's either practicing with his headphones on—the only sounds are the fleshy plunk of the keys—or he's working on the computer. When my father isn't working he's running errands or doing the manly things around the house. He relaxes occasionally, both of my parents do, but it looks so different from what I do to relax that sometimes I can't tell the difference between leisure time and work.

My sister is back in Washington D.C. now. She and I reached Tulsa on the same flight from Dallas. I got home and took a long nap. She went to meet some former coworkers and got a new job in Tulsa. My mother was so excited that she jumped around the house for a good twenty minutes. I have never, ever seen my mother behave like that. Safe to say that it put a different spin on what would have otherwise been a solemn reunion. Gillian has been away longer than I have. Sure, she didn't move countries, but she was in San Antonio for college, Kentucky for grad school and promptly moved to D.C. afterward. That's about 8.5 years away from Tulsa, plenty long enough to get worldly and decided that home isn't all that terrible. I'm excited because she'll be living on her own in a place that I can easily visit. I'm making a list of decorating blog articles to send her.

It's 10:55 now. I was going to write a list of everything I've done since being home, but that would take too long and I don't have any pictures to add. I need to go get ready for ice-skating outdoors in 70 degree weather.

The Bat and The Bear: The Bear

2010-12-06T16:35:00.000+09:00

Yes, the Bear hibernates. You saw that coming from across the Pacific. All I’m doing in this post is defining “hibernation.” My version makes me friendless and fat.

This was a month ago, when the cold was just playing

When it is so cold within my home that I can see my own breath, I have the option of turning on the heating unit and paying about 100 dollars to warm a one-room apartment. Though this method may feel worthwhile at the time when I’m all the way over in my kitchen, cleaning, it rarely feels very efficient to hand over such a huge chunk of my change to the electric company every month. The sun seems to be in hibernation mode as well, given that it is in hiding by 5 p.m. Not only does this mean a colder life for us in the Northern Hemisphere, it makes me feel like I shouldn’t be awake. I start yawning at 3:45, looking forward to the time when I can go home and settle in a cave of blankets.

Even an hour-long bus ride was okay if the sun was shining.

Naturally the solution to both the heating bill and the long night is to sleep. It’s the only time when I can’t feel the cold. During my first Japanese winter I was sleeping on a futon on the freezing floor. I had set the kotatsu (the heated coffee table) over it, placed an extra comforter at the foot to trap the heat, another to pull over my head, and had an electric foot-warmer tucked in the bottom. The rest of my apartment was usually unbearably cold. My routine became the following: (1) Come home from work. (2) Shed materials and clothes. (3) Pull on sweat pants if not already wearing knit tights. (4) Wriggle backwards under the kotatsu and pull computer within reach. (5) Stay there until I had to a) leave for an evening class or b) I fell asleep. On my free evenings, Tuesdays and Fridays, I usually could be found asleep by 8 or 9 p.m. The only things that changed the 2^nd winter were that I had a bed (on which I’d placed the foot-warmer, comforters and an electric blanket) and my rabbit had chewed up the kotatsu cord. I slept a lot.

See how relaxed, happy, and double-chinned I am? Bear: Early stages.

Given that my bed was the always the warmest place in the house, I’d usually eat my meals there. Cooking involved being the farthest distance from the heat, shivering and chapping my hands with frequent washing. It was far easier to buy frozen foods or things that come in convenient portion-sized packages, like cookies. Then I could eat while lying down and freeze my fingers only during that short trip from a blanket-covered snack food bag to my mouth.

That day when I took the wrong bus and alit in Lordy Knows Where

If I wasn’t eating at home then I could be found ordering the most calorie-packed items on the menus of various restaurants. Katsudon—a breaded pork cutlet on a bowl of rice topped with egg, onions, and a special sauce—has just as many calories per serving as the worst foods I consumed in the states. It’s my winter standby here. The warmth of the food and fullness in my belly made my bones feel a little less frozen and comforted me on the walk home.

It rained on me a little, and my extremities were freezing.

I think we all have a little bit of the winter Bear in us. We use the cold weather and holidays as an excuse to eat hot, filling foods, then we go to sleep and don't exercise. Unlike the bear, we don’t fill our bellies and then go to sleep for a few months. There’s no time to let our bodies use all those calories (not advocating binge-eating and anorexia, by the way). No, we repeat this eat-sleep cycle every day, packing on more and more fat cells because some basic instinct tells us that we’re going to need it when the sun has set. Wonder why we never seem to keep New Year’s resolutions about losing weight? I blame the winter.

It was a beautiful walk nonetheless. And then I remembered the real bears.

The Bear is not skilled at multitasking. The Bear lives for immediate priorities and comforts, but with the vague, uneasy sense that there are other things to be done. I’ve been studying for the Japanese Language Proficiency Test (JLPT). That period consisted of six or seven-hour sessions at the local Mr. Donut because it’s the only place to study and drink coffee that’s open after 7. On weekends I could be found at a Starbucks in Kyoto, usually spending between seven and ten hours eating carbohydrate-laden foods and drinking fattening drinks. I kept forgetting to ask for soy; sue me.

These leaves are mostly gone now.

If not holed up at a coffee shop with an equally disgruntled study buddy, I was cocooned in my blankets at home. If I had prepare for scheel then I would slide from my bed to the heated pad on my floor, shove all of my body under the kotatsu that would fit without lying down, and wrap my upper body in blankets. My immediate priorities were staying warm, passing the JLPT, getting the ALT Team Teaching Seminar over and done with and not sucking at my job. I won’t find out if I succeeded at my second goal until March, but the others were taken care of. The downside was that everything else that is important, like staying in touch with friends and family, got shoved to the back burner. I apologize, friends and family to whom I never responded. I got your emails and letters, and I read them and felt good, but I was deep in Bear mode.

My favorite part: SNEAK

Just click on it.

Bears may not be completely solitary, but they nevertheless regard social obligations as irritating and exhausting. A Bear will complain about the best friend’s birthday party he “has to” attend. He will tell you later that he had a splendid time, but thinks energy he expended on getting out of bed and being congenial merits him at least four subsequent days of not talking to anyone. A Bear will stop attending an activity that she usually loves during winter. If asked why, an honest Bear will tell you she’s just too cold to leave the house, and that interacting with people is just too draining. All that smiling she has to do, you know.

The combination of ignoring anything but face-to-face contact and shirking of social events makes Bears unpopular. We appear self-absorbed and uncaring; the blunt reality is that we can’t think anywhere past what is happening now or what we can’t avoid. I’m writing this on an empty stomach, because even though I was awake early enough to Skype with my sister and eat breakfast, and didn’t think far enough ahead to remember that I’d need to bring my own lunch today. I can barely concentrate on finishing this post before catching the 3:11 bus home (the earliest one I could take) because my brain is occupied with planning what to shove in my maw once I get home. That, and wondering how early I can get to sleep tonight without waking up at five o’clock tomorrow morning.

A rare moment of fun: watching my friend Tamon's taiko group.

Speaking of bears, there had been some real bears venturing out of the mountains all over Japan. Most elementary students walk to school—some have up to a 30-minute trek—so they’re all wearing school-issued jingle bells on their backpacks. There’s nothing more off-putting to a bear than an adorable child in a yellow hat with a matching backpack that sounds like a Christmas song.

The Bat and The Bear: The Bat

2010-11-15T17:41:00.000+09:00

It’s cold. It’s wear-tights-under-my-pants cold. It's runny-nose cold. I have a long grudge against cold weather. In October when all the folk at home were celebrating the advent of sweater season, I was grumbling as I dragged out my heavy blankets and switched my sheets to jersey.

This will be my third winter in Japan. Anyone who talks to me has heard me bemoan the lack of insulation and the inescapable frigidness. I was discussing this with a teacher the other day. I had decided that maybe I was being melodramatic. The new ALT is a Minnesotan, and she once went trick-or-treating in a blizzard. In Oklahoma a foot of snow stops life for a week.

My teacher said, “My friend from Hokkaido—you know Hokkaido, the farthest north prefecture in Japan?”

Japan’s Minnesota. “Sure,” I replied.

“My friend said that Kyoto winters are worse than Hokkaido’s!”

“What?” I exclaimed.

“Because you say, the buildings in Kyoto are built, not for winter,” he explained. “The houses are not warm. Kyoto and Kameoka, we call them bonchi. It means they are low cities surrounded by mountains, so the cold air stays. So winter is easier in Hokkaido.”

I responded with some noise and facial expression reminiscent of an angry housecat. No wonder.

We have had some beautiful sunsets. This was even more vibrant from my kitchen window.

Among the municipal ALTs in Kameoka, Kim-Chi and I seem to be most adversely affected by the cold. We talk about it at great lengths, and by “talk about” I mean “complain.”

Kim-Chi and I have discovered that we hold similar postures when we’re at our schools in winter. We pull our sleeves up to cover our hands or (despite what well-meaning teachers tell us) wear our fingerless gloves in the office. We sit or stand with our elbows in and our hands clutched to our chests. We hunch over our desks, writing with crabbed hands. Our expressions are sour—upper lips curled, brows drawn, runny noses wrinkled. Kim and I have termed this “bat face” because it clearly says, You want to talk to me? I’ll give you rabies.

The Bat is a crabby soul. The sour mood brought on by Seasonal Affective Disorder is pervasive and subtle, and the Bat is the unwitting result of not recognizing how severely being cold affects one’s psyche.

I was at an elementary school a couple of weeks ago, and I was pissed off. The object of my wrath was the English supporter, a Japanese woman who does my job but at only five schools and only with the 5^th and 6^th grades. I should preface with that I’ve had a couple of issues with this woman in the past. It has never been anything big, just small things like hearing her teach incorrect English. Or that the teachers who used to try to talk to me directly now wait for the supporter to show up and translate. Or how she seems convinced that I can’t communicate with Japanese teachers on my own. The previous Friday the supporter, who shall from henceforth be known as Mrs. Westmouth, had deemed it necessary to explain BINGO to me. It went something like this:

I have italicized the parts that were originally in Japanese.

W: Okay, Ryan, okay.

Me: Yes?

W: Today’s lesson, sixth graders, play a BINGO game.

Me: Yes. It’s lesson 7.1 in the manual.

W: Okay, Ryan. Mm. Um, sixth graders cut the cards. Have cut cards. Student have cut the cards, and put on.

Me: Yes. Just like regular BINGO. We played this last year. I often play BINGO in class.

W: Okay. Students a put on card, on the paper, and Ryan say a card. Ah, pyramid!

Me: Yes. We have played this before.

W: Students, ah, [in growly voice] “pyramid” and put the card. Take off card.

Me, glancing at the sixth grade teachers watching us: Yes. I know. I understand

W: And Ryan, “Germany,” say “Germany,” and students [in gravely voice] “Ah, okay, Germany.” And, take off Germany’s card.

Ms. Miyoshi, 6^th grade English coordinator: Er, the students haven’t cut those cards out yet.

W: Ah, Ryan, sixth graders, have—

Me, to Miyoshi-sensei: That’s okay. We have a lot of [those] country [flag] cards. Please using just those. Those only are fine.

For the record, I did mean to say, “we can use” instead of “please using,” but I am not good at this language.

Miyoshi-sensei: Ah, okay. Thanks. Is it okay if the students just write the country names into the BINGO blanks?

W: —not cut cards. So, Ryan, ah, what should we do, I wonder?

Me: Yes, to write also okay.

W [to Miyoshi-sensei]: What should we do? We could use the country cards. There are a lot of those.

Miyoshi-sense, gesturing at me: Oh, uh, yes. We’ll just use those and write the country names in the blank.

W: Okay, in Japanese?

Ms. Miyoshi looked at me.

Me: In Japanese is okay.

Miyoshi nodded.

W: Okay, Ryan, okay, Ryan will use country card. Westmouth made, country cards, do you remember?

Me: Yes, we used them last year. Thank you.

W: Mm, not so (translation: Oh, no problem). Okay, Ryan will use Westmouth’s cards. Germany, Ghana, Swiss, Canada, Ryan will use BINGO’s game.

Me: Yes.

W: Students not use, will not use cards. Students will write name, country name, in BINGO sheet. Ryan will…

I shan’t recount the rest. Westmouth proceeded to tell me in what way a student might achieve a BINGO, and how to play a game called “What’s this?” which involved me showing the students part of a picture and asking them to guess what it is. The whole conversation, or whatever you call it when two people talk but one doesn’t listen, lasted for at least five minutes. My part was mostly saying “Yes, I understand. I have done this before,” and “Yes, it’s right here in the teacher’s manual.” Westmouth did a lot of gesturing to the cards that hadn’t been cut and country flag cards, confirming with Miyoshi-sensei, and demonstrating how I should call BINGO cards.

Woman, I wanted to say, BINGO is an American game. I know how to play it. I’ve been playing BINGO in classrooms for the last two and a half years. Don’t presume I need a crash course in BINGO For Dummies, especially in front of the other teachers. I may be smiling, but Imma bite yo face off.

Some of my outrage might be merited. It’s never fun to be treated like a stupid child. However, Westmouth is an incredibly nice woman, and she bends over backward to make sure that her schools have everything they need for English classes. She often drives me home, and once when I was going to bike home and back during recess (I’d left some materials at home) Westmouth followed me home in her car, and then drove me back to the school. Still, this BINGO explanation drove me nuts. I grumbled about it all weekend.

A portable shrine featured in the Kameoka Festival

When I woke up the following Tuesday, I was cold. I didn’t want to put my feet on the cold floor. I didn’t want to get out of my warm bed. My nose was frozen and my fingers were stiff. I dragged myself out of bed and made sure I got on a bus on time. I had reviewed the plan for the day’s lessons (the school had given me a detailed outline of when each grade would be studying what part of the textbook) so I walked into the elementary school feeling prepared.

I entered the teacher’s office, said a cheery Ohaiyo gozaimasu, and sat down. The office manager came to my desk. She held a clear plastic file that contained one piece of paper. She said something like “The other teacher, what’s her name again, left this note for you.”

“Westmouth?” I suggested, taking the file.

“Yes. She left this for me to give you.”

I thanked the lady and resisted crumpling that note in my hands. I won’t retype what Westmouth had written. Let is suffice to say that it was information that I already had available, and without which I would have done just swimmingly. This note really bothered me. I fumed the whole day. At one point I sent Kim-Chi a text message that simply said, “I’m like to murder some folk.”

She replied, “Is it the coming of the cold? I’ve been like to kill people all week.” Then she inquired after the potato soup I’d made the previous night.

I pshawed. The cold? What would the cold have to do with the idiocy with which I was surrounded? It was that woman’s fault, what with her micromanaging and her notes. And the teachers who walked out of the room when I was teaching. And those dumb kids with their yapping and telling me that my hair was weird and making fun of me. And the stupid school lunch sitting on my desk until it got cold while I waited for the students to get their act together and come get me. And the stupid school with its open windows in the staff room that made my nose was cold and runny…Ah. Maybe I was cold.

The Bat. It is an ugly creature.

The Costume

2010-11-10T08:57:00.000+09:00

I was so lazy, it turned into "The Broadway interpretation of a lion." I bought materials to make a tail, but never made one. It was all in the makeup.

From L to R: Teresa (new ALT), Jen (new JET Prefectural Advisor), Kim-Chi

I've been in a funk when it comes to blogging or leaving Kameoka, so maybe I'll just transfer some of my school notes here to give you an idea of what live has been like these past couple of weeks.

Also, I planned an entire Thanksgiving menu. I feel like I may be living up to my mother's legacy of Incredible Hostess, save for that Turtle Hill's Thanksgiving is more of a cultural exchange event, it's not at anyone's house this year, and we may not even have tables. More about that as I learn the details.

And I'm off.

Help Me Chose A Halloween Costume! Do It!

2010-10-14T22:46:00.000+09:00

For the record, many of the children attending will be students of mine, and they've already seen my hair at its wildest. So, if you would be so kind, please find a better reason than "awesome hair" for me to chose a costume.

P.S. If you look up at the top right of the blog, there is now a poll. You can vote on my Halloween costume. Everyone loves voting, right?

Nothing Says Japan Like A Camel

2010-10-08T11:12:00.003+09:00

Saturday, September 25^th I was scheduled as the guest speaker for a Global Session at the Kameoka Exchange Center (if you want to know more about it, click here). Margaret and I woke up early on a Saturday (travesty) to get a champion’s breakfast of donuts and hop on a bus to the Center. I spent the next two hours reading and aiding discussion of my paper, the subject of which was adult language learning and learners. We never really got to what I’d wanted to talk about, which was improving the ways we learn as adults, but at least the group talked a lot. Seriously, click on the link and read my paper. It's gold.

After the Global Session I headed home to pack, deal with a sick creature in my house, and then hopped on a train. The Kyoto Association of JETs had put together an overnight trip, and as dorky as I felt for signing up to travel around with a pack of foreigners, I was determined to go. It was my first tourism-based travel in Japan since Hannah visited last year, and I was going for only one reason: camels.

Tottori-ken is the only prefecture in which lies an expanse of sand large enough to be labeled dunes. It’s a tiny desert, or a giant beach, on the west side of Japan. I was warned that the dunes are completely unimpressive, and were disappointingly small. This doesn’t sound particularly exciting, but in keeping with the desert theme they offer short camel rides. Camel rides! As a casual fan of equestrianism and an avid fan of piggyback rides, I am always up for sitting on a sizeable beast and hanging on while it lumbers this way and that. Had I the time and money I would pull a City Slickers move and be a cowboy for a month or two. I just like riding things.

Safe to say that I could care less about the rest of Tottori Prefecture (which is rumored to have some of the best and cheapest steaks in the country. Screw you, Kobe). I just wanted to hand someone five thousand yen and sit/hyperventilate with joy on a camel for five minutes while it walked around. It’s a small dream, but some dreams do come true.

I met Kim-Chi and J.S. to catch a bus over to Tottori. It was about a three-hour drive, but the round trip was less than one way on a train that would have taken us there in half the time. We needed to save our money for the camels. That day of the trip was rather uneventful. We met up with six other ALTs in Tottori-shi, checked into our hotel, ate at a mediocre Italian restaurant and had donuts for dessert. Then we went to bed.

View from my 11th floor hotel room in the morning.

This is where I hide my crusty face

On Sunday morning we all met up to catch an 8:40 a.m. tourism bus to the dunes. Tourist buses are great for letting us see what we’re missing on the way to our destination. For the most part Tottori City looked like Kyoto, though Kim-Chi pointed out a larger number of buildings with western-style roofing. There were old buildings, new buildings, run-down areas and some beautifully kept parks. I almost wished we’d arrived earlier on Saturday to take a look at some of the sites. Almost.

Finally we arrived at the dunes. There was a huge group of volunteers with barbecue tongs and plastic bags receiving instructions on removing the encroaching grass from the dunes. We shrugged and figured we might as well look around until it was time to ride a Bactrian or dromedary. Not to call the unnamed sourpuss who told me the dunes sucked a liar, but he was wrong. No, they weren’t mind-bogglingly large. I’d seen the Planet Earth section “Deserts,” and Tottori had never been mentioned. Nonetheless the weather was perfect and it had rained the night before, so it was as though no man had ever set foot on the striated beauty of the sands. You know, aside from the dozens of people picking up trash and yanking weeds out of the sand with metal tongs. Here are thirteen thousand words’ worth to back it up:

See that encroaching grass?

I like a shadow.

Cross this expanse and you can…

watch Kim look at the ocean! There's a really steep drop off right there, by the way.

J.S. lagged behind to take a picture or ten.

I like three shadows. Guess whose.

Our traveling party.

Sumo!

By the time we finished frolicking in the surf and crawled back up the dunes it was about noon. There was a kite festival scheduled going on, so the camel rides didn’t start until 2 p.m. We settled for shaking the sand out of our shoes, discussing camel care, the ethics of camel rides in Japan as compared with elephant rides in Thailand, picking the camels we wanted to ride, imitating camels noises and noting their influence on creatures in Star Wars, remarking on each other’s growing sunburns (just because it ain’t summer don’t mean you don’t get sun), and watching the kites dance in the sky. We were a thoughtful bunch.

Perusing the souvenir shop informed us that Tottori is also famous for the apple-shaped Asian pear, the origins of one of Japan’s most beloved manga/anime, and rabbits, which may or may not have been associated with a type of historical figure, or whatever the Buddhist or Shinto version of a saint is. Pear frozen yogurt, or “soft cream,” is one of the best flavors in the world. We went to a nearby restaurant called Sukato, or maybe it was Sukkato, or Sukatto for lunch. Here are some more pictures to prove that we were having fun.

After lunch we all signed up for camel rides. I paid my 1800 yen and ended up riding last like a loser, but by golly I was on a camel. Who gives a newt poo if I was the only one of the group/only person who rode that day to go by myself? I was sporting the boots I’d worn specifically for a photo shoot on a camel. I was sitting on a white-ish Bactrian camel named Cherry, which is the closest I’ve gotten to touching a yak (another dream of mine). You know, what with them sharing the desolate parts of central Asia and all. Learned that from Planet Earth “Deserts,” too. The following pictures are worth at least two thousand per.

Dromedary, dames.

Bactrian, b— oh, just kidding.

About the time I was trying to explain why a large group of foreigners could speak Japanese.

After the camel rides we all went souvenir shopping. I came away with a lot of pear-flavored things, and finished off the last of the pear dango yesterday. That stuff was dang good. See what I did just now? You see? Wordplay. Kim-Chi, J.S. and I indulged in our second pear soft cream cones of the day before catching a bus back to Tottori station. We had an hour before our bus left, so we napped and chatted outside. Or we tried to, at least, though there was a man yelling nonsense, and then some sense, across the way from us.

The return bus ride was over an hour longer than the first due to traffic. I went through most of Season 6 of The Office and made a list of wistful and melancholic songs to create a playlist for writing. For when I have real free time again. Fauré’s “Pelléas et Mélisande” and “Griet’s Theme” from the Girl With a Pearl Earring soundtrack are high on that list, for any potential copycats. I didn’t get home until after 9 p.m. To give you an idea of how this affected me, here’s the beginning or Monday’s journal entry/school notes:

Praise God for self control, praise Him for preparation.

Days of My Life

2010-10-06T23:01:00.002+09:00

Want to know how my life has been since the last real update (when I was freaking out about my belt test)? Just remember you asked for it.*

Thursday, September 23^rd

In interest of saving time, I’ll reproduce my journal entry.

10:40 p.m.

Things I did today:

· Skyped w/whole family

· Cleaned

· Hosted okonomiyaki party for Nanami, Kim and Margaret

· Filled out aikido and JLPT forms

· Made short video for blog

· [Went to aikido and took the test. I’ll tell you how it went someday.]

o learned the word for armpit—waki

o realized that I forgot to eat dinner in my nervousness

· Ate pie chez Margaret and discussed art with her and Atsushi

· Wrote this, debated whether or not to eat something.

I’m hungry.

Friday, September 24^th

I went to Ansho Elementary. I taught two classes of 6^th graders, spent morning recess talking to the English Supporter about why American moms don’t wake up at 5 to make lunch for their kids (teaching independence, that’s why), then taught two more 6^th grade classes. By the end I was a little worn out (the games we played were loud and exciting), and for the second time in my life I yelled at a group of students “Oh, my gosh. Shut! Up!” In fairness, they understand “shut up,” but not, “be quiet” or “listen,” and I wasn’t ready to resort to using Japanese. Also in fairness on the kids’ part, I did overreact.

I spent lunch and recess with class 6-4, a friendly bunch, and ran my toosh off playing tag with them. After lunch there was a brief fifteen minute respite during which I drank some coffee, updated my notes on the day’s classes, and wrote this:

Praise God for today. Praise Him for will power, praise Him for patience. Praise Him for stamina.

Which should give you a pretty good idea of how I was feeling about getting out of bed, waiting for the English Supporter (who is supposed to be good at English) to put a coherent sentence together, and teaching five classes in a row.

The fifth class was with the Hikari Special Needs class. We read Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What Do You See?, reviewed colors, and made our own what do you see? pages. I used to have a lot of trouble teaching this class because I was so accustomed to basing lessons on conversation practice and interactive games. Now that I no longer expect these students to repeat after me, or their full attention, it’s much easier to feel satisfied with a lesson. For example, the two students with Down Syndrome like to pretend that they’re afraid of me, which makes helping them difficult. However, when they watched me show an older student how to write “Green frog” on her paper by herself, one of them allowed me to write “Blue dog,” on hers. And the student with autism, who used to put her hands over her ears and hide her face when I attempted to talk to her, is now repeating after me (mimicking, really, but it’s still awesome). Victory.

After wrapping up at school I headed out a little early. My right wrist had been hurting badly since a gung-ho kid at aikido decided to get his revenge during a sparring session when I dominated him. He got excited and used his full strength during a move that involves twisting the wrist to reduce any attackers to a weeping puddle of pain. I just said “Ow,” and shook it off. The injury, however, seemed to get worse and worse with every practice, to the point where I tried to tell the group not to touch my wrist. “It’s, how you say, soft wrist,” I said. “Somehow, hurts.” They tried to be careful, but often forgot which wrist was soft, and put the hurt on me anyway. It started to hurt when I wasn’t at aikido, though only if I bent it a certain way. Eventually I decided to be an adult and go see a doctor.

Margaret, the doll baby that she is, came with me to a clinic to translate. The x-ray showed damage where my inner wrist bone and one or some of the tendons in my hand. The doctor informed me that had I come in when the injury first occurred, he likely would have put me in a hard cast. As it was he advised I wear a brace for a couple of weeks. The people who sell braces weren’t there at the time, so we were told to return next Friday.

Then came the weekend, which was enough to merit its own entry with many pictures. I'll post that later, when I'm not in the middle of cooking steak bites.

* You didn’t really ask for it. I just wanted to quote Bugs Bunny. I hope you know this means war.

Stuffed Mushrooms

2010-10-05T00:41:00.002+09:00

Normally I don't like mushrooms, but I was hungry at the office today. Sarah R-T had talked about making stuffed mushrooms when she stayed with me on Saturday. Kim-Chi had made some recently. Though I couldn't recall the last time I'd eaten a stuffed mushroom, but I was inspired. The recipe I found online looked delicious.

I realized today that I can't cook when I'm hungry. I bought a package of fresh fried oysters ("Imagine the po'boys these would make," Kim said) and ate them all before I got the energy to get off my couch and start chopping onions and the like. I put them in the oven for about ten minutes before I had to shut everything off and go to taiko. When I returned, I entered a home filled with the savory aroma of cream cheese, mushrooms, Italian spices, and Parmesan. I was so excited when I finally popped one of the mushrooms in my mouth. It was like eating a piece of heaven, at least it was until I noticed something rubbery against my teeth.

It was then that I remembered—it's not the taste of mushrooms that I hate, it's the texture. That slimy, uncomfortable chewiness, the way it sounds against my teeth, I hate it all. In fact, I'd go so far as to say it feels like I'm masticating the sound of a squeegee on a window. So there I stood in my kitchen, senses of taste and smell overcome with one of the most delectable things I've ever eaten, and simultaneously ready to gag at the slug-like texture of cooked mushroom sliding over my tongue.

Swoon in delight or vomit? It's the most complicated bundle of emotions I've ever had about food.

And, son of a ponce, that has to be my lunch tomorrow.

Nerves Like A Heifer

2010-09-16T18:48:00.005+09:00

If I never write on this blog again it's because I have died in the throes of my black belt test in aikido. I loved you all. Please burn my journals, because I never really meant any of that stuff.

AAAAAAAAUUUUUUGGGGGHHHH!!!!!!!AUGH!!!!AUGH!!!!AUGHAUGHAUGHAUGH!!!!

I Can't Grow Up

2010-09-15T18:08:00.002+09:00

The Ryan family video collection consisted largely of animated features, animal movies, and musicals when I was a child. Peter Pan was one of our favorites, despite having been filmed on a stage rather than as a film in its own right. One song that made a firm impression on me was "I Won't Grow Up," and I remember dancing around in my room, chanting "I'll never grow up, never grow up, never grow uuUP! Not me!" That, along with the current Toys 'R' Us campaign (I don't wanna grow up; I'm a Toys 'R' Us kid…) must have affected my psyche much more than just getting stuck in my head on the occasion. Most days I masquerade as a quasi-responsible adult, but some days I think I have the brain of an adolescent boy.

1) At Takada Junior High I was teaching the first grade. We were covering the "How many ____ do you have?" The students had a sheet with various items on it, and they were to ask each other how many of this or that their friends possessed. Each student also had to create their own question, as well. The teacher had written a couple of options at the bottom, such as stuffed animal, ball, pen, and video game. Pretty standard stuff, but every time a student asked me "How many balls do you have?" I'd giggle. Then, with all sincerity I would answer, "I have no balls." And then I would snicker some more. Eh heh eh heh eh heh. Balls. Here's what's worse: I was tempted to explain why I thought the question was funny. Don't do it, Laurel. Just don't do it.

2) I can't wake up on time. Maybe I should say that I can't go to sleep on time. Yesterday I slept all the way through every single one of my seven alarms, including the really loud irritating buzzer that supposedly can be heard in the upstairs apartment.

If I were able to ready myself in only three minutes I would have been on the bus. As it was I biked to the school instead. I'd never done this before, as it was one of the schools that I'm only visiting until Paulette's replacement arrives. First I got a little lost. I didn't turn when I should have, and so ended up on a minor highway. The sidewalk ended and I rode with the fear that I wasn't going to be able to turn off, and that I would be run over. So, when I saw up ahead that the sidewalk started again I pedaled a little faster. The dip in the curb, made for cyclists by myself, was unusually high; it was between two and three inches high. About this time my bike and I had an argument.

"Get on the sidewalk," I ordered it.

"Screw you and your business capris," it retorted, and as soon as the front wheel hit the curb the bike slide out from under me, dumping me and my stuff onto the sidewalk it so detested.

Now I don't remember falling. The memory is of the oh, no sensation, of the knowledge that I was about to be in pain, and the stomach-twisting fear that my bike or I would end up in the path of an oncoming car. I hit the ground high on my left thigh, smacked my right palm hard against the pavement in efforts to break my fall, and rolled.

"Ugh," I huffed, and flopped on my back. I wasn't broken, and I wasn't in the street. Okay. I briefly debated crying a little, just for stress release, but I didn't have time and I wasn't broken. I stood, brushing myself off as best I could, and dragged my bucking bronco bike onto the pavement. Thank you, God, for watching over me, because I wasn't bleeding anywhere and all of my school stuff was on the sidewalk close by.

Notice the tear, same height as the couch arm

Of course, you must think, this dope couldn't have fallen so hard and gotten off without a scratch. You'd be correct. I have three small scrapes on my right knee, my right hand is bruised, the inside of my right ankle is bruised from hitting the bike as I flew off, and there is a huge bruise on my left thigh. Also, my pants were torn. Yep, because I didn't go to bed on time, because I woke up late, and because I can't make my bicycle follow orders, I had to teach in dress pants that were torn at the knee and inappropriately high on my thigh. I am one classy broad.

3) My last bit of evidence is last week's visit to Betsuin Junior High. Though this may be just as indicative of my mindset as an English teacher as immaturity, I feel like a more mature person would have handled this differently. I was with the first-years, and had just finished class. They had just learned "do you like/have/want~" and so were full of questions such as "Do you like baseball?" "Do you like soccer?" "Do you like Japan?" It was super-duper cultural exchange-y.

I guess they got bored with sports-related questions. In the middle of answering a question about Japanese baseball players one boy hurried away and came back with a bookmark. "Do you like?" he asked knowingly, pointing to it.

Upon closer inspection I discovered that it was a yaoi bookmark. Yaoi, for those out of the know, is a type of manga that is usually written by women for a female audience, and features two male romantic leads. Gay comic book porn for girls, basically. The first question that sprung to my mind was Whose is this? but decided not to ask. After all, I didn't want to think any ill of my Betsuin angels, who would surely not be bringing sex-based comics to school. So I hemmed and hawed while the boys pointed emphatically at the man embracing rather than the one embraced.

"Kakkoi?" they asked. "Cool? Cool?"

"Er."

In the meantime one boy, Shouma, was prompting his friends in a whisper. "Do you like sex?" he wanted them to ask me. "Do you like sex?"

I ignored him. One boy finally took pity on me and suggested bimeo. "Yes, bimeo," I said, indicating the gay bookmark. It's delicate. I really can't say.

Then they dragged me over to see an optical illusion that was hung in the classroom, and to further interrogate me on wants and likes. They pointed to pencils, to characters on folders, and to each other. Do you like Yuki? Do you like Taichi? Do you like Ryuusei?

Shouma, however, wasn't finished yet. I was talking to another kid when I heard him.

"Do you like pehneesu?"

I turned and gave him a look.

"Do you like pehneesu?" he repeated, stupid grin affixed.

I smacked him lightly on the head with my notebook, because I can do that in this country. "That's bad," I said sternly. "Don't ask me that."

Shouma's friends all started laughing and slapping his head. Hah hah, the English teacher got on to you.

Maybe because I felt sorry for inciting the slap-fest, or because I was in teaching mode, I couldn't let it lie. "And it's not peh-NEE-su," I added, making sure to speak so he understood. "It's PEnis. You mean 'Do you like penis.'"

And then I helped them translate kareshi ga imasu ka, because "Do you have a boyfriend?" totally fit in with the day's grammar point.

Ohashi Jouzu/Good with Chopsticks

2010-09-08T00:08:00.002+09:00

I went to Chiyokawa Elementary School today. Until the new ALT comes Kim-Chi and I are splitting Paulette's old schools; it's only one visit per school, two for a junior high, and then the new ALT will take over whenever s/he arrives. The good thing about Chiyokawa is that it was one of my schools when I first arrived; I "lost" it to Paulette when we were switched around. I knew some of the staff already, and some of the sixth graders I taught recognized me. Good start.

When lunchtime came around I ate in the staff room, which smelled like Pitch Lake (T-dad shout out, holla) a.k.a. old egg. The principal was helping to set food on staff members' desks, and when he was distributing chopsticks he dropped the question most likely to irritate foreigners.

As he placed the chopsticks on my bowl of rice, he asked, "Ohashi daijobu desu ka?" (Chopsticks okay is it?/Can you use chopsticks?)

I nodded and laughed a little. This from a man who knew me when I wouldn't have even understood that question. "N, daijobu desu yo." (Yeah, they're fine.)

"Eh, Japanese ohashi? Okay?" Now he was just being a little silly, trying to use what English he knew and make the other staff laugh.

"Okay," I said, nodding vigorously while debating whether or not to try saying something about having figured chopsticks out two weeks after arriving. I opted not to.

On a bad day this might have made me angry. I've been here for two years, and you think I might not be able to use chopsticks? Do you think I'm completely inept? I will cut you. However, remembering back to when I first came, I didn't know how to use chopsticks. Having inadvertently stabbed my right thumb with an Epipen complicated the situation, but I do remember dropping things a lot. Even after I learned how to hold them I often looked at something I was supposed to eat with chopsticks and thought, You people are nuts. Foods like slippery things and large pieces of fish, for example, or all noodles. Now that thought only applies to cake and corn on the cob (and there's almost always a fork with cake, anyway).

I concluded that I appreciated the principal's thoughtfulness. He chose not to assume that I was ultra-skilled with the two pointy sticks. Japanese courtesy is all about anticipating a guest's needs; it would have been much embarrassing for the both of us if I'd had to ask for a different utensil. That would have resulted in a flurry of get the ALT a fork, get her a fork! instead of a casual request to the kitchen lady. It's a little like asking dinner guests if they prefer a plate or bowl for their salads. Far less awkward to be asked and to chose, than to be the barbarian pushing vinaigrette-soaked lettuce onto her fork with her finger.

This was my breakfast today. The yogurt says "It's irresistible I just can't help it."

That wasn't the end of it. Before lunchtime was over I got the other ire-raiser from the groundskeeper. He and a couple of other teacher were seated at the end of a long row of desks, his being the closest to the cart where we were to put our dirty dishes. Even that thirty seconds of silence while I got up, walked down the aisle, and reached the cart were awkward. I needed to say something, anything, that would be relevant. I was being watched (I was the only thing moving. It was understandable). The three teachers seemed to be struggling just as hard to think of a lighthearted comment that I could understand.

I tried first. "Oishikatta desu," I said, smiling. (That was delicious.) It was an overstatement, but I didn't know how to call the meal "satisfying." Five more steps until I reached the cart. I gave a contented sigh. "Ippai desu yo." (I sure am full.) Was I being too casual? Was that considered too much information in Japanese? This was turning into an ordeal.

The three staff smiled at me. I reached the cart and stacked my bowls and plate.

The groundskeeper recovered. "Ohashi sugoku jouzu desu ne," he said seriously. (You're awfully good with chopsticks.)

Here's the deal: to most foreigners, having one's chopstick skills complimented can often come across as extremely patronizing. After all, no one says, "Hey, Japanese person, good job with that knife and fork. Really super." When I was reading up on this country in the summer of '08 I ran across this very phrase a lot. Ohashi [ga] jouzu desu ne. One article claimed that it was because Japanese people think that no one outside of Asia can use chopsticks. They might compliment you, but it's because in their minds a non-Asian foreigner using chopsticks is like a horse that can count—just a neat trick. Many expats found this to be one of the most irritating parts of meeting people, because no matter how long they'd lived in Japan they'd still be complimented on their chopstick skills.

After a quick search I found this online:

This reminded me of my second biggest annoyance: chopsticks.
PROBLEM: It doesn't matter if you've been eating Chinese takeout with wooden chopsticks since you were four. It doesn't matter if you've been eating with chopsticks for years. If a Japanese person sees you pick anything up with chopsticks and not drop it, you're in for: "Aa! Ohashi ga dekimasu ne!" or, "Aa! Ohashi ga jouzu desu ne!"What this means:

I thought foreigners only ate with forks and spoons!
Nice weather we're having, don't you think?
Wow! You didn't drop what you were eating! Takashi and I were in the corner laying bets.
How to respond (depending on how polite you want to be and degrading to how sick you are of hearing this):
Ie, ie, sonna koto wa nain desu yo! [Or other somesuch denial--the degree of self-deprecating humbleness is up to you.] Laurel's note: it literally means "No, no, that thing is not!" but in this case is more like an "Aw, shucks. That ain't true."
Aa, domo. [Thanks.]
Anata mo jouzu desu ne. [You too.]
Yahari dekinakattara tabenai deshoo! [If I couldn't, I wouldn't eat, right?]
Ara. (Said as you drop whatever you were holding with chopsticks into the speaker's lap.) Laurel's note: "Ara" is kind of an old lady-ish way to say both "oh my" and "oops!"
AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!!!!!! [Said before you either run from the room or fling your hot tea at the speaker.

…

In retrospect, I wish I'd laughed a little more.

It's from a little something called "Coping With Being Jouzu ("Skillful")" by one Wendy Dinsmore, who doesn't know I'm quoting her. It's pretty much at the center of the bell curve about how most people I've talked to feel about the subject.

I'l give you four guesses as to what this is. People who know, no spoilers.

Rather than choose any of the above reactions I opted to tell the truth. I responded in Japanese, "Really? Two years…uh…ago, all bad. [made chopstick hand motions] Now, somehow I do." The staff chuckled, I felt pleased as saying something amusing or at least interesting, and I went to wash my hands. All happy.

Sure, I could have been insulted, or said something sarcastic like, "I'm pretty good with knife and fork, too." That woulda shown him, right? But I haven't been using chopsticks since I was weaned from the bosom. I don't know the ins and outs of Japanese table manners like I do American. If the groundskeeper thinks I'm good with chopsticks and says so without an ounce of insincerity, without even a smile, then I take it that I'm not doing anything off-putting or offensive.

In reality my chopstick skills were as much in question as the weather. Who says, "Hot, isn't it?" and expects a shocked reaction? omg. hot, in september? is *that* why im sweating? i srsly had no idea. It's like telling any NBA player except for Muggsy Bogues, "Wow, you're tall," or telling me I'm short. We know how tall we are in relation to other people. We know it's hot. And I knew I was skilled with the chopsticks. Comments like ohashi [ga] jouzu desu ne can get old, but they are a conversation starter.

These thoughts and getting out of bed are just a couple of things I did today with the help of God's grace. So the next time I get irritated with a jouzu comment, feel free to remind me of this post.

Things I Did Today

2010-09-01T15:51:00.001+09:00

Sent emails on behalf of the Ganbatte Times.
Replied to emails on behalf of the Ganbatte Times.
Sent personal emails.
Planned website improvement.
Drank coffee.
Went home for lunch.
Returned in a foul mood.
Complained about lack of response to emails.
Got onto the subject of paludariums.
Google searched paludariums.
Decided to get a newt.
Researched newt breeds.
Discussed newt care.
Thought about it, and decided to not get a newt.
Signed up for a trip to Tottori-ken, Japan's only desert, with KAJET. Determined that it is not dorky to go with a group, and that I will not feel like a loser for not knowing anyone who wants to go.
Drew a detailed rendering of a lycanthrope village's pretty princess.
Gave picture to Kim-Chi.
Google searched "history of princess cone hat"
Secretly reconsidered newt ownership.
Wrote this.

Hard Time for Ryan

2010-08-31T17:16:00.001+09:00

One of the English Supporters with whom I work likes to hear how busy I am all the time. I tell her my schedule, how I'm always at a different school and only have two weeknights free. She responds by shaking her head and saying, "It's hard time for Ryan. Ryan has a hard time." Usually I wave my hands and say, "No, no, it's not so bad." Today I don't feel that way at all.

I'm currently sitting outside of Margaret's apartment. It's 4:46 p.m. and I have to catch a train to a marimba concert at 5:32. I'm stealing Margaret's WiFi (she pre-approved, never fear) to access the Ganbatte Times FTP so that I can back up the site before updating to the new Wordpress system. Also, I have to backup the MySQL database through the phpAdmin on my cPanel, just in case something goes wrong during the update and I crash the site. No pressure, especially since I'm not even sure what half the words I just typed mean.

5:02 p.m. and the FTP backup is 35% finished. I'm sweating in this 94 degree shade and am watching swallows flutter overhead in fear than they will excrete on my computer. I honestly can't tell if the MySQL database downloaded yet.

5:11 p.m. means 10 minutes until I need to leave for the station. I figured out the MySQL, but the FTP backup is only at 54 percent. I haven't eaten yet. I am thus far safe from birds. I am anxious. It's hard time for me.

Edit: Now it's 11:05 p.m. and I've been home for about 30 minutes. That marimbist I watched was fantastic, and proved to me just how lyrical a percussion instrument can be. I did get the site all backed up and I just updated it without any problems. Now I just have to figure out a) how I accidentally squashed the header, and b) if the Arras theme (the site design) I'm currently using is worth updating. I'm frigging tired, and all I had to eat was a "sea chicken" onigiri, a packet of M&Ms and two thingies of drinkable multivitamin gel. Whatever. I'll eat in the morning, after I get up from my couch because I'm too tired to fold all the clothes on the bed now. Later, kids.

Out of the Deep

2010-08-24T06:12:00.002+09:00

have I called unto thee, O Sleep. Sleep, hear my cry.

It's 4:14 a.m. right now. Sure, by the time I actually post this it will be way after 4:14 a.m, but the important part is that it is currently the middle of the night and I am not asleep.

I'm writing this because, well, what else would I be doing while completely jetlagged? In spite of last night's effort to keep normal waking hours I was unable to last past eight o'clock, and lay my weary head to rest. At about two this morning my body made a grand imitation of my cousin Nigel's son, shouting at my brain "Wakey wakey!" This is right in the middle of a dream about holding my brother at sword-point so that he would fetch me a glace of juice and make me a sandwich. Beleaguered and disgruntled, I relented and pulled my computer from the floor into my lap. On a side note, my Softbank Yahoo BB modem has once again failed, and so I'm connected to a neighbor's WiFi. I hate my internet and am debating a switch to a pocket mobile device. That's a story for another day.

I suppose that for those of you who were not with me in Trinidad want a saga of the trip. You'll get it in pieces.

The first piece is the journey. On Thursday, July 29th Kim-Chi Do and I set out from sleepy Kameoka on the 5 a.m. train without much trouble. In efforts to throw my sleep schedule off and possibly better prepare myself for the Trinidadian time zone I had stayed up the entire night. Sometime in the wee hours of the morn I'd taken a trip to the nearby convenience store and picked up some energy drinks and a bag of pistachios for the trip. It looked like this:

Clearly I am generous and a cool friend. See how I have given to Kim-Chi a Red Bull? This was in part out of concern for my health and safety if I were to consume two of those drinks within an hour. I still fell asleep on the train, but by the time Kim and I had checked in I was all nervous and jittery on the inside. Thanks, taurine.

After an hour-and-a-half flight spent listening to a disillusioned and bitter private ALT who had quit his job, Kim-Chi and I arrived at Narita Airport. I followed her around until she got on her flight to Oklahoma, then spent rest of my eight hour layover sleeping on a bench with my feet propped on my luggage and eating an underwhelming sandwich.

You know what Narita Airport has? Amenities for showering and "dayrooms." Not sure what a dayroom is because I was a fool and did not make use of these facilities. That thirteen hours from Narita to JFK is pretty brutal. I watched movies, put up with the toddler kicking the back of my seat until she fell asleep (then her infant sister woke up and practiced screaming), tried to sleep, and forced myself to eat nasty airplane food. By the time I reached New York I was exhausted, disheveled, and extremely disoriented. I was ready to smack the lady at customs who was being discourteous with the many Korean passengers who were confused about the forms. Quit being so rude to them, I wanted to snap. They aren't stupid. You're talking too fast and with a thick accent. Slow down, for the love of Sweet Peter. Culture shock. Also, humanity.

I wandered around trying to find internet facilities and a shower. If Narita has showers, surely JFK has showers.

Lies.

Or perhaps not outright lies, but deception nonetheless. Sure, if you are a qualifying member of an airline or its partners you may use the showers in the airline lounge. If you are not then you must pay for access. I chose the first one that was recommended to me by an airport employee, which happened to be the lounge associated with Middle Eastern airlines. I just wanted a shower, people. Just to shower. And I was willing to fork over the $40 for four hours of respite. This would have been much more worth my money if I had gone earlier (place closed at 10 p.m.) and visited the restaurant area. As it was I paid forty American dollars for a shower (with complimentary mint shampoo. Ahhh, my scalp), use of a disappointingly old computer, a banana, a bottle of juice and some finger foods. Whatever. I'd do it again.

Sometime after 11 p.m. I got a treat. This treat was company in the form of my dear friend Nina Badoe. For the uninformed, Nina and I have been friends since high school and attended Wesminster together. She's the other best friend. There's Hannah, and there's Nina. Since Nina relocated to the East (D.C. and then New Jersey) I hadn't seen her much over the last three years, and to be able to spend at least seven hours of uninterrupted time with her was just superb. Then she caught a train home and I went through security.

It's now 6:01. After puttering around on the web, writing this, and sighing a lot while watching the dawn break outside my window, it's time to get ready for the day. Wish me luck.

Requiem For My Strawberry Plant

2010-08-24T04:43:00.001+09:00

I'm sorry that I abandoned you for three weeks. You didn't deserve to die so soon.

Happy Anniversary, Me

2010-07-27T16:08:00.001+09:00

Two years ago today I arrived in Japan, wide-eyed and bewildered. Today I sit at my desk at the office, refreshing the Missed Connections page on Tulsa Craigslist every hour, letting my backside rot as I write down every single item I'll pack for my trip to Trinidad. I leave on Thursday, and Lord willing I will arrive in Port of Spain on the 30th. It will feel like a three-day journey, but the calendar will say that is was just two. I am excited out of my pants to see my family, friends, and eat good food. In the meantime I will thank God for bringing me through some of the most tumultuous and stressful and wonderful years of my short life. As Lina Lamont would say, bless you all!

IT'S HERE AT LAST

2010-07-22T16:44:00.003+09:00

We The Kameokans filmed a little silent movie last year and have been anticipating its release ever since. Well, guess what, nerds. It's here. It's HERE! Please go to YouTube to comment and rate and tell all of your friends and neighbors! Thanks a million times over to Liz Brent, who filmed and edited, and to my dear brother Barron for the fantastic soundtrack.

The Truth About The Future

2010-07-14T09:30:00.001+09:00

Truth bombs is 'bout to be dropped!

I've complained countless times that I have no idea what I want to do in the future. Sure, my dream career is that of a lazy housewife with maids to do all the unsavory tasks and the time and money to indulge in my favorite hobbies and charity work, just like Mrs. Bridge. However, given that I'm dating no one and have no current prospects, there's no real way for me to pursue this career as a means of income within the near future. Also not included in this dream in the guilt from being lazy while my husband works, but I'm sure I'll find ways to suppress that. Still, I have to find something to do in the meantime.

I am trying to set myself up for independence, by which I mean a life of leisure. Therefore my goal is to do something amazing that provides me with royalties for years. Things that would enable this lifestyle include starring in a Hollywood box office hit, marrying an oil baron or whatever the new equivalent of that is (bamboo baron? Ecologically friendly wealth), or writing the next big franchise-able bestseller like J. K. Rowling or Stephanie Meyer. The first two take a considerable amount of effort on my part, mostly involving exercise, getting into parties with rich people, probably some nudity, and the success would result in scrutiny from the press.

The bestseller, on the other hand - no, don't look at your other hand; it's just a figure of speech - just requires an imagination, a word processor, and to not step on anyone's copyright toes. The great thing about being a famous author is that oftentimes readers would rather not know what the author looks like, so no paparazzi follow authors around. You may have heard of Tom Clancy, read a few books and watched some movies based thereon, but would you recognize him if you bumped into him on the street? Don't lie to me. You wouldn't. So therefore shall I also be rich and famous yet unrecognizable.

I feel that the fight to get published is largely about balancing originality with mass appeal. Since wizards and vampires are already done, I can either write about vampire wizards and top them both, or find some new fantasy creature that could kill you and probably wants to but that everyone still finds sexy. Mrs. Meyer also cornered the werewolves, a pox on her head. At first I thought of Frankenstein's monster, but a guy made from other dead guys doesn't hold that much sex appeal.

I've also debated combining elements of the Chronicles of Narnia, Lord of the Rings, and Peter Pan to appeal to the younger crowd whose parents buy them whatever the heck they want. I thought about borrowing bits from The Golden Compass, but the movie version didn't do so well,* so scratch that. Basically, my idea is that a band of adolescent lost girl pirates fall through a treasure chest into a new world where they have to throw a bracelet (read: not a ring) into a volcano, and a wizard dwarf fairy guide helps them along and occasionally makes them fly. And then they get attacked by elves, and have to sail somewhere with a long lost prince (potential for romance? Donezo) in a boat called the Dusk Meanderer, and when they complete their task they fall back out of the treasure chest, only they haven't aged at all and Jack Sparrow is trying to steal their rum. Good idea? Look for it in your local bookstore in 200Never.

End tangent.

I had said in a previous post that I was writing a book, but that I didn't ever want to talk about it. Someone, however, ignored my request to never speak of my shame (you know who you are), and now I feel the need to explain why I even bothered to write something that I didn't really want people knowing about. The truth, kids, is that it's part of this independence scheme. Considering that I have no five-year plan, not even a two-year plan, I need to do something now that could earn me money in the future. You know, when I stop teaching in Japan and spend a year looking for a job because the U.S. economy doesn't want to support me. My ultimate goal of lazy housewifery seems like a pipe dream, only slightly less realistic than becoming a published author, and the longer I work for other people the more I realize I am not suited for it. Fluorescent lights, name tags, dress codes, getting out of bed before 8 a.m. every day and wasting the best part of the day indoors is not for me. I'm an untameable mustang, like that horse in the animated film Spirit: Stallion of the Cimarron which I never saw.

So what to do? Call upon the rusty skills of creative writing which I so carefully honed in high school. I won a contest, dangit, and got third place for that poetry entry I didn't even like writing. I should be able to make a living off of words. Why write about it and tell people to never bring it up? I'm the type who is easily excited about the idea of a goal, declaring "I will do this or perish in the noble attempt" with fire in my eyes. Then I give up because it's hot, or cold, or I'm tired, or it never was that realistic of a goal, anyway. I needed some accountability for this goal of Book, and I figured that declaring my intent on this blog meant that at least a few people would know. Knowing that someone else knows is motivation, of the shame kind. It's like this - writing is an activity that requires nothing but a little free time and imagination. There are few excuses to not write. So, how ashamed would I be if someone were to ever ask me, "Oh, hey, how's that book writing coming along?" and all I could say was, "Er, yeah, I never finished that." Motivation, that.

Plus, if I start writing now while I still have a steady job with a good salary, I can start hawking my paltry wares as soon as I get back to the good old U.S. of A. Inevitably my opus, Teenage Pirates and the Vampire Wizards: The Journey of the Bracelet with Prince Darien on the Dusk Meanderer will be a bestseller and opted for a movie. After a couple of hectic years making special appearances and doing book signings and looking fabulous at my movie premiers I can slow down, put my feet up on a pile of money, and live off of royalties.

I know, I know. Getting published is darn difficult. There are letters to write, agents to find, negotiations to make, and sure rejection to face. Looking at the Google Analytics report of number of visitors to my blog, I'm missing something when it comes to attracting readers. There are blogs like http://hyperboleandahalf.blogspot.com/ about nothing that get the same readership in a day that I get in a year. Okay, yes, I don't have badly-draw-yet-hilariously-apropos pictures. I'm not sure I've ever made a stranger have to hide his or her laughter snorts when reading my blog at the office. Nevertheless, I question my ability to write something that the general public, not just friends and family, will want to read.

And don't worry; I understand that writing itself isn't just a stroll down Easy Street. When I look at the successful authors I know (one: Dr. Jan Dargatz, auntie extraordinaire) I see that writing is constant work. It's my kind of work, though - work that can be done anywhere and at anytime, and while wearing any amount of clothing, the ideal of which is zero. I'd be doing something at which the Tulsa County Library and my high school A.P. English teacher said I'm skilled. I don't have to go back to school to do it (I'm mean mugging you, Music). And best of all, it's something I can totally use an excuse when people ask me in the future why I'm still sleeping on friends' couches instead of getting a real job. "I just need that time to write," I'll say, and scratch my unwashed body thoughtfully.

And the people will watch me shuffle into my friend's kitchen to eat some potato chips that I didn't buy, shake their heads, and think, What a douche.

The moral of this story is that I only wince a little at admitting the pursuit of authorship as a means of income. I will not be discussing the subject matter. If you ask, I will make something terrible up about wampire wizards and the Dusk Meanderer. Don't test me.

*By "so well," I mean that it seems a sequel is unlikely. The film was reported to under-perform both in the U.S. and abroad. In my opinion, that just shows that people don't like being hammered with anti-religion messages throughout a film any more than with pro-religion ones, and not just in societies that still have strong ties to Christianity. Suck it, proud atheist Philip Pullman. When watching the film I personally started rolling my eyes. Okay, I get it, you hate religion. Get to the exciting stuff. Holy Fart that polar bear just knocked the other polar bear's jaw off how is this a good movie for children!?

Next up on my list of posts: Why I associate creative writing with pretension and d-baggery. It's almost as complicated as carrying or not carrying a collapsible umbrella.

Precursor

2010-07-12T14:59:00.001+09:00

I spent much of my morning and part of the afternoon writing a post about that thing that I said I didn't want to talk about. Before I pontificate on truths that will blow your mind, let me make three unrelated points. 1) I am currently suffering from a massive headache. It feels like my head is that one impassable evil mountain in the Fellowship of the Rings, you know, where the dwarves used to live before all the goblins killed them, but my head is before they even lived there, and the dwarves looked at my head/the mountain and said, "Hey, let's use our sledgehammers and pickaxes to hollow this place out. Then we'll tramp through it with our sturdy boots and set up our home. Then we'll have raucous parties and dance on the heavy oak tables in drunken revelry. Don't forget to hang many pictures and tapestries on the walls, which means we'll need to drive many sharp nails into our rocky abode with our powerful dwarf forearms. Yo ho ho!" Right now the dwarves are about halfway through the excavation process. Also, I am very tired.

2) The rainy season isn't over yet. The constant threat of rain should mean that I carry around a collapsible umbrella at all times, but I don't. Having an umbrella with me brings on either great pride or extreme irritation. If I leave the house with an umbrella in my purse and then it starts to rain, I pull out my umbrella with a smile and think, I am the most genius of all the geniuses. Look at my foresight. However, if the clouds overhead never follow through on their threat of rain, I look at the passersby with their hands free of the burden of umbrella weight, and think, I am stupid. And if I get caught in the rain without an umbrella, I think, Don't judge me, you fools. I thought the clouds were being fakers again.　It's a complicated set of emotions.

3) The JET Programme is potentially in danger. According to this article the government has considered cutting down on the number of participants or doing away with the program altogether as part of an effort to address excess government spending. As someone who is not at all politically minded nor prone to researching the subject, all I can say is that I really hope the government finds out just how valuable it is to have native speakers in the classrooms. Sure, they might consider making future applicants take the TEFL to make sure that they're getting people who at least know the principles of teaching (which would rule me out. Oops I hate tests). Just don't shut the program down, mkay guys? Thx. It's kind of great for your economy.

I'll give you a day or two to mull this over, then I'll post that other thing. So comment away, faithful readers three.

My Brain It Does Not The Working

2010-06-30T16:09:00.001+09:00

Something about summer turns me into an idiot. I've been racking my brain trying to come up with a new post, but said brain keeps rolling over like a bloated goldfish. So here are some things I've been thinking a lot about lately, interspersed with pictures of my struggling gardening attempts (when I get home and upload them, that is).

My apartment: It takes a long time to settle anywhere, and I've had to work around some terrible furniture and a giant television that I never use. The humidity has ruined my wallpaper in the living room. This isn't a surprise; I made it myself using 100 yen shop duct tape and white construction paper. It seems that my apartment is not only in need of a thorough cleaning, but some rearranging and redecorating as well. I will be getting rid of a table, a desk, that TV, and an old yucky carpet within the next couple of weeks. This could be an exciting simplification of my possessions.

Foreigners: I paid a visit to the JET Programme Forums to promote the Ganbatte Times to incoming JET participants. One of the more active newbies was excited about her placement in one of the most remote locations in Kyoto (which doesn't seem to hold ALTs for long). She wrote the following.

My boyfriend lives in Kyoto city. I think I may go into the city once a month, but I think for the most part he will visit me. For one thing, my apartment is bigger LOL. I'm excited about my placement... especially with it being isolated. Gaijin tend to ruin my Japanese experience :p

Gaijin is a shortened, casual (or rude, depending on context) version of gaikokujin, which means "foreigner." At first I thought, You pretentious little chit. Japan can ruin your Japanese experience. You are gaijin. And no matter how fluent your speech, how Japanese your boyfriend, or how comfortable you may be in the countryside, at some point you'll want nothing more than to talk to someone who shares your home culture and language.

I felt justified in this superior indignity for a couple of hours. What a thing to write on a forum for foreigners in Japan, that foreigners ruin your experience. Then I got on a bus, watched a bewildered white couple carrying tourist maps board, and mentally shook my head. Lordy forbid if someone mistook me for one of them.

Turns out that I understand that girl's comment to some extent. I mentally distinguish myself from gaijin, who are tourists and loud or rude or who wear spaghetti-strap tops. A Japanese person may use the same word for us both. On realizing my prejudice, I proceeded to ponder whether or not I've ever ruined someone's Japanese with my foreignness.

Movies and The Future: The long-awaited world premier of my silent film, Pistachio Thief, is close at hand. On Sunday morning I filmed another short movie (untitled, but based on muppets, Sesame Street, an old commercial for Mercury, and sitting in the office with Kim-Chi and Paulette). I'm working on scheduling the film date for the silent movie sequel, Pistachio Thief in Love.

What does this mean for my life? I have no idea. I'm secretly hoping that someone bored and important stumbles across it on YouTube, thinks I'm brilliant, and gives me tons of money to do stupid stuff like that for forever. I may have worried in a previous post that I wouldn't be able to do stuff like this once I have to get a serious, no-clowning-around-in-your-pantsuit-missy job in the states. Then again, when would I ever surround myself with a bunch of fuddyduddies who wouldn't be willing to take part in my film-making? Let's be real, here. Also, when would I ever get a job that requires daily pantsuits?

My Body: I think my body registers stress before my brain does. This is probably common for a lot of people, but when my brain is fighting to accentuate the positive (Doris Day) my body compensates by hibernating. I lost my weekends to Japanese classes and travels (church doesn't count as a loss, but that transit time, oy) way back at the beginning of May. The beast of a Spring/Summer holiday schedule means that between May 6^th and July 17^th there is no vacation whatsoe'er. In addition my teaching schedule has intensified, as has sexual harassment from 1^st graders and my tolerance thereof. Not sure if those are related.

In a nutshell, my brain is skipping like a squirrel on crack made of bubblegum and cotton candy. It cheers "Yay yay yay yay only a month before I'm on my way to Trinidad yay yay I can do it I can survive yay! Nooooooo meltdown!" My body flips my brain the bird and sleeps through four alarms, three days in a row. I made it to all my schools on time, but that one day at the office when I walked in at 10:30, that was not a good day. How am I still employed?

Books: I'm writing one, with pencil and paper. I'm not saying anything more because just admitting it embarrasses me, which is due to a long association of the open love of creative writing with pretention and d-baggery. Also, I almost deleted this part when I remembered that sometimes people in Japan read this. That's just how badly I do not want to talk about it.

This took me three days to compose. My brain is starting to cave in.

Bleeding Japanese

2010-06-03T14:46:00.015+09:00

I resumed taking Japanese classes in May. The plural indicates correctly that I am attending more than one class. Good friends and neighbors, I am taking two classes on the same day. The morning class is a conversation course at the Kyoto Prefecture International Center in the Kyoto Station building. The other is a Nihongo Bible Class at my church, which uses the Bible (shoulda seen that one coming) as a text for learning vocabulary and grammar. Goodbye, weekends.

When I talk about my Saturday schedule the reaction from my audience is usually the same. It’s something along the lines of Wow, your Japanese must be [getting] really good! Though I usually laugh and say no, no, no, I do admit that I can tell my listening comprehension is getting better. Being in two classes with foreigners who are better at this language than I puts me right in that Zone of Proximal Development on which Vygotsky placed so much importance (yeah, still using that education degree for something). Listening to them speak and, just as importantly, listening to the teacher explain their mistakes (nonexamples. Ed. degree comes into play again) both reminds me that I have a long way to go but encourages me to at least open my mouth once in a while.

When I’m at school or the office the adults who speak to me are usually eager to try out their English. Ergo, although I drop phrases in Japanese here and there I rarely use conversational speech. Two classes means that I’m being forced to practice inviting people to my apartment for a party, to convince a reluctant friend to go mountain climbing with me, and to tell a waiter politely that he messed up my order. While I’ll likely never try to convince someone to go hiking with me, at least now I know how to say “it’s good exercise and the air is fresh.” Actually, what I’d say is more along the lines of, “body becomes good and air is good,” but it transfers nicely to explanations on why I bike to certain schools.

My favorite part of taking classes is learning idioms, slang and colloquialisms. That and proper inflection are the best ways to fool a listener into thinking that I’m good at his/her native language. I did it when I was in France; after being told that the use of franchement (frankly) was very natural, I threw it in everywhere. Franchement, I prefer the Romantic and Classical periods in music over the Baroque. Franchement, Americans are not as fat as your television makes them out to be. Franchement, I’d like a croissant.

I’ve said before that I speak Japanese with a Kyoto accent, which already gives me a leg up on sounding natural to the folk here. Still, when I can tell students to quit zoning out in Japanese their little eyes get all saucer-like I feel very, very good about myself. It also helps when an elementary-school first grader repeatedly commands me to show the class my underwear, and I can say, “Eh? Eh? Ears are far,” which means I have selected deafness. That buys me enough time for the teacher to come back in the room and tell the boy to cut it out; he’s being very rude.

It’s clear that the benefits of actively studying Japanese far outweigh passively waiting for my brain to absorb the chatter around me. Still, every time I get on that train to go home on Saturday evening, I feel like my brain has dissolved into a puddle of Japanese and question marks. Kim-Chi mentioned that the movies romanticize learning a language as an adult; it always seems so easy for the foreigner to just pick up whatever they hear. I’m looking at you, Russian Dolls. As though if one just studies for a year, one can form complete sentences and not miss on all the subtle parts of speech between noun and verb. Now, I ain’t no dummy like Dale Peterson’s political opponent, but I feel downright ignorant compared to them folks in the talkies.

The benefits of not being a movie character is that I understand what a gross misrepresentation that “I learned Russian in a year” baloney is. I can remember that it takes a child just as long to learn how to speak its native language properly; even if taught proper grammar children make natural mistakes through age eight or nine. After that most of the improper speech is from habit, which is correctable. I’m still a child in the Japanese language, not even two years old yet. Yes, my brain capacity is much greater than a toddler’s, our levels of comprehension are probably similar. I can say with confidence that I have a larger vocabulary than a two-year-old.

Stormy Weather

2010-06-03T14:46:00.013+09:00

I love approaching storms on sunny days. The looming power rolls in on the horizon, slowly and steadily pushing back the the blue sky in sumo style. Thunder follows, rumbling a gentle warning, telling the people scurrying below to quit playing around; it means business. I like how the wind goes before it, curling around trees and bones and chilling the air just a little, just enough to let you know that the tongues of wind come from a gaping mouth of rain. Those invisible tongues shake leaves and rattle wind chimes, sound so cheerful that they're nearly ominous, they clink "Take cover! Enjoy the sun while it lasts!"

I love being able to look into the heart of a storm and see where it drips and moans on the hills miles away; I can say to myself, "Ah, that'll hit here before too long," and feel smug when I have found shelter just before the rain pounds on doors and windows and those unfortunate people who didn't check the weather report or bother to look up.

I love the fresh smell of rain in the distance. It smells like water in a clean glass bottle. It smells like a glockenspiel sounds. It's a smell in the absence of scent, tinged perhaps by whatever collected to form the storm clouds. There's no water whose fragrance is as clear and nonexistent as rain; creek water smells like a creek, seawater smells like salt and everything that used it as bathroom, dew smells like grass. When I smell the rain I anticipate the smell of wet earth and flora, and I inhale again and again to purge my lungs of all the city smells collected within.

I love the darkening sky, how it tints everything a vivid grayish blue, and how it makes colors pop from their concrete backgrounds instead of fading in the sunlight.

There's no sky that affects my psyche like a heavy daytime storm. If I'm seated under fluorescent lights it makes me sleepy and a little grumpy. In the states when driving I used to feel an exaggerated sense of anticipation; would I be braving floods in the near future? Would a tornado form? Would it rain so hard that I'd only be able to see a few feet in front of my fender, and strain my eyes for the white lines on the road and tell stories on the way home of how everyone went 30 miles per hour on the interstate highway? In Japan when I'm walking or biking I get a little adrenaline rush. Can I outrun a storm? Am I faster than the angry gathering of clouds that flooded parts of China and lost little speed on its way to swell the rivers of western Honshu? Can I defeat the sky by finding shelter before the storm catches sight of me and throws wet wrath on my head?

I love marvelling at the awesome power of a storm. It's evocative. It overpowers the senses. It is beautiful and terrifying all at once. Still, common sense snorts at all my purple prose as I stand at the bus stop and stare at the clouds, saying, "Wax poetic all you want, but you should have at least brought an umbrella. Idiot."

Nothing In Vain

2010-06-03T14:46:00.009+09:00

This is a long one. There is much hypothesizing and rhetorical questioning, that's why.

What Are You Going To Do After JET has been a hot topic of coversation recently. News of layoffs, other former JET participants going jobless for a year or more, and the threat of getting stuck teaching for real (because I have no other marketable skills) all make staying in Japan an attractive deal. One morning I read this article by a former ALT on reverse culture shock. She says that her years in Japan sometimes seemed like they were from an alternate reality, largely because no one around her could relate. This frightened me.

I like it here. No matter how much I complain about the price of Mac&Cheese or the frustrating cultural differences or the seeming impossibility of this language, I'm glad that I'm here. I've met some wonderful people. I'm learning how to be an adult, and what that means. The importance of maintaining a strong relationship with Christ has never been so clear to me as it has in Japan. Would I lose all of these defining years of growth if I were to move "home" to America?

My two worlds don't connect. My friends and family on the eastern side if the Pacific don't know my friends here and vice versa. Save for the people Hannah met, Facebook pictures and the rare Skype session when I'm in someone else's apartment, there remains a disjointedness that I have no idea how to fix. There are people who care for me here; what can my parents know about the two different men who have claimed to be my Japanese dad? Or about Yoko-sensei, who makes me curry and lets me play her piano? It's tough to compare my relationship with these men and women to those I have with my aunties and uncles in the states (who've known me since birth), but the roles are very similar.

My friends in the States are irreplaceable and I miss them daily. However, God has given me a fantastic social group here, who understand why I whip out my mobile phone whenever I see foreigners wearing backpacks and/or hiking boots. These folk will miss me when I leave, and I'll miss them. If I leave, who's going to make me laugh so hard I almost fall off my bike, just by saying "gay anal region"?Anyone who isn't Margaret will have no idea [why that's even funny]. With whom will I be able to sing that song about eating worms in turn-of-the-century voice? For whom will I write screenplays about pistachio thieves or muppets? Oftentimes at church I intend to leave immediately after the service, but end up staying for nearly an hour extra, chatting with the goodly folk there. I don't regret a second of the time I "lost." When I leave I'll miss them terribly.

As of July 2011 I will have lived in Japan for three years. Sure, in the grand Circle of Life (HIMEELLAMAWEEMELAMAWAAAAY!) it's not that long. I could have had three babies in that span of time. Four babies, if I pushed it. I'm not sure why the number of possible offspring is my measurement for time passed, but it is. Anyway, if I return to the U.S. after Japan, that's all I'll have to talk about unless relating tales of my youthful folly before age 23 (and a half). I've been told before that it sounds pretentious when I begin every sentence with "In Japan..." At first I thought it was a logical complaint. Now I don't know how else to talk to people who've never lived here. If I were to make a visit home and someone asked what I usually do for lunch, would it make sense for me to say, "I usually just have an onigiri and some cheddar Jagabees, unless I eat kyuushoku at an elementary school" without explaining the jibberish coming out of my mouth? I don't know what's happening in pop culture and barely keep up with politics. I may be following 30 Rock faithfully, but I thought that the reference to Hot Tub Time Machine was a poorly-titled joke that they made up for an episode of the show. Not until I glanced at a list of recent movies did I realize that it was real. And I thought, fantastic. Now everyone's going to be quoting a bunch of movies I've never even heard of when I get back. No one's going to care that I know which member of SMAP was once arrested for screaming in a park while nude and intoxicated. It was Kusanagi, by the way.

How the aich am I going to relate to people? Should I refrain from sharing stories or perspectives because talking about living overseas is annoying? i see myself apologizing at the start of every conversation. "I'm sorry if I sound pretentious, but my only frame of reference for the past three years is my life, which happened to be in Japan. Forgive me if I talk about it."

Already I converse in a strange kind of Japanglish (it happens to every foreigner at some point), throwing commonly-used words like taihen and ganbatte into English phrases. It'll be a hard habit to break, but I know I'll end up sounding like a pompous windbag to the people at home. Here, you look like an insensitive idiot if you pronounce manga or karate improperly. Back in Tulsa people think you're a know-it-all if you pronounce Tokyo or Kyoto with two syllables, i.e. correctly and without an American accent. Is living in Japan dooming me to be seen as some vainglorious cosmopolitan wannabe, waving a brandy snifter in the air while pontificating on when I was in Japan?

Thinking about the future rarely fails to bring a writhing knot of anxiety to my belly. What'll I do if I leave Japan? I thought I'd go to France in the near future, but after spending over three years without studying the language, how will I be qualified for any decent job? Will employers think that I was just playing around, since I stuck with a job that offered no opportunity for advancement in pay or position? If I go "home" to the U. S. where will I live? Where I live, how will I find people who won't tire of me talking about my life abroad? What will spending three or more years in Japan have meant in my life? Am I just wasting time?

A couple of weeks ago there was a guest speaker at church. The man was a missionary from the Philippines to Afghanistan. He told us about how he felt when grenades exploded near his house, how life was constantly interrupted by the international troops' hunt for Taliban members. He told us about the toilet an sewage situations, how there's no guarantee that the nan they buy at the market isn't flecked with dried waste that the wind blew from the gutters that run down the middle of the street. He told us about how he has nothing--no retirement plan, no house of his own, no assurance of safety--and his wife and children, one of whom has special needs, are in just as much danger as he is. Then the missionary reminded us of 1 Corinthians 15:54, which tells us that nothing, absolutely nothing that we do for Christ is in vain.

Ah, yes. God brought me over to this land. I have a purpose now, and I'll have a purpose wherever He takes me next. I may be a stranger in my own country, but I'll be a stranger with a purpose. I may be adrift for a while as my future unfolds, but I can know that God will be guiding me to what's best for me, because that's how much my creator loves me. What a restful realization.

Hazukashii III

2010-05-24T15:47:00.001+09:00

Still Friday, May 21, 2010

This is actually a twofer post. Part three of the hazukashii series results from the embarrassment which results from the Japanese gift-giving culture.

After teaching 2^nd period with the special needs class (pretty easily rearranged when there are only five students) I went back to the office. The special ed. teacher was filling her drip coffee filter when I went to wash out my cup for some gourmet caramel praline hot cocoa that I'd purchased from the foreign foods store in Kyoto station.

"Do you drink coffee?" the teacher asked.

"Sometimes," I replied.

"Japanese tea?"

"Sometimes. I like sweet things." I showed her the packet of hot chocolate mix.

The teacher tried to ask me something about milk and sugar in my cocoa, to which I replied no, I just used the packet contents and water. I held up the cocoa for her to smell. "Very sweet," I repeated.

The teacher retrieved a packet of Japanese cocoa. I sighed a little inside. This was one of those times when I would have to accept this gift of cocoa, even though I already had a mug full of it. I would also have to pretend that I'd never know that Japan, too, had sweet cocoa mix packets so as not to make the teacher feel that her gift was commonplace or unnecessary. Then, before I could return to my desk the teacher handed me a sweet from Ishikawa prefecture.

Admittedly, my first thought was, Crap, now I'm going to have to give her one of my cookies. I only have two. When one gives a gift in Japan, no matter what the size, a gift of equal value is returned. They are wrapped nicely, too; no funny-looking burnt cookies in Ziploc bags get exchanged here.

As I was debating how to apologize for ugly cookies the teacher pulled out a map of Japan to show me where Ishikawa Prefecture was located, then gave me another sweet from Okinawa (and pointed it out on the map), and explained to me how certain cities were famous for local sweets. Yes, I knew. That's why souvenirs are usually sweets or snacks that are exclusive to the area visited. I asked the teacher if she traveled, she tried to explain the process of ordering sweets from a catalogue, I tried to tell her that I understood in English, and we ended up saying the exact same things to each other in our respective mother tongues.

Since she had given me two sweets and taken the time to show me the map and what have you, I pulled the ugly cookies out of my lunch bag and handed them to her. I said in Japanese, "Not pretty, but…" She asked if she could share them, and I said of course, figuring that she'd do so at lunch, and only with the three other teachers who sat at her section.

I stopped paying attention until I heard a discussion on how to say, "handmade" in English, and "from Ryan-sensei." I turned my head to see that the special ed. teacher had broken those moist, ugly cookies into tiny pieces and was offering them to everyone in the office, including the vice-principal. Crap.

I apologized, the staff ate their cookie bits and lied about how scrumptious they were, and then the awkward, embarrassment set it for real. They had been given a gift, you see. Ergo they were obliged to return in kind. So, for two flat, unattractive chocolate chip cookies I received a package of instant café au lait, hard candies, and a package of instant mushroom potage. It was entirely disproportionate to those cookies. I don't even like mushroom soup, but because it was offered as thanks for my crumbly burnt mess I had to accept. And listen to the teachers nag each other to say "thank you" and "delicious" in English. And pretend not to understand, because to indicate that I recognize when I'm being discussed would have embarrassed them. Then how could they talk about me when I'm in the room?

If this doesn't strike you as awkward and a little embarrassing, give one person in a group of Japanese people some crappy food, and see what you get in return. Then you'll know. Oh, the social guilt. I will never bring cookies in a Ziploc bag again.*

*This is a lie. I will do it frequently, but I will eat them myself.

Hazukashii II

2010-05-24T15:17:00.001+09:00

Friday, May 21, 2010

I will be humming this day out of my head for years, and it's not even noon.

I awoke on time, made fried rice with kimchi, and packed a nice lunch for myself, complete with fresh chocolate chip cookies. I ironed my pants, wore a little makeup, and left nothing behind. I walked leisurely to my bus stop. My only concern was that I had no paper money with me, and would have to find a vending machine to change one of my 500 yen coins in order to have the afternoon bus fare. Vending machines are everywhere in this country. My concern was mild.

I relaxed on the long bus ride to Betsuin Junior High. After transferring from a city bus to a　furusato bus (which I translate as "boonies bus") it's a good forty minutes into the hills of western Kameoka. The bus comes infrequently and takes even longer to return to civilization than to leave it. Still, I was alert, nicely dressed, and en route to my favorite junior high. When I walked into the staff room I greeted the teachers with enthusiasm and vim. They didn't seem quite so wowed at my presence, but there were only three of them there at the time and one I had never seen before.

I sat down and began to unpack my things. The new teacher, a young lady likely only a couple of years my senior, came and introduced herself. She was the substitute English teacher; the regular teacher was out sick for the month. I indicated my understanding and made a mental note to pray for Mr. Yamashita. Then new teacher shattered my morning.

"I think you come to this school next week," said she.

Twice in a row? Lucky me, but I wasn't sure this was the case. I looked at my schedule and realized what she meant with a sinking heart.

"So we were shocked when you walked in," the teacher continued.

No matter how hard I wished for it, the ground beneath me did not rise up and swallow me whole. I was at the wrong school. How had I missed it? Sure, all I had done was switch two Fridays in my brain, likely because Betsuin's plan had already come and I had only received Takada's the night before. But had I not gotten that email alert from Google calendars, telling me that I was to visit Takada Jr. High on Friday, May 21, 2010? Did my iPod not tell me that it was Takada this week? Did I not look at my school schedule the night before? Had I been so set on going to Betsuin that I completely ignored all signs pointing to the contrary? Answer: yes.

"You don't have a car?" the vice-principal asked.

I nodded. "That's right, it does not exist."

"What's the bus schedule?"

I pulled mine out. "Next's bus eleven hour twelve minutes is," I replied.

"I don't even know," the secretary chimed in. "Will she be able to get back in time?"

The vice-principal of Betsuin asked when I started classes at Takada. I pulled the lesson plan out of my bag. The first class was the first period with the special needs students. Crap. I didn't even get to Betsuin until five minutes after first period started. To prevent complete panic I answered from the next class. "Fifth period, sixth period," I replied.

"Okay," the vice-principal replied. "I'll give Takada a call and let them know that you're here, but you'll be coming."

Sometimes I wish I couldn't understand any Japanese, like when I have to listen to one side of an our-little-ALT-is-stupid-today conversation. The principal of Takada must have responded that my first class would begin at 9:45, because Betsuin's vice-principal gasped and exclaimed "Nijikamen?" (Second period?). The new teacher had class third period and the vice-principal had to (wo)man the school. The secretary would have to drive me over there, as though she had nothing better to do with her time.

Lord Jesus, if you wish to take me now it's fine by me, I thought. I repacked my bags and left with the secretary. "See you next week!" the vice-principal called after me. Yeah.

My boss sent me a text message. It said in English "call me" with a little image of a phone beside it. Her number was underneath. I called her on the way to Takada, and pulled out the mother of all apologies: moshi iwake arimasen. Literally it means "I have no excuses," and when I see it on TV it's usually accompanied by a long, low bow, or even by getting on one's knees and pressing one's forehead to the ground in shame. My boss laughed and was very sweet about it, fitting with her love for Hello Kitty paraphernalia and lace trim. She could hate me and I'd never know. Still, when one cannot fully explain why one would board a bus going in the opposite direction of the day's scheduled school, one cannot help but to appear very, very stupid.

When I finally reached the school I met Takada's vice-principal in the hall. Since there were a class of students passing by I didn't apologize as heavily as I had to my boss, but I injected as much heartfelt abashment into the one I gave. Then I walked into the staff room with my head hung low. You know that nightmare people have, when everyone's laughing at them and pointing and talking about them? Well, it was like that, but real. Oh, hah hah, you made it! You were at Betsuin?! That's so far! How do you even get there? The secretary brought you here? Chortle and guffaw!

One of the English teachers told me that another one of the teachers (whose name I didn't even recognize) was really worried, because I'm usually at the school before the 8:15 morning meeting. Which was the teacher who had been so concerned? Who knows; probably one of the ones laughing at me.

It was all good-natured teasing, and well-deserved at that. Plus it broke own some barriers, I guess, because some teachers who had never spoken to me congratulated me on getting to Takada in one piece.

Hazukashii I

2010-05-17T22:23:00.002+09:00

The word hazukashii means both shy and embarrassed. I realized that I hum when trying to stop thinking about something embarrassing. Every so often there are things I can't get out of my brain (the humming intensifies), so I'll set them free here. This is the first installment from an incident over two years ago.

One day at Chiyokawa Elementary I needed some sturdy cardstock for the students to use. I didn't know how to describe that to the staff in the office, so I went into the supply room and did some searching. The closest thing to cardstock was some smooth, thick, cream-colored paper. It was a little big for my purposes, but Ifigured that if I cut it in half It would be perfect.

I took a stack of the paper back to the teacher's office, to the back table where the paper cutter was located. The vice-principal, the secretary, and the office guy just watched me for a bit as I cut this paper in half. They started talking amongst themselves, so I went about my business of preparing for class.

When I was about halfway through the office guy stopped me. He asked me what sized paper I needed, so I explained the lesson and what I wanted. He took me back to the supply room and showed me where the printer paper was kept. He pulled out a stack of B5 sized paper, which happened to be the exact size I needed. He took back the paper I had cut/been about to cut, I thanked him again, and that was the end of it.

Not much later I was at another school, watching some sort of awards ceremony. Imagine my dismay when I recognized the paper on which these official, sealed and stamped awards were printed as the exact same stuff that I had cut up at Chiyokawa. I had taken the most expensive paper in that supply room and rendered it completely unuseable.

P.S. I, too, look forward to being able to put pictures in my posts again. Text alone is boring for the eyes.

P.P.S. Apologies for my occasional spelling errors. I'm writing from my iPod and the application I use doesn't use portrait mode. So sometimes my thick thumbs just hit the wrong key.

Material Girl: a Four Hour Journey

2010-05-14T20:41:00.001+09:00

4:33 pm, on a train to Osaka by way of Kyoto. I have been without a home computer for nearly six days. It hasn't been as life-changing as I thought it would be. I do spend less time ruining my eyesight for the numerous tv shows that I follow. I've cooked for myself three times this week, which is already twice more than usual. Having no money to eat out also encouraged my volition to use the food in my fridge.

By the grace of Kim-Chi, I made an appointment at the Apple Store's Genius Bar in Shinsaibashi, Osaka. I was nervous, and not only because I would be traveling to Osaka alone, maneuvering through unfamiliar railways. I hadn't been able to specify that I needed the Apple Store to speak some English.

After a nerve-wracking trek to the Apple store I got a professional's confirmaton that God was watching out for me. Not only did I make ALL of my trains and arrive right on time, but the young guy dealing with me can speak the English. This was after telling me that he didn't speak English, but could understand a little. "First I'm going to check the hard drive. Do you have a backup? Okay, it will be five or ten minutes" qualifies as speaking English, in my opinion. I would know, you guys. I teach the language.

Right now it's 6:33 and I'm sitting at the Apple store. Typing this helps me look busy and not so pathetic. I was hearing an old school robot voice and thought that someone was playing with the word processor function that reads text aloud. It recurred at uneven intervals, so eventually I turned around. It was a man with one of those voice boxes. He barely looks to be fifty years old; it makes me wonder what might have happened (assuming his condition is not related to tobacco).

The lady next to me is learning how to use her iPod Touch properly. If I understand correctly, she was saying that it wasn't working properly. The store employee basically went through all the iPod functions and told her why nothing was wrong with them. It reminded me of my mother, who also refuses to read manuals. She's never had to go to a store to lean that she wasn't using a device properly, so that's one up on the lady customer. My mother is blessed with quasi-patient family members who read manuals and answer her questions.

Ingen, my personal Genius Bar staff member, just told me that there is no damage to the hard drive and the expensive buy-a-new-computer mechanisms seem to be fine. The problem likely deals with the logic board. I nodded like I knew exactly what that meant, but the only part I cared about was how a logic board by itself would otherwise cost upwards of $700. For a flat repair fee of about 450 American greenbacks I can get my computer fixed within one week. If it turned out that dear Ingen-san was wrong and the repairs would be more expensive, I can simply cancel the repairs.

Then he turned my computer over to take the battery out again and something flew out of it, skittering over the counter. "Eh?" said Ingen-san. He peered into the laptop's underside. "What was that?"

"Er, rice," I replied in Japanese, pinchng the offending grains between my fingers. There was no waste basket nearby, so I dropped them in my purse. Ingen laughed at me.

7:56 pm and I'm on the train back to Kyoto.I entrusted my computer to dear Ingen, and will return sometime next weekend to retrieve it. Despite the lure of being in the heart of Osaka's shopping district and in the proximity of a Krispy Kreme I opted to head home. I am exhausted, friends. Given my workload this week (and how I had a jam-packed weekend), not having a computer to keep me up late was a blessing. The blessing masqueraded as a terrible, expensive disaster, but in retrospect I'm not sure I would have survived the week otherwise. Going to bed by 10:30 every night save one has left me enough energy to teaching five classes per day and play with students during all of my breaks.

The title of this post should tell you that I had originally prepared to tap out a diatribe/expose on how this experience has taught me that I need to simplify my possessions. You know, something about how I was going to get rid of half my stuff and take better care of what I keep. As I close this post I'm aware that maybe it's more about the lengths to which I'm willing to go for my own comfort (Internet in my own home) and the stress I'm willing to endure for one of those possessions whose hold on my life I'm supposed to resent.

8:34 Now I'm going home from Kameoka station. I'm going to cook the steak I have thawing in the fridge, which I purchased on a whim back when I had money.

Computer Murderer

2010-05-10T13:31:00.002+09:00

I had about three blog posts typed up and ready to post yesterday . It would have been glorious. One of these posts was about how unsteady my life has been recently. I have terrible mornings, then teaching is great, then something goes wrong in the afternoon. A day starts off wonderfully, then something terrible happens, then it ends well. For example, I had written about when I went to my alternative junior high only to realize that the library was closed. I thought that meant I had a day off, so I went home. Then I learned that though the library was closed, the school had been open on its third floor. In the original post there was a lot more wit and self-deprecating humor, along with a transcription of my thoughts (goig home had made sense at the time) and the conversation I had with my supervisor on the matter. Up and down, up and down. Don't worry, I still have a job.

You may wonder why I'm telling you about a blog post rather than post it. The reason, good friends not only explains why I wasn't able to call my mother on Mother's Day, but also is related directly to that rollercoaster ride of emotions, the battle of Good Day, Bad Day. Yesterday started off well. I went to Paulette's shakohachi performance, I had TGIFriday's for lunch, church was great, then I learned I had won a "color changing fiber light" in a raffle at the morning's performance. Much needed for my home disco parties, to go with my lava lamps, glowsticks, and supply of Hallucinogens. Then, in an accident of devastating proportions, my laptop got wet last night. I was carrying the device while attempting to multitask (wash dishes, do laundry, bathe, make lunch for today) in preparation for a busy week. I got too close to a tub of water. In a nightmarish, fumbling, slow-motion moment of horror I lost my grip on my laptop and dropped it into that tub. It shut off immediately. I haven't cursed like that since I pursued the guy who stole my purse, back in college. Thank the Lord that I had just backed everything up on my external hard drive.

I did not give up, friends. I happened to have my blow dryer and a vacuum with a hose nearby, so I suctioned and heated and prayed. I remembered that Margaret had not yet returned from her trip to Australia, so I used the spare key to break in (I felt like such a creep) and use her computer to search the term "save waterlogged laptop." The internet told me it could be done by popping all the keys off the keyboard, drying it as best I could, and packing it with desiccants. Another suggestion for waterlogged iPods and iPhones suggested immersing the device in uncooked rice, which would absorb the moisture trapped inside.

I had both rice and desiccants. I spent about thirty minutes removing the keys from the keyboard, vacuuming at every step. Then I grabbed some bubble wrap and dumped rice into a pile. I smushed my laptop into that grainy bed, scooped more rice around the sides, put desiccants packets on the naked keyboard and put rice over that, then sealed the whole thing up and left it overnight.

Perhaps this technique only applies to computers that haven't been dropped into water. As of 7:00 this morning there was no sign of life. I spent another thirty minutes standing outside of Paulette's apartment to access her WiFi through my iPod, just to make sure that no urgent emails awaited, and to find out if it was going to rain or not.

To top it off, I left my pencil case with all of my flash drives inside on the bus this morning. I have one green pen on my person. There's a chance it will turn up at the lost and found, but I need to research how to ask for it, first. Basically, Bad Day has been winning since 10:24 p.m. on Sunday, May 9.

1st Addendum: I just read a testimony from someone whose laptop revived, slightly handicapped, after drying for three days. I've decided to see if I can Lazarus my computer. There maybe hope.

2nd Addendum: About two hours after I had finished writing this, my junior high got a visitor. While this wasn't unusual I was nevertheless startled to hear my name. The pricipal of the elementary school next door had brought my pencil case, which the bus driver had left with her in case one of her students had dropped it. Yes, I ride a schoolbus to work sometimes. Though the event was embarrassing it seems as though Good Day hasn't given up fighting just yet.

Done Like To Got

2010-04-19T23:30:00.001+09:00

I don't think most Americans believe that there are dialects in our country. Instead we talk a lot about accents and ebonics (which I do not think is a separate language, but is easier to say than African American Vernacular). We may admit that Creole is a pidgin language, or that Cajun can be nigh-incomprehensible. Still, when I was asked if America has dialects like Japan, for a long time I’d say no.

I attended some friends’ joint birthday party a few weeks ago. Two of the attendees (one of whom was a birthday boy) were Australian at the time. Now I don’t know, but then, they were definitely Australian. Anyway, we inevitably started poking fun at each other for our funny speech patterns and weird customs. I’ve always thought that Australians had the advantage; who can understand them when they start using all their slang and abbreviations? Plus, American media is popular everywhere, and therefore the anglophones in other countries are frequently exposed to American accents and slang. With everything from rap to Grey’s Anatomy (yeah, I consider those things opposites) reaching the Land Down Under, how could I compete with cuppas with brekkie or baby-eating dingos?

Thank you, Lord, for giving me a country-born and bred grandmother, for so many reasons.

A couple of years ago, at the end of one trip to see my aunt’s family in Dallas I was sitting in the back of the car. We were all packed up and ready to go, but at the last minute we realized that our dog was still running around. She was quick to come when called, so someone dumped the animal in my lap without ceremony. My grandmother leaned over and addressed the dog.

“Why, Tiger,” Grandma exclaimed, “you done like to got left!”

Take that, Australia.

Close proximity to my grandmother and spending the greater part of my life in the Midwest has left me with a certain fondness for country accents, but it wasn’t until I was able to stump the Australians with my pronunciation and twisted grammar that I was genuinely proud of it. I may not know what a combie is, or how a man could chunder, but if someone is fixin’ to tan my hide I sure as heck know to hightail it outta there 'fore I git walloped.

Edit: The subject of American dialects intrigued me so much that I wrote a short essay about it for an adults English conversation circle. There was a pretty good turnout at the conversation session; nice to know that the attendees find dialects as fascinating as I do. While doing research for the essay I ran across this site, and it made me homesick.

Laziness. Turns Out It's A Habit.

2010-04-14T12:44:00.001+09:00

My parents thought that I was lazy as a form of rebellion. I would grow out of it. I would start folding my clothes, and doing dishes after I dirtied them, and cleaning on Saturdays to the sounds of 1950s jukebox hits, just like my mother. Eventually, when I became an adult, I would do it. That's what I thought they thought, at least. Laziness is something that adults grow out of.

I’ve been waiting to reach adulthood for a few years now.

Kim and I were discussing a paper maché class that she was considering taking. "I don't know," she said, "that's five hours I could spend studying French, which I don't do."

This struck me as hilarious. Doing my best freckle-faced lispy kid impression, I parroted, "That's five hours I could spend doing something I don't do." Kim and I giggled over that for a few minutes, likely exasperating my new boss and coworkers.

Later I realized that Kim’s seemingly ridiculous statement was actually my daily modus operandi. Why do dishes when I could be studying Japanese, which I won’t get to until I’m taking a class? I can’t fold my clothes now, I need to spend an hour searching for a recipe for those pastries I’ll never make. I could tidy my apartment, but that would detract from getting ready for a jog in the pleasant spring air, even though I’ll get distracted dancing around my apartment, then watching clips from America’s Best Dance Crew, then remembering that there are at least three episodes of The Mentalist that I haven’t seen and therefore must watch them immediately.

Living on my own in a decent-sized apartment (Americans would think it was ridiculously small) has given me ample space to drop my stuff. This is not an analogy or metaphor. Really, when I walk in my apartment I started shedding; shoes, then school bag, then purse, then iPod, and finally clothes all get dumped on the ground in my exhaustion. I leave a trail of items behind me, always picking something else up and putting it elsewhere, never quite getting everything put away.

As a member of the workforce I highly doubt that many people come home from work energized and ready for a productive, tidy evening. Adults, however, are supposed to do their chores at night, during their free time, right? I’ve been waiting for the day when I walk in my door, take a deep and satisfying breath, and think, it’s a grand night for cleaning.

It ain’t coming anytime soon.

Hannah Comes to Town part 9

2010-04-12T11:17:00.001+09:00

Sunday was the last day of Hannah's visit, and was the day we completed our list of Foods To Eat and finished her souvenir shopping. I'm not sure why it took so long for me to write this post, other than to remember the feelings I describe towards the end of this post. Gomenasai, good friends.

We began the day the right way—covering the bed with plastic, leaving the rabbit with plenty of food and water, and heading over to Mr. Donut for a well-balanced donut. We headed into Kyoto early (remember, those who are keeping track, that it's 400 to Kyoto station) and wandered into Isetan. Kyoto's beautiful train station, opus of architecture that it is, holds a hotel, a theater, an art gallery/museum, and the upscale Isetan department store that hosts upscale shops for upscale brands like Gucci and Prada. It also has two floors dedicated to good eats, including a burger joint at which the employees all have to wear large orange cowboy hats, so it's not all class and couth.

Hannah and I wandered around for a while to find some souvenirs for her and her family. Shopping for souvenirs is always tough; I've never been very good with buying something that is both representative of the place I visited and relevant to the person for whom I'm buying it. Especially when one visits an expensive country like Japan, it can be really frustrating to balance a budget and buying for people what you think they'd appreciate. Still, Hannah did manage to find some items she liked, I bought a cute useless woodblock with a hand-painted picture on it, and we headed upstairs to cross off the last item from Japanese Foods To Stuff Down Hannah's Willing Gullet list.

This last item was ramen. Americans, and likely many Westerners, will forever associate ramen with the stuff you buy in packages or cups, the college student's staple food. It makes for a decent salty lunch or snack, but isn't something you'd ever purchase from a restaurant. Real ramen bears resemblance to its Appalachian hillbilly cousin Cup Noodle in only the most basic form: the noodles are the same thickness and length (forever long) and the soup is usually broth-based. Even basic real ramen, however, includes a couple of slices of pork, spring onions, some bean sprouts or other vegetables which are unidentifiable to my eyes, and sometimes half a hardboiled egg. One bowl of the stuff is enough to be a meal. It's friggin' delish, guys. Friggin' delish.

Hannah and I chose one of the least expensive ramen restaurants in Isetan, the kind at which you chose and pay for your ramen at a machine. The waitress shows you to a seat while the chef gets started on your order. My half-size ramen was a mere 540 yen. Hannah treated me, but I figured I'd let you future visitors know. Ramen is cheap. Ramen is delicious. Ramen is plentiful. According to a quick Google search, ramen restaurants in the states can be found in Denver or New York. I'm sure there's one in California or Hawaii, where Japanese residents and tourists tend to congregate, but all's I'm saying is that you shouldn't discount ramen as real food until you've tried the real thing. Ramen.

Once we finished our noodles Hannah and I skipped back down to the station. We said our goodbyes without tears, but with big hugs. I clowned on the platform as Hannah got settled and waited for the train to start, much to the delight of the other passengers who could see me. Always a good time, watching a mop-headed monkey jig like a drunk toddler. I jigged and waved and hopped up and down until I couldn't see her train anymore.

Sometimes I wonder if I appear cold because I am uncomfortable with long farewells and phrases like, "I miss you already," or "I'm going to miss you so much." I have trouble telling folk that I miss them at all. Maybe it's because I hate to darken the last few moments of fraternization with thoughts of upcoming sadness (that, in my opinion, is completely pointless). Perhaps it's because I don't get truly homesick frequently, or that I don't miss people in the same way; I figure that we'll see each other soon enough, and the wonders of the internet can keep us fairly well connected. Nevertheless, after seeing the one person who took the effort to cross an ocean just to spend time with me disappear with the train, I certainly felt bereft when I finally stopped waving on the platform. I took a side trip back into Kyoto to buy some picture frames (because shopping was supposed to fill the hole in my heart. That didn't work. Also, I needed them), and then headed home. When I walked into my house I found a pencil pouch that hadn't been there before. I recognized it the pouch fabric as one I had pointed out to Hannah during our trip to the Kazari-ya woodblock print shop. I had said something to the effect of "This is the cutest print I've seen in Japan," and hadn't given it any more thought. Inside the pencil pouch was a box of chocolates and a note from Hannah, thanking me for my hospitality and friendship, telling me what a wonderful time she'd had.

And then I sat down on my living room floor and wept.

Over It

2010-04-01T18:10:00.000+09:00

FYI, I had this finished two days ago, but I misplaced the cord to connect my camera to the computer. Plenty has happened since I wrote this text, but that's for another post. Please be enjoying.

If the tone of my most recent posts has seemed gloomy, it's because I've been in a slump. For the past three weeks or so I haven't cooked, cleaned, or cared to do so. Perhaps at the end of the semester all the stress of working caught up to me at once. Maybe it was the gloomy weather.

I'll tell ya'll sumthin', though. A little church time does me a whole lot of good. It's a dog-eat-dog world and we can't truly rely on anyone but ourselves, we're told. On Sunday I was reminded that the being who created everything at which I marvel is my provider, the one who fights my battles, and the one who brings me peace. Though the lethargy didn't really leave until Tuesday (which was my own doing) I can now say that I am past that stage. Yeehaw, kids!

Oh, are you looking for proof? Here's your pudding:

Last Tuesday I made mini quiche, my second time to take that wild ride. Is it safe to use raw eggs that I whisked last week? Tupperware and my nose say it's fine. If I could remember anything from my food handler's permit classes I'd probably be singing a different tune. My chef-ery did not stop there. I prepared for twice-baked potatoes by baking five of the small suckers. I made taco meat and taco-seasoned rice for future meals. I organized the contents of my fridge according to what meal it would create. I had found real bagels at the grocery store, (angels I have heard on high, sweetly singing o'er the pizza crusts) and so fried some bacon for an evening BCBagel. The C is for cheese. I forgot the egg until I thought to myself, something's missing. Still, I stored the remaining crispy pig meat for a future breakfast and enjoyed my American-esque breakfast sandwich for dinner. Productive.

On Wednesday I learned that my supervisor and sub-supervisor both would be transferred to other departments come April. My supervisor won't even be in the same building anymore. I'm sure that their new positions involve promotions, and am forcing myself to be happy for them. Still, I have no idea what I'll do without those two men. They've been an integral part of the ALT support system and are just plain wonderful gentlemen. There has been many a time that they've gone above and beyond their duties to help me and the other two foreigners. I don't think either of the new members who will replace them speak English. WHADDAMIGONNADO?

That night I didn't have calligraphy, so I did all of my laundry, and dishes. I've been in the process of potting plants for the last month or so (I am lazy), but I finished all but the repotting of my pepper plant. I am awesome. Now I have plants on my back porch, something of a terrarium on my windowsill, and I'm slowly returning green to the the front of my apartment. There used to be azaleas there, but last summer the folk in charge of my residence had the bushes ripped out. The azaleas were replaced by concrete and gravel, which turned the already-bland building into an eyesore. I'm hoping that some of these things grow big enough to participate in the upcoming Man vs. Nature battle of spring. I'll put pictures up later, when they don't look all scraggly.

As a treat for my good behavior that night I started watching The Good The Bad The Weird. It's a Korean film that will soon be released stateside, according to Apple.com's movie trailers. I haven't watched many western films—a couple of John Waynes, Sukiyaki Western Django (a cowboy version of Japan's War of the Roses and a tribute to spaghetti westerns rolled into one bleak, bloody movie) and Once Upon A Time In The West—but this film might be my new favorite in the genre. Given the amount of gunfire that was exchanged I figured that all my favorite characters would die in the end. I hate those movies. I root and root for the plucky good guys who seem to prevail against all odds, and then someone shoots them in the head and the wrong guy gets the girl. Spoiler alert: It happened in Once Upon A Time In The West and The Departed and Sukiyaki Western Django. Still, about a third of the way through I thought, What the hay; I don't care if everyone dies in the end. I'm just enjoying the ride. That is the best compliment I could give to a film, given that my personal DVD collection is all Disney movies, comedies, and one HD documentary on dolphins.

After hanging on through the breakneck pace and guffaw-worthy antics of the main characters, I was pleasantly surprised at the ending. More accurately, I never saw it coming. Though the theater version probably has much a much better translation, there is a version on this website that was subtitled by fans. If you have a free evening, this will not be a waste of time. I was afraid it would be like Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon in that it would be filmed beautifully, but every so often someone would end up with a blade sticking out of his forehead and I'd want to toss a few cookies. True, there were some moments that made me a bit too squeamish to watch, but in retrospect The Good, The Bad, The Weird is mostly bark and not a lot of bite. The bark is violence and the bite is blood and watching heads roll.

Thursday was wickedly productive. I was up on time, made myself a real bacon, egg, and cheese bagel, and looked darn good in my black skirt and purple sweater. I bought coffee on the way to work, worked on the Ganbatte Times website, and continued my new project. This project is reading the letters from my students. One letter from a 6th grader takes about an hour for me to translate. I have about one hundred of these. In spite of my general ineptitude in regards to Japanese, I have resolved to read and understand these letters. Good thing, too, because I realized that one class of 6th graders misunderstood my pictures and gesturing, and now believe that bison were a gift from the French. Don't worry, they'll be at one of my junior highs in April, so I can set them straight.

That Tuesday night I made what I'm going to call MidWest Twice-baked Taters. Typing that, I realized that tater is not considered incorrect spelling, and shows up in my dictionary. Hooray, country talk! I scooped out the insides from a baked potato that I had prepared earlier in the week, mixed it with the taco meat, sour cream, and some Monterey Jack cheese. I piled it all back into the potato skins, stuck it in the microwave for a bit, then topped it with sour cream. It was, as my people would say, duhli-yushus.

The weekend was the weekend. It was good. Kim invited me to attend a marching band performance at an elementary school that I used to visit last year. I had accidentally mixed up my dates when I was teaching at this school and had missed the previous year's performance. I decided to show my support, given that even the youngest members would have been my students, and therefore would at least remember my face. The Minamitsustujigaoka Elementary School Blue Angels Marching Band is made of female students in grades 2 and up. Eight of the students were graduating 6th graders. They are the cutest thing since puppies.

Here's the Blue Angels playing ABBA's "Dancing Queen."

Now "Memories" from the musical CATS by Andrew Lloyd Weber.

And finally, "I Could Have Danced All Night," which came embarrassingly close to making me tear up, and for no good reason other than that I was so impressed.

Smack me if I ever badmouth the music education system over here.

Sunday was good fun churchy times. Margaret's older sister and brother-in-law were in town, and Sunday night was the only time that M and friends and family could dine together. It also happens that the last Sunday of the month is when Kyoto Assembly has its prayer meeting time. I looked at my watch as the pastor was finishing his announcements and realized that I would have to run for my train. As I gathered my things and stood up I heard, "We'll start the prayer time right after this, so please don't leave."

Oops. Well, the Korean barbecue was delicious.

Yesterday was slightly less productive that I would have preferred, but I blame that on my body clock. I woke up in the morning thinking it was the morning of the Sabbath. I planned on keeping it holy with rest, and so ignored what I thought was my weekend alarm. I did not realize my error until 8:10, which is five minutes before I need to leave. Thankfully I had prepared my bags, clothes, and breakfast the night before, but thanks to the restaurant my hair smelled like grilled meat. I got to work about three minutes late, still dripping. My presence clearly relieved some worries over my absence, so I explained to the bilingual audience as best as I knew how.

"I'm sorry!" Low bow. "Asa ni, atashi wa," mime waking up and stretching. "Ah, nichiyobi! To omoimashita." My coworkers, Japanese and Oklahoman alike, thought this was hilarious. The translation boils down to "I thought it was Sunday," but I think the combination of my acting and bad Japanese was what sent my section into chuckles. I was forgiven.

Waking up late threw my whole schedule off, and to top it off the weather was positively Oklahoman. It was sunny in the morning, then it rained a little before lunch, then it was sunny again, then it snowed so heavily that we couldn't see one hundred feet outside the office window, then a wintery mix and arctic wind battered us on the way home. Call me a pansy if you will, but it was too cold to put my feet on the floor. I stayed in bed and watched episodes of Parks and Recreation until it was time to go to taiko.

Now it's Tuesday again. I was on time to work, read a couple of letters, and I wrote this lengthy-derriere blog post. My friend Michie, a teacher with whom I worked at a junior high school, is being transferred to a different city for a full-time teaching position. Dara, Kim and I are going to meet Michie at Kameoka's most popular Italian restaurant, Louisiana Mama. You read that right.

If you'll excuse me, I have some over-eating to do.

Terrible TV Update

2010-03-23T04:00:00.010+09:00

I almost didn't watch the last episode. School is out and I don't need to study up on Things Teeny Boppers Like again until early April. I could have skipped the proof that I was right all along about the ending of Yamato Nadeshiko Shichi Henge. But duty is before all! I told You The Readers to check back in seven weeks, though I hadn't realized that the drama had already aired its seventh episode. The shows here have between eight and eleven episodes, and really popular ones often end in a long special or a cinematic feature film. Some have both. YNSH has but ten episodes, enough to be torturous but not enough to kill me. I told you to check back, and so for the sake of this blog and my reputation I rolled my eyes for an hour and restrained my gag reflex. Ten episodes, by the way, isn't enough for the ravenous fans—all of the comments on this show are squeals of delight, repeat OMG's, never-ending exclamation points, and declarations that the final kiss scene is the best thing since glitter.

You might wonder what has happened between the garbage of episode one and the nuclear waste of the finale. This happens:

The body roll is at 1:37, just in case you don't enjoy uncoordinated choreography to the sound of dying cats. That's the important part. This was on every episode as the opening credits until episode 9 or 10. Though it's never less painful, it does get funnier with every viewing. Remember that these are sexy, sexy men.

So, update: I was right. Dude continues to be a complete jerk and idiotically, insistently insensitive. Girl runs away because dude hurts her feelings, gets in trouble because she's dumb, dude saves her and they realize their love for each other. Urk.

However, this final episode threw in a few bonuses for our viewing pleasure. We get to see guys runs like morons. I don't mean that they run without purpose. I do mean that the archetypes of male attractiveness swing their arms from side to side, bent at the elbow, while they run. I don't want to stereotype that as effeminate, but I'm pretty sure that slows you down. It also makes you look stupid.

Another bonus is seeing our heroine, Sunako, dressed like a stripper. She gets tricked, you see, into doing a fashion show that's actually a masquerade for human trafficking. The models get sold on the black market. Of course, our heroine is so naive/ignorant/just plain dumb that she doesn't suspect a thing when dressed like a Playboy Bunny on Halloween. Nor is the pole dancer at the end of the catwalk in the least alarming. Nor is the venue in Kabuki-cho (Tokyo's red light district, for crying out loud) a good enough reason to leave it all behind. Sure, the girl is nervous about how short her outfit is, but the sly devil who conned her in the show tells her that it's the only way for her to shine.

Ah, then by all means, go ahead. Shine. It gives our male friends a good reason to display their weird running. "Shine" means mooning a bunch of men in suits because your skirt is too short, right? I suppose that counts as a passage into adulthood or something.

We also get the extra super bonus of racial and foreigner stereotypes. Yay! Dante Carver is the black guy in the picture. He's famous for his role an a series of SoftBank (mobile phone service provider) commercials featuring an unconventional family. He's the big brother, the dog is the dad. I don't get it, but the commercials are pretty funny. He speaks fluent Japanese though his accent is distinctly American. His popularity is growing and he's getting more acting gigs and does some modeling. This culture loves to give its celebrities nicknames as much as America likes to condense couples into a single name (Brangelina, Bennifer). Dante Carver's nickname is Yosou Guy, because yosougai means "unexpected," and who expects a black guy from New York to speak Japanese or as a member of a Japanese family, hah hah?

In the final episode of this Bedazzler-ed black hole of a show, Mr. Carver is first seen in the angry jerk's dream. Dude can't move his feet, girl is running around in fright, black guy stalks girl, shoots her in the head. Dude wakes up in a sweat.

Go ahead, roll your eyes.

Then Mr. Carver's character, Greg, shows up in real life. Gasp! Don't worry, though, Greg is an African man who was sent by the heroine's father to fetch her. Totes trustworthy. Also, he scouts models.

Wait a cotton picking minute.

Yep, Greg is not only a killer in Dude's dreams, he's also a human trafficker who tells idiotic females that "shining" involves Fredrick's of Hollywood clothes. After convincing the heroine and another of the achetype's girlfriend (whose voice is higher than Snow White's) Greg calls the dude and tells him to pay a ransom. What a turd.

Angry dude to the rescue!

Oh, in the meantime our heroine gets really nervous and almost backs out. But no, she must do it, because she remembers the jerk she loves; he told her not to run away from obstacles. Yes, this is an obstacle, and she will never grow as a person unless she joins the pole dancer on the catwalk. I think we're supposed to be proud of her. I nearly broke my computer screen.

So she prances out, and who happens to be at the end of the runway but her four archetype housemates? They had to get past Greg the African, who pulled a gun on them, but there they are. Shocking. Then she walks back down the runway, and the four guys start beating up everyone in the room in what is arguably the worst fight scene I have ever witnessed. Oh, I might not have mentioned this before, but the heroine's complex about her appearance means that if anyone calls her ugly, she sees red and starts pummeling everyone nearby. Or expels ghosts. You know, whatever the episode calls for. Anyway, she fights; they fight (in manners befitting their appearance, of course).

Then, when the enemy has been vanquished and has magically disappeared within three minutes, suddenly African Greg is there, holding a pistol to the heroine's head.

Let's all roll our eyes together.

Suddenly Dude can't move his feet again. He watched his beloved die in his dream already. He can't go through that again. Love flows from his eyes in the form of manly tears, and he offers himself in place of the idiot who wasn't paying attention to the only black guy in the room. Don't you know that black guys carry pistols on them, girl? They will sell you to a brothel, just like my grandma feared when I studied to France.

So dude cries like a baby, and I wonder if Dante Carver lied when he said he didn't want to play stereotyped characters in Japan. Dangit, Dante.

He's going to shoot.

SIKE!!!

The whole fashion show was a setup to get angry jerk dude to confess his feelings for the girl! It was all so that he could understand how the fear of losing someone he cared about! African Greg is only pretending to fill a stereotype for the sake of true love, and whatever compensation he received for playing that role.

Please take the time to tie a pillow to your head. This show is not worth the goose egg and brain cell damage that will result from knocking your cranium against the wall unprotected.

All the guys that were beaten, and pole dancer, and the fake Chinese girl-buyers—it was all an act. The streetwalker getup? Er…that was…necessary for the…uh…shining. Anyway, scratch that racial stereotype bonus guys, it's all good. Does Dude get angry? How could he, having been taught such a valuable lesson? Once they're back home Dude tells the girl he loves her, they suck face, and then things go back to normal. She cooks and cleans, he and the other archetypes eat, but at least they all learned how to tell someone they love of their true feelings. Remember this lesson for life. The End.

Give me my life back.

GIVE IT BACK!!!!!!!

A bonus for you:

I'm sorry that I couldn't figure out how to make it play specifically at the start of the fight, but it's at 4:44. Stop the video at about 7:30, or forever waste the rest of your life. Spoiler alert, Greg's pointing a gun at Sunako.

Also, the Bedazzler commercial is here. According to advertising, bedazzling is back and bigger than ever. I haven't been in the states for a while, but I'm pretty sure that this is a lie.

Bad For My Self-Esteem

2010-03-22T00:34:00.000+09:00

One of the parts of becoming an ALT that I had feared the most was teaching at junior high schools. If I had a dime for every time I heard, "Well, you'll be teaching Japanese students, so they'll be much better." I was reluctant to ascribe to the stereotype that uniformed Asian students did not have the behavioral issues of their American peers. Rightly so, I dare say, because my junior high school students can be as surly as a bear in Spring and stubborn as donkeys.

I think I was mentally prepared for the junior high schools. My junior high schools are like zoos—you know there are animals there, but sometimes they're active and sometimes they're not. A day at the zoo can be thrilling or a drag, depending on whether or not the polar bears are doing anything interesting. The additional benefit is that there are zookeepers who know the animals well and can intervene on the visitor's behalf. If I am really having trouble communicating with junior high school kids, the English teacher isn't far away.

Teaching in an elementary school is as close to extreme sports as I need to get. There's no adrenaline rush like playing tag after eating too much for lunch, then realizing that the entire class is gunning for me. Fight or flight kicks in almost immediately, and I pelt across the schoolyard, shrieking comically at the top of my lungs to disguise my real fear of being trampled by a pack of wild second-graders. I've been manhandled and sexually harassed by six-year olds (sounds harsh, but what else can I call it when I'm writing on the blackboard and a kid comes and pokes me right between the buttocks?) and endure daily run-ins with xenophobia and racism. Not only that, but sometimes that brutal honesty which is characteristic in all children who aren't old enough to understand social niceties can be downright hurtful.

Only once have I been so frustrated with a class that I've neared tears. Elementary school. After I'd exhausted my lexicon of Japanese in efforts to get the teacher to help me manage her badger-like bunch of 6th graders, what was I to do when she shrugged and told me in Japanese, "I don't understand English, sorry"? I tried being stern with the disruptive students and was met either with the same reaction as the teacher's, or with mimicry. Imagine one of the Mario Bros. being kicked in the head by a horse, filling his mouth with peanut butter, and trying to list his favorite pastas. Apparently that's what I sound like when I talk.

Let's examine my Wednesday this week. I was at Sogabe Elementary, which hosts one of the best teachers I've worked with and the most insane first and second-graders I've ever encountered. The day started pretty well. I taught with Ms. Yumiko Okita, who has created an environment that is so positive towards English that her students actually take the initiative. They write their daily schedule in English, call each other Mister and Miss, and always answer "yes" instead of "hai." At the end of class they asked me to explain the first verse and chorus of Michael Jackson's "Thriller," then we sang it together. Fabulous, I say, fabulous. And not one of them told me I look like Michael Jackson in his youth, so that was even better.

Let us now skip ahead to fifth period. It was after lunch and recess, both of which I had spent with the sixth grade. I had barely sat down to make my notes on the morning's classes when a couple of first-graders came to fetch me for their class. I grabbed The Very Hungry Caterpillar and skipped after the boy. The teacher of the first grade class, while a very sweet woman, is disinclined to involve herself directly in the instruction of English. She stands to the side and wanders up and down the aisles, making sure that the students are seated and facing me.

During this most recent visit the Sogabe first-graders seemed to have been injected with massive amounts of taurine. They stood on their desks, yelled over me, and could not seem to focus on the only book I've ever used that had yet to maintain group attention. Come on, kids, count how many pears the caterpillar ate. Ignoring my cheerful invitation "How many? Let's count!" the students discussed whether or not they wanted to eat a pear, and what fruits they liked. When we got to the part about how the tiny caterpillar had grown big and fat, they all laughed and said that the rotund larva looked like the teacher.

I don't know how that woman kept smiling.

The thing about this is that the students are actually sweet as candy. They are always thrilled to see me, and often pull me into the classroom when I'm just passing by. Sometimes I can't make it back to the staff room because a group of of first-graders is crowding around me. If buttons are cute, working around these kids is like diving into a pond of shiny, mother-of-pearl buttons. It just so happens that they are also mischievous and insane, so like candy with habanero inside, or buttons that pinch you in the swimsuit area if you aren't vigilant.

Charmed by their eager welcome and baby faces, I didn't hurry from the class at the end. The students reached up to touch my hair and I didn't stop them. This was seeing candy without noticing the habanero inside, or more plainly, a mistake.

Allowing one child to pat my head and exclaim, "Wah! Fua fua! (fluffy)" opened the door for the rest to swarm like hornets. One tiny hand became ten on my head. I kept hearing a word repeated as they asked me questions.

"Katsua? Katsura desu ka?"

Whenever they used the word katsura the students would gesture as though taking something off their heads, or would pull their hair back.

I used the only word I could remember. "Jige desu." It's my natural hair.

Still, the students kept repeating katsura and trying to expose my hairline, and suddenly I understood. Katsura means "wig." My hair looked like a wig to them. I told them no, reiterating that it was my natural hair. The students didn't believe me. I know this because they exclaimed, "Eh? Honto? Honmani?" (Huh? Really? Really?) and pulled my hair.

Allow me to emphasize this point. The students pulled my hair because they couldn't believe it was grew from my head.

PULLED

HAIR.

I reacted to this as best I could. I asked them to stop, told them forcefully to cut it out, and did my best to separate the fingers that were causing me pain. Meanwhile, two more students were attempting to tickle me. Being young and inexperienced in the art of tickling, what the children were actually doing was turtle-pinching my sides. Still, it was not half as uncomfortable as feeling two small hands running over my backside, patting gently and dipping into my pockets.

"nnNNOOOOoo, thank you," I yelped, and put my teaching materials down to grab the culprit's hands. The girl was completely unabashed; she smiled at me and reached up to my head. I retrieved my supplies and shuffled out the door with six and seven-year-olds attached to my sides like adorable malignant tumors. I could see the relative safety of the teacher's office at the end of the hall, but at that moment it seemed impossibly far away, lined with a gauntlet of hyper children with grasping hands. Distracted by the task of dislodging the cute parasites from my legs and back pockets, I took little heed when a familiar little boy approached.

I should have known. This boy was particularly touchy-feely; he liked to hug me and hold my hand, and would play with any zippers or buttons on my clothes. The child had once tried to fit his toothbrushing cup over my breast while I was talking to other students. I had made it very clear that the lack of cup etiquette was unwelcome and he hadn't tried anything too strange since. Still, the school-of-piranha-viciously-devouring-a-fluffy-lamb atmosphere was enough to change the most obedient children into a bunch of crazypants. This boy was no exception.

As I detangled my hair from the last of the clutching fingers, the little boy took the chance to unzip my left jacket pocket. This jacket's pockets were vertical, situated on the front so that it would look super cool and indie rock if I were to walk around with my hands in them. As it was, the boy saw something more than indie rock; there was a golden opportunity for him to reach inside to feel where my ribcage began, then to turn his fingers upward and reach for my mammaries.

"BAH!" I shouted, unable to voice anything more comprehensible in my flabbergasted state. The fingers in my hair finished untangling themselves, the students were so shocked by my violent exclamation. The little boy laughed and ran back into his classroom. Booger.

The worst was yet to come. As I bade the students a firm goodbye and gave the teacher and apologetic boy, one last little girl approached. She held her arms out for a hug, and since she was one of the quietest students I allowed the embrace.

“Yes?” I asked the little devil in cherub’s clothing.

“Akachan mo?” she asked sweetly, patting my stomach.

Akachan is “baby,” mo is “also”.

The child was asking me if I was pregnant.

Hannah Comes to Town part 8

2010-03-08T17:29:00.002+09:00

We’re winding down in our journey through September’s chronicle of Hannah Comes to Town. On Saturday the 26th Hannah and I chose an easy day. Since the rabbit had been discovered and I hadn’t reconstructed its cage, the two humans in the house paid a visit to the 100 yen shop. Hannah and I browsed for a bit, laughing at all the terrible English that peppered the packaging and stationery, and I recall encouraging her to buy something she probably didn’t need.

In our western friend Seiyu the 100 yen shop is on the basement floor and the groceries are on the ground floor. With a few plastic table cloths in tow (remember how I bought a bed? The rabbit had to stay inside) Hannah and I made a tour of Seiyu’s finest foods. We picked up ingredients for cookies and Hannah found some weird foods to bring home. This is when I convinced her that a whole dried squid was an excellent gift for her brother-in-law. I think shopping with Hannah proved nothing if not that I would make an excellent trophy wife—if my husband is unable to think of a good reason to spend money, I’ll find one for him.

Japan’s most renowned donut establishment is Mr. Donut, an American-born chain that did much better overseas than in the motherland. Japanese donuts are a little different from their American brethren. There are fewer sprinkles (if any) and many more varieties of cake donuts. The love for mushy, or “mochi mochi” textures has infiltrated many of their donut creations, as has soy and matcha flavoring. Like curry, cake, and mayonnaise, donuts have become part of Japanese cuisine, and therefore Mr. Donut was a necessary stop on Hannah’s food tourism circuit.

After covering the new bed in plastic and making sure the rabbit had food and water I borrowed Margaret’s bike. Hannah and I set off for adventure. We swung by Mr. Do to grab a couple donuts apiece, then headed over to the nearby moat to eat our sweets and soak up the sun. We looked good doing it, too.

Since Hannah had yet to see much of Kameoka our next mission was a bike ride. We went up to the Galleria Kameoka, a large building that serves as both an expo and community center. There’s a chapel on the 3^rd floor for weddings and a library on the first. It’s a beautiful, well-constructed building, which was made slightly less beautiful when I accidentally dropped the ice cream I’d purchased on the floor. Do you remember that episode of Reading Rainbow, the one that featured the book The Swamp Band (Mama don’ allow no music playin’ ‘round heeeeeeeere)? Lavar Burton was eating ice cream in a park, and the ice cream fell off the cone and landed on his shoe, and he looked so sad that I nearly cried the first time I saw it. It was like that. Except few tears and more scrambling to clean up the mess before someone noticed. And no alligators, which was both a relief and a disappointment.

Hannah and I ended up taking two routes that day. The first was to the Galleria using a roundabout back way to let Hannah see a variety of neighborhoods. After a break the second was across the Hozu river to an area that I don’t ever visit. I’ve been driven through the area on the way to Kameoka’s best cherry blossom site and another time to a taiko performance. Riding past the rice fields and elementary baseball games and traditional neighborhoods was nevertheless a first for me. Hannah and I pedaled around until we had decided it was time to be lazy in the privacy of my home. It was the kind of experience that I can’t describe without turning poetic and lyrical, and this just isn’t that type of story. Visit me and see what it’s like to ride with the late summer breeze at your back while the sun sets quietly behind the mountains, then stroll through a field of sunflowers and listen to the rustle of wind through dying leaves.

Then see what it’s like to rent a couple of movies from iTunes and eat nothing but fresh chocolate chip cookies for the rest of the night. It’s good, people. It’s good.