Winter Vacation (feat. Elio)

A few days after Christmas my dad had a trip to Tokyo and somehow Elio managed to hide himself in the luggage. I met with them after making my way there on the bullet train. We hung out for a bit and they gave me some Christmas presents, including an awesome grey overcoat that I wore constantly through March, then walked around the neighborhood for a bit until the jetlag set in and my companions went to bed.

Elio and I wandered around Tokyo for two days, seeing things like the Tokyo Skytree and the Shibuya crossing. We met up with our friend Hiroto, who was an exchange student at our high school for a year, after seeing Meiji Shrine and he took us to a cool little conveyor belt sushi place. Apparently I can’t upload videos to this blog, so you’ll just have to imagine the Skytree view through the lens of a shaky handheld camera panning over the bright orange and yellow lights of sprawling skyscrapers and tiny cars scurrying along a web of roads, all stretching into the horizon in the mass of humanity and steel that is night time Tokyo. And then finish your scene with a quick look through the transparent floor of glass to the dark concrete a thousand feet below.

Here’s a lower view of (part of) Tokyo’s skyline:

On the afternoon of December 31st, after saying goodbye to Hiroto, we made our way out of Tokyo and inland to Nagano, land of mountains and snow. We were on our way to try out Japan’s famous ski slopes. There had been only one snowstorm so far, about two weeks beforehand, and they had just opened some of the runs in the last few days so we were a little worried about the conditions on the mountain. But, on my way to Tokyo I did confirm that there was at least some snow, and that night it was supposed to snow more so we were cautiously optimistic. Elio is a real mountain menace as we all know, but for me this would be my first time in over ten years, as well as the first time putting so much stress on my knee since I hurt it in high school, so I was also feeling a little nervous. These worries were soon eclipsed by more serious ones the next day though…

Once we arrived that evening and settled in at our hotel in the ski town of Hakuba, we hit the town for some food and drinks. I was immediately hit with the realization that this town was FILLED with foreign tourists (mainly Australian). Since I’ve been here 99% of the people everywhere have been Japanese (outside of big tourist spots) so the streets filled with loud voices and crowded bars with the patrons all singing in unison as opposed to one person belting out a karaoke tune felt like quite the switch up. Elio and I spent the night wandering around and finally around 11:30 the snow started falling. At first it was just a few shimmering flakes here and there but after a few minutes we looked outside and saw something like the snowy Christmas Eve from It’s a Wonderful Life. We trolled around the base of the mountain, stopping for a bit at a random DJ set, until midnight struck and there were cheers and fireworks (an unusual New Year’s celebration in this part of the world).

We were a bit slow to get up the next morning, making it out of the hotel and to a ski rental store just before noon. We also noticed they had rental slippers “of the King Size (~12 us)” that looked pretty tempting, as the ones at our hotel were a little too small.

After a miserable trudge another half mile or so to the entrance we arrived just in time to get our whole money’s worth for a half day pass. We took the gondola up to the top half of the mountain, technically the only area that was open. First we went down the beginner slope, which was actually quite fun. It was not very steep but it kept things interesting with its neverending switchbacks dropping into a forested ravine below. You could see the whole Hakuba valley stretching out below you as well, with the clear skies above and freshly fallen snow on the ground.

After that we spent the rest of the day on the main blue slope that was open. It took me a couple of runs but about halfway through the whole skiing thing clicked for me again and I was having a blast. No knee issues, but my quads were burning. Elio split from me at some point to go down some of the big boy runs and towards the end of the day his phone was running out of juice. Last I heard from him he was heading down to the base of the mountain on his snowboard, through all of the closed runs without enough snow. He didn’t know that they were closed, despite all the announcements and signs saying so, because well, it was all in a language he doesn’t know.

So Elio got to skip the line waiting for the gondola to the bottom, and was waiting for me at the base where we had celebrated the night before. I on the other hand had to wait in a crawling line for my turn to descend. At this point I’ll mention that Elio had rented our gear, so it was all tagged with his name. But interestingly enough, the helmet of the man in front of me was tagged “Angelo”. What are the chances! I got to talking with him and I didn’t actually catch where he was from but his family is from Hong Kong and he has a normal Chinese surname, but his name is in fact Angelo. We boarded the same gondola and continued talking on the way down. He’s living in Tokyo but has traveled around Japan quite a bit. The conversation moved to Ishikawa and how I live close to the Noto peninsula, where he’s actually spent some time drivi…. JISHIN DESU the gondola’s inhabitants’ phones sirened in unison. After three or four iterations the gondola lurched to halt and we began to sway back and forth, and drop down and up what felt like 50 feet as if we were bungee jumping. Several hundred feet off the ground, we returned to an eery still after maybe a dozen seconds.

Unsure of how strong the earthquake was, having been suspended in midair, we immediately checked our emergency notifications. The epicenter was just north of the Noto, and it was quite a big one. Elio told me later he could see the buildings nearby shaking in an impossible way with their glass warping and shooting out distorted reflections. We were stuck in the gondola for about 30 minutes while they made sure there was no structural damage and it was safe to continue operation, sitting through an aftershock in the meanwhile, and as soon as I got back to the hotel with Elio I got to work checking in and getting checked in on by all manner of people, from Tsubata and abroad. The water mains in Tsubata had been damaged and a lot of people were without water, but there wasn’t much structural damage and no tsunami threat thankfully.

A bit further north and the effects were much worse, and due to the isolation of the peninsula and damage it sustained there are still thousands of people, nearly half a year later, living in shelters or other temporary living conditions. Many people are still without running water, as well. A student from Wajima, the town at the north end of the peninsula that was badly damaged by the quake and subsequent fire, who was temporarily at my elementary school was just able to go back this last week. Things have been pretty normal in Tsubata since a week or two after the earthquake, but it is crazy to think that just a bit to the north it’s still quite a mess.

On our final, full day of skiing I tried out some of the big boy slopes with Elio, but they were a bit much for me, and towards the end of the day my knee was getting a little aggravated. It was a lot of fun, but my worries about how we were going yo get home, and what home would look like, put a damper on the end of our ski trip.

Sorry to end it on a somber note but this one is getting kind of long! I’ll make a second post wrapping up my trip with Elio and some other miscellaneous things that have happened in the (months) I haven’t posted. Stay tuned :)

Photo Dump

Photos from a weekend trip to Tokyo where I met up with my parents for the first time since coming here.

The first picture is our hotel room view, with snow capped Mt. Fuji peaking over the closer mountains.

Second is the view from a cafe we visited in Shibuya. We were curious about the church spire near the center of the photo so I asked our waitress about it. She looked it up and explained that it wasn’t really a church at all, it was a wedding photography store complete with rental gowns and tuxedos. Businesses like this exist so couples who want to can take “cool and fun” Western style wedding photos, presumably after the traditional religious and/or legal wedding ceremony.

Third is a crowded donut (?) shop with a funny name.

Fourth is a picture my dad took while flying in, south of Tokyo.

Fifth is a picture my mom took overlooking Roppongi, one of several city wards full of high rises throughout the city. The shiny red thing is Tokyo Tower, very obviously inspired by the Eiffel Tower but not nearly as impressive in its respective city’s skyline. However, as a symbol of a rebuilt modern Tokyo it is one of the city’s most beloved landmarks.

And sixth is a family photo we took while walking through the massive park surrounding Meiji Jingu, a shrine housing the spirit of the Meiji emperor.

Snow in Tsubata! The year’s first big snowfall on the weekend before Christmas. The last two photos showcase the Japanese system for clearing roads of snow. Instead of snowplows they have sprinkler systems that spray water to melt it all. From what I’ve heard they can ice over as well though…

One of the real sumo world’s rising stars, Ou no Sato, is from Tsubata and went to the elementary school I work at. A few months ago he came by and since then they’ve kept this little corner with a life-size cut out and newspaper clippings of his sumo exploits along with other memorabilia and some of his elementary school photos. There’s also his handprint for people to compare sizes with, and I get a kick out of showing students that are passing by that my hand is almost the same size (he is however 6’2” and 400 lbs). In the ongoing national sumo tournament he’s sitting at 6 wins and 1 loss through the first week of what is I think a two week round robin style event.

These are the photos I’ll post for now, I’ve still got a lot more, especially from my trip with Elio that I’ll get to soon.

Visit to Osaka and Happy Holidays!

Hey everyone! I know it’s been a while and I’d like to apologize for the lack of posts, especially to my patrons who bought me this account and domain. So, sorry, Cory and Dad. And sorry to anyone who has enjoyed reading and commenting on the blog. It really is fun to do and I hope to keep it more up to date heading into next year.

Anyway, two days ago it hit 70 degrees for the first time since probably mid-September, and today it snowed. It’s not cold enough for it to stick but the ground is dotted white for a few minutes after each dusting. I thought this kind of weather whiplash was only possible in the Midwest, but apparently they’ve got it here too. So it seems the Japanese aren’t the only ones who think the weather where they’re from is unique when it really isn’t, haha!

Now, back to. . . early November. Sheesh. I went to Osaka for my first trip out of the area since I’d arrived in August. Osaka is one of my favorite cities, and I made sure to spend some time there on each prior trip to Japan. It’s the second biggest metro area in the country after Tokyo, and has a reputation of being kind of dirty, very energetic and friendly, and a bit rough. And by Japanese standards it certainly walks the talk and relishes in it. There’s a big rivalry between Osaka and Tokyo that goes back several hundred years from when Tokyo developed as the country’s political capital and Osaka as its mercantile powerhouse. It’s not one to one but thinking of it like New York and Boston may give you a decent idea. I decided to visit this weekend for one big reason: the end of the Japanese baseball season. This year, two teams from the Osaka area were playing for the championship and I wanted to see if the city would be even livelier than usual. The two teams were: the reigning champion Orix Buffaloes, with their stud starting pitcher Yoshinobu Yamamoto (whom I’m sure the baseball fans reading this will become quite familiar with soon, as he’s coming to the States next season), and the Hanshin Tigers. The Tigers have a MASSIVE fan base, second only to (you guessed it) the Tokyo Giants, historically the most successful team (but with an astonishing display of mediocrity in recent years). The Tigers, on the other hand, hadn’t won a championship since 1985. That year, after the team clinched their league pennant, fans celebrated by having lookalikes of each starting team member jump into the disgustingly green-tinted river in the city’s famous Dohtonbori nightlife district. However, they had no lookalike for the team’s lone non-Japanese player, bearded Randy Bass from Oklahoma, who had been on an absolute tear that season. So, ingeniously, they decided to take a Colonel Sanders statue from outside a nearby KFC and throw it into the river. This raucous display of vandalism led to the “curse of the Colonel”, which entailed years of abysmal performances sprinkled with postseason heartbreaks. Throughout this season’s run, inspired by a quote from the first-year team manager (who played on the 1985 team), newspapers in Osaka refused to use the words “championship” or “champion”, instead euphemistically referring to it as “that”.

I arrived as the Tigers were leading the series 3 games to 2, with Game 6 scheduled for the following night. Despite October having come and gone, it was remarkably warm and I changed into a t-shirt at my hotel before heading out into the nearby Dohtonbori streets. This ended up being a better idea than I expected, because it was genuinely hard to maneuver through the near standstill crowds and in heavier clothing I would have been a one man sweatshop. The place was full of tourists Japanese and foreign, so I’m assuming it was not only due to the baseball influence. After some typical meandering about I went in to an izakaya with some locals I met on the street (friendly Osaka!) and sampled a bunch of Japanese bar food. Oh, I also had to have some takoyaki beforehand, which is a classic street food consisting of fried dough balls with pieces of octopus inside, covered in mayonnaise, a special savory sauce, and bonito flakes. You can find it all over Japan, but the takoyaki in Osaka is supposed to be the best. I couldn’t really tell the difference, but that was probably because I was trying to eat it quickly on the side of the road and burnt off my taste buds, as I felt weird being in the gaze of the dozens of people passing along the street by the minute.

My hotel room view looking into the dense, dense city.

The only photo I have of part of the scene lining the Dohtonbori river, circa 2017. . .

A giant Buddhist statue I saw on the way to Osaka, built during the economic bubble of the 80s and slowly falling into disrepair since. One of several across the country.

The next morning I noticed a curry bread shop at my hotel’s ground floor. Turns out, this is a chain shop owned by a pretty famous Japanese youtuber called Rafael. When I first got to Japan I wasn’t sure how easily Japanese people could pronounce Raffaelli, so I decided to go by Angelo (in Japan surnames come first and are the common way to refer to people). This really turned out for the best, because whenever I tell anyone my last name they immediately think of this Rafael guy. The first time I thought people were surprised because it sounds like the painter, but after I got the equivalent of “what the hell are you talking about?” and had their thought process explained to me I decided to stick with Angelo. However, I thought this incident too great a coincidence and went into the shop, had some fantastic curry bread (a great choice after a night out) and told the staff my name. I got a sticker of the guy’s logo out of it so that was pretty neat. Still haven’t seen a single video of his though, lol. Afterwards, I walked around the city pretty aimlessly, visited a temple and a park by the city’s big river (not the Dohtonbori), as well as the Osaka City history museum, which had a great view of the Osaka Castle grounds. It came time for the game and I quickly ducked into a fun looking restaurant, but a) it was not very fun, and b) by the 5th inning it was 4-1 Buffaloes and the Tigers’ bats were as dead as the restaurants’ clientele. Feeling pretty tired anyway I went back to the hotel to watch the rest of the game, deciding that if the Tigers somehow pulled it off I’d go back out. They did not, and I had a great night’s sleep. Game 7 would be tomorrow night, Sunday, so I’d have to watch it at home. Game 7 was a one-sided slaughter, with Texas native Sheldon Neuse (pronounced noisy), after a quiet series so far, hitting 2 home runs en route to a 7-1 Tigers victory. “That” had been achieved. No statues were thrown this time, but at least two people dressed as the Colonel passed the police barricade and jumped into the dirty Dohtonbori river.

Castle grounds from the museum.

I pulled this sticker out of my travel backpack, for the first time since putting it there when I first got it, to take this picture.

Stay tuned, because some time later this week I’ll post a photo dump with some captions for context regarding other events and things from the last two months!

Summer’s Eventful End

A couple weeks ago Tsubata had its yotsukado matsuri, which means “four corners festival”. In this event the inhabitants of the four historical neighborhoods of the town proceed along their routes, sporting traditional instruments and a giant lion costume operated by a mass of people, to the final showdown at the town’s crossroads along the main shopping and nightlife street. With anticipation I went out to see this last bit at around nightfall, having heard the clash of the neighborhoods could get quite rowdy. This was the first festival being held since Covid, the last one apparently resulting in the police breaking up a big fight, so I expected there to be a lot of energy on display. The familiar echoes of traditional flutes and drums of the past month soon melted into the roars of a crowd as I crossed the bridge and got closer to the meeting point. Tons of people were packed in to watch the show and I saw many of my students, who greeted me excitedly and introduced me to some of their parents. Moving to a good vantage point, which is not all that difficult being a head taller than most of the crowd, I started to watch the dance.

It’s called shishimai, “lion dance”, and it consists of two synchronized dancers, equipped with (plastic) swords and giant blonde wigs, performing in the center of the street. After a couple minutes they approach the lion of their respective neighborhood and give it a slash, wounding it. It took four or five of these dances to finally slay the beast, with intermediate pauses for the lions to run at each other, for some reason. This is the notoriously unruly part and there was a lot of shoving and a couple thrown punches, but mostly holding back of the most gung ho participants. Some of my middle schoolers were part of the lion from my southern neighborhood, but they were all stationed at the rear, I’m assuming out of at least some concern for their safety. I did see, but first heard, one of my elementary schoolers on his dad’s shoulders blasting a vuvuzela of all things near the lion to the west. When all the lions were dead they met in the middle in a show of friendship, and then the event leaders of the neighborhoods, eight in full, met at the center of the street and took turns polishing off a massive sake bottle. The whole festival was quite the spectacle and I thoroughly enjoyed it, but when asked about it the next week by anyone I couldn’t help but add 「訳わからんかったけど」 which means, “but I just didn’t get it.”

The end of one of the lion wounding sections.

The feel good ending to the hectic evening, complete with vuvuzela.

The week after the festival both of my schools had their “sports day” events. The closest thing to sports day that I can think of is our elementary school field day, where students spend the day playing various games and sports and competing with each class. However, it really isn’t that comparable. At the elementary school all the classes are divided into two teams, red and white, which the keen of you have noticed are the colors of the Japanese flag. The red and white dichotomy goes back to a Japanese civil war 1,000 years ago in which two clans, the Taira and Minamoto, vied for control of the country, sporting red and white as their respective clan colors. The Minamoto clan eventually defeated the Taira and established the Kamakura shogunate, the first samurai government. And now, almost every competition involving two teams pits a red team against a white one. Until recently however, there were more teams involved on sports day. But with the aging and decreasing population outside the major cities of Japan, the student population has shrunk to the point where having more than two would stretch the teams thin. I didn’t notice at first because the class sizes are anywhere from 25-40 kids, but, having familiarized myself with the layout of the buildings, it’s become very apparent that there is at least one empty classroom in each grade’s section at either school. One of the elementary school teachers remarked that this was quite sad on sports day, because this way there would only be one winning team and one losing team. Such a lamenting remark, with the characteristic Japanese sentiment of striving for group harmony, towards a ubiquitous modern Japanese event represented by the colors of deeply important cultural heritage. My head is spinning, how about yours?

At the middle school, the teams are divided into five colors. The extra colors are blue, green, and purple. Not sure of any significance. Both schools have typical sports day events like various footraces, and massive tug-of-war battles between dozens of kids on either side, but the middle school also has a choreographed dance sequence organized by the third-year leaders of each team. They took the last class period off the whole week prior to work on this portion of the day and I was excited to see it come to fruition. The elementary sports day was planned for a Tuesday, and the middle school’s was for a Thursday, both theoretically allowing me to see them. However, it was cloudy all week and the dark threat of rain loomed large overhead. Tuesday morning was wet, but the elementary school held the opening ceremony and some events in the school gym. It cleared up by noon, and the students were able to run their races on the track outside. Thursday was a downpour so the middle school pushed their sports day to Friday, and despite my head teacher’s best efforts to convince the elementary school to let me show up it just wasn’t in the cards. Oh well, there’s always next year. I had helped set up some of the equipment for the elementary school’s so at least I got to see that through. And there by the final tally, the mechanisms of which I know nothing about, the score was 680-632. The white team had won.

September, Pt. 2

One of the neatest things about school starting up has been the daily lunch experience. To preface this you’ll need to understand that all the way through high school Japanese students are grouped into classrooms each school year, and the teachers are the ones who move from class to class depending on the period (obviously for things like P.E. and music the kids move rooms but it’s still done as a class). The same group of kids are together in each class for the whole year. Since the classroom is theirs, they also eat lunch there and clean it up at the end of the day every day. Therefore, a cafeteria is nowhere to be seen at your normal Japanese school. So does everyone bring their lunch from home? No. Through some arcane trickery, the mystery of which I’m yet to unravel, there is a uniform school lunch you can opt into throughout the school, and because I don’t have a homeroom I always come back to the staff room at lunch time with a plate of food waiting at my desk as well. Well, except for the days I don’t have a class the period before, then the nice lunch lady hands it to me and sometimes we chat for a bit. You’d expect this food situation to result in some Lunchables style slop being served because of the logistical nightmare but it is always fresh and decently healthy, as well as traditionally Japanese, usually. From my understanding the schools use locally grown food because this is a big farming area. I also really enjoy the chances I have to eat a more “home-style” Japanese meal that I wouldn’t have known about otherwise. That being said, today’s lunch was a really nice Chinese meal, and the carbonara they served a couple weeks ago was honestly not half bad, either.

These are some typical school lunches, divided into rice (occasionally bread), soup, and the main dish.

This is the October menu at the middle school, complete with ingredients and health information.

Another thing about lunch at the middle school are the announcements made over the school’s P.A. system. It starts halfway through the break with a cheerful little jingle that fades into the slightly nervous voice of the first-year broadcasting club’s representative of the day. They describe the day’s meal and make some other relevant announcements about the day or upcoming events. My predecessor (yeah, still don’t like this word) told me that sometimes they’ll announce whose family farm the parts of the meal came from. However, because of the middle school mumbling and not-so-state-of-the-art P.A. system, as well as the fact that I don’t pay much attention to the announcements’ contents because I’m too busy shoveling in mouthfuls of rice, I haven’t been able to make anything like that out yet. Once the announcement ends they play a few songs over the speakers for the rest of the break. I always look forward to this part because they really play whatever they want. Sometimes it’s typical J-pop or K-pop, but I’ve heard everything from Bach to vocaloid to “Tokyo Drift” from the Fast and Furious movie. I couldn’t help but let out a stunned chuckle when I heard the first bell from that one, earning me some concerned glances from the others in the staff room. Knowing full well that my surreal feelings about hearing that song, which is also kind of an inside joke with my California friends, during lunch time over a school’s P.A. system in Japan wouldn’t translate at all I resigned myself to being the weirdo. Any attempt at an explanation would do nothing but cement that feeling I’m sure.

Unfortunately, I’ve written so much about food that I’ve become hungry for dinner, so I think I’ll go get some curry. I’ll give these posts a new working title because I haven’t really written much about settling in. I’ll be back soon!

September, Pt. 1

Hey everyone, how was your September? Because it’s been so long since I’ve updated this, and I’m kind of tired after finishing up something for a class tomorrow only to find out I left my flash drive at the wrong school today, I’m going to break this into two parts. I’ll start things off with some videos and photos of my sumo matches and the aftermath.

You can tell I’m really trying for the grab and lift in this one, haha.

This guy was the closest to me in size and it was definitely a tough battle! When I threw him onto the compacted sand at the end and then landed on top of him I knew it had to suck so I wanted to make sure he was OK. I know I was hurting!

After eight or nine matches I was definitely ready for some food. And a shower…

With that out of the way, September was pretty wonderful. Most of the school days have been taken up by self-introduction lessons, which turned out to almost perfectly fit the allotted time per class period and ended up being pretty fun for the kids. So, I am quite satisfied that the introduction I spent a lot of two weeks creating went so well. At least for the most part… At the beginning of the introduction I would ask the students where they thought I was from and give them the choices of America, England, or Australia and they would raise their hands for which answer they thought was correct. English accents aren’t easily differentiated by the untrained Japanese ear so this was a completely random guess, but at every grade level and in almost every class for some reason more than half of them thought I was Australian. I guess this is karma for years of mocking the Australian accent. Just call me Crocodile Dundee.

Also, I mentioned in my presentation that I like playing video games, which went over well with all the kids who’ve spent the last couple years in and out of online classes and use chrome-books for nearly every lesson. Go figure. I was talking to some of the middle school boys about a particular game I play that’s very popular here and we got onto the topic of its competitive ranking system. I told them that at one point I was in a rank a bit above average and they acted so shocked that I thought they were giving me the classic sarcastic middle school boy bit, but given that it’s been a month and I’m still having kids come up to me and say, “Hello, Angelo . . . Apex Legends, yeah?” with genuine looking excitement on their faces I assume they think I’m some god gamer. This is hilariously unfounded but I won’t be the one to tell them. Unless they find out the password to this blog, I guess.

Stay tuned for next time when I’ll talk about school life, more festivals, and other miscellaneous happenings.

Many New Experiences

This will be quite a long entry, with an unfortunate lack of photographs, so please bear with me. I promise I will have some photos and videos of the exciting bits soon.

Last week, I had a brief introduction at the elementary school I’ll be working at twice a week. Elementary schools in Japan have only recently been required to make English part of their curriculum for 5th and 6th grades, as previously there was something like a “foreign language” fun time class. So, as you might expect the teachers there are a bit less equipped to teach English than at the middle school. They were relieved that I was able to speak some Japanese, not only to communicate with them (even though their English has been quite good!) but to communicate with the students in case they don’t understand something in English. It seems like I might have some big shoes to fill at the elementary school, because my predecessor was quite the character, very loud and very fun, something that I’ll at least attempt to be but we’ll see how that goes.

Speaking of shoes, at Japanese schools you are supposed to remove your outside shoes and wear specific shoes for school in an effort to keep the school clean and surely instill some kind of discipline in the students. I knew this already, so I bought an extra pair of shoes for this purpose. However, as I left the elementary school with my school shoes that I had brought from the middle school in my backpack, my supervisor told me something to the extent of “it could be a good idea to get a new pair of shoes,” which, given the famous Japanese penchant for directness, really meant “buy a new pair of shoes as soon as possible or you’re going to look bad.” So I got on that as soon as possible, thank you Amazon. At least now when I come back to the U.S. I’ll have shoes for the next 10-ish years, I guess.

After that it was back to the middle school without any real clue of what it is I’d be doing at the elementary school, but that would be figured out soon enough (to the greatest extent possible). Here I hadn’t spoken to any of the other teachers besides the English teachers I’ll be working with yet, so it was a bit awkward in the staff room. I’ve experienced and heard from other people, including Japanese people, many many times that the Japanese are not so keen on small talk, meeting new people, etc., which is of course only exacerbated by the (honestly fair) assumption that someone who is not Japanese can’t speak their language. This assumption coupled with typical Japanese politeness leads to a well documented encounter whereupon a foreigner says something in Japanese and is enthusiastically complimented on how good they are at the language, no matter how simple what they’ve said is. I have certainly received my fair share of “nihongo jouzu”s, and I understand why people feel patronized when they say a simple phrase and are praised for it constantly, but it’s definitely just one of many cultural differences between the U.S. and Japan. The Japanese definitely don’t expect foreigners to learn their isolated “little island language”, right? And English being the lingua franca is the only reason I’m here in the first place after all. This all being said, there is a way to know that a Japanese person is genuinely impressed with your level of Japanese. And that’s when they ask you how long you’ve lived in Japan. And while talking with one of the non-English teachers that day I was asked that question… except I misheard it! I thought she had asked me how long I planned to stay in Japan, so to her when she asked how long I’d been in Japan I answered “I don’t know.” Oops! Shows how much I deserved that compliment, haha. But obviously the key to learning a language is to keep trying, which is something I hope to express to the kids here. I understand that forming workplace relationships is slow going and I have to be patient (especially when you can only sometimes understand what’s going on and are only there for some parts of the week) in a place like Japan where constant presence and sense of community are so important, but it’s definitely a little jarring being the odd one out. But this cultural unfamiliarity is a challenge I was excited to tackle while here, so I’m looking forward to bridging the gap as well as I can.

That Friday night, I decided it was best for my health to stay in (a great decision in hindsight). At about 9pm I went to a nearby conbini for a late night snack and heard in the distance the low reverberating thunder of drum beats, coupled with the whining atonal flutes of traditional Japanese music. I quickly texted my supervisor to see if there was an event I was missing, but she let me know that it was just practice for the big town festival next month! I’ve been hearing these practices echo into the night ever since, and my History degree has shaken in my brain in anticipation and joy ever since.

The next morning I left town and took a slow rural train up the coast to an “international sumo exhibition” I had heard about. I invited another JET who lived along the way and we went to watch. Along the way I got to see the wonderful rugged, rural beauty of Japan, with its small villages full of that typical Asian roofing that butt up against the dense mountain forests. From what I saw on the website, the applications to join had been closed for two weeks so we were fully expecting to sit and watch the whole thing play out. We walked to the sumo grounds and were greeted so warmly that I was a bit off put at first. “These people are trying to get me into some pyramid scheme or something,” I thought. I soon came to realize that us two had equaled the amount of English speaking Japanese volunteers for the event, as there were now four foreigners in total, so I went along with their guidance. Initially when we showed up, they asked if we would participate. I was wholly unprepared for that turn of events and so was my buddy, so for the moment we insisted on just watching. Neither of us had seen sumo in real life before, and watching the highly ritualized beginnings, short bursts of wrestling action, and respectful bowing at the end during the team matches really got us going. We both decided to join for the individual event in a fit of fantastic masculine excitement. Luckily, the actual sumo wrestlers, who would’ve eaten me for breakfast, sat out this part and left it to the amateurs. We didn’t have to take off any clothes, but I took my shirt off just because. Imagine someone trying to fight you shirtless with a big ass belt tied around his cargo pants, I thought I was quite intimidating.

I don’t know how many people there had experience with sumo before, but it really was tough. Sumo isn’t about size necessarily, especially because of how fast it is. The sudden burst of aggressive fury and technique about how to take your opponent down is paramount. The first two bouts I lost because I stepped out of the ring while throwing my opponent and then by accidentally putting my hands on the ground while trying to go for a grab. One of the other participants gave me some advice and told me to calm down and slow down. I thought the next would be my final match so I steeled myself to try to win just one. I caught my opponent close to the ring and used my American Football lineman training to keep my legs churning and force him out, which received a raucous approval from the crowd. I was gassed, but once I stepped out of the ring I was told I had one more match. I had seen one of the real sumo wrestlers pick someone up by their belt (which is actually really sturdy) and carry him outside the ring. I thought that looked incredibly cool so I wanted to try it. This match I got the opportunity. I managed to get both hands on my opponent’s belt and picked him up and set him outside the ring. The people sitting under their tents and in the shade in the intense summer heat were so excited at such a display, and my adrenaline was running high. I was told I qualified for the next round. I kept fighting, match after match, win after win, small cup of tea after small cup of tea whenever I said “I need some water”. Eventually, I started hearing people cheering for me when it was my turn. The town this event is held in is known for its sumo, and even has a sumo wrestler at the highest level right now, so I take it as a great honor that they thought I was doing well.

I went through several towels wiping off my sweat so as not to give myself a slippery advantage, as one is supposed to. Finally, it was the championship match. I stared at my opponent at the edge of the ring, and threw salt high into the air, as did he, which landed on the opponent’s entry point signifying that “this area is mine”. It was the same man who had given me the advice earlier. He was shorter and leaner but had made quick work of his opponents with his explosive speed thus far. We stepped into the ring, performed the customary squat and ceremonial clap, and readied ourselves for the match. After an initial give and take it was a near repeat of my first match where I had my opponent and threw him, but stepped out of the ring. However this time, it was so intense that as I threw him he fell out of the ring and I fell after him off of the elevated floor of the sacred sumo ring onto the mats outside. The judges got together and conferred. They couldn’t tell who’d won! We’d have to fight again! I was thrilled at the chance because I thought I had made the same mistake as in my first fight, so any thought of exhaustion left my head. We fought again and I was able to throw him to the ground by grabbing his belt. I WON! I WON A SUMO TOURNAMENT! WHAT! WHAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAT! Talk about beginner’s luck! The next week I was all over the local news and papers and it’s become a talking point with my teachers and students and other locals. They’re thrilled that I tried sumo and maybe a bit frightened that I ended up winning my first time. I guess I’ll have to back up my championship next year!

Finally, to Work

I completely forgot to mention this in the last post, but at the beach there were some incredible sand sculptures I took mediocre photos of. The first is of two with anime themes, the second is one with regional icons, and the third is beach/summer themed! They look a bit rough around the edges but they’re still really neat.

The next morning I made my way to the middle school, my “base of operations” for the time I’ll be here as I’ll spend most days helping with the classes here. It’s about 5 minutes by bike from my apartment, an absolutely brutal change from walking next door to town hall. After the customary greeting I was led to my desk in the staff office and got to know the Japanese teachers of English (JTEs) I would be working with. One of the first things they explained to me was how they hadn’t expected me to speak any Japanese, and had told the students such, so they made it very clear that I’m expected to play dumb and talk to the students only in English. Well, this should be a fun secondary work objective. I wonder how long it’ll take for my cover to be blown.

Oh, and for the time being the air conditioning in the staff room is broken. So I take back what I said about the garbage system being the worst thing here. At least I’ve been able to get a hang of that and haven’t upset anyone yet (as the stereotypical foreigner does, the improper sorting of trash is usually given as a big reason Japanese landlords will often refuse to rent to foreigners). As for the heat and humidity, it just does. not. let. up. I am in constant need of a shower, and not having any lighter work appropriate clothes has been pretty rough (I need to wear an undershirt to both stop sweat stains and the see-through exposure of nipples in the workplace).

I’m not sure how well known this is, but the Japanese take punctuality extremely seriously. I have always been aware of this and how it might be the greatest cultural gap I’ll have to adapt to while I’m here. On my second day I stopped at the conbini for a coffee and to pull out some cash from the ATM on the way to the school. I accidentally took out 50,000 yen (about 400 dollars) instead of 5,000, so after redepositing the extra cash anxiety began to fill my brain. I strolled into the staff room and greeted my head teacher, and with her quick glance at the clock I knew I was finished. I looked over to it myself with the final hope that I might be reading the situation wrong. 8:31. What a shameful display. I stayed a few minutes late that day and showed up a few minutes early the next to try and make up for it, but I think that relationship might be in an irreparable state (I’m not serious, but I definitely don’t want to make that a habit).

At work I’ve been busy making my self-introduction lesson with input from the JTEs, and helping them make some tests and worksheets. The school semester starts next week, so there’s plenty of time to get things smoothed out and ready to go in the meanwhile. I’m looking forward to it!

Life’s a Beach

Sunday night… time to head to bed and prepare for the start of the work week. Except not! This week I took Monday off, because I have three days of summer vacation to take before September starts. I had already known for a few days I’d be taking the day off, and luckily I didn’t have to do much planning. Mentioning that I’d be using a vacation day at the bar prompted the manager to pull out a calendar and make sure he’d heard me right; they’d all be taking that day off too, and were going to the beach and he invited me along! Although I’m not a beach person I’m also not stupid, so I jumped at the chance to tour the area and get to know some locals. Monday morning I got picked up in the typical Japanese box-looking car and we headed for the sea. I had realized earlier that I’d be going to a beach on the Sea of Japan, rather than the Pacific Ocean proper, so the thought of experiencing a new body of water helped wipe any gripes about sand or wearing sunscreen away.

I’m not sure if it was just the group I was with or the fact it was a week day and 4,000 degrees outside but I found Japanese beach-going much more agreeable than our familiar counterpart. First off, the beach we went to is famous because you’re able to drive on part of it. I had heard of this beach at some time during the now fast deteriorating memory of PowerPoint presentations, pictures, and bullet points at orientation, but I didn’t realize that’s where we were going until we were pulling onto the street of sand just feet away from the water on the way to our eventual parking lot. We then spent a few hours at a seaside restaurant/hang out spot in the shade, similar to the bagno restaurant areas in Italy, trying various kinds of local seafood and chatting the day away. The beach itself was pretty sparsely populated but there were some people with the chairs, towels, and umbrella setup around. Again, not sure if I should attribute that to being a Monday or to the sand being so hot my feet still feel a bit cooked five days later. We did take a dip in the ocean, for a quick 15 or 20 minutes, and though everyone else commented on how nice and cold it was all I could think was how they might share some of my disdain if only they knew the depths of coldness one could feel at the other end of the Pacific.

An example of a turban shell, one of the local foods. You pull the meat out with a provided skewer. Should only be eaten by those who like a strong bitter taste (not me)

Snakes and Sake

After Friday orientation, which was only a half day, I went out for lunch with a small group. We got some recommendations from the veteran JETs who were in charge of the orientation and decided to head for the mall near the Kanazawa train station. The 6th floor of the mall is dedicated to various restaurants and is essentially a floor-wide food court, but with actual quality restaurants instead of fast food. I’ve seen this kind of setup countless times in all of the bigger Japanese cities I’ve been to, and I had actually gone to the sushi restaurant the night before with my “predecessor” and we had to wait a while for space to open up.

Predecessor is the term used by people on the JET program for the person being replaced by the incoming JET (me). I dislike this word, probably because it seems too important for a job that’s entriest of entry level (the requirements are basically having any bachelor’s degree and no criminal record) and people often shorten it to “pred” which I just think sounds weird, but I’m stuck with it. It’s kind of the only word that works and when I say “the person who I’m taking over for” it’s a real mouthful and I get weird looks.

Anyway, we perused our lunch options until I spotted an okonomiyaki restaurant and told everyone that’s where we needed to go. Okonomiyaki, specifically from Hiroshima, might be my favorite food in the world. It translates approximately to “cooked how you like it” and is a sort of pancake. Along with the batter there is your choice of meat, cabbage, eggs, your choice of vegetables, and noodles topped with a special savory and sweet sauce and mayonnaise. It’s delicious and oh so healthy, ha ha. When I’ve had it in Hiroshima they cook it up on the skillet in front of you but that wasn’t the case here. However, it seemed like the chef was trying to recreate Mt. Fuji with the verticality and portion size of the thing. Overall, I remember my Hiroshima okonomiyaki more fondly but it was still quite tasty. But I’ll have to revisit Hiroshima again to make a real comparison.

Perhaps we were all in a bit of a food coma, but after checking out the mall and walking around town a bit post lunch the mood didn’t seem to be heading towards anything, so we went our separate ways around 5pm. I took the train back to my town and made my way to my apartment. The first thing I noticed was the spiderwebs that had been accumulating over the last few days had vanished and their terrifyingly large inhabitants were nowhere to be seen. My momentary relief was broken when in the dim light of dusk I spied something long and thin resting on the barricade under which I had just walked. I thought to myself I might not have noticed some sort of wire or rubber stopper yet and my eyes could be playing tricks on me, but I took a flash photo just to be sure.

In this moment I realized that my knowledge of snakes in Japan was limited to the fact that, yeah they exist. I had no idea what kind this was, let alone if it was venomous. I sent that picture out to some people hoping for some advice and in the meanwhile it started to make its move.

I decided to take the advice I had just received from my supervisor and run the hell away, praying for it to be gone by the time I returned. I spotted an opportune moment in which it looked like the snake couldn’t lunge at me and made my break. After an elongated stop at one of the conbini near my apartment, appreciating the blasting air conditioning and the lack of wildlife, I bought a little sandwich and slowly made my way home. I arrived in time to see the snake make its exit and slither off into the darkness. Out of sight, out of mind… except now I’ll be checking the stairwell every time I come or go.

I rested for a bit inside and then decided I was unsatisfied with the events of the evening and decided to check out the nightlife of my quiet suburban town at around 9. I steeled myself for the outside and managed to leave without any trouble. Crossing the bridge into what looked like the bar district on my phone map I noticed how unlike the lively riverfronts of Kyoto, Osaka, and Tokyo this one was, with its plant life buttressed against dark two story buildings and a quiet stillness enveloping it all. The cool river breeze felt great and I actually quite liked the scene.

On the other side there was indeed a small assortment of bars, but it wasn’t a bustling scene. I walked by one with a big red sign out front that piqued my interest so I went inside. It was small, like most Japanese establishments, and the bar had 5 or 6 seats with two small tables at the other side of the room. Beyond that was a traditional room with tatami mat floors, meaning shoes have to be removed before entering, and cushioned floor seats instead of chairs. I was led to a seat at the bar but I’d definitely like to have a night in that back room some time, even if sitting Japanese style kills my knees and makes my legs fall asleep after 15 minutes. Looking at the menu above the bar and noticing a sign that read マルゲリータ “marugerita”, I thought I’d order a margarita. The bartender, who I’d later learn was also the cook and manager of the place, looked at me kind of puzzled and asked “pizza?” Margherita, not margarita. Got it. With that misunderstanding cleared up I got to mingling with the locals and had a wonderful time. At midnight, closing time, I headed home and luckily found no sign of a serpent waiting to greet me.

Jumping ahead a Bit…

These last 11 days since arriving have been quite hectic so in this post I’m just going to give a quick summary of everything of note. That way I can be all caught up and not have a blog backlog in the back of my mind to add to all this new stimuli. If you’re interested in certain bits and want to know more you can contact me and I’d be glad to share the details.

Orientation was a pretty bizarre experience, being jetlagged and sitting in a chair for close to 8 hours. I found myself forgetting I was even in Japan halfway through the first day because it just seemed like a really long school assembly or something, being almost entirely in English and with mostly western looking people. And oh my goodness the elevators. This unbelievably fancy hotel, for some unfathomable reason, had no stairs and just six elevators for 36 floors of rooms. That compounded with a group of hundreds of JETs made for staggering elevator lines post orientation. I attempted to wait out the lines by going to conbini and walking around but even after 45 minutes of that they hadn’t let up.

Unfortunately, my roommate had to leave that morning and miss orientation because a typhoon was heading for his region, so every JET participant going there had to leave early instead of risk being delayed in Tokyo indefinitely. After orientation I met with my friend, a high school exchange student from Tokyo, who I had forgotten to tell I was even coming to Japan so he was (very understandably) shocked at the news when I remembered to tell him on the bus in to Tokyo. We went out around Shibuya and we caught up at his usual after work hangouts; my being there was something he was pretty amused with.

Day two of orientation was more of the same, and I went out afterwards with the remaining people of the group from our first night. I was planning to go to a baseball game but it was sold out, so I still need to do that at some point! I did wear my Ohtani jersey and got a couple comments on it throughout the night and a very clean fist bump from a local which was enthusiastically described by one of my JET mates as a perfect cultural exchange. So, I guess I’m already doing my job well.

The next morning the JETs heading for my prefecture left the hotel at 6AM (aahhhhh), and we got on a quick one hour flight from Haneda airport to Komatsu airport in Ishikawa prefecture. From there the day was another whirlwind and I got my first exposure to Japanese bureaucracy, signing papers and making bank trips and introducing myself to entire rooms of new people, all while jetlagged, sleep deprived, and maybe a bit hungover. An interesting tidbit about signing things in Japan: an actual signature is not what they really use, what they have is a personalized stamp that you stamp papers with, and I did plenty of that all day. I did also write a lot. Mostly my address. And name. In Japanese. Over and over. I’ll reiterate, I had to do this in JAPANESE, using all three “alphabets”, which I can read decently well but have NEVER WRITTEN IN BEFORE. It took a while. At least this was all done on my first day as compared to Italy, where I’m still not sure if I’ve done all the paperwork 5 years after leaving.

One thing Italy does do better than Japan is the garbage system, surprisingly. Italy and Japan both have similarly fussy and overly detailed categories of garbage that need to be sorted, but at least in Italy they provide you with the bins you need to separate your trash. In two weeks this has already become my least favorite part of Japan. It even beats out the heat and humidity, which is truly awful. I’ve tried walking around town during the day and am instantly gross and sticky with sweat. I can’t wait for fall.

However, thanks to the heat I’ve been able to watch a lot of the koushien baseball tournament on TV in my apartment. Koushien is the country’s annual high school baseball tournament where the best teams from each prefecture compete for the national championship. I’m pretty sure it is the most watched sporting event in the country, and I can see why. It’s amateur, high school baseball, but there are moments of brilliance from the players and the stakes are so high with a march madness style one-game-at-a-time bracket. For a lot of these players, these will be their final games with their high school, and final games period, so loss is often met with tears. Throughout the games, the schools’ respective bands and cheering sections can be heard and seen, and it really is fun to watch.

Since then I’ve been desk-warming at the Board of Education, and I never imagined doing almost nothing for 8 hours could be so tiring, but I also just finished my first day of Ishikawa specific orientation, which has been a bit more insightful and specific, and I’ve managed to meet some other JETs in the region and get in contact with them. We have another half day of orientation tomorrow and then the plan is to hit the town! Next week I’ll finally be heading to my schools and meeting with the teachers I’ll be working with for at least the next year. I’ll update soon with any new developments.

The town mascots!

Frogs on the vending machine outside my apartment complex!

Arrival and First Day

After a “relatively quick” ten hour flight from San Francisco, dozing off and on throughout, we arrived at Narita International Airport.  After a brief encounter with the mugginess that would welcome us later and a routine customs and immigration inspection, in a jet-lagged haze I found myself separated from my plane seatmate whom I had grown quite familiar with while I wasn’t asleep on the flight.  Now awkwardly balancing my two suitcases and two backpacks I made my way back into the real world.  Well, kind of the real world.  As soon as I stepped out into the Arrivals section of the airport my attention was caught by someone frantically motioning at me with one hand and a sign reading, “JET Program” raised high in the air with the other.  This sight would greet me another 25 times every 20 or so yards until I had reached the buses taking us to our hotel in Shinjuku and handed off my suitcases again to be delivered to my final destination.  This parade of welcomers seemed pretty overkill to me, but apparently someone did lose their way getting to the buses, so I’ll let you make your own decision.  

An hour and some change passed on the bus, complete with a nonstarter first conversation with my new bus seatmate and an excited rise of voices upon the first sightings of landmarks like the Tokyo Skytree and crossing Rainbow Bridge, and then we arrived at our hotel.  It was a gorgeous place and I’ve got nothing bad to say about it at all.  Well, more on that later… I set my bags down in my hotel room on the 22nd floor and took in the spectacular view of the Shinjuku government building: picture coming at the end of this post.  But since I was the only one in the room at that point and it was about 5pm I decided to take a walk around the area in hopes of happening upon a convenience store for some caffeine.  “It’s Japan,” I thought, “there has to be a convenience store right outside.”  Wrong.  I went on a 30 minute walk looping around the downtown area and found no sign of anything but concrete, glass, power lines, and steel, except for one street densely lined with trees and cicadas roaring so loud they muted all the other sounds of the city.  As I was rounding the corner to head back to the hotel in defeat, I spotted two (two!) conbini that I would have seen immediately had I turned right rather than left at the start.  Oh well, at least the cicadas were pretty damn cool.

I returned to the hotel room after a rice ball and some tea and found my roommate there unpacking, and it was none other than my old friend from the plane ride!  We shared a laugh over the coincidence and would only learn later that mostly everyone was set up in the same way.  Because it was still only around 7pm, we wanted to go out and acclimate as much as possible to the time change so we could be ready for orientation the next morning (read: we wanted some food and beer).  After tidying up and showering we found some others who were taking their circadian rhythm adjustment seriously and ended up with a group of five.  One of the members, more knowledgeable of the area, suggested a ramen place for dinner.  And for my first actual Japanese ramen in three and a half years, it was… quite filling!  After the soup and a beer we wandered through one of the classic Tokyo neighborhoods, with advertisements and storefronts stretching stories into the sky and bathing the streets in their bright glow.  It was here we happened upon bar, not a bar, but BAR.  Finding the owner’s naming sense quite agreeable we decided to patronize BAR, and entered the building and went down the stairs into its basement location.  After a nice cocktail and some lighthearted conversation about our excitements and worries for our new journey we all decided it was about time we headed back to the hotel to await our orientation the next morning.