Off to Kyoto

Hi everybody,

I had a wonderful, wonderful Christmas even though I was sick for Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday. I missed my end-of-year party because I didn't feel well, but I did make it to a Christmas Eve party and a Christmas Day get-together! I had dinner with my host family on Christmas Eve night (chicken, albeit not KFC), and afterwards went to a bar and socialized with a bunch of cool Japanese people for a couple of hours. It was a little terrifying being one of only two gaijin there, plus I was just getting over being sick so I felt kind of woozy, but I ended up meeting a bunch of cool people. I just wish I could speak Japanese better so we could have more meaningful conversations than "Where do you work?" and "How old are you?" and "What are your hobbies?" Little by little, I have to keep reminding myself!

Christmas Day I spent with a bunch of other ALTs with no place to go; we had a really fun time sitting around and watching "Christmas Vacation" and "A Christmas Story" and a couple of Disney cartoons. I think I've watched every Christmas movie I've wanted to see except Rudolph, so I'm happy! The day after I Skyped with every member of my family, and even though it kind of made me sad not to be with them, it made me happy to be able to talk.

I'm off now to Kyoto with my friend Anna. We'll be gone for about a week. We're taking the Shinkansen there tomorrow morning (because we travel in style), and staying in some cheap hotel once we arrive. A couple other of our friends are also going to be there, so hopefully we'll all be able to hang out once we arrive. (Side note: the Japanese word for "hang out" or "get together" is the same word as "play". "Let's play!" really means "Let's go do something." Does anyone else find that odd? If I go back to the States saying, "Let's play!" I'd sound like a 5-year old...)

I'll try to keep you posted on these end-of-year adventures. It will probably be a nice cheap trip of walking around and looking at famous buildings, and eating whatever food Kyoto is famous for. They're also calling for snow so that might be fun--! My first Japanese snow!

I hope you're all doing well and I'll write back in a week or so.

Love!

Jaimie

Vietnam

Remember a while back I told you about Sakura, the Vietnamese girl from my Japanese class? She'll call me once in a while to say hello and we'll always say we're going to get together, but we never do. This afternoon, though, we actually did hang out. I was still in my pajamas at three in the afternoon, still feeling kind of woozy but trying to rustle up something to eat, when she called. I explained the best I could that I was sick, but it didn't seem to make a difference. "Daijoubu, daijoubu," she kept saying. So I took a quick shower, threw on some clothes, and went to meet her at a restaurant near my house.

We didn't eat there, though, but instead drove to a cute Vietnamese restaurant called "Saigon" about 15 minutes away. The proprietor, a cute woman in her 30s, studied English a while back, and we were able to have a bit of a conversation. It was a strange feeling to be in a Vietnamese restaurant in Japan, speaking in a Japanese/English mix, eating Vietnamese food and listening to popular Christmas songs being played in Vietnamese. And what was even stranger was how much it reminded me of Greensboro! I miss Binh Minh and that other place off of Spring Garden St. (what is its name again...? Ah, Pho Hien, thanks, Google). It's just something about hanging out with immigrants from other countries that makes me feel like I'm right back in North Carolina, like I could walk outside and be on High Point Road (sketchy!). We ate Vietnamese "nabe" (hot pot), which is really similar to Japanese nabe except some of the vegetables are different and the sauce is spicier. And afterwards I got to have some delicious Vietnamese coffee--yum!

We talked about dating Japanese boys (both of them are married to Japanese men:"taihen!"/terrible! in their words, haha), about America, about learning English, about learning Japanese, about using chopsticks (why is everyone always so impressed?) and about clothes. Even if I was coughing every once in a while, the hot soup and coffee helped me breathe easier, and I left feeling almost all right. Fun times in Takasaki!

(Side note: I asked Sakura who she was able to speak Vietnamese with. She said she only had two Vietnamese friends in Takasaki. It was really nice to see her speaking so quickly to her friend, even though I didn't understand a word of it. All day long she goes about struggling in Japanese at work, at home, all around. It makes me appreciate the 100+ English-speakers I've met so far. . .imagine if I could only speak my native language with two people--! Taihen!!! )

Christmas @ School

Unfortunately all of my plans for a fun-filled Wednesday night fell through when I caught a nasty cold (from whom, I’m not sure; everybody is sick recently). I came home from school at 4:30 feeling like a ghost and crashed on the couch until 9:00, when I got up just to go to bed. So I missed the end-of-year enkai (party) and what seemed a promising karaoke experience, all because I got sick. On the bright side of things, I also saved myself 11,500 yen (60,000 for dinner, 25,000 for karaoke, 30,000 for a cab ride home). But I really was looking forward to it.

This morning (Thursday, the Emperor’s Birthday and a national holiday), I woke up at 6:00 and couldn’t go back to sleep since I had slept so much the day before. So I made myself comfy on the couch again, wrapped up in two quilts, and drank tea and read for a while before talking to my parents. Google Talk really does do the trick when Skype is down, like it was today.

But I digress.

I wanted to tell you about school.

We made balloon piñatas in my Special Ed class. The kids—there are seven of them—really enjoyed putting them together, and their decorations were fantastic! One boy hung origami cranes all over his, giving the Mexican tradition a Japanese flair; another kid made his into a head, drawing the features on the newspaper with magic marker and using pink construction paper for the hair. Mine, the one I filled with tiny presents from the hyaku-yen shop (dollar store), was a jumble of red, pink, and yellow tissue paper.

Since yesterday was the last day of school, it was the day we broke the piñatas. After learning the English words for “spin” and “hit,” we went to the “Friendly Room” (no joke, the フレンドリールム)where Ms. I and I had set everything up. We attached the piñatas to a thin green rope that hung from a bar on one side of the room to Mr. K’s hand, who stood on the desk opposite. I didn’t have a good stick to use, so we used my Mt. Fuji stick—more than a meter long! After a little squabbling about who would go first, the kids lined up. They really enjoyed having their turn at whacking the piñata (or the air) as hard as they could! But once it actually broke, they were so kind and polite to each other! I was astounded. I was so used to kids throwing themselves on the ground and beating each other up in order to hoard as much as possible, but these children stood by quietly waiting to be told what to do. I explained that there were enough presents (a pad of paper with a dog picture on it, an anime-themed pencil with a pencil tip holder, candy, and tissues) for each of them, and then they knelt politely down to pick up what was theirs. Oh, Japan!

Back in October, I had gone to an elementary school to pick up some ideas from an ALT there, and he inspired me to make Christmas cards for my students. He actually makes Halloween, Thanksgiving, and Christmas/New Year’s cards for the entire school (hell, he might even make Valentine’s and St. Patrick’s Day cards, too, for all I know) but after I started cutting the construction paper, I decided only to give them to the san-nenseis (3^rd years/15 years old). I made them green and red, with a green (or red, whichever the contrasting color was) tree, snowman, or star silhouette on it. With the help of two other teachers at my school, we managed to put all 120 cards together by the end of November, and I spent my free time in December writing variations of “Merry Christmas and Happy New Year! I wish you much happiness in your life!” on each card in curlicue cursive writing. I even tried to write a more meaningful message to the 15 or so students that I know better than others, like the ones I helped during the speech contest.

Before I passed out the cards (and after we watched “A Charlie Brown Christmas/Snuu-pi no Ku-ri-su-masu”) I first explained how the U.S. Postal Service works. Showing a small cardboard box wrapped in green paper with a red cardboard flag, I demonstrated how the postman takes note of the raised flag before taking the cards out. There were a few gasps of astonishment from the students, as here in Japan, you mail your letters in the orange post boxes scattered around town. You don’t leave mail at your door like back home, and you certainly don’t have a cute flag that raises and lowers. “So,” I told them, “When you write a card, you put it in the box, and raise the flag. Then I’ll know I have mail.”

I stole that idea from RG, as well: ask the students to send me a card that they write on their own time. I wasn’t really too sure how it was going to work out, but I am very impressed with the results! It’s not a lot, but 18 san-nenseis (and two ni-nenseis, who didn't even get one from me) gave me cards! All of them except two are homemade, and so super cute! Almost everyone said, “I really like your class” (even if it’s a lie, it’s sweet), and one boy promised me, “Hereafter, I will hold out English because I want to go the foreign country some day.” M, one of my favorite students but don’t tell anyone, wrote a long message in almost-perfect English, telling me at the end that sometimes I look sad, and that if I ever need anything I can talk to her. At the bottom she put her email address. I didn’t think I look sad a lot, but it was a very nice thing for her to say!

The cards are up top because I couldn't figure out how to put them down here. Enjoy! Merry Christmas, everyone!

Haruna Lights & Hiking in Agatsuma

Haruna Lake has a big Christmas Illumination [Ku-ri-su-ma-su I-ru-mi-ne-shyo-n] going on, but it wasn’t as impressive as I wanted it to be. Or maybe I would have paid better attention to the glowing lights if it hadn’t been so [expletive deleted] cold, or if I had prepared for it better, like with a fur-lined polar bear suit wrapped around me and fire in my pockets.

Mt. Haruna is only about a 20-minute drive from Misato, up into the mountains on a windy mountain road through a forest of bare-trunked trees (a little scary, actually; that little old blue lady could have been hiding anywhere in that darkness). But at the top of the mountain where all the people were, the lights were twinkling and there was a huge green “laser show” flashing all around.

I’ll say it again, boy howdy it was cold up there; I had on about five layers and was still complaining! I was in utter astonishment at the number of scantily dressed girls I saw, too. They were certainly beautiful in their short-shorts and pantyhose, but good grief, how could they manage?! I must be too American: comfort before style, always!

Liz and Angela and I had a good time wandering around and taking pictures of everything—us with the group of sexy firemen beside their fire truck. . . us with the creepy Santa Claus passing out omiyage. . . us with a group of juvenile delinquent Japanese college kids who kept following us around and speaking to us in incoherent English. There were strings of lights forming Christmas trees, wreaths, and hearts, and more lights lining the walkway, a child-sized airplane, an 1800s carriage, and a boat. There were even lights on the water. To add to the magical Chrismas air, they were playing Danny Elfman’s “Edward Scissorhands” music, making me want to spin in the ice like Winona Ryder.

The lights were beautiful, but my favorite part was eating the food (curry and rice, a hot dog with no bread, hot chocolate) and huddling around the bonfires that were scattered around the parking lot. Oh, warmth! We only stayed for about two hours because I just couldn't take it any more. When I got home, I thawed out under the kotatsu, eating my mom’s Chex Mix, a German stollen I got from Kaldi, and hot milk.

But, as if once were not enough, I went back again on Friday night because my friend Oren wanted to see the lights, too. It was mostly the same—really really really cold but with pretty lights—except that this time I got to practice my Japanese! Some little girls—one was 12 and in 6^th grade, the other was 14 and in 8^th (chuu gakko sannensei)—started talking to Oren and me in English and the four of us we ended up talking for about an hour! As we were having our English/Japanese conversation mix, one of the girls’ dad, an extraordinarily drunk Japanese man in a Santa costume, stumbled over and handed us cups of hot chocolate. And then a pair of bunless hot dogs sitting in a glob of ketchup. Then some yakimochi (?). Then a paper plate of French fries and fried chicken. He kept going to different vendors, grabbing whatever they were selling, and handing it to us! I got so full from all that street vendor food, but it was so delicious—and free! We took our picture together. I felt sorry for the little girl who kept trying to excuse his behavior. . . but she seemed used to it and not too bothered.

Later, after we went inside one of the dining tents and were huddling around the kerosene heater, the girl’s mom brought us cups of hot tea. I felt like a very privileged guest, and all I was doing was talking about which member of Arashi I liked (even though I didn’t have much to contribute . . . ) We left around 10:30, and I got emoticon-filled text messages from the girls for the next hour. They were really sweet, though, and it was a fun night. Yes, that was my Friday night: sitting around a heater on top of a mountain talking with a couple of middle school girls in Japanese.

Saturday night about the same, except that I was talking in English and there were no children. I was on a mountain in front of a heater, though. My friend Peter was in town on Saturday afternoon and offered me a ride up to Agatsuma, an area up in the mountains about 25 miles northwest of Takasaki, where some other JETs live and where I was going hiking on Sunday morning. Way in the middle of nowhere, our Saturday night consisted of watching half of Willow and half of Pulp Fiction before everyone fell asleep at 11:00.

Sunday morning was beautiful, though. We woke up bright and early at 8:00 and were at Seven Eleven to meet Ebachan and Friends by 8:30. (Ebachan is the guy who rents cars to ALTs and who also hosts mountain climbing/hiking adventures around Gunma. He’s in his 50s—or was it 60s?—and was joined by three other older Japanese men around the same age.) We had a lovely time, Jacob and Peter and the Japanese guys and me! The hike wasn’t too strenuous, even though we had to use chains to climb up some of the rocky parts. Unlike Miyogi, I didn’t think I was going to die on this climb. It was just like taking a stroll out on the Appalachian Trail in late fall: the brisk weather, the leaf-less trees, the ground a carpet of brown and crunch.

We stopped for lunch halfway down in a small picnic area overlooking the mountains around us. Even though we Americans hadn’t bought a very good lunch at the 7-11 (just a Snickers bar and some mixed nuts for me, and an apple all three of us were eating), the other climbers shared their rice balls, snacks, and fruit with us. Everything eaten outside always tastes better, and it was delicious. Afterwards, feeling full and complete, I laid down in the leaves, feeling the warm sun and smelling the crisp late-autumn-smelling air. I was feeling lazy and could have fallen asleep if I hadn’t been jolted awake by leaves being thrown all over me. Soon, they were all kicking leaves onto me, raking them up with their feet and hands, and I was quickly buried under a huge pile, with only my head sticking out. Ebachan made a crude wooden cross out of two sticks and stuck it in the ground at my head, and Peter took a picture of the four Japanese men and Jacob kneeling at my side with their hands under their chins in prayer and their eyes closed. In retrospect, the picture looks kind of creepy, but it was fun while we were doing it! I at least didn’t have to do anything: I just laid there with my eyes closed covered in leaves.

After the funeral, I burst through the leaves like a zombie--first one arm, then the other--and raked the dried leaves from all over me. Then we finished the descent down the mountain. The path took us through a magical-looking forest with widely-spaced trees and little undergrowth, over a tiny shallow steam, beside a (hopefully not-in-service but still scary) electric fence (a little incongruous with the rest of the scenery) and through a tightly woven bamboo forest that reminded me of House of Flying Daggers. Running through the thick branches of the short trees, brambles flying back and hitting people in the face, we could have been ninjas. It was exhilarating.

Back on the pavement, Ebachan & Co. drove off to soak in an onsen for three hours, while Jacob and Peter and I went back to Jacob’s to finish Pulp Fiction. I went home soon afterwards, on the 16:39 train, arriving in Takasaki at 5:33, just in time to realize I missed the 5:30 bus back home. Luckily, though, I ran into our lovely Gunma CIR at the station, who drove me the thirty minutes back to my house on her way back to Maebashi. (And thank you! thank you! for not making me wait until 6:25!)

It was a very fun chill weekend, unlike this one coming up, which is sure to be raucous from Wednesday, the night of the end-of-year-school-party, to Christmas. I'll let you know how it goes. Next post: a little more about school!

The Usual Chill & Pre-Christmas Festivities

I am buried under my kotatsu (a coffee table with an electric heater underneath, surrounded by a blanket to trap the heat at your legs), drinking hot tea and eating a pb&j and an orange, listening to Christmas music and waiting for L to call me about what we’re doing for New Year’s in Kyoto. When I came home from school today, I turned my kerosene heater on, and the thermostat told me the temperature inside my house was 9 degrees Celsius. Yes, that’s 48 degrees Fahrenheit. I know it’s going to get pretty old if I keep complaining about the temperature all winter—I mean, everyone’s house is cold in Japan, and it’ll probably be hovering in the 30s when I wake up in the morning most days this winter. So I’ll try to keep my bitching to a minimum, and not screech when I can see my breath in the kitchen or when boiling water becomes tepid in a matter of minutes. It’s just par for the course. But man oh man it’s gonna be a long winter!

I’m keeping warm for the most part, though: I’ve got this handy-dandy kotatsu, a gallon-sized hot water bottle that I sleep with every night under a pile of thick blankets, and the not-so-dangerous kerosene heaters. I should make out all right for warmth all winter, as long as I keep wearing several layers of clothing and heating only one room at a time. I remember reading in an Early Colonial America magazine (don’t laugh; I get into stuff like that) of a foolproof way to stay warm all winter with only one log: Go to the top floor of your house. Drop the log out the window. Run downstairs. Pick up the log. Run back upstairs with the log. Repeat process until warm. Ha. Ha. Ha.

Changing the subject, I’ve had some fun pre-Christmas events recently. On Friday night, about 25 Takasaki ALTs got together at a fancy-shmancy restaurant called Hanabi’s in downtown Takasaki for an end-of-year Christmas party. Because I miss all my friends at the CNNC, I asked if we could play the White Elephant/Dirty Santa gift exchange and it was a hit. I got a cool “I Heart Melbourne, Australia” t-shirt that I’ll wear with pride, and a three-piece sake set. I was also able to get rid of a bunch of leftover stuff from my predecessors, like a Japanese manga set I’ll never read, a weird pink stuffed animal, and some other randomness. After our dinner and gift exchange (the stealing went quite well; Nolo would have been proud), half of our group went off to sing karaoke until 1:00 in the morning. (And I, cough cough, sang a song in Japanese. And by sang I mean fumbled my way through the verses but actually got the chorus right--thank you, Soshi, for that Radwimps CD years ago!) I took a taxi back home and surprised myself by having a conversation with the taxista the entire 20 minutes back to my house. The conversation consisted mostly of how much—or little—Japanese I could speak, how long I’ve been in Japan, what I do here, how long I’ll stay, and directions to my house. I was thrilled I could reply “either one” to his question of “Which 25 should I take?”

SATURDAY

On Saturday, I had a fun morning cleaning—like every Saturday—before meeting Mr. K at the Gunma Library at 11:30. We went to his house, where I met his wife and 8-year old daughter, who regaled me with an origami Santa Claus card, absolutely adorable. Over a cup of tea, we talked in a Japanese-English mix about a variety of topics: easy things like where we worked, hard things like language. I was very impressed with his wife’s English, though, especially since the first words out of her mouth were, “I’m sorry I don’t speak English!” before giving her entire self-introduction in it!

This led to a conversation about language in general, like how today’s Japanese is different from the Japanese spoken even 100 years ago. I was also interested when, as we were discussing the merits and drawbacks of kanji, Mr. K said that there were kanji used in the newspaper that even normal Japanese people don’t understand! To give me an example, he picked up the local paper that was lying on the table, and, after skimming it for about 15 seconds, pointed out three kanji in a row that made up one word. He read it out loud, pronouncing them fine, but when he looked up he said, “I don’t know what that means.” So Dr. P was right: pronouncing words does not mean you understand them. Reading is understanding, not just putting the string of syllables together correctly.

After our little visit, Mr. K and I went to a tempura restaurant off of the Takasaki Loop. The rest of his family couldn’t go because his wife was sick, wearing the traditional white facemask that everyone around here wears when they have a cold. All the way to the restaurant we debated the finer points of Christmas and American Christianity in our grossly inaccurate ways, neither of us really able to explain ourselves the way we wanted to, but understanding enough to have a lively conversation. We got to the restaurant just thirty minutes to closing time, so we ordered fast. When our food came—a nice meal of fried vegetables and shrimp, rice, miso soup, pickled vegetables, and hot tea, with a glass of apple juice for dessert—Mr. K coached me on the proper way to eat in a Japanese restaurant. You pick each dish up to bring the food to your mouth, never bend over the table to bring your mouth closer to the food. “This is the way dogs eat,” he said, referring to bending over your food. “People pick their plates up.” Duly noted. I was a little self-conscious for the rest of the meal, but I think I did okay, considering how much I like dogs.

I saw two of my students at the Gunma Library when Mr. K dropped me off. It was so cool to see them without their blue tracksuit uniforms on! K was wearing a black t-shirt under an unbuttoned teal- and black-checkered shirt, and T had on a pink coat. (Funny how Japanese style can be so early 90s and so super hip at the same time.) My students looked like real people outside of school, not just carbon copies of each other. It was refreshing to see some individuality.

On Saturday night I had a date with A, G, and Australian L—we drove from Takasaki all the way to Ogo to pick G up, then all the way back to Maebashi to eat shabu-shabu (which I couldn’t quit saying every time I dipped the thin slices of pork or beef into the boiling water), then back to Ogo again to see a light show in the Flower Park for the five minutes we had before it closed. It was a fun evening, despite the miles.

SUNDAY

Sunday was my host mom’s Christmas party. I got to her house bright and early at 9:30 a.m. so we could drive to a community center a couple miles away to set up. I got to wear a Santa outfit—well, a Santa hat and red Santa-like jacket, at least. It was a fun party even though I felt a little out-of-place. The families of her English students—about 50 people in all—brought all kinds of food, and we played a bunch of different games. I won two toothbrushes for being the first to finish an English-language word search, but I didn’t even try to compete in the “Guess This Song” contest. I couldn’t tell Exile from Arashi if I tried. I had to make the beginning and ending speeches in front of the group as well, which I did in a mix of easy English and incomprehensible Japanese (Yoko-san had to translate my Japanese into a language the crowd could understand). In the off time when I wasn’t participating in games or activities, I read “The Three Billy Goats Gruff” in Japanese, with about 60% success.

My Japanese is getting better, bit-by-bit. I need to sit down and conjugate verbs (and adjectives, too) until I can say them without thinking. I have a mental block on the dates, also; no matter how hard I try to learn first, second, third, fourth, etc. I can never remember them! But I am having marginal success at some things, so I feel like there is hope for me.

Back to Christmas for a second: I miss normal Christmas activities back at home, like caroling （や）, singing Christmas songs at church（や）, having a tree（や）, etc. I hope that all of you back in the States are drinking store-bought eggnog for me, too. That’s the one thing I’m dying for that I can’t get anywhere, and even though I make it at home, it’s never as delicious as ol’ Maola makes it. And a big thank you to all my friends who have provided me with Rice Krispie Treats, Chex Mix, fruitcake, Moravian cookies, spiced apple cider mix, and other such holiday goodness. Christmas Day will be yummy and traditional!

Till next time . . . メリークリスマス！Me-ri--Ku-ri-su-ma-su!

Japanese Names 日本人の名前

Working at a school with about 400 students, I have a lot of names to memorize. Most of them are names I’ve never heard before (Hajime and Junpei come to mind) and some of them sound downright weird: Eigo (“English”), Wataru, Itta (the past tense of go???), Takanori (that last one reminds me of something you would eat, like yakitako). I have trouble pronouncing some names, especially the ones that start with RY: Ryo, Ryosuke, Ryota, Ryuuta. The students do love to hear me call out their names when I’m passing back papers, though; oh, how they howl at my mistakes!

I like that some names have a meaning in Spanish and are easy to pronounce: Noe (here, a girl’s name, not Noah), Risa (laughter), Reina (queen), Rio (river), Yuga (yoke, a bit weird…). I’ve also noticed that while in Spanish, “-a” is a girl marker and “-o” is a boy marker, it seems to be reversed in Japanese. Masaya, Keiga, and Shunya are all boys, while Masayo, Yukiho, Kaho, and Nao are girls. (A lot of girl names end with “ko,” “child,” too.) And there are Anglicized names, also, like Arisa or Anna.

It’s been an interesting experience to learn so many new names, and to try to match them with the faces, too! I’m still learning teachers’ names, and it will probably take me until next year to remember more than the 50 students’ names I know so far. I’m trying, though!

Here are my Top Ten Favorite Japanese Names I’ve heard so far, in order:

BOYS

1. Kohei (Kouhei) (You just can’t go wrong. Ko-hay. It sounds so nice!)
2. Daisuke (I love all those –suke endings on names, but Daisuke is my favorite)
3. Masaru
4. Masahiro
5. Takahiro
6. Daiki
7. Masaya (The Masa- and –hiro names just sound so strong!)
8. Kazuki
9. Shyou (Shou)
10. Kenji (an oldie but a goodie)

GIRLS

1. Mizuki (so beautiful-sounding!)
2. Chitose (I like the way it sounds: Chi-to-se, almost like chistoso/funny)
3. Ai (who could resist a girl named “Love”?)
4. Misaki
5. Miyu
6. Natsumi
7. Yuu
8. Megumi
9. Michiko
10. Yumiko (I like the –ko and the –mi, apparently)

If there was a kanji for “Jaimie,” I could use “美” (-mi) as the last sound (it means “beautiful”). Unfortunately, though, there’s no native Japanese sound for “Jei” in their syllabary. ジェイ美 looks funny, so I’ll just have to stick with ジエイミーor じぇいみい if I want to be snazzy. More’s the pity.

Koto

I was putting the finishing touches onto my Christmas English bulletin board (see above) when Ms. N, the music teacher, came up to me.

“Jaimie Sensei!” she said. “Do you know koto?”

“Um. . . “ (think think think) “. . . no.”

She mimicked strumming a stringed instrument with one hand, facing down.

“Like a guitar?” I asked.

“Mmmm. . . . ” (That means no.) “Do you know ‘Sakura’? Famous Japanese song?”

“Um . . . “ (think think think) “. . . no.”

“Come to the music room!” she said. “One, three or four time.” (First, third or fourth period.)

I didn’t know what a koto was, but I had first period free, so, dropping my bulletin board materials on my desk and putting off preparing for next week’s Christmas lesson for another day, I followed her up the stairs and into the music room.

I am impressed with my school’s music program: three huge rooms take up half of the third floor, two filled with instruments and one a large empty space where the band practices (and where I was serenaded a few months ago). Today we went back into the large room, its wooden floors covered today in large musical instruments I had never seen before, propped up between two chairs. They were long and wooden, with 13 strings made of white twine. They strings were numbered 1-13 on the side. White plastic Eiffel-Tower-shaped legs held up the strings, and, I discovered later, could also be moved to tune the instrument.

(Picture from http://library.thinkquest.org/05aug/00717/pages/instruments.html, not from my camera. Also, it says the picks are called tsume, which, I want to say, means fingernail in Japanese.)

“Dozo, dozo!” Ms. N waved me in cheerily. A woman I didn’t know, well-dressed but with what looked like exceptionally long claw fingernails, was already inside.

“Jaimie sensei, this is T-sensei,” Ms. N told me, then introduced me in rapid Japanese to the long-fingernailed woman. I caught “ALT” so I smiled and said yoroshiku onegaishimasu politely. She smiled back.

Ms. N shooed me over to the instrument in the back of the room. I sat in front of it, not knowing what to do. I was given three picks, which turned out to be what Ms. T had on her fingers as well: inch-long plastic fingernails fitted into red leather holders. I put one on my thumb and two on my index and middle fingers but didn't touch the koto.

Then the ichinensei (first year, 12-and-13-year old) students filed in. There was a twitter of “Jaimie-sensei!”, some awkward smiles, and a couple of rowdy, “Hello!”s at first, but they got settled in after a while. I sat through my first all-Japanese class like a real ESL student (or JSL student, as the situation would have it). First the bow, then the lecture, then the practice. I understood the word “rhythm” but the rest of the lecture was pretty incomprehensible.

When it came time to play, though, I felt great. We started off strumming up and down to get a feel for the instrument. The strings were more difficult to pluck than a regular guitar string, but the sound, if I played it with the right strength, was clear and strong. We started right off with a song that only used the sixth and seventh strings, written on the board in Japanese: 七六七六六七七六. (seven six seven six six seven seven six).

After that, our class was given free reign to make up our own songs. I composed a nice Asian-sounding melody before class ended, feeling proud of myself. And after class finished, Ms. T came over and showed me the famous “Sakura.”

When I walked into my second period class, I saw that I was teaching the same ichinensei group that I had just learned koto with. The English lesson for the day was the following introductions:

Her name is Jaimie.

She lives in Takasaki.

She is my English teacher.

She is good at piano.

She likes books.

She is 28 years old.

When we got to the “is good at” part, Mr. T wrote on the board, “She is good at koto” and everyone laughed.

Apples and Aesop

I forgot to mention A and I stopped by a vendor on the way up the mountain to buy some apples. We were able to go out in the orchard and pick our own--! Here is a view of the apple orchard (Apples: 1 kilo for 400 yen):

I made fried (and baked) apple pies when I came home. Oh, yum!

Also, I feel so happy that I can understand 75% of one of Aesop's fables in Japanese! I bought this kid's book the other day on a whim (it was only 350 yen at Bookman's Academy) and I've been reading it. Today I studied vocabulary and actually understand some of it!

ああ。。。おなかがすいたなあ。。。

そのとき、木の下にあかりが見えました。それは、はたらきつずけていた、あのありのいえでした。

きりぎりすにたべものをあげて、ありはそっといいました。

よくはたらけば、本とうにたのしいくらしがてきるんですよ。

きりぎりすははすかしくてかおがまっかになりました。

Ahhh...I'm hungry...

At that time, he saw a light coming from under a tree. It was the house of the hard-working ant.

After the ant gave the grasshopper some food, he said gently to him:

If you work hard (often?) it's true that you will live a good life.

The grasshopper felt ashamed, and his face turned bright red.

So my translation might not be perfect, but I think I get the gist of it. I even understand the "te" form from "Tabemo o agete." Thank you, Kotoba dictionary!

"I think I'm getting smarter! It's a piece of cake--!"

(said before I fall into the oubliette...)

Learning Japanese, Christmas, and the Gunma Mountains

The little things that remind me of home are enough to tide me over until I get there. Being able to talk with my friends and family on Skype (when I remember we have a Skype date, CG, sorry), smelling the autumn leaves as I walk through the woods, cooking familiar food, listening to familiar music I can download from iTunes--they all help ward off the sad, homesick feelings that can creep in every now and then. I'm also busy a lot--so busy that I wish the weekend was just a little longer so I could do fun exciting things and also have time to clean the bathroom. Japan is treating me so well, though, and I can't help but love it here.

My community Japanese class is over (I accidentally missed the last class because I went to watch Harry Potter instead) and doesn't pick up again until February. In the meantime, I have acquired a private tutor--a middle-aged Japanese woman who speaks almost perfect English from her time living abroad in England a decade ago. She tutors a lot of ALTs here in Gunma and I have heard her praises sung from a couple of people here. And if I'm going to learn Japanese, I'm going to need real lessons!

I went to her house on Saturday. I did an immediate double-take when I saw the full-sized Kawai grand piano in her living room. I've been keeping an eye out for pianos ever since I was a kid, much to my parents' embarrassment ("Oooh, can I play?!") "Do you play the piano?" I asked her in Japanese. "Yes," she told me. "Do you? How long have you played?" It took me a second to realize I have been playing for -- hold your breath -- twenty years now. I started when I was eight. "If we have time afterwards, you can play," she offered, and I was happy to find myself an hour later flipping through her terrific songbooks and playing. (She wanted me to play "The Star Spangled Banner" for some reason, too, which left me feeling terribly patriotic!)

We didn't have a real class, only an overview of what to expect. I'll start studying for the JLPT (Japanese Language Proficiency Test) that will be held in August. She'll teach me GRAMMAR! Verbs, adjectives, conjugations, real conversations: I'm so excited! She even has a little whiteboard in her living room, and stacks of JSL (can I say that?) books on the bookshelf. She's been teaching for a while, it looks like. I feel vaguely like I'm being a traitor to my other sensei from the kaikan, because he's such a nice, kind, grandfatherly figure, but . . . . I want a real class. I want grammar. I want English-Japanese explanations. And this will help me more.

After I met with her, J, his gf, S and I went to Costco again. I needed more Christmas cards, but of course they didn't have any . . . so I got vinegar and baking soda instead.

Sunday was beautiful. I woke up at 8:00, graded those papers I had brought home (ugh), then went to A's house. We had planned on going to Mt. Akagi and to Fujioka, but after two hours at Sakurayama Park, we just went back home, being lazy.

It was a beautiful drive down to Fujioka. Takasaki almost touches city limits with Fujioka, a town a few miles southeast of here. Fujioka is more mountainous, though, and the brilliant green evergreens contrasting against the deep blue autumn sky were gorgeous. The city was behind us, and the narrow mountain roads reminded us of just how in the country we were. Most of the leaves have fallen off by now, and only the brown or deep red ones remain, slowly dying and falling off the branches. At this park, though (Sakura = cherry blossoms; Yama = mountain), winter cherry blossoms were still blooming. There weren't as many as we would liked to have seen, but it was still fun to wander around the park and see the white blossoms on the trees.

At the base of the parking lot, vendors had set up tents, displaying their wares on big wooden tables. I bought some mochi from one lady, who said something about miso soup that I didn't understand. The parking attendant had also told us something about go-hyaku-en (500 yen) but we didn't see any place that looked like where we'd have to pay. We finally decided that we had misunderstood him and he had given us free entrance instead of forcing the issue. Thank you, parking attendant man, for having pity on two gaijin girls.

Tonight I'm making what I hope will be a delicious turkey and sweet potato soup, out of the turkey carcass from last week's dinner and the leftover (oji? what are they called?) potatoes I had bought for my party. I bought a huge stock pot at Costco for the express purpose of making soup all winter. That's what's going to keep me warm on these cold Gunma nights.

Christmas festivities are starting up. I want to see the illuminations at Mt. Haruna some weekend. The Takasaki ALTs are also having a Christmas party on Friday night. Closer to Christmas, my host mom is having a party, and then we have a date to eat KFC and Christmas cake on the 24th. Christmas is almost Valentine's Day-y around here; it's all about having a date at Christmas. Considering how nil my Japanese is, I'm kind of giving up on my dream Japanese boyfriend . . . but my host mom and I will have a wonderful evening I'm sure! Then I want to go to Maebashi Catholic Church for the English-Japanese-Portuguese-Spanish mass on Christmas Day. It's not exactly like being home and opening presents with my family, but it's something . . .

Accomplishments

• T came down from Hokkaido to visit for the weekend!
• We had a successful turkey dinner on Saturday, November 20. Cooked a 9-pound turkey in a microwave convection oven for about four hours. Hosted 12 people. Everyone brought something--dessert, a side dish, snacks, a guitar. . . and I never could have done all of it without A's oven in Maebashi: thank you! Also had seven people sleep over. Piles of futons all over my house.
• Ashikaga Wine Festival in Tochigi Prefecture. Bottle of wine, wine glass (inevitably breaking; thanks AB), and bottle opener for 2500 yen. Climbed a mountain and took some pictures.
• Got a membership card at Time Clip (movie rental place) and a movie that I can keep for a week for FREE! (Saleslady explained everything to me showing me a pamphlet and explaining it in maybe simple Japanese, but I still was surprised that she didn't want my money.)
• Went with Mr. K to get toyu (kerosene) for my heaters. He made me talk to the guy who worked there for Japanese practice. "とゆ、ください。”　”いくつリテロ？”　”１８。”　(Kerosene, please. How many liters? 18.) No problem. Then to a grocery store and drug store tour. And I learned when the cashier says, "Irasshaimase" you either don't say anything or you say, "Kore, kudasai" (this, please). There is no small talk ("Nice weather we're having, huh?") like in the U.S. According to Mr. K, "communication is small" in Japan. According to Dr. H at UNCG, Japan has a "high-context culture"--talking is not necessary. A certain type of telepathy exists among them, unlike in America, where we have to talk about everything.
• I'm starting to run to keep my blood flowing during these cold winter months. Got almost to the library (a kilometer away) without stopping. Today I went to Mitsudera Park, saw two of my students kicking a soccer ball, and ran twice around the park. I had to stop three times. Then I biked to the library (2 kilometers away?), got a Japanese detective novel, Harry Potter 1, and a book of haiku. Ignored the tables upon tables of my students in their uniforms hunched over their books. It was a beautiful day.
• Watched A order pizza online at pizza-la.co.jp. Now I know!

I had the chillest of chill weekends. Stayed home Friday night and most of the day of Saturday. Staying home most of Sunday, too. I love these weekends doing nothing. But accomplishing so much.

Cinema Experience

For all my film school friends out there who complain about the American movie experience (stupid people in the crowd being loud, cell phones going off, etc.) may I recommend flying several thousands miles to experience a movie in Japan? I saw Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part One last night and was just as impressed with the theater as I was the movie itself (which, being the HP fan that I am, I loved). Maybe all theaters aren't like the one I went to, but here's what I liked about the one I went to:

First, you get to pick your seat when you buy your ticket. The computer screen faces you, and after you tell the friendly cashier (or surly cashier who maybe hates gaijin) what movie you want to see, the available seats pop up on the touch-screen. Your seat number is printed on your ticket, so no one argues over seating.

Second, the previews and commercials are funny because you don't understand them. There were about 10 minutes of commercials, some which were really weird. What is really up with that Honda commercial and the guys in superhero costumes? I was also impressed with the 5-minute presentation on UNICEF's Clean Water Project that this theater is helping with. Maybe they just showed it because it's almost Christmas, but it was nice to see theaters chipping in with a very noble cause to help communities in various countries in Africa and Southeast Asia. But none of the previews for American movies looked good to me at all--sorry, Tron fans.

Most theaters have a cheesy intro right before the movie starts, requesting movie-goers to turn off their phones and please go get some Coke, because aren't you sooooo thirsty? But the intro at this theater was very. . . Japanese. Simple and to the point. Black and white pictures showing a cell phone, a couple talking, and a cigarette, all with a "no" signs across them. Violin music in the background. "Please refrain from talking during the movie kudasai," "Please refrain from smoking in the theater, kudasai." So kind and polite, in English and in Japanese. Everyone in the theater in silent, rapt attention, a state in which they stayed for the two-and-a-half-hour running time of the movie.

After Harry Potter ended with [spoil spoil spoil], I expected the house lights to come on and the people to start scurrying out before "Daniel Radcliffe" and "Rupert Grint" even flashed across the screen. But no such thing. Only ONE COUPLE snuck out, but the rest of the crowd remained in the still-dark theater throughout the entire credit roll, silently reading the list of gaffers, best boy grips, and stunt performers. I doubt that many of people in the audience could read all that English--I mean, I wouldn't want to watch the credits rolling in a language I didn't understand--so I'm doubly impressed. I've never been to a mainstream movie theater (and this one was on the third floor of a *mall*) where 99% of the crowd watched the credits and the theater stayed dark during them. I wished you UNCSA people could have been there to see it. You would have been so proud.

Pride and Falls, Etc.

I heard somewhere that your highs are higher and your lows are lower living in a foreign country. It's so true. If something good happens (like I have a successful conversation with someone, or understand someone's sentence), I'm on top of the world. But if something bad happens, I come crashing down, devastated and wanting to hop on the nearest flight back home.

It's little stuff too that gets me down. Like yesterday. I went to Saty (supermarket) to pick up some things I need for dinner this weekend. I was in such a good mood, feeling like I knew what I was doing, I could get around, I had my dictionary on me so I could ask if nani-nani was there, and hey, I've been here almost FOUR MONTHS so I am no stranger any more. Ha. Ha. Ha. The problem was that everything I was looking for was so Western I couldn't find it anywhere. After 20 minutes of going up and down every aisle in the place and feeling people's eyes boring into me (which probably isn't even true, but I get paranoid), I left with just a few things. I didn't even get easy things like butter and milk because I didn't want to be there one minute longer! Then the cashier asked me a question and I looked at her blankly--I'm getting so good at that "what-did-you-just-say" expression. Luckily she repeated herself in English, and I was grateful.

I couldn't find black raspberry Jell-O at the other store either (I know, laugh, laugh, laugh). I did ask one of the salesladies if they had gelatin, though, and she showed me two packages. They looked plain, though, and I needed flavored. "Hang on a second," I muttered in English, fumbling around for my dictionary so I could find the word I was looking for, but couldn't find either one. She stood by politely, but I couldn't find the word I wanted to use, and I felt antsy and pressured. "Nevermind," I said in English, then in Japanese said, "It's okay. It's okay." I'm sure she wanted to help, but wasn't sure what I was looking for.

Today G and I went to Aeon to buy baking dishes and to have dinner. He waited for our hot plates to come out, and I went to McDonald's to get drinks and fries to go with it. I was trying to tell the cashier that I wanted two drinks: one large Coke and one small ginger ale. I obviously said the wrong thing, though, because she made TWO large Cokes to go with my ginger ale. And all I could do was stare dumbly at the tray and say in English, "But that wasn't. . . nevermind." I could have pressed the issue and explained myself, but it was so much easier just to pick up the tray and forgo the extra 200 yen. And I felt like my night was ruined. Because of one little incident!

It's just--oh! The incompetence! The impotence! The not being able to communicate, not to be able to say simple things in an understandable way. I could have lived in any of the 22 Spanish-speaking countries or 53 English-speaking ones, but no. I need a good challenge. Feeling incompetent is good for my over-inflated self-esteem.

So I have to say what I always say: Ganbarimasu! I'll keep trying......

What Time Do You Go to Bed?

My first year junior high school students (ichi-nen-seis, comparable to American 7^th graders) are studying time expressions. Last week they learned “What time is it in London/Australia/China/Japan/etc.?” This week they are learning, “What time do you get up/have breakfast/come home/go to bed?” We play a quick warm-up game to get them shouting time expressions at the top of their lungs, T-sensei introduces the vocabulary and grammar, the students listen to T-sensei ask me about my daily schedule (and are fascinated that I go to bed at 11:00 and get up at 6:30!), then the students fill in a schedule in their books with their own answers.

For the most part, what they write is fairly standard. “I wake up at 7:30. I eat breakfast at 7:40.” (Everyone seems to hop right out of bed and run to the breakfast table, according to their schedules! Do they all take baths at night?) “I go to bed at 10:30.” There are a few “I go to bed at 11:30”s, but the majority of the kids—12- and 13- year olds—are getting about seven or eight hours’ sleep every night. One girl even goes to sleep at 9:30 and wakes up at 7:00. Now that’s a schedule I can get down with.

Then there are these other kids. “I go to bed at 1:00 a.m. I wake up at 5:00 a.m.” WHAT? Did I just read that right? “I go to bed at 12:00 a.m. I wake up at 4:30 a.m.” Sorry, come again?

“Why?” I ask one student, the cute girl with pigtails and bright red glasses who gets up at 5:00. “What do you do that early?” She doesn’t understand. I rephrase. “What time do you come to school?”

“Oh, seven o’clock,” she replies casually, as if it were the most natural thing in the world. “Brass band.”

“Why do you go to bed so late?” I turn around to ask the kid who goes to bed at 1:00 a.m. and gets up between 4:00 and 5:00. He always seems awake enough in class but his eyes do look tired.

He doesn’t have enough English to really understand my question, but my incredulous expression passes straight through the language barrier. He answers me in Japanese. “Benkyou,” he says. Studying.

“Do you go to juku?” (Juku is cram school, a place where a lot of junior high and high school students spend their after-hours and weekends cramming for extra subjects or to get extra help.)

He nods. I inwardly gasp.

I point to the schedule where he had written, “I come home at four o’clock in the afternoon.” “Do you sleep at 4 o’clock? Do you go to bed then?” I ask.

Either he doesn’t understand me or he really just doesn’t sleep, because he shakes his head. He points at, “I go to bed at one o’clock.” “I go to bed,” he tells me.

After class, as T-sensei and I are gathering our materials, I ask him, “Why are the kids going to bed so late and waking up so early? They are so busy!”

“This is the life of a Japanese junior high school student,” he says dryly. He doesn’t say anything more, and I don’t feel like it would be appropriate for me to scream, “But that’s crazy!” So I am quiet.

Earlier today, one of my ni-nen-seis (2^nd year students) had told me he had gone to bed at 1:00 a.m. the night before too, because he was doing his homework. In this case, I would believe that he had just slacked off until the last minute, instead of having a legitimate excuse. (He’s the student who won’t get his work done during the 50 minutes of class time, the 20 minutes of extra time at the lunch break, or after school. You could give him the rest of eternity and he’d be too busy goofing off to actually do his work.)

But these other kids. Is it common that Japanese students wear themselves out studying? There is a lot that has surprised me about the school system here, but nothing seems quite so shocking as the fact that so many students are stretched so thin. It’s not just school. It’s school, cram school, piano lessons, tennis club, judo club, private tutors, Sports Day, speech contests, entrance exams . . . the list goes on and on. Most kids are wearing their uniforms seven days a week! Drive down Highway 25 in Takasaki at 8:00 on a Saturday morning and it’ll be bustling with uniformed students on their way to cram school just like it was a weekday. When do they rest? When do they sleep? When do they have—heaven forbid—free time? How do they get to love Arashi and AKB48 and One Piece if they’re always glued to their notebooks?

It’s not that I’m not an advocate for education. (I mean, look at those double negatives! Of course I want children to study!) But I wonder when can kids be kids here?

I think back to when I was a junior high school student (except we call them middle schoolers) back in the mid-90s. Sure, the school was in the middle of nowhere—there was only one middle school and one high school for the whole county—but there were still plenty of clubs and teams to participate in. I ran track in seventh grade and took piano lessons once a week in town. In high school I was in the drama club and the Spanish club and sang in the Chorus. But that was about the extent of my WCMS/HS participation. And I don’t ever remember feeling exhausted as a child. I mostly remember coming home from school, doing my homework, and playing outside until it got dark. And you can bet my parents had me in bed before ten o’clock when I was thirteen years old, too!

So why are Japanese and American students so different? It’s not that Japanese kids are particularly smarter or more well-behaved than American kids. There are plenty of students at GMJHS who don’t take school seriously, who talk during class, who do their homework at the last minute (or not at all), who slack off. But their lifestyles seem to be different. In Japan, kids’ lives seem to revolve around school. In America, school is something to put up with until you’re eighteen.

I guess there are American kids—most of them mid-to upper-middle class—who are just as busy as the kids are here. (Read Unequal Childhoods by Annette Lareau for a really good comparison between the kids who have strictly regimented weekly schedules filled with soccer and music lessons and trips to Europe and the kids who don’t.) But those kids don’t make up the majority of the population in America like they do here.

Am I so backwards that I don’t think filling a child’s every minute with activities is the best way for them to have a healthy, happy life? Kids need sleep. Kids need to play. Kids need time to be creative and fill their free time the way they want. I can’t imagine being twelve and having so many expectations put on me. What if school is hard for me? Do I just study more?

Do I say, "Oh, it's just the way it is?" I can't help but feel sorry for my students. Are they used to it, though, so it's okay? Am I being too culturally-centric to understand the deeper meanings here? What do you think?

Tokyo Interior: A Play in One Act

Conversation Between Saleswoman at Tokyo Interior and Me (100% Japanese)

I see a rug I like, marked for 6800 yen. A red 40% off sign is beside it. A saleswoman is approaching.

Saleswoman (under her breath): Irrasahimase. (Welcome, come in, etc. Everyone in stores greets their customers with this line).

Me (going up to her and pointing at rugs): Excuse me. How long is this sale until?

Saleswoman: Japanese, Japanese, Japanese, Japanese, let me see. (Looks at sign.) (Continues talking in comprehensible Japanese.)

Me: I want this rug. But today I don’t have money. Next week, will it be here?

Saleswoman: Mmmmmm. (Takes bar-coded prices out of the plastic sleeve. Shows me two tickets. Speaks in Japanese.)

Me (switching tactics): Maybe it will be here. Maybe it won’t be here. Maybe I can buy today. Is VISA okay?

Saleswoman: VISA card?

Me: Yes, VISA card.

Saleswoman: It’s okay.

Me: Can I see it?

Saleswoman: Sure. (We both take it off the rack and place it on a stack of rugs nearby.)

Me: I like it.

Saleswoman: (Smiles.)

Me (pointing at 40% off sign and at 6800 yen sign): Is this the last price? Is it [in English, “40% off”] now? Is it 5000 yen? 4000 yen?

Saleswoman: Japanese, Japanese, Japanese, Japanese. Wait just a second, please. (Runs off.)

Me: OK.

Me (to myself): Am I having a conversation in Japanese?

Saleswoman (returning): (Points to 40% sign.) 6800 is already 40% off. 6800 is the [in English, “last price”].

Me [in English]: Mmmmm, let me think.

Saleswoman: (Looks at me quizzically.)

Me [in Japanese]: To think. (Makes thoughtful face. Puts finger on temple in “Thinking” pose.)

Saleswoman: (Maybe gets it.) Japanese, Japanese, Japanese.

Me [in English]: Maybe I can come back. Today I will not buy it. Thank you for your trouble, though.

Saleswoman: Oh, it’s okay.

Me & Saleswoman: (Put the rug back on the rack.)

Me: I’m sorry, just a little Japanese.

Saleswoman: It’s okay. Just a little English.

Me: Thank you a lot. Maybe I will come back.

Saleswoman: Thank you. Japanese, Japanese, Japanese.

Me: Thank you.

(End Scene)

Christmas is Coming the Stores Are All Crowded...

I've been bugging my mom for piano sheet music recently, so she sent me a stack of the hymns I wrote about earlier and the music to a cantata our church did in 1997 (?) called "That's Christmas." Tonight I went to my host mom's house for dinner, and before we ate our Chinese stir-fry, rice, and salad, I got to bang on their beautiful Kawai piano for half an hour. Of course the family didn't recognize any of the songs (American families don't know this cantata!), but I was transported back to high school, with Josh singing, "Do not be afraid, Mary...." and everyone else bellowing out, "Where is the Child?!" vigorously. (And remember when Jonathan thought "laud" was Southern for "Lord"? Of course, he was 10 at the time, but still...it was funny.)

Christmas is already all over Japan. All the stores are playing Christmas music and they all have Christmas decorations up. But I'm thinking about the Thanksgiving dinner I'm going to miss in two weeks! (I'll have my own version here, I'm sure, but it won't be exactly the same.) I wonder what Christmas will be like. My host mom has invited me to her house, where they celebrate the Japanese way: eating KFC and cake. Not exactly my mom's glazed ham, but it'll have to do, I suppose! Maybe Christmas is like home: wherever you are, you make it yours.

Language, Time Capsules, and Japanese Class

“Sumimasen” (すみません) is a magical word. Depending on context, it can mean “I’m sorry,” “Excuse me,” or “Thank you,” and it can get you out of almost any pickle you happen to find yourself in. JTE talking too fast? “Sumimasen, can you repeat that, please?” You trip over someone on the train? “Sumimasen, sumimasen!” (and throw in a “gomenasai”—the real “I’m sorry”—too, for good measure, so they’ll quit thinking darkly, “Pinche gajin…These foreigners are ruining our country!”

I felt happy yesterday because I felt like I helped the gaijin cause. First, the woman behind me in line at the sushi counter dropped a 100-yen coin but didn't realize it. When I picked it up and handed it to her, with a maybe impolite, “Anata-no desuku?” (Is this yours?) she gave me a shocked look, stared incomprehensibly at her palm with the other coins in it, and stared back at me. Then she let out a string of “sumimasen”s, which could have meant, “I’m sorry to have troubled you,” or could have been, “Thank you so much for your trouble!” or maybe, “OK, thank you, goodbye.”

Then on the bus headed home from the Takasaki train station, a woman’s wheeled suitcase flew across the floor when the bus driver took a turn too fast. Since I was the closest to it, I picked it up for her and rolled it back to her seat. “Sumimasen! Suminasen!” she cried. Score two for the white girl.

(This may or may not balance out the butter incident in Tako-machi, Chiba-ken. I put two sticks of butter on the counter to pay for them. The cashier looked at me, looked at the butter, looked at me again, and asked hesitantly if I want a bag. No, thank you. Is a sticker ok? Yes, quite ok. He put the stickers on the butter and slid them across the counter to me. I showed my wallet. Aren’t I supposed to pay for these? He made an embarrassed noise and rang them up. 200-odd yen. I paid, got my change, left. Half-way back, I realized he only charged me for one. Do I go back? How do I explain? Did he do it on purpose? Was he too shaken up by the sight of a non-Japanese person that he forgot what he was doing? In the end, I didn’t go back, and I let my guilty conscience accompany me home. I still feel kind of bad about it.)

----------

HOUSE

There is something absolutely comforting about being in my apartment—wrapped up in a quilt on the couch, or curled up on my 4-layer deep futon—that just seems like home. I wonder, though, if home is just anywhere I am, if I just make it home. No matter where I’m living, it seems like I always end my day writing in my diary and reading a book. Last night before I turned out the lamp, I looked at my bookcase and saw the same titles that have accompanied me for the past ten years: some Ray Bradbury, some poetry, some Cortázar, and a bound blank book that serves as journal. I guess it’s these rituals that keep me grounded.

Speaking of rituals and being grounded, I got an email yesterday from Forbes.com. Apparently, I had signed up for its 5-Year E-Mail Time Capsule on November 8, 2005. I’m not going to copy the whole thing, but here’s part of it:

“Well, it’s noon on Tuesday, November 8, 2005. I’m sitting in my office at [X] in Greensboro, North Carolina….I’ve got a lot of plans for the next five years and I really hope they happened.

1. Travel to Mexico, Argentina, Bolivia, and/or London. AT LEAST Mexico!!!

2. MOVE OUT OF THE HOUSE I’M IN NOW and get a real house in the country with lots of room and space for a garden and animals.

….

4. Be happy.

I am 23 years old right now. I will be 28 in five years. Lord, Lord, Lord.

…

And so, I leave you here, at 12:08 p.m., sitting in this office wearing your fuzzy GAP pants and shirt, about to take a phone call.

Love,

Jaimie”

Funny, isn’t it, how time flies. In 1997, I put together a “time capsule” in a checkbox, taped it all together, and wrote in capital letters: “DO NOT OPEN UNTIL AUGUST 29, 2007, 1:07 P.M..” When the allotted hour arrived, I tore open the tape eagerly, having forgotten everything I had put in there. And much was my disappointment when all I found from 15-year old Jaimie was a couple of pictures of Leonardo DiCaprio, some plastic hair clips, pages ripped from a teen magazine, and something written about a boy I had a crush on then (yeah, you know who you are). I think I had just been cleaning my room back then when the urge to preserve some part of my life struck me—or maybe I was just bored with straightening up?—so I packed it up quickly from random objects strewn around my room. Next time I’ll have to do a better job.

But back to this 2005 time capsule. Well, in the past five years, I’ve managed to go to Mexico three times and Bolivia once, although I still haven’t gone to Argentina or England. And I can certainly say I moved out of my house…. and city…and state….and country….Check. Of course, Japan isn’t really known for its “lots of room and space for a garden and animals” but I guess I’ll get that when I go back home to stay. I will also say I feel quite happy with my life now (except when I'm in Japanese class, as you will see below). I just wish I knew where those fuzzy GAP pants and shirt were. . . .

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Japanese Class

It still gives me a headache. Yesterday, I was so stressed out from 2 hours of not understanding and not being able to communicate (“Quit giving me new assignments when I don’t understand the old ones!!!!”) that as soon as I got in my car and drove ten feet, I screamed at the top of my lungs for 30 seconds. It didn’t help. I went home and did 20 push-ups quick. It still didn’t help. I was furious, furiously furious like I haven't been in a long time. I threw on my tennis shoes and pounded down my neighborhood streets in the dark, stopping at the corners and high-speed jump-roping until I was so out of breath my lungs hurt. After about 20 minutes of this madness, sprinting and jump-roping, I wore myself out. I stumbled home and sprawled out on the couch for the next hour, sipping water and trying to breathe. Then I read “Dance, Dance, Dance” and went to sleep.

This morning I woke up and my knee hurts again.

What does this tell me about teaching a foreign language? About language-learning? About me as a teacher and a student? What can I learn from all this?

Chi-Chi-Chi-Chiba

(I'm breaking this up into two blogs in one day: EVENTS and NOT-EVENTS)

#1: EVENTS

So I spent the weekend in Chiba, a flat, dog-shaped prefecture a couple of hours southeast of crane-shaped Gunma, visiting my friend M. After the mountains of Gunma, Chiba seemed remarkably flat to me as I rode out to Narita Airport on the train. To get to M’s little town, you take the JR (Japan Rail) from Takasaki to Ueno, then switch trains to an entirely different line I’ve never heard of, then take a bus for thirty minutes out to the inaka (countryside), admiring the rice fields and evergreen trees as you go. From there, it’s another 5- or 10-minute walk to his apartment. Traveling in a foreign country is always so fun!

Most of Saturday was spent at the Tako Junior High School PTA Bazaar (or ba-zaa, as they say in Japanese). It reminded me of any little festival back home: tables set up outside, food venders wandering around, arts and crafts displays in the big community building, secondhand and super cheap new things in another building. And everywhere were Tako JH kids milling around in their nice navy blue track suit uniforms, selling hot dogs, apple cider, popcorn, or bento boxes of sushi, and throwing "Hello!"s out at us, the two non-Japanese people. M had convinced his JTEs that he should volunteer, too, so not ten minutes after we arrived, we found ourselves in aprons selling hot sweet potatoes.

It was kind of fun to stand beside a huge fire pit—like a barbeque pit but much smaller—calling out, “Irasshaimase! Yaki-imo! Hyaku yen! Kaitte, kudasai!” (which should mean, if I was saying it right, “Welcome! Sweet potatoes! 100 yen! Buy one!”) Being on the other side of the "Irasshiamase!" was also fun, because I got to be as loud and nasally as I wanted! The attendees—mostly middle-aged or older women with huge empty shopping bags under their arms to put their bazaar goods in—either seemed delighted or terrified of me, but in either case, I still managed to sell about 10 or 15 potatoes before heading to the bazaar myself.

Neither M nor I had brought shopping bags (not thinking we’d really want anything), but after a few minutes in the huge barn/gym/community center place, we realized we probably should have. I picked up a 500-yen t-shirt (and Jonathan, you’d better like it, too, if it fits, that is), a 50-yen sweater (best purchase all day), a 50-yen bag, a 200-yen bag of kitchen towels, a 200-yen pair of sweatpants, and 100-yen toilet cleaner! M got a brand-new coffee maker for 400-yen, which was also a pretty stellar purchase, and some other stuff. After all of our loot was bagged, a 13-year old kid asked us if we wanted any help getting it to our car.

Oh yeah. Getting home. We hadn’t driven, though: M had ridden (had rode?) his scooter, and I biked, neither modes of transportation really full of storage space. We stuck our bags in another building for the time being and decided to cross that carrying everything home bridge when we got to it.

In the meantime, we continued to shirk our duty as potato salesfolk and went to see what was happening in the community arts building. (We were still wearing the aprons, though, so they'd think we were working...) There were students' art pieces hung up on huge displays in the main hall: bright paintings of the beach, self-portraits done in pencil, various watercolors, and a big display of calligraphied kanji. M and I spent a good 20 minutes reading the hiragana and struggling over the kanji: I might have recognized 10 out of 200. Nature photographs (taken by adults this time) lined the walls down the hall. In another room was a scene straight from the North Carolina State Fair: tables of handmade arts and crafts from the autumn and winter holidays. There were knit and crocheted sweaters hanging up, Halloween-themed wall hangings, silver spray-painted flower arrangements, and ceramic animals, mixed awkwardly with the more traditional Japanese masks and art. It was nice to see it all, though. It felt like home.

At 3:30, we snuck into the auditorium, where some performances were already going on. We listened to a couple of men in 1940s voices sing love ballads in high, nasally voices that almost sounded Chinese. We watched a traditional Japanese dance that involved men in expressionless masks circling around the lead singer in a brilliant gold suit. And we marveled over a group of absolutely gorgeous and scantily-clad Japanese women dancing the hula, wearing coconuts and grass skirts. The dancers were soon joined by older women in more modest clothing, but who could also dance to Hawaiian music like they had been born there.

At 4:15-ish, the show finished, we managed to stuff all of our purchases onto M’s scooter and rode home. (Side note: the fastest I could bike was 29 kilometers an hour—about 18 miles an hour—for about half a minute. Keeping up with a motored vehicle on a bicycle ain’t all that easy, though.)

I had to leave Sunday morning, so the rest of Saturday was pretty chill: we made New Zealand lolly cake (involving some kind of fruity, gummy candy I’d never heard of before) and watched anime before playing two extremely competitive games of chess. I almost won one. But lost them both.

The ride back to Takasaki took over four hours: 30 minutes in bus, 70-minute train from Narita to Kesai-Ueno, walk from Kesai-Ueno to JR Ueno, then on a train for 2 more hours until Takasaki. It was funny, though, how competent I felt. I guess because I know how to read a map, and because everything's in English. I can get myself around by myself, and I feel kind of cool. It was also nice how familiar the mountains of Gunma seemed when they first appeared from the window. It’s like I said last time I went on a trip: coming home now feels like coming home, the way I used to feel when I saw the “Greensboro City Limits” sign from I-40. Except this time, it says, "高崎."

Catch-Up

Hi everyone,

I'm sorry I haven't written for a few days--I'm sure you've all been holding your breath in anticipation! I just wanted to write a quick note and let you know I'm still alive and well over here. It's still mostly cold and rainy, but some days, like today, are spectacular and autumn-y. Unfortunately, they're also the days spent inside all day; by the time I leave after 4:00 there is only about an hour of daylight left.

My Halloween was fun: on Friday I watched "The Ring" and "The Others" with a group of friends in Takasaki, and on Saturday I joined almost 100 more people in a two-room bar for a huge Halloween Costume party. I didn't take too many pictures but those I have are on Facebook if you want to see them. I went as the Year of the Dog and was told either that it was a fantastic, original idea, or that it was too hard to figure out and what was I thinking....

I went to my Japanese class yesterday and it was definitely one of the best so far! (I skipped it last week because I had to prepare for my English class on Tuesday morning.) Another student joined Sensei and I, a Chinese guy in his 30s who speaks about as much Japanese as I do. Of course, he also has a huge start on me with the kanji: any word he doesn't understand, he just asks the teacher to write it for him, and he immediately gets it. The teacher had a lesson plan, too, even though he expected us to absorb much more vocabulary than is humanly possible in one night. Over the course of the two-hour class we studied:

• fruits and vegetables
• numbers
• body parts (in way too much detail: he was even giving us the name for each individual finger! I did feel smart for a second though because I guessed "naka-yubi" 中ゆび was middle finger and I was right!)
• counters (the ending to the word changes according to if what you're counting is paper, trees, animals, people, cylindrical objects, etc.)
• sicknesses and ailments ("throw up" is "hakikega shimasu" はきけがします if you need to know)
• verbs and nouns ("I BRUSH my TEETH," "I DRINK TEA," etc.)

I wanted to interrupt him and tell him I would feel much better if we could practice what we learn, but he seemed happy just telling us without having us practice. I did get a lot out of the class, though, and feel like I learned something, even though he broke the "10 new vocabulary words a day" rule.

My English classes at school are also helping me with Japanese, since they're conducted primarily in that language. All the teachers write the vocabulary lists bilingually on the board, so I'm picking up some of what the students are learning. Today I learned, "ii ii n desu yo" = "That's all right."

School is going well. I really love the teachers and the students--most of them, anyway! The 14-year old girls call me Lady Gaga in the hallway (don't ask) and the boys all yell, "Hello!" at me without waiting for an answer. It apparently is hilarious to speak in English to me, too, because every time I walk past a group of students and say, "Hi!" or "Good morning" or what have you, they respond and then immediately burst into peals of laughter. I'm glad I'm good for that. I also understand why no one can really pronounce "Hello" the way I think it should be: the katakana for it is "Ha-ro." Maybe it's the British way?

Today we had an earthquake and fire drill, which consisted of hiding under our desks for 10 seconds before immediately running (literally: RUNNING) down the stairs and out the door into the soccer field. The firemen gave the students a 20-minute presentation on how to use a fire extinguisher while I didn't understand anything in his speech but "3-5 meters" (san-go metoro). It was nice to be outside, though.

Tomorrow (Wednesday) is another holiday--! This time Culture Day. I'm planning on spending it at my apartment cleaning and doing laundry before going to the park and to a friend's house to play the piano. I want a low-key, do-nothing day, and I'm pretty sure that's what I'll get. I'm going to Chiba (a few prefectures over) for the weekend, so I need to rest while I can before I hit the ground running. Tonight I've studied Japanese, conjugated about 15 verbs, and eaten some delicious homemade chicken and vegetable soup. I might watch E.T. before I go to bed: I've been thinking about it ever since I was planning the Halloween lesson at school (I ended up using "Monster Mash" instead of clips from the movie, though).

Sorry there's nothing too exciting going on recently, and that my writing is taking a sharp downhill curve. Hopefully I'll have more to talk about as time goes on. Thanksgiving is just around the corner, as is Christmas and New Year's! My, how time flies--!

Saitama

I spent most of the day today (a Gunma holiday, no school) in Saitama at Costco! As in, American Costco! I gawked at the pumpkin pies from the bakery, the Swiss Miss Hot Cocoa, the Tide detergent, and lost count of how many times my friends and I said, "They've got [fill in the blank]!" It was nice to feel "at home" for a bit. Then I ate a slice of pepperoni pizza and basked in its deliciousness.

Funny how at home, I never ate at McDonald's or KFC, and rarely drank Coke, and was so nice and healthy and organic, and I come to Japan and suddenly regress. I need to work on that, or I'll be a pig in a few months. But tomorrow my friends and I are getting KFC and eating it and watching scary movies for Halloween, so maybe NEXT week I'll start eating better....

I'm also happy because I got a package in the mail full of apple cider and hand lotion and Japanese study books! Time to drink hot apple cider and read some nihongo!

Stats

So I just discovered this website lets me keep track of visitors to this page. Not necessarily "who," but the countries they come from. It's an interesting list. I know people in the U.S., Canada, Japan, and the U.A.E., but not so much in Europe. I guess those poor folk were Googling something else and somehow stumbled upon my blog. Thank you for coming, anyway. じゃyまたね！

Pageviews by Countries (all time)

United States 1,406 Japan 501 United Arab Emirates 26 Denmark 20 Lithuania 19 Ukraine 18 Canada 16 France 16 Estonia 12 Italy 10