What I'll Miss about Japan

I've been thinking about home a lot recently, but it's become quite common for my thoughts of home to turn 180 degrees to what I'll miss about Japan once I leave. Thoughts of food usually arise at such times, and of public transportation, but today made me think of another thing I will truly miss:
Back home, I won't be famous.

It seems that, every time I leave my house, I run into at least one student. Sometimes, as I walk around the mall or grocery store, I hear a whispered "...Leslie-sensei!" from behind me. Sometimes I see them ahead and get an excited wave, or a "deer in the headlights" look, or sometimes even a "please don't see me, please don't see me" brush-off. Still, the fact that my presence elicits a response whenever I go out is very, very different for me.

Being so noticeable has its downsides, to be sure - sometimes, I don't want to be so on display. Also, it gets worse the more of us there are. 4 foreigners walking around in the mall gets us a lot of stares, and, should one of our number be anything but white, well, the level of stares is exponentially higher. Overall, though, the reactions are positive and I enjoy my little kingdom of fame.

A good example of this was two weekends ago, when we celebrated Odelia's birthday by picking fresh strawberries. The concept, which I find to be a hilarious one, runs along these lines: play a flat rate and have access to a grove of strawberries, all you can eat, for 30 minutes. (You quickly find that you can't eat all that many strawberries in one sitting.) The picking field was in my part of Ota, and along the way the group of some 10 of us saw quite a few of my students. One group of boys were playing basketball at someone's house, some passed us in cars or buses on the road, and every one of them we saw waved excitedly at us and spoke to us (when possible). Throughout the next week, I had those students come up to me at school and ask me about it. It was a lot of fun.

My position as a not-real teacher helps with this - I don't discipline the kids, I don't give out homework, and I come with a game or worksheet that won't count against their grade. I'm also different, which is (this time) perceived as a fun thing. Once I move back state-side, though, I'll lose my notoriety, and I can already tell that I'll miss my short stint with fame.

Kyoto

AKA: Impressions of a City

Were I to write up a comprehensive entry of my four days in Kyoto, I fear I would lose the interest of my (already minimal) readership. We went to at least 16 notable places, we ate the local specialties, and I endure through some million mental images when someone asks me about the trip. Instead, I'll write some of my impressions...which will be a long enough post as it is! (If you want more specifics, comment and let me know!)

Kyoto ... felt like an old love; I loved it in a way that was not passionate or overwhelming, but instead had a very comfortable, broken-in kind of feel. It sounds odd for me to say that, as I've always felt myself to be more of a country or outer suburbs sort of girl. I love being surrounded by nature, quiet, and my own space; the idea of being comfortable in a city seems entirely out of my realm.



There were several things that made Kyoto comfortable, in my mind. To start, the city sprawls. It's huge, and there is a lot there, but it doesn't have the cramped feel of Tokyo (or New York, or Chicago's downtown, or Atlanta's downtown, or...). It also has a very well-planned public transportation system. We were mostly using buses on our visit, which is my least favorite kind of public transportation, and yet it was always so clear where we were and how we were going that I rarely, if ever, had cause to complain. I find both of these qualities really attractive in a city, especially because they are things you can't find in the suburbs/country-side. Kyoto is also breathtakingly gorgeous. Now, we were visiting at the height (arguably) of Kyoto's beauty - the cherry blossoms were in full bloom and the weather was that of sunny-spring instead of rainy-spring. Still, it is wonderful to be in a city with parks, trees, and occasionally even grass (a luxury I never fully appreciated before seeing the dirt field in front of my middle school in the midst of a heavy rain).

In short, I never felt threatened by it's city-ness, nor did I ever feel that I was in an ugly place.

One of the major life lessons I'm trying to take from my time here in Japan is how and where I like to live. I've never lived on my own before, and this is pretty dagum "on my own." Kyoto taught me that I like the idea of living such that owning a car was unnecessary, or, at the very least, not an everyday necessity.

Of course, a large part of having a comfortable, long-term love is knowing your partner's faults. Kyoto was too touristy; I would always feel I was being viewed as a tourist. As Ota, especially my corner of it, is not exactly what you would call a "tourist trap," I feel like people understand that I'm here on a long-term agenda when they see me in the local store. I take a lot of comfort in that feeling. While I should probably try to adjust my neurosis in regards to how I'm viewed instead of complaining about how it limits me, I do find fault in Kyoto with this.
(...not to mention the swell of tourists come the weekend. It was strangling.)

I will tell two quick stories, as I think I'd do any post about my trip a disservice to not include them.

1. Hanami
In Japan, it's traditional to have "cherry-blossom viewing parties," or "hanami" in Japanese. While this sounds like a very spiritual thing, like a time of reflection, it is, in fact, an excuse to get wickedly drunk. We went to a pretty famous park on Thursday night in order to experience this phenomenon, and experience it we did. Maruyama Park is lit at night, so we arrived at 4 or 5 and stayed until well past dark, finally leaving at 9:30. During that time, we were "adopted" by a group of Japanese people and one foreigner, all cheifs for a local hotel. They gave us some of their extra food, which was delicious, and some of their extra alcohol. All of this was entertaining, especially because they were using their broken English and we were using our broken Japanese. They laughed at us when we said we lived in Gunma; they laughed even harder when they saw the alcohol we brought ("I guess it's ok for a foreigner..."). They labeled Aaron as a John Travolta doppelganger and, upon my asking, declared Clarissa to be Whitney Houston. Some moments were priceless, though I will say that my favorite moment was when the nicest of the bunch said, in apology for the sudden on-rush of his coworkers, "Many men...ONE gentleman." (I just about died laughing.) We were issued invitations to join them for post-hanami partying, but, as they were "likely to be sick any moment" drunk, we declined and went home instead. All in all, it was a wonderful experience and was easily one of the highlights of the trip.



2. Fushimi Inari
My favorite place in Kyoto, I can easily say, was Fushimi Inari. It's known as "the Shrine of 1,000 Tori" ("tori" are the red arches/gates often found at the entrance to a shinto shrine), though the name is somewhat of a misnomer. It should be "the Shrine of 1,000,000 Tori," and no one will convince me that there are fewer than that number there. The main shrine is at the base of a mountain, while the inner shrine resides at the top of said mountain. The path from the main shrine to the inner one is lined with tori of various sizes: the largest each standing as close to the one before it and behind it as possible, straddle the path between the shrines, while the two smaller sizes (between 1 foot and 3 feet in height) are stacked, hung, and otherwise arranged so as to enable them to be seen, but out of the way. The place is literally overflowing with these red and black arches.

It was really beautiful. There is a real sense of peace in walking along those arches, feeling them sweep over you and knowing that each arch is another knotch of time flowing past you peacefully, bringing you a little further forward in your life.

Tokyo Plus

AKA: A Very Busy Time

The month of March was one without rest. To start, my friends (Caitlin, mostly) began planning day trips to various places and inviting me on said day trips, filling my weekends. It was also the end of the school year (which runs from April to April here), which brought a lot of changes in my school life, as well as a lot of End of Year activities. As if this were not enough, I also had a few visitors from the US - a friend of mine from WashU, Jeff, and his two siblings.

Most of the time I was hanging out with Jeff-tachi ("Jeff et. al") was spent in Tokyo, a place that had, during my summer orientation, earned my esteemed "Hell on Earth" ranking due to its sheer size and overcrowded feel. In short, I wasn't looking forward to spending some 7 days there.

When all was said and done, though, I had a lot of fun; Tokyo no longer freaks me out quite so much. While I couldn't tell you of every place we visited or all the things I did, as I'm ever-so-forgetful, I can tell you that my highlights were found late one night in Rippongi.

Now, Rippongi is known as the place where foreigners go to eat, drink, and party. OJ, Jeff's brother, was determined to dance and possibly find a "nice girl" that night, so we went clubbing. I wasn't sure about all of this until we got out on the floor. OJ was not to be ignored, and decided he would showcase his abilities to the eligible ladies through salsa.

Three or four times that night, OJ would cut in on my dancing with Jeff and take me to a viewable location. Then, the salsa would begin, me doing my best to not screw up and OJ doing an admirable job of not giving me the chance. He would keep his eyes open, looking to see which of the girls were watching us, and, when he found one to his fancy, he would send me back to Jeff and make his move. Should the target ever ask about the girl with whom he was dancing so recently, well, she was clearly dancing with his brother, wasn't she? The fish was on the hook before she could realize the danger.

When I wasn't dancing with OJ, I was dancing to exhaustion with Jeff. It's rare that I'm in a situation where there's not only dancing music, but a boy who's willing to dance with me all night and a complete anonymity in the crowd. I wasn't ever going to see any of these people again, nor was I likely to have the chance to dance anytime soon, so I truly let myself go. By the time Jeff and I left, which was around 3 in the morning, I had a happy exhaustion I usually associate with the end of a Cowboy Mouth concert. I was sweaty and footsore, but very content.

(An amusing sidenote: OJ didn't make it back to the hotel until 6:30 the next morning; he was having too much fun staying out on the town.)

Jeff came back to Ota with me for a week and joined me a few days at school. Unfortunately, there was only one day in which I was teaching classes - the rest of the time was filled with the elementary school graduation, the End of Year ceremony, and the start of spring break. For those two classes and his time visiting my school, though, Jeff was a total star. Everyone wanted to know who he was, why he was here, and whether he was my boyfriend (rather, most assumed and were shocked to find he isn't). Many of my male students were thrilled, greeting him three or four times in a row (and then, belatedly, greeting me). I think he won me a lot of student interest, which I hope will help refresh their interest in my classes a bit.

So it seems that the thing I needed to get over Tokyo was nothing more than spending a couple of weekends there with good company. Who knew?

St. Patrick's Day!

AKA: I'm Just a Poor, Wayfarin' Irishwoman...

St. Patrick's day is pretty much unheard of in Japan. While there seems to be (according to the Japanese wikipedia page) some small celebration of it in Tokyo, there is little to none of it out in the inaka ("country-side") where I live.

Still, St. Patrick's Day is one of my favorite holidays, so I did what I could. I decorated my English board with a St. Patrick's Day theme, I taught a couple of St. Patrick's Day classes, and I wore green. After that, I went home, and did what is turning into my annual tradition - made an Irish dinner, drank beer, and watched an Irish(-themed) movie.

Now, making a traditional Irish dinner here would be next to impossible, or at the very least required more effort than I was willing to give. I compromised with a dinner of green, white, and orange, all of which are the colors of Ireland.

My mom pointed this out to me, and, while I already knew it, I will pass it on to my readers - the flag of Ireland represents the two factions of Christianity, Catholicism (green) and Protestantism (orange), and the hope for peace between the two (white). My mother, who comes from a Catholic line, said that orange was never allowed near her St. Patrick's Day meals when she was young, but that "a meal of all green is not very pretty."

In any case, I was proud of the results of my cooking.

	The whole spread...
	....and a view from above.
	The sides: salad with cucumbers, 2 kinds of lettuce, orange bell pepper, carrots, and homemade dressing; rice with sweet potato; and some random, heart-shaped, green and orange chips.
	The main dish: salmon sashimi on a bed of shredded radish, with a side of spicy-marinade cucumbers and some delicious vegetable for which I don't know the name.
	My beer; I couldn't find any Irish beers, so I just went for one in a green can and my normal Asahi Super "DRY" (scare quotes added by Asahi, not me).
	My dessert: green an-mochi, white an-mochi, and mandarin orange segments. See, it makes the flag! I'm so cute.

Of course, I couldn't finish all of this; I never got around to the bottle of Asahi, and most of the rice in that bowl went to waste. Still, it was delicious and I was pretty pleased with how well it all turned out! :D

Oh, and by the way, if you were curious about which movie I ended up watching, it was:

Graduation

AKA: "Bye bye, baby..."

Graduation was bitter sweet for me. On the one hand, I was excited to see the ceremony here and glad that my students were at this exciting point in their lives (think high school graduation, end of compulsory education, etc. for back home). On the other, I was seeing the best behaved and most interesting of my students leave, knowing all the while that the worst behaved group of students in my town, arguably, would succeed them.

The Japanese love a good ceremony, and this was no exception. The preparation was intense, and the staff room had been gaining a progressively more and more stressful air as graduation came nearer. Even I was recruited to help - I helped pass out programs to the "important visitors" we had. This was quite the category, as people were invited from the Board of Education, other schools, and God only knows where else. The gym, the center of the ceremonies, was completely decked out in red and white, the ceremonial colors of good fortune and happiness, and flowers (both fake and real) graced most of the stage.

The ceremony began, as most do, with an official statement from the vice-principal ("This marks the start of the graduation ceremony!"). After that, everyone sang the "start of graduation song," which everyone but myself seemed to know, giving me the impression that it's a common aspect of graduation. Immediately following this was the school song, which I could at least join in at certain parts.

Then, suddenly, diplomas were being handed out. "Where are the speakers?" I thought in horror-turned-joy, for I realized that I would have quite a hard time looking attentive through several lengthy speeches in a language I don't understand. The diploma ceremony itself amused me for a couple of reasons.
1. My principal was wearing a coat with tails. He very strongly reminded me of a bellhop.
2. The walk to the podium was very regimented and ... clockwork. It was almost funny.
3. The first and last diplomas were read in full; all of the others were handed to the students only with the announcement of their names.
4. During the time when the students were rotating (as it seemed to be to me) to the platform, everyone was completely silent. The only sounds that could be heard were the faintly-playing recordings of the Chorus Competition songs for each of the classes.

After this, to my disappointment, the speeches began. Telegrams from teachers who at some point taught these students and wanted to make their well-wishes known were read aloud, and representatives from the Board of Education, the PTA, and others spoke. The main difference in these speeches from those made in American graduations was that each of the speakers had their speech written on a formal, folded piece of paper, which he or she than gave to the principal. To quote one of my mom's favorite (stolen from a movie and said in a French accent) lines, "Why? We do not know." Another odd part was the standing. At times, everyone stood during a speech; at others, only a certain group of students would, or just the teachers and the parents. I didn't question, but stood whenever I heard the word "shokken" (teachers) in the midst of a lot of Japanese from the teacher who played the role of Head of Ceremonies from behind the microphone.

After (and sometimes in between) the speeches, there were several times of singing. The graduating 3rd years sang to the 1st and 2nd years. Everyone sang to the 3rd years. The 1st and 2nd years sang to the 3rd years. In short, it was a lot of singing. Still, I rather liked this aspect of the ceremony, as the songs had special messages (I was told later) to the group to whom it was being sung. The songs from the 3rd years were full of thanks and good memories, while those sung to the 3rd years by the younger students and by the ceremony attenders at large were ones of well wishes and thoughts of the future. It had a good feeling about it, even if I didn't understand the words.

At long last, the graduating students left the gym as they had entered it, in lines of boy-girl pairs, the main differences being the presence of flowers in hands and tears in eyes. The 3rd years went back to their classrooms and gathered their things while those attending the graduation lined the walk to the front gates. They exited the school in ceremony, with cheers and clapping from their onlookers, finally leaving behind junior high forever...


...only to return most every day they could thereafter. :)

I gave out 5 presents to some of my favorite students: my four speech contest girls, and one other. She should have been in a special education class, but, because that is quite the black mark here even after school, she instead stayed in the normal class and fought through both the difficulty of the classes and the teasing of her classmates. While her English was at a level lower than that of any junior high school student, she tried so hard in class to do my games that I felt she deserved a little special attention.

All in all, it was a good experience, though I will say that I'm glad it's something I only have to go through once a year. (Speeches rarely grab my interest, especially when there's a rather tall language barrier involved.) I already miss my wonderful 3rd years...

Nagano

aka: MONKEYS!

I have a bad habit of avoiding posts like this one. The trip to Nagano was a full one; I don't want to leave anything out, but I have a hard time telling myself that I have the time to write up the entry properly. So, forgive my brevity - it's all in the name of getting something down "on paper."


Early on a Saturday morning, I met up with Caitlin, Odelia, and Aaron, and we made our way up to Nagano. This brought about my first ride on a shinkansen, or bullet train, and I can say we had quite the experience. There are two "classes" on the bullet trains - reserved, where you are given a seat number and are ensured a place to sit, and unreserved, where seating is first come, first serve. The former is some $30 more expensive than the latter, but, after our experience, I understood why someone who was riding the train for a while would want to do it.


So, we got to Nagano after several long train rides, only to embark on another long train ride (and, subsequently, a bus ride and a half-hour long walk) to get to the Jigokudani Monkey Park. The lengthy travel time was worth our while, however, for the monkeys were a wonderful addition to my "Look What I Did In Japan" stories.

For starters, there's no distinction between "monkey areas" and "people areas." In short, anywhere they monkeys want to go is classified as "monkey area," even if that might invade one's personal-space bubble.

All in all, though, the monkeys were cute and we had a good time.

After our run in with monkeys, the four of us went back to Nagano to see one of the largest wooden buildings in Tokyo, the Zenkōji temple. It was beautiful, and featured one of the better sights of my Japanese trips - a vending machine for protective charms.



Dark was falling as we left the temple, so we hurried to buy our famous, Nagano-only shichimi ("seven flavor") spice mix from Yawataya Isogoro and find a place where we could eat miso-flavored ice cream, both of which I officially label as "awesome and delicious." We then made our slow way back to the train station, claimed our spots on the Shinkansen (no problems getting seats on the ride back), and relaxed our way home.

One thing I should note is that I finally got my hands on an ekiben, or a "train station boxed lunch." I even bought a kind that is famous: the Takasaki "daruma bento," which comes in a box in the shape of a daruma doll. Sadly, I was disappointed by my bento for not being delicious and tasty. Perhaps I would do better to get one earlier in the day, rather than when the store is almost completely out of bento...

(Credit to Odelia for the shinkansen shot and the monkey-on-Leslie shot.)

Kimonos and McDonald's

...are two rather unrelated topics.

Yesterday, I asked one of my teachers if it would be OK for me to wear a kimono to graduation (tomorrow). Her reply was one of great hesitation. Yes, it would be fine, of course, but did I know how to put one on? Upon my negative response, she began to backpedal fiercely on her previous "yes."

Now, this is coming from the teacher who supports me the most on practically anything I bring her, so I found this sudden (and yet very Japanese) "I don't think it will work" to be somewhat troublesome. "I wish I had known earlier..." (...than two days in advance?) and "Do you really think it's possible?" became a constant litany in our conversation.

In the end, I figured out the problem: no one knows how to properly put on a kimono. In fact, most of the women on staff pay someone else to help them when they wear more formal attire, an affair that can cost anywhere from $50 to $100. Not only this, but one even has to have a consultation with these "kimono beauticians" (as my teacher called them) beforehand to make sure one has all the right pieces and that they coordinate with each other.

Does anyone else see a problem with this picture? So many things here are treated with such ceremony and with such commitment requirements that few ever seem to learn them. Ikebana, tea ceremony, kimono, kabuki ... and that's just naming a few ... are arts that are losing numbers at such rates that they are dying out as arts. Even saying that, though, something about keeping things traditional does seem to help them hold their magic, even when "magic" translates to "inaccessibility."

In short, I'm wearing Western clothes tomorrow, to my great disappointment. I don't know when the opportunity will arise where I could wear a kimono and "get away with it," but, in all likelihood, it will be at next year's graduation.

---

On a completely different note, I went to McDonald's for the first time tonight and spent a buck fifty on a hamburger and a drink "peh-ah" ("pair"). Amusingly, while the burger was what I was used to, the drink was what I would consider to be a children's size, though it may just be that I've not ordered a small drink in a long time. All in all, it tasted the same to me. So much for that!