the infamous enkais

i complained before about the lack of proper house parties and briefly mentioned their alternative, the enkai. these parties are arranged at restaurants, almost every establishment has special rooms equipped to handle groups, some upwards of 100 people. they are expensive fiestas, ranging from 4000 to 8000 yen per person depending on the occasion and the spread. usually several plates are arranged at each place setting before arrival, then the servers continue to bring out other courses on platters and in pots that everyone will share from. these feasts are always accompanied by the fantastic 2 hours of any and everything you’d like to drink. it’s amazing to see so many of the reserved, distinguished teachers devolve into slobbering drunkards slamming shots of nihon shu and peer pressuring each other into guzzling beers, like college students out of the movie animal house. this extreme consumption of alcohol has lead, on more than one occasion, to some bizarre situations. once i saw 2 men, seated at another table belonging to another enkai, drop their pants and underwear to the floor and feign lovemaking. at the end of one of our early parties, a female teacher attempted to stand, stumbled and fell, cracking her head on the corner of one of the low tables off of which you eat [they are akin to coffee tables]. she bounced off the raised platform where the dining tables are, rolled onto the floor and laid there motionless for a good 5 seconds. glad there was no blood. buzz kill and a half. at another party, the maintenance man who’s always really nice to me spent half the evening trying to convince me i should do a home stay program at his house one weekend; wink, wink, nudge. i found it funny and wasn’t offended in the least [there isn’t nearly enough double entendre borderline sexual harassment in this country. you know what i mean…] nevertheless, for weeks after he was mortified and barely spoke to me. that is so often the case; you feel like you have a breakthrough with a fellow teacher during one of these get togethers, you spend hours talking, they realize you can actually communicate your ideas in japanese, they confide in you, then the next day at school it’s as if nothing happened, as if there had been no communing of the minds. it’s part of the phenomenon of nomunication, a hybrid of the words ‘nomu,’ meaning to drink in japanese, and ‘communication.’ another interesting side bar… at my base school the teacher’s labor union has a very strong presence, more so than any other high school in the prefecture i’ve been told. this often puts the administration and many of the teachers at odds, resulting in much collective bargaining, many meetings and often remarkable displays of disregard for school rules as dictated by the government. for instance, at any school event where the national anthem is played, teachers who are members of the union refuse to stand or sing. the words to the anthem allude to the ultimate power of the emperor, and the union, which wishes to play a strong role in determining the laws that will govern the education system, doesn’t subscribe to this idea. in another example, the principal and vice principals are never invited to these parties because this would be viewed as sleeping with the enemy. the first exception to this unfortunate standard occurred recently when we went to a party after culture day in naoetsu, the neighboring city. word spread like wildfire that the big dogs had been invited so rsvps for the shindig were few. about 16 of us gathered for a fabulous dinner [pics in a minute] and i spent much of the evening chatting away with the principal and v.p. who i never get to interact with in this setting. the teacher who organized this party is in the teacher’s union and i heard that subsequently he was demoted in the hierarchy and forced to attend several meetings, that no one else wanted to go to, on behalf of this chapter.

at the restaurant...
the pots shaped like bundt pans held a flavored broth in which we swished thin slices of ika, squid, for a few seconds. they curled into warm, soft, delicious ribbons. then there were crab legs, a bit charred, straight from the grill. also down the table, a plate of lobster; some grilled, some tempura-style.


kodama sensei chowing on some fresh fish presented in a fune, or boat. i'm really coming to appreciate the pairing of raw seafood and cold beer.


ishiyama sensei, me and maruyama sensei. she's an english teacher and i'm not sure about him, although his desk is caddy-corner from mine so we often share morning chats and he attempts niceties in english everyday.


my first opportunity to try the delicacy fugu, aka the scary, poisonous blowfish, and i lived to write about it. it was presented beautifully on a round platter, hundreds of paper thin slices, slightly overlapping, arranged in concentric circles. i watched others use one chopstick as a shovel of sorts, running it under 5 or 6 pieces, and then clamping down on the pile with the other wooden stick. a quick dunk of soy, into the mouth, then watch the look of satisfaction settle on their faces. although i was anxious to try the notorious fish, i couldn't help but remember a news article i'd read the day before about a man in kyoto who had died after indulging in the expensive cuisine. i did as i had seen and, not surprisingly, found the fugu to be really good; the slices of sturdy meat had a mild, clean flavor.


although the fugu was tasty, i favored the fresh tuna they served next. they brought a large section of maguro to the table still intact enough to be unappetizing to some perhaps. outwards from the thick backbone rib-like bones ran in parallel lines. this slab served as a plate for chunks of so-fresh sashimi as thick as a deck of cards. the pieces were like velvet on your tongue, rich flavor, substantial but soft enough to melt.


the slab was also accompanied by seashells, which i thought were decoration until the technique was explained to me. the shells were used as spoons to carve the sweet meat from around the bones. we traced the lines of the fish with our natural scoops until we were nearly down to the skin.