laugh o` the day

Today in class the students were presenting commercials they had written. One group was selling a robot that could `cook...wash...clean baby shit...` huh?!?! in japanese there is no equivalent to the letters `si-`, there is only `shi-`. there is also no pause between their words. the kids were actually saying `cook...wash...clean...baby sit...` i thought i was going to rupture something laughing.

japanese labor day

Tuesday of last week was Japanese labor day and a welcome respite from work. Monday night a few of us gathered at my house for snacks and martinis before heading out to play darts.

It was the first time I’ve entertained, other than impromptu gatherings, in my tiny apartment. Everyone here is used to sitting on the floor anyway so I found it was a cozy and comfortable time with us seated on pillows around my coffee table.
The next day brought unusually warm weather so i hopped in my car and headed to the coast. I drove along the seaside road, climbing and descending small mountains as i wrapped my way around alcoves heading south.

I stopped for a bit to study and people watch. There were lots of surfers, families on picnics, young couples and photographers.

As I was leaving the shore I noticed a gaudy building down the road which turned out to be a bustling seafood market where they were hauling in and cleaning the days catch.


There were odd sea creatures everywhere…huge eels folded to fit in Styrofoam cases over ice, whole salmon hanging from their tails on wooden racks with their underside split, gutted and propped open with sticks to aid in the drying out process, tons of crabs ranging in price from cheap to near $100 each.


Unfortunately I had dinner plans or I would have stocked up for a nice meal. Afterwards, Liz and I went shopping for costumes for the musical we are dancing in before heading to Melanie’s house. A few other jets came over and she fed us chili for dinner. We spent the night at her place doing the girl talk, sleepover thing. Wednesday morning Liz and I hit the road, heading to Niigata city for a business meeting. It was our first time driving there, so we got a little lost. All part of the adventure though. After the meeting a couple more girls piled in and we headed downtown for some dinner and a stop in the bookstore. It’s one of the few around here that has an English language section. I purchased a few new reads and am now busy devouring the Da Vinci Code.

the deep end...

i’ve spent a bit of time lately contemplating my life plan. recently another girl on jet program commented that she just assumed everyone was 21, fresh out of college, because she was. that sent me spiraling into thoughts of aging, the future and common perceptions of what constitutes a life well spent. one of the only things i’ve ever felt strongly enough about to term a ‘passion’ is cultural exchange, be it in the form of language study, travel, culinary sampling, etc. now i find myself in a place where i am realizing how well i understood my own needs and desires. i truly feel like i am prospering here; that this is an environment in which i can flourish. i am acquiring skills and, if that isn’t reward enough, also remembering how empowering it is to stretch your brain and learn. i’ve decided to sign and mail my letter of intent to stay another year. this country and this experience are a huge fruit that i haven’t squeezed every drop of juice from yet. i can’t discount how this experience is changing me in positive ways. aside from the obvious excitement that erupts when a student approaches me in the hall and uses a new word that i taught them in a sidebar, like ‘stylish’ or ‘what’s up’ complete with the head nod of course. there are kids here who had never spoken to a non-japanese person before and were literally pained by that prospect. i’ve been slowly working on them. at first a discreet wave…then an elbow in the hall and a smile…a 'hello' followed by ‘how are you?’ when they became comfortable. the teachers seem amazed that i’ve gotten some of these kids to talk with me. one student wrote me a letter the other day, apologizing for falling asleep in class, saying she likes it when i smile but i wasn’t smiling [all in japanese, a coworker translated for me]. i hugged the girl and everyone looked scared to death because unnecessary touch is something they shy away from. knowing me, and my affinity for connecting, touch and all its communicative power is something i feel obliged to introduce to them; a way of bonding and communing that doesn’t require words, which aren’t my strong suit here. i’ve answered questions for Japanese friends on topics ranging from sex, to banking, to the grocery store; queries they’d never have answers to if it weren’t for some random foreigner that was plopped down in their town. and in kind, i’ve had my normal and bizarre questions answered by people who value true understanding. being in such a strange place spawns all sorts of curiosity and questions…the kind that you can’t find the answer to in travel guides or textbooks. i’ve contemplated holistic living quite a bit since i’ve been here. yoga has helped me piece together the two sides of many different coins. academic learning is truly vital for functioning in a situation like this; for understanding the logistics of a daily routine, for improving the quality of life, for providing a historical and social context in which to place each experience. but i am absolutely convinced that it is the grassroots, interpersonal style of learning that yields the greatest understanding and empathy. there is no point in learning information from books if you never put it into play and never put yourself into situations where you must draw upon and expand upon that which you’ve acquired through research. someone else’s empirical and experiential evidence, while a great place to start, cannot be substituted for your own. i find myself constantly surveying, conducting social experiments, testing the hypotheses i have formed from observations. at first i felt guilty about this, somehow devious. then i recall an elementary truth that i arrived at long ago. as different as we all are, we are all human. we share basic needs and embody common characteristics. we all find ourselves on this complicated journey of life without a guidebook. we were all afforded instincts and faculties which we must shape and hone to serve us well along our trek. we do this by calling on all of our senses to perceive acutely and rapidly so we can learn as much as we can about the world around us. there is noble intent in curiosity. while i’m observing you over my udon at the shop on the corner, you’re surveying me.
while i’m curious about your motives, you’re wondering about mine. while you rummage through my grocery cart with your eyes, i am studying your children. while you talk about me in a foreign tongue, i’m concentrating on your words. this is the give and take, ebb and flow, yin and yang that weaves the fabric of relationships, from the one between best friends to the one that creates a global society.
looking ahead…it is truly important to put into society as much as you get out. i view your contribution, on an infinite number of levels, as the measure of your success. what if that is best accomplished not through a desk job in some tall building on the corner of two important streets in your town, u.s.a.? it’s easy to pass judgement on those who wait tables until retirement, or forego college in order to make music, or quit their jobs mid-life to move to key west and fish. in every case these aren’t the honorable actions of a productive member of society, but in some cases, they may be. what if i decide to criss-cross the globe, in a quest to further understanding [on the micro and macro], while increasing the thickness of my book of experience? that will mean no 401k, no life insurance benefits, no big house with a picket fence. some would deem that unsuccessful. some would not understand. some are not cut out for that type of living. some of us are.

love letters

today i graded love letters the english 2 class had to write.
a transcript, all errors intact:

how do you do?
I’m Yuka naganuma in third grade.
I have some auestions to ask you.

what are your famous traditionally ivents?
How is the character of American people?

I want to go to Europe to explore nice towns.
I want to hear wondeaful stories there.
I want to know what kind of world they are.

My dream is to have little hearty shop where I serve bread and coffee.

I want to make this shop where little trouble can be changed in to happiness by the hearthy hospitality.
I like antique cups and dishes.
I want to fly around the world to collect my favorite things.
I like reading books drinking coffee with my favorite cup.
I like to grow flowers as well.
I like cats too,
I think my dream is too big, but if it comes true I will be happy.
What is your dream?


you go yuka!

flashback...

been explorin’ like crazy lately. a while back liz, mel and i set out looking for the viking [in japanese: ba ii ka in gu], this infamous all you can eat in 90 minutes buffet. it was ugly.
1 bar of make your own dishes…soba, udon, curry rice. a second bar was nothing but tempura stuff…shrimp, veggie patties, beef and potato patties, squid, octopus, chicken. there was a sushi bar, a dessert bar, a salad bar, and the highlight: a yakiniku bar. tons of different meats and vegetables and seafoods to grill at your own table. oh my.
last wednesday, lizzy and i stumbled upon a new bar called the sleeping sheep. [sidebar: while there, i discovered that animals too speak different languages. in English sheep say “baa, baa” and in Japanese their noise is “meh, meh”. odd huh.] the bar’s master was incredibly hospitable. we ran into liz’s neighbor there and chatted with lots of friendly, drunken Japanese people. when we went to pay, the bartender said not to worry about it, it was ‘service’ which is the term they give to free things in bars and restaurants. can’t beat that.
on friday, we headed out to secure our re-entry permits which are necessary before leaving the country. complicated like every other official thing in this country. first to the post office to buy a 60$ stamp for your passport. then we ventured out to the port looking for the immigration office. by the time we found the nondescript building at 4:20 it was closed. we crept in, acting as if we didn’t know. we played the foreigner card and the awesome officer bought it and handled all our paperwork after hours. we promised next time to come earlier. next time, right…
saturday, we set out in my new wheels looking for an onsen we’d spotted on the map. it was a true hotspring located in Ogata, a town about 30 minutes from here. after a couple wrong turns, quite a few scary minutes on country roads with no lights in the middle of nowhere in the Japanese countryside and some directions from a couple of helpful store clerks, we arrived. it was misting rain as we lowered ourselves into the rock pit containing the spring water outside. the air temperature was cold, and the water was nearly scalding. so warm it felt cold and tingly. we only lasted a few minutes before retiring to the indoor area where they pipe the water inside and do a better job of controlling the temp. these public baths are so refreshing. you leave feeling effervescent and purged with skin soft, muscles relaxed and mind clear. that evening we taxied to a club near the center of joetsu for a hip-hop and reggae party. drinking, even a little, and driving is taken extremely seriously here and, in my case, would be punished by deportation. so going out takes a lot more planning and is quite a bit more expensive than at home. you can, however, drink en route to your destination in trains, buses and taxis. the party got rockin’ around midnight and it was the first time in a while we really got to dance.
sunday i hit the second hand store looking for some heating implements. bought a tiny electric heater [in Japanese: hi ta] fairly cheap, although i’ve been warned it runs up your power bill quickly. i do have a kerosene heater in my storage room but it reeks of fuel and i can’t imagine having that smell concentrated in my tiny apartment. you have to leave a window open when you run it too, which seems counter-intuitive since you’re trying to heat the place.
this is a shot of the countryside of sado island, where we practiced for the musical last weekend.
a punk-y not-so-fantastic japanese band we saw at the university's cultural day. they're all wearing pajamas and crazy masks. it's so refreshing to see some of the youth thinking independently and acting it out in a supportive environment.

a few new pics...

halloween games at school. this is 'pin the chewed up wad of gum on the witch'. this was the first day i noticed the scars on ayano's wrists. not all together suprising, especially now that i'm getting to know more about the students', their backgrounds and situations.


these are some of the genkiest [genki= cheerful and full of good energy] girls that i teach.


this is sato sensei and i eating loco moco [they say roco moco...l sounds aren't their forte'] at yoshikawa high school's bunka sai, culture festival. sato is my supervisor there.


some of the kids sampling their yaki soba. there were all sorts of food stands, bands, a tea ceremony and art exhibits.

for halloween i dressed up as a m.i.l.f. since this is a family-oriented website, suffice it to say that's kind of a code word for a sexy mom.

i superglued these cookies to the pan; even so, they were all eaten by the end of the night. idiots.

ishiyama sensei, an english teacher, and i dressed up for our english club halloween party. how sad is this...none of the kids in english club showed up. the teachers were dressed and waiting...i think they freaked out cause we were going to make them do a halloween fashion show. everyone even made costumes. haven't seen any of them since. it wasn't a complete loss though. we roped a few students and teachers into playing the games and we ate all the food ourselves. that's testament to the extreme shyness and borderline social disorders that plague some of these kids.

hell on motorized wheels!

watch out japan…tiffany’s got hot new wheels!! i finally got my car last week! it’s the cutest / most silly looking bubble of a car you’ve ever seen. aqua blue, 4 door Mitsubishi minica [Japanese for minicar]. it’s a manual which means i’m not only sitting on the right side of the car and driving on the opposite side of the road, i’m also shifting gears with my left hand. really odd at first, but no problem now. oh the freedom. i’ve got that feeling again like i did when i was 16 and first got my license. i just want to drive for the sake of driving. the potential for exploration is endless. woohoo!! got gas for the first time the other day. funny how i keep finding amusement in the darndest of places. pictures coming soon.

went to sado island for the weekend. well, we missed the ferry on friday night…long, irritating story. but after we treated ourselves to a nice dinner and were treated to some shochu by three older business men at a hostess bar, we didn’t really mind. practiced for the musical on saturday [did i tell you guys i’m dancing in peter pan the musical. what a riot.] then about 20 of us made curry rice for dinner and played guitars and drank beer and had a lot of fun. sunday, 5 of the girls had a leisurely lunch overlooking the ocean and then went to an onsen, a natural hotspring, near the coast. the water in these baths is incredible, like silk, and it just coats your body. the view was awesome. also saw the strangest thing while there…a tanuki. that’s the raccoon dog made famous by sushi bar statues the world over. there’s one on the corner of the bar at inakaya in cola town. it looks more like a raccoon cat than raccoon dog. kinda cute…definitely looked rabid.

another hilarious student snafu…grading papers this morning and read “my dong doesn’t eat meat.” i’m pretty sure he meant “my dog.”

it came out of no where...

my eyes leaked today out of frustration for the first time. i was at the hospital trying to get the immunizations i need before my trip to Thailand. i had studiously written out the Japanese for everything i required and had a friend jot down the kanji. as if the paperwork and hoops associated with going to the hospital aren’t enough to drive you mad in your native language. it was busy and i was a constant problem not being able to read and write reliably. i roped a nice grandfatherly man into reading all the releases to me while i feverishly flipped through the dictionary and pulled vocab out of the depths of my memory. a few things he wouldn’t read because, as he explained in Japanese, ‘he is a man and these are women things’. i arrived at 8:30 and spent nearly 5 hours having no clue where i was supposed to be, what i was waiting on, what anyone was saying to me, how long it would take, or if they even had what i needed [turns out they don’t. apparently you can’t get a typhoid immunization in japan because ‘japan is clean’.] i tried to phone a friend at school for translation help and got chased outta the hospital because obviously cell phones aren’t allowed. i had to call school three times for help, interrupting my supervisor who recently told me he is busy and wouldn’t be able to help me again for two weeks. after getting blood work for something to do with my liver i’m finally given one injection. something about vomiting and fever and red and two weeks. it’s so odd to have to shrug off the direction of medical professionals and fudge medical history forms because you can’t completely understand, but what are my options…not get the shots? later my supervisor translated one of his conversations with the nurse and it turns out i understood quite a bit, but in the moment there was just no way to verify my inferences. i couldn’t hold the silent tears back after i could not understand why i was only stuck once when i need 3 vaccines. the staff was friendly but understandably unable to coddle me. then i was lead to a big room with about 75 people waiting in chairs facing a huge screen with numbers flashing and names being called and was told to pay and yoyaku. i had no idea what to do. a nurse lead me to the counter where i left my file. then i just sat and pulled my hair out wondering if i needed a number, how long the wait was, how much this jab was gonna cost, if i was in the right waiting area… i finally heard my name [cause it was the only odd one they called out] at 1:30…so late that i was tardy to my own class. although i’d called to explain, i knew my teacher wasn’t happy when i found a note on my desk that read “hurry up!!”. i put on my happy face for class [reminded me of serving and how, even on horrible days, you turned on the smile at the table]. i went home for a movie and some cheesy comfort food. i really hate that it got the best of me...damn culture shock was to be expected though.

lil` bits

laugh of the day...
in class we were role playing waiter and customer. when seating two kids, one of the cute little boys asked `how many people do you eat today?`

an interesting article about sex and relationships in japan. very telling...
click here

although i:m loving the outdoor hotsprings, these aren:t the kind of baths i:m taking...
click here

oh, kids

was grading papers…an assignment where they had to use past tense to fill in a diary for last week…some standard answers…”went to shooping” and “i went to out eat” and then there was this one…”i teased a cat”. ha, ha.

quivering

just felt three more quakes in the span of about 10 minutes. the first was strong enough to have teachers grabbin’ their coffee and stacks of papers. i don’t want to imagine living in the areas closer to the epicenter where classes haven’t even resumed yet and people can’t sleep through the night because there are so many aftershocks. i’ve got three friends who can’t even get back into their apartments cause they’ve been condemned. went to a university festival this weekend that was raising money for the victims. amazing to see the extent of the damage and the way people are responding across the country. i’ve known for a while though that most japanese people are extraordinarily compassionate and helpful.