Go Your Own Way

Alternative title “Cats are Racist”

Japanese Word of the Day
English: Nerd or enthusiast
Japanese: Otaku
Note: Otaku is often used with a word before it; “ketai otaku” is a cell phone enthusiast. In America, “otaku” has come to mean an anime otaku and used alone in Japanese, otaku can mean the same thing. It used to be kind of an insult but now it’s more used with pride, like ‘nerd’ in English.

Let’s talk about misconceptions. When you move to a foreign country, you will have many of them simply by virtue of having set things that in your home you feel safe to assume and often don’t even realize you assume. I got smacked in the face a bit by that on this trip. When Namba-san first invited me to his home I made the American assumption it would be a standalone house. Upon actually walking around Kyoto to his home I realized how completely ridiculous a notion it was that anyone other than the emperor would have a standalone house in the middle of Kyoto city. I also made another assumption, but I’ll get to that in a minute.

Last entry brought us right up to arriving outside Namba-san’s apartment complex. It was snuggled between two other buildings but fortunately the name used Katakana that I could read so I knew I was in the right place. So in the door I went to a lobby with… a glass set of doors jutting out in a half circle. Ok, that’s cool. Let’s just walk up so the sensor will notice me and open and… why aren’t these doors opening? Do I need to poke them? Nope, that didn’t do it. Oh hey, there’s a camera watching me, awesome. I bet I look like a really lost gaijin trying to break into someone’s apartment complex.

After a moment of being baffled I noticed an intercom looking machine next to the door with a keypad. Using my amazing college-education deduction skills I determined that this must be to call up to tell tenants you are here so they can let you in. At this point I realize I don’t know Namba-san's actual apartment number. Ffff-… frick. So I whip out my cell and send him an email saying I’m at the apartment but stuck behind a glass door. I awkwardly stand around trying to plan a next course of action when I get his reply; he’s sending his son down to get me. Success!

Remember that other misconception I said I had? Well, when Namba and I were first planning he said he would send his son to get me from the hotel (before he knew about the beer garden event). This led me to assume he meant his son would drive there and collect me and led to me assuming his son was of driving age. So after a minute this maybe early junior high boy comes down and over to the glass door. He doesn’t seem to speak English but nods at me and opens the glass doors. Wow, I really hope this is Namba-san’s son and I’m not just following some random boy back to his apartment.

Fortunately, it was Namba-san’s son (whose name I am not going to use for privacy matters; there are probably lots of Nambas who live in Kyoto). I followed him into an apartment where I quickly spotted Namba-san seated at a table and relaxed – I made it. Now what? Oh crap, I didn’t think about this.

Upon walking into the room I immediately noticed a beautiful black and white long hair cat. The cat also noticed me and immediately… bolted. Well thanks cat, I appreciate the assurance. I set down my bags and took a seat on a nearby couch and was generally awkward while Namba-san was a polite host and offered me many things like to watch tv, or collapse in bed. I don’t understand a word of Japanese television and I didn’t want to immediately ignore Namba-san and sleep so I politely declined and continued to sit around awkwardly for a bit until I was offered a shower which I decided to take. I don’t think I’ve mentioned it, but I walked all day (as well as the 10 minute walk to Namba-san’s house) carrying a decently bulky bag in the humid Japanese summer so when I arrived at Namba-san’s I was pretty much drenched in sweat. Namba-san’s wife showed me to the shower room and presented me a towel before offering me privacy.

I’ve shown you all my shower room, though I use it like an American and shower in the tub rather than sitting on a bucket on the floor. Namba-san’s family seemed to use the shower room correctly (being Japanese and all) so I decided to give it a try. I can’t even imagine how Japanese families keep mold from getting everywhere with all the water that gets splashed around the room. I’ll stick to my easy maintenance strange American habits, thanks.

After getting cooled off and feeling much better I returned to awkwardly sitting on the couch for a bit until I saw Namba-san’s wife yawning widely and wondered if my presence was keeping her awake (for the record, it’s about 10PM at this time). So the next time I was offered sleep I gladly took it and was shown to Namba-san’s son’s room. I noticed (being the nerd that I am) that he had several comics and figures from shows I was familiar with. When I popped back into the main room I relayed this (in Japanese!) to Namba-san who laughingly called me an “otaku” to his son. I was too busy being proud of myself for remembering “hagane no renkinjutsushi” was the Japanese name of “Fullmetal Alchemist” and think I at least got a few coolness points with his son.

Happily, I retired to bed exhausted. It was now around 10:30 and I decided I could read until 11:00 and set my alarm for 7:00, be fully rested, and have plenty of time before I needed to be at my orientation at 8:30. Things did not quite go like that. At right before 6:00 I began to hear movement through my sleepy state but mostly ignored it. Then a soft knock at my door jarred me to consciousness. Namba-san told me that his family ate breakfast at 6:20 and to be ready. In my sleepy state my voice was near non-existent and crackly but I tried to manage confirmation. Time to get up!

I rose and dressed quite quickly and found myself at the table around 6:05 so I had 15 minutes to watch Namba-san’s wife cook. I genuinely wish I knew how to offer assistance in Japanese as I sat there awkwardly feeling like a terrible rude guest. At one point the cat reappeared and seemed to give me a chance, carefully approaching. I offered a hand to sniff and gave a small smile and the cat returned it by… bolting even faster. Dammit all.

At 6:20 almost on the dot a delicious spread was placed in front of me and breakfast began. I was given a plate with a cooked egg, a meat of some capacity (I have no idea what it was), some sliced cucumber with a sauce drizzled on, a small serving of a pasta salad type dish, a bowl of rice, a bowl of miso, and some tea. It was all really delicious (except maybe the strange meat I couldn’t place the taste of) and quite a lot of food but I ate it all. After that, I watched tv for a bit with Namba-san’s son and was told I should play a game with him. He showed me his selection of games and I selected the safe Mario Brothers, since I knew the basic controls. Sadly, the disc was missing in action so he asked me to pick again. I asked which his favorite was and he selected a Dragon Ball Z fighting game. Ok, I have an older brother, I’ve played tons of fighting games, I got this.

Using his father to translate, the son relayed that our first match would be a practice round so I could get a feel for it. Through mixed language and pantomime he showed me what each of the buttons did and we started playing. I could tell he was going easy on me at first and let me have 5 characters to his one but I still managed to win each round, though only barely a few times. It was actually a really fun way to spend the morning as Namba-san and his wife each left to go to work. We played until 8:00 when I had said I wanted to leave and the son showed me to the door.

Back on the streets of Kyoto, but this time I’d done the anxiety inducing part of the trip so I felt on top of the world. I easily navigated up the road to the hotel area and decided to stop in at a nearby conbini to grab a drink for orientation. By the time I reached the hotel I was still 20 minutes early but there was already a large collection of other early risers. I much preferred to be among this group than the late.

For the first half of Tuesday’s orientation we were split into groups to give our self introductions and be students for the other presenters. Before each presentation the room moderator would flash a sign describing the type of behavior our class would have. Some of the examples were uninterested, quiet but attentive, and rowdy. I had signed up for a later presentation (simply because all the earlier ones were taken before I got to the signup sheet) so I had to wait through 8 presentations before it was my turn, all the while nerves mounting. When it was my turn I approached the front of the room while the moderator showed a sign to the ‘class’ telling them how to act. At the sign many people made noises of surprise and one person called it a ‘wild card’. Oh good, I wasn’t nervous or anything. Thanks. As previously stated, Allen was playing the role of my JTE (Japanese teacher of English) and introduced me before setting me loose on my powerpoint introduction.

I’ll spare you the blow-by-blow of my presentation but you should know that I am teaching at 2 elementary schools as well as a junior high school, so I had made every effort to make my presentation very understandable. For each English line I had a translation in Japanese; in my opinion, while teaching English is highly important I think that for an introduction being understood should be the main goal. I spoke slowly and clearly and asked questions of my ‘class’ which they answered… in perfect English. Yes, my ‘students’ were actually native speakers but for these exercises people played the role of students with minimal English. For each question I asked I received a perfect English reply using words and concepts far beyond the capacity of Elementary school kids. Hmm… I wonder what type of class I got. After having a “student” ask me the meaning of life it became a bit hard to continue treating my ‘class’ as Elementary school kids and my façade slipped a bit. But come on! They were asking me quantum physics questions!

At the end of my presentation it was revealed that my class type was “the material is too easy”. I pointed out that even if the material was too easy for elementary schoolers they still wouldn’t be as advanced as my ‘class’ was but mostly just to defend my honor. The last presentation after mine unfortunately drew a “rowdy” class type and we were all so tired of presentations we gave the presenter quite a run for his money. Many a paper airplane was thrown and plenty of diversion occurred before our valiant presenter finished up and we were set free. Sweet, sweet freedom! Except not really since first years such as myself had another afternoon orientation to attend. Boooo!

I joined a large group that grabbed lunch at the nearby conbini before heading off to the second orientation which was in a separate building. I feel like I should take a moment to explain conbini in Japan. As you may guess, “conbini” is a shortening of “convenience stores” and oh my goodness are they convenient. In America you go to a convenient store for… maybe snacks on a trip or to pay for gas? In Japan you go to a conbini for delicious on-the-go meals heated up for you in house, freshly cooked junk food, to get the latest magazine, to pay your bills, to pay for something you ordered on amazon.jp, to be in a place with AC instead of outside... you name it, you can probably do it. Conbini are completely awesome.

I had selected a curry rice (with a katsu!) dish that was heated up for me before rejoining the group. I’m really glad we had a big group to follow because finding the building the second orientation was in would’ve been tricky alone. We all piled into the orientation room and ate while waiting for the rest of the crew to show up.

Once everyone showed up we started with a session by Mark (the offended Scotsman) who explained that normally this orientation is held a week later and we all would’ve had to come back to Kyoto. Fortunately for us (myself in particular), Mark had redone the scheduling so we could knock it out in the afternoon. That one decision saved me 1800 yen (~$18USD). Thanks Mark!

The afternoon orientation was a series of small sessions designed to help new ALTs. At one point we were divided between primarily Junior High and Elementary to hear about the experiences of older JETs who had worked with those groups. After that, we had sessions on healthcare in Japan, traveling around, and general advice for living successfully and happily in Japan. All of the sessions and information were incredibly useful (especially the healthcare/doctor stuff) so it wasn’t boring at all. There were also plenty of entertaining stories to keep it light. One of the better quotes from the sessions was about keeping your foreigner resident card on you at all times. Mark was joking that the police may approach you asking to see it if there was a crime nearby and the police decide “Oh, you match the identity of foreign”. I really can’t properly explain how homogeneous Japan is that that is actually an entirely plausible scenario.

Another particularly entertaining anecdote highlighted the relationship between a BoE (board of education) and the JETs in their employment. An older JET was telling us how he had caught a stomach virus when it was going around and diagnosed himself as needing liquids and rest. So he called in sick to work when his supervisor, upon hearing he wasn’t feeling well, began suggesting he might need to go to the hospital. The JET assured him he would be fine and ended the call. An hour later the supervisor called back with the head of the department, again asking if the JET was ok and they really thought he might need to go to the hospital. Again, the JET convinced them he was fine… until an hour later when the supervisor called back, this time with the 2^nd in command at the BoE. The supervisor explained that if the JET was worried about getting to the hospital they could call him an ambulance. The JET assured them that no, he really didn’t need an ambulance and got them off the phone. As you might have guessed, an hour later the supervisor called back with the head of the BoE. Our JET friend threw his hands in the air and said “fine, call me an ambulance” and allowed them to escort him to the hospital where the doctor told him what he already knew.

The point of sharing this story was to illustrate how much the BoE worries about us and our well being. Talking to my mom I made this analogy; we’re like a really expensive family pet. The BoE ships us over from far off lands, teaches us some tricks, makes sure we don’t ruin the carpet tatami, and invites us to join their family. In turn, they get concerned if their little Maddykins is coughing or they think she isn’t eating all her food. This is a very good thing (especially in my mother’s opinion) but due to cultural differences it can be troublesome.

After lots of other good information I’m too lazy to share the orientation drew to a close. It was now around 5:15 and the last bus to Ujitawara would be leaving Uji station around 10:30PM. According to (all hail the mighty) Google it would take me an hour to get from my spot in Kyoto to Uji. Well, I’m already in the city, might as well do a little shopping.

So Madeline, since you’re a new ex-pat setting up house in a country wherein you couldn’t speak or read the native language where would you go shopping in Kyoto?

…a book store? Really? You do recall that you can’t read Japanese right?

…Picture books? How old are you?

That’s right ladies and gents, I saw mentioned of a nearby neighborhood with a large bookstore and set my sights there. I looked at the distance on my phone and it didn’t seem too far. After sitting all day I could use the exercise!

15 minutes later I was kicking myself as I lugged my heavy overnight bag in the hot sun on the roughly 30 minute walk from the orientation area to the bookstore. Oh well, I saved a whopping 230Y, that has to count for something right? Actually the best part of the walk was I happened to go by a large park area in Kyoto and snapped some pictures as I passed by the openings.

This is what you saw from the road; just off camera is a busy street

I peeked inside and saw this. I confess I was too lazy to investigate more.

Once I finally arrived at my bookstore I found my way over to the magazine section to look for a magazine I’m fond of. Instead I found… holy crap, is that an Alphonse Mucha goodies set?! What the hell? That’s so awesome!

Childlike glee filled my face as I found not only did the bookstore have a set of various Mucha goods but also several books dedicated to him in both English and Japanese. For comparison, there was one Da Vinci book in Japanese and 4 on Mucha. There was also the biggest Mucha book I’ve ever seen in my life (and also the most expensive at 9000Y/~$90) but I had to leave it behind as I can’t even imagine how much shipping it would’ve cost. For people who have no idea what I’m talking about, Alphonse Mucha is my favorite artist; A Czech artist who painted in turn of the century (early 1900s) France and basically pioneered the art nouveau movement. He’s also apparently really popular in Japan which is completely awesome. In the end I settled on the Mucha set, a Mucha book, and a magazine by another artist I like who is actually Japanese and makes sense to be in a Japanese bookstore.

My art nerd heart is so happy.

So bags now heavier with my lovely loot I looked up the nearest station and headed that way. I contemplated when I should find dinner as I approached an intersection. My train station lay to the right across one road but across the road in front of me was… a Book Off. Book Off is part of a really awesome chain of used good stores that all have –Off in the title. The flagship store is hilariously called Hard Off and no matter how long I live here will that cease being funny.

The pedestrian crossing light flash in front of me signaling I could go and well… what’s the harm in just a peak in the store?

Trying to stay focused I barreled past the rows of video games, DVDs, and CDs and tried to focus on finding my magazine series. After searching in vain in the last store I learned my lesson and flagged an attendant and asked them through a combination of bad Japanese and a picture on my phone. The attendant showed me over to a section that had… Cosmode! Yes!

Those who know me may know I have a strange affinity for donning wigs and silly costumes I made and traipsing around with other such people. This is called “cosplay” (it’s a combination of costume and play) and Cosmodes are a magazine of cosplayer pictures, sewing patterns, crafting tips, and other awesomeness.

Because I’m a clever little collector I had made a note of which numbers I already had and quickly found that there were 7 present that I didn’t have. I began to compare them while calculating based on my otaku allowance how many I could get when I noticed the price. Normally a Cosmode costs around 1100-1300Y new, depending on what the insert is (patterns, photography guide book, etc). These Cosmodes were marked at… no, that can’t be right. They can’t be only 108Y each. No way. Oh my God, yes.

So I marched up to the register with my massive stack of magazines and happily paid half the price of a new Cosmode for a healthy collection of 7. By this point my bags were starting to be really heavy and I decided I should head home immediately lest I get more carried away and purchase an entire book shelf.

Best shopping trip ever. Also, stop judging me.

As I’ve said previously, navigating the subway and train systems in Japan is very easy for me. I found a certain joy in traveling by myself that evening, arms laden down with awesome books, as I easily purchased my tickets, surfed along the train ride barely need to hold a bar. I felt very much like I belonged; if a stranger saw me they would think that I lived here and this was no big deal to me. It was a good feeling.

This was right before my station and the Book Off; I thought it was pretty.

I got to Uji around 8:53 and had to make a choice. My bus was due at 10:00 on the dot and I wanted to grab dinner food before I got into town. The next bus wouldn’t be for 40 minutes so I’d have to wait if I didn’t take this bus. In the end I decided food is good and went to the neighboring conbini to grab some things to constitute a meal for when I got home. I selected a salad, a large roll of some capacity I can’t recall, and a mineral water of sorts. With my food I got back to the bus stop at 10:02 and settled in to wait for the next bus. While waiting and sipping my water I saw a cat emerge from the side of the station and walk out towards the bus area. The cat noticed me noticing it and quickly steered its course away from me. It then noticed a businessman walking by and I swear it smiled before taking off after him. Despite the fact I was holding food in my hands, Miss Kitty decided Salaryman-san was more likely to give her food. Japanese cats are racist, man.

At 9:30 on the dot the bus pulled up and I boarded with the others waiting. I’ve been meaning to get a bus card to use to pay rather than constantly worrying about having the right change so I approached the driver to buy one and – oh hey we’re moving. Guess that’s not happening today. I retreated to a seat and enjoyed the ride home.

This is what a bus trip from Ujitawara looks like, though not taken during the Kyoto events.

So ends my adventures in Kyoto. Well, mostly. When I got home I popped into my bathroom to brush my teeth after inhaling dinner and when I opened my slightly ajar toothbrush cabinet a freaking cockroach jumped out and scared the shit out of me. He evaded capture and found a spot I couldn’t reach so I gassed him with my anti-mosquito spray. Normally I try to just escort them off the premises but the little jerk had shit in my toothbrush cabinet (possibly from fear when he saw me but still). I was not pleased.

Now my adventure ends, with stacks of orientation booklets and art books littering my floor. Next time! Either the Ujitawara Elementary School summer matsuri or food blog part 1! I haven’t decided yet. Check back in half a week or so!

Paradise City

Japanese Word of the Day

English: History
Japanese: Rekishi  (れきし or 歴史)

The JET program seems to really like orientations. Regular readers will remember that before leaving for Japan I had an orientation in Atlanta and upon arriving another for a few days in Tokyo. But they were both incredibly useful and interesting so knowing I had an upcoming orientation in Kyoto was a source of excitement. This orientation was specifically orchestrated to be for the JETs in the Kyoto prefecture and was held in Kyoto city, our “home base” of sorts. Now I live out in what we call the 田舎 (“inaka” or countryside) so getting to Kyoto is a good hour/hour and a half trip and 900￥(~$10) one way. The second day of orientation started bright and early at 8:30 A.M. so knowing this my supervisor offered to let me spend the night at his house in Kyoto between the days so I wouldn't have to get up super early (and pay nearly $40 in travel). So at that point I was excited for orientation and incredibly nervous about visiting my super’s home and proper etiquette. I did know that when visiting a Japanese house you should bring some sort of gift to show appreciation for the invitation. Japanese homes tend to be quite private so being invited is a big deal. Now the question was, what to bring? I recalled seeing a no-oven cookie recipe on cookpad (I have no oven) while browsing and decided homemade cookies would be a good choice. Time to cook!

Because I've been cooking awesome things like pizza I already had several of the ingredients I needed like flour, oil, eggs, etc. One thing I definitely needed was chocolate chips which proved remarkably hard to find. By which I mean I could not find them at all. Oddly, I found white chocolate chips but no regular. That’s fine, I’m a creative, liberal arts educated woman, I can improvise! So I bought a bar of chocolate, froze it, and cut it up and called it chips. Totally worked too!

The cookies turned out quite well (I’ll stick a link to the recipe at the bottom of the entry) though I burned a few and had to penalize myself by eating them. Can’t make a good impression with burned cookies and waste is bad! I wrapped them nicely then stuck them in plastic so they wouldn't turn into cookie dust in my bag.

Cookie dough+Microwave=Science!

Ok, got my cookies, I am so set for this orientation! …Oh right, I have to get there first. I had actually researched a route I felt fairly comfortable with before Allen let me know that he’d go with me to help me get around. He told me the plan and we agreed to meet at 8:40 outside the apartments before walking to the bus stop. The plan was to take the bus from Ujitawara over to Uji then hop the train into Kyoto proper before taking a bus to the orientation hotel. No problem right?

On the first bus ride to Uji proper I got a text from Namba-san (my supervisor who I was staying with) telling me that I “would” be picked up by his son at 17:00 and then go with his family to dinner. I had actually told him previously that there was a JET event that night that I wanted to go to so I could meet and network with my local peers. The reason I stuck ‘would’ in quotes was to emphasize his manner of speech; it comes across as very absolute demands when in fact it’s not a demand but an offer. That said, it’s still pretty scary when your super says “YOU WILL COME WITH MY FAMILY TO DINNER” and you have other plans. Allen encouraged me to just explain the situation and that he wouldn't take offense so I did. I was told that I should come to the house between 21-22:00 then. If you’re wondering why I’m talking in military time it’s because that’s what we use here in Japan and if I have to deal with it ya’ll do too. Right, so first crisis averted.  On to Kyoto!

Trains in Japan are awesome. They really are. They say arriving at 8:27 they mean 8:27 and if they don’t arrive then you can bet they’ll notify you of the delay and give an exact time the train will arrival. Thanks to such a delay we were able to catch a rapid express that was running a bit late into Kyoto. On the platform we spotted some other foreigners and well dressed foreigners in non major towns always means fellow JETs. Actually that’s probably untrue but in this case it did! Like magnets we gravitated to the other non-Japanese people and rode into Kyoto. We happened to be in the front car of the train and I was directly behind a glass wall separating the conductor which allowed me to watch his routine. Whenever the train stopped before restarting he had to point his white gloved hand to the time table and then do an exaggerated pointing gesture directly in front of the train. For some reason there was a slight delay and he kept starting his finger point then having to delay and restart again in a few seconds. It was pretty entertaining to watch.

Once in Kyoto we headed for the bus pool outside the station. We knew which bus we needed but the bus pool was absolutely massive and we’d have missed our bus if we went around to each stop to see if it was ours so we asked a friendly police officer who directed us. The other JETs from the train joined us at the bus and we merged into a super group of out of place foreigners that commandeered the back half of the bus.

Despite catching the rapid express train we were running a bit late so it was fortunate the bus route went right by our orientation hotel. We hopped out and hurried over to the hotel and slipped into seats after the end of what I presume was the first welcome speech. Japan likes speeches a lot so there are usually a welcome speech or two so I didn’t consider it a huge loss (though I do hate being late).

The next speaker was a gentlemen who had served in the JET program in the late 90s (give or take 5 years) and was now working for the Japanese government doing… something. It was early and the details probably don’t matter. Overall his speech was quite interesting as it told the history of the JET program, which I will try to massively condense. Basically, after WW2 Japan’s economy became very powerful and up until the 90s was incredibly strongly and growing massively. This led to some economic hard feelings with American businesses (again, massively paraphrasing here) and gave Japan a bit of a negative reputation. Japan had a ridiculous amount of disposable income and someone decided a solution to fix their reputation; bring a bunch of Americans over to live in Japan and develop a fondness for the country before returning home to spread this fondness. But those Americans need to work… what can they do? Why not teach English? English seems useful. And so the JET program was born! No really.

It wasn’t until the economy bubble collapsed and Japan’s economy began stalling that the true usefulness of the JET program was discovered. At this point Japanese companies were needing to get overseas business since the home market was so bad and to do so they needed a better grasp on the universal business language – English. So now all these JETs we’ve got developing a fondness for Japan are suddenly very useful for preparing students to go into work in an increasingly global Japan. Japan is actually still making changes to push English more and more. I believe it was 3 years ago English was introduced at the Elementary level (where I will be teaching!) where it hadn’t been before. At elementary school students have a home room teacher who teaches all subjects and were often not trained in English so now the JETs like me are even more useful. So yeah, JETs are a really respected commodity around here (or so I’m told). If you’re curious, the speaker told us that there’s a book called “Importing Diversity” by David Connell about the program and its origins more in depth.

Moving on with orientation, our speaker finished and we were given a break to get lunch. I spotted some JETs from my next town over (Uji) and decided to follow them in an effort to network. We ended up going to a nearby bakery and getting some really delicious breads for lunch. And no, I don’t mean breads like slices of different loaves; I mean like rolls with fillings and baked in meats, cheeses, and fruits. I got a roll I thought was a desert roll (it said “kurimi” which I read as “creamy”) that turned out to be filled with some sort of pink fishy stuff. It was ok. I absolutely adore cream filled rolls here though. In fact I just ate one with pudding in it before typing this, but I digress.

After heading back, orientation recommenced with a lesson plan swap. We had all been assigned a number of letter and arranged ourselves at tables based on that. After the first 15 minutes all the letters rotated around the room to the next table while the numbers stayed. This was a really great chance for newbies like me to get lesson plans (tried and proven ones!) to use and hear how different class types went over with different ages. I collected probably 20 or so different lesson plans and got lots of good ideas so it was an excellent exercise in my opinion.

After a short break the second half of the afternoon began wherein a few selected sempai (senior) JETs did their self introduction lessons to demonstrate for us newbies. During the first presentation, the man presenting made a reference to visiting “England” and showed a picture of Great Britain in its entirety. Our prefectural advisor, Mark, (who helped run the orientation) is from Scotland loudly exclaimed “WHAT?! England?!” to the amusement of all. The second presenter also had a slide saying he lived in England (to which he apologized to Mark) and the presenter had a picture of the UK with England’s flag transposed on all the countries. It was a frustrating afternoon for Mark.

After the introductions we were allowed to ask questions as “students” to complete the experience. Some of the better questions were someone asking “what’s your favorite color?” followed by two more people asking the exact same question immediately after. I guess that’s a thing that happens. Another person asked “what is love” but sadly the answer wasn't “baby don’t hurt me”. The self introduction lessons were really nice since the next day all the newbies would be giving mock presentations of our planned introductions with a partner JET acting as our JTE (Japanese teacher of English). My partner was Allen since he’s from my town and why not.  Luckily, I’d already asked him to look at my powerpoint so he was familiar with it. We nitpicked a few details and had it good to go for the next day.

So now it’s about 4:15 and orientation is over. My JET social event isn't until 5:30 so I have some time to kill. I notice a bunch of JETs heading in the general direction of the station so I follow along with some groups and kill time chatting with others. I was also told that apparently do not sound southern and had people guess I was from a more British location. Go figure. I also had a really nice discussion about feminism with two young women from South Africa that was quite interesting but I’m not going to pad this entry with it. Instead have a picture of tanabata cards in the station mall we waited around in.

In the Tanabata Festival people write down their wishes on paper and hang them in bamboo.
There's a lot of mythology behind it that's really cool but I can't fit it all in this box so google it!

As 5:30 approached my group headed over to the Kyoto Tower and up to the rooftop beer garden where our JET gathering was happening. Basically it was a 4 or so hour chance to hang out and network on the top of a tower in Kyoto and have an all-you-can-eat buffet and all-you-can-drink-beer… buffet. I didn’t really know but 3 or so of the people there so I picked a group and sat down. I’d like to take a moment to point out that I am inherently an introvert and this was rather difficult but knowing other English speakers is so important to your sanity as an ex-pat that it’s usually worth the struggle. In this case it definitely was. I met a young couple from northern Kyoto who were really nice. The husband was a JET and his wife had come with him and thus didn’t have the same JET network connections the rest of us did so she seemed excited to make contact with some people. I also got to chat with several people including Kyoto’s non-Scottish PA, Sammie, who is equally awesome. For those curious, I had a little bit of beer and then spent the rest of the evening with a radioactive looking tankard filled with melon soda. All-you-can-drink beer on tap? Nah bro, all-you-can-drink melon soda!

That bright green mug is delicious melon soda (though not mine).

The tower itself was very pretty after nightfall.

I had planned my route to Namba-sans house and decided I could leave around 9:00 and get there about 9:20 and be right in the middle of the time range he gave me. So when 9 struck, I excused myself from the group and headed out alone to the station. One of the really good things about Japan is the main bus station always seems to be next to the main train station, which the beer garden happened to be next to. Alright, I’m an expert on navigating the Japanese public transit system, let’s catch a bus!

…or not.

I want to clarify that I could have taken a bus but I made an executive decision not to. You see, Kyoto is a big city and big cities need a lot of buses. So the bus station for Kyoto was massive and seemed to be sectioned based on some system that probably makes a lot of sense if you can read Japanese and know the cities layout. I lack both of these skills so after checking a few bus stops for my bus I threw my hands in the air and went to the subway.

Subways are good. I like subways. Japanese train and subway systems are incredibly easy to navigate. You find the ticket station (usually some computers set in a wall) and check the map above them. The map shows you your station and all the routes out of your station and all the stations those routes go to as well as the fare to those stations. Then you give the computer money for your fare, get a ticket, and you’re good to go. Also, in Kyoto many signs are written in English since it’s a big tourist spot, so it’s even easier.

I took my subway train no problem but it popped me out back into the world about a 10 minute walk from Namba-san’s house, whereas the bus would've taken me right next to it. Oh well, time to walk. Good thing walking around in Japan at night is really safe. For the record, that’s not sarcasm, it really is, especially in a big town like Kyoto on a main street.

Using my handy-dandy-I’ll-never-dis-Apple-again Iphone I was navigated right to the front of Namba-san’s apartment complex. And then… oh hey, this entry is already really long. Opps, I guess I’ll have to break it into two. Guess you’ll just have to check back in a few days to find out what happens!

Bonus! Microwavable Cookie Recipe

In English but with metric amounts and Japanese microwave cooking instructions. Fair warning, I overcooked several of mine because they do cook from the inside so it's hard to tell when they're done.

River of Tea

Japanese Word of the Day:

English: (Loosely translated) "Hurrah!"
Japanese: Banzai! (ばんざい or 万歳)

Note: Banzai is a celebratory chant usually shouted three times with both arms raised. Imagine me doing that to complete the experience 

So this is a special entry because…. I have now surpassed the word count from my previous set of entries during study abroad! Wooo! That’s really kind of crazy that in about 2 weeks I’ve said more than I did in 4 months. Regardless, this entry is going to focus on some cultural differences I’ve run across, especially in teaching. Some of these things I’ve brought up briefly and want to emphasize and others will be new details. Before I start though let me first say that this is not an “America versus Japan” tally sheet. In general, I try not to say something is “better” in one place or another because that’s ignorant of all the years of history that reached this point. It can be hard to completely remove opinion from comparison writing though and I probably will state that I think something is good or successful but that absolutely does not mean the other country is ‘wrong’. Got that? Ok then, let’s go!

Nudity in General

As I’ve said, I’ve been exposed to a fair amount of child nudity lately in nursery school. On my first day at the nursery the kids went swimming which meant they changed into swimsuits right in front of each other. Since then I’ve learned that after any recess the kids strip down to be hosed off, regardless of it being in the pool (I assume this does not happen in the winter, by the way). So on a daily basis, the children get naked, are hosed off by their teachers, and then dry off and recloth, at least in theory. In between the clothes being removed and returned the kids do a lot of horseplay because they are kids. Watching a mixed sex group of children run by butt naked and end up wrestling was pretty jarring. The entire time the kids were naked the first day I kept thinking how very illegal this would be in America. Allen told me that he felt the same way when he first came but that he appreciated the trust we were given to do things like help dress kids. After thinking about it, I have to agree with him, though it all still makes me a little uncomfortable.

I think from an early age in America we teach children to cover up their bodies at all times and feel shame towards nudity. But at the same time, when I’m working at the BoE office I need to make sure I have my shoulders completely covered, my dress or shorts cover my knees, and have no more than 3 fingers below my collarbone exposed. Japan also has an indecency law that requires large bars to cover any depiction of parts of genitalia like nipples (of women, not men). Speaking of breasts, I was thumbing through a children’s book in the nursery classroom (5-6 yr olds) and found a book about a mother being pregnant with her son, giving birth, and his first few years of life. I was first surprised to see a depiction the developing baby in the womb and then later the mother breastfeeding the child. I haven’t been to many kindergartens in America (like none at all) so I may just be uninformed but I thought embryo development wasn’t really something taught to children so young, and I’m pretty sure breastfeeding isn’t. I was pretty impressed that it was so comfortably not an issue to tell kids where they came from. That same book stack also had a picture book of the original Little Mermaid story where she tries to kill the prince and commits suicide though so maybe it was just a very progressive classroom.

Gardening for Everyone!

As you may have noticed in the panorama pictures out my porch there are a few personal gardens behind my apartment complex. Biking around town I was surprised the amount of and scale of gardens in town; everyone seems to have at least a few plants. In addition to this, the nursery class I worked with had 3 large planters of variations of cherry tomatoes. The kids would be sure to water them (or rather drown them) a few times a week. The school grounds themselves also had some other various vegetable plants but I don’t know who maintains those. I did notice during recess that several teachers went to the corners of the play area and began pulling weeds to fight the advance of grass. Even stranger, some of the kids joined the teachers and spent their entire play time helping pull weeds. It was really cool to see kids getting to be a part of growing things and wanting to help keep the area tidy. Which leads me to my next point…

Cleaning is the Student’s Job

In the Japanese school system, students are assigned to a class (like 2-3 for the 3^rd class in the 2^nd year) and that is where they spend their day. The class has a homeroom teacher but throughout the day as classes change the teachers go to the classroom rather than the students going to the teacher’s rooms. This means that everyone takes all the same classes, as well. At the nursery level this isn’t in effect yet since the only real class the kids have is a 30 minute English “lesson” near the end of the day. Regardless, they still have their assigned room and in Japan it is the student’s job to keep the classroom clean. This mentality is started at the Nursery level to prepare them for the higher grades when they will be the people keeping the room clean.

It’s actually kind of ingenious how it’s been turned into a game of sorts for the nursery kids. After the afternoon snack (last food of the day) the kids are told to go find any trash they can and boy do they search. By making it into a competitive type event it encourages them to work without realizing they’re doing it. I had several kiddos come up and proudly show me the tiny speck of dust bunny they found.

In addition to this ‘game’, the class also assigns 5 helpers each day. These helpers help with cleaning the tables before and after lunch/snack time as well as helping actually distribute the food. There are no cafeterias in Japanese schools*; the meals are eaten in the classroom. At the nursery level, the food is wheeled in on a cart. The teachers set about dividing the food onto plates that the helpers take to each student, waiting patiently at their desk (or more likely doing a headstand somewhere). After the food has been given to everyone the helpers stand in front of the class and there’s a little chant the helpers and class do back and force. My basic understanding is “here is food” “I understand, thank you” “let’s enjoy the food”. Then everyone is able to begin eating. If there is extra food, students can go up and get some more. If a student doesn’t eat all their food (again, at Nursery level) the teachers may come by and encourage them to eat more or even spoon chopstick feed it to them. Waste is considered very bad in Japan so you are supposed to eat every bite of food on your plate.

*I do not doubt that cafeterias do exist somewhere in Japan but for the most part this is not the case

After everyone is done they return their plates/bowls to bins at the front and the helpers go back to the front of the room for another chant, basically appreciating the food. Also, when the helpers are announced at the beginning of the day they have another chant where they basically say they understand the responsibility and will do their best. The reason I can’t give a better translation is because some of the more 元気 (energetic) kids tend to shout the lines at the top of their lungs which makes comprehension hard. Also, every other phrase they say is “はい、わかりました” (yes, I understood)

I don't have many pictures for this one so have an unrelated sunset

Special Needs

I feel like I’m stepping into a minefield right now. I have basically no knowledge of special needs classrooms in America or treatment in general so I’m going to be really vague here and just reflect on what I’ve seen. Disclaimer aside, I was a little surprised when I noticed there was a special needs man working in my BoE main office. He has an unusual way of speaking (which was my first tip off) that reminded me a lot of the way mentally handicapped individuals speak in English. I confess I can’t understand a word he says because the inflections are strange and my Japanese comprehension is pretty limited anyways. He seems to be the tech type person for the office. Inaho-sensei called him to fix computer problems and he was the photographer at my Welcome Ceremony responsible for the pictures you saw in the last post. Because of this I figured he was a higher functioning individual but sometimes I’m not sure. Regardless, I don’t think I’ve ever seen a mentally handicapped person working in a school or government office before in America so it was a bit surprising.

While working at the nursery I quickly picked up that one little boy in my class was also handicapped. The classes seem to share teachers which is very convenient since my classrooms main teacher seems to spend most of her time with this young boy; I actually thought she might’ve been his mom for a while. He participates in all the same things as the other students, though I haven’t seen him be a classroom helper. Most of the kids don’t seem to seek him out and he stays glued to the side of the main teacher. Yet, my last day at the nursery Allen pointed out that a quieter girl had gone and played with him and spent the morning time with him. I remarked to Allen that I found it interesting that he wasn’t in a separate class like he would be in America. Allen told me that in Korea there was a problem with parents being too proud to admit their child needed help and thus keeping them in the main classes and that could be what was going on here. Also the fact that my town is so small could mean there weren’t enough special needs students to actually make a class. Regardless, right now he seems to get the help he needs since there is a teacher about to devote so much time to him, I hope that continues in higher grades.

Miscellaneous Things

So in Japan it is considered rude to walk around while eating or drinking. Yeah, I dunno why that’s a rule either. What it means is that often people will loiter next to a drink machine or inside a convenient store while they drink their drink. Allen and I spent about 45 minutes loitering on a break once because we’d both gotten drinks and the convenient store had AC. This is apparently an entirely acceptable thing but it feels incredibly weird to me. I feel like once I have my drink I need to leave ASAP lest I be accused of shoplifting or something. Also the drink I got on this excursion was an “Orangina” which I feel would not be successfully marketed in an English speaking country. I may have giggled a lot. Also they’re really good! And I certainly did not buy it the first time because it came with a free figurine, that would be silly. I am a mature adult, thank you very much.

Mmm delicious. The pink thing behind it was a freebie with it, too!

Japan likes loudspeakers. Last week, we had a typhoon come through the area as you all know. The night before it was due to hit I began hearing strange loud Japanese voices. Fortunately, I have been in Japan before so I instantly knew what it was. My city had a van (or possibly more) decked out in loud speakers and a wee-woo red light that drove around and made sure everyone knew the typhoon was coming. That may sound like a really cool idea for notifying people, because it is. You know what isn’t cool? When politicians do the same thing (minus the wee-woo red lights). It’s especially annoying when they wake you up with their loudspeakers that are basically just saying their name and maybe “vote for them”. I haven’t seen any of those in Ujitawara yet (my experiences of them come from Hirakata/student abroad) and I’m hoping my city is too small for them to be a practice.

Opps, back to nursery stories. On my last day working there it was a rainy day so instead of recess outside the kids were given a ton of old newspapers and other paper and told to go nuts. Creativity ensued. I decided to show off and make a paper flower, a think I am well known for at home. One of the teachers noticed and got another of the teachers and watched me, quite interested. I told them what I was making and they were quite surprised. Once I finished I was told how very skillful I was amid their shock that I even knew origami. One of the teachers asked me where I had learned to make origami. I told her I learned it in America in one of my classes and she was really surprised. It struck me as strange that a city would pay to literally have me move across the world to teach their kids about language and culture and yet they wouldn’t think that American students would learn things about Japanese culture. In retrospect I do realize that probably not everyone learned to make cranes in class but with Japan such a powerful soft power cultural influence right now (see video games, comics, anime, etc) it still surprised me. Or possibly I’ve just been very receptive to other cultures; my brother liked to joke that I wanted to be anything but an American as a kid. I also made a crane and found out that the style of crane I make is different slightly from the traditional Japanese style. I need to learn that.

That's all I've got for now. Well not really, but that's all I'm saying now. I think I might try to do occasional entries on cultural differences between the countries people might not know about. It seems like a fun way to talk about differences in Japan while being able to stave off culture fatigue. Also if anyone is curious about something in particular I might do a question answer blog, if that's something people would be interested in. You can pop me a message by email or facebook or you can just leave a comment if you'd like!

Post Note: Some of you may have noticed I think myself clever and have been making the article titles plays on famous books and songs lately. This particular one requires a smidge of explanation. As a kid my parents play Eric Clapton’s “Pilgrim” CD a fair bit and I always misheard the song “River of Tears” as “River of Tea” (which I thought sounded way more awesome anyways). Given my town’s unending love of tea (and large river carving through the center of town) I deemed it a fitting use.

Unrelated Post Note 2: I forgot to upload this before going to my prefectural orientation (opps) so I have a bit of a backlog of entries. That said, the Japanese Word of the Day is "banzai" because I just got internet in my apartment! Banzai!! That means I can upload my entries from a comfortable seat in the room I air condition instead of standing next to my front door trying to steal Allen's wifi. Getting my internet also means my apartment is now perfect basically so I can start getting on requests from people (like figuring out my address in English). Anyways, next entry will be about Kyoto Orientation! Look forward to stuff about Kyoto, spending a night at my supervisor's house, and bookstores (among other things)!

Kois of Summer

Japanese Word of the Day:

English: Cell Phone
Japanese: Ketai  (ケータイ)

I know the timeline for this blog is kind of funky since I keep hopping around. I wanted to touch on two more events from my first week of being in Ujitawara that I didn’t get to in my 3 part intro. As I recall, the last bit of that entry ended with my getting free stuff from the bank (my first Friday in town). The first thing I want to tell you about it a neighborhood festival that I went to on Saturday evening, though the story actually begins on Friday. Woo timelines!

Becca had told me that she was a member of a local Taiko (traditional drumming) club and that they were performing before she left. She had invited me to see them practice before the performance on Friday at their usual time. Unfortunately, I had a bad case of the ‘felt-like-shits’ that day courtesy of a throbbing headache that mostly incapacitated me. So the prospect of watching people drum loudly for two hours was practically a war crime and I had to back out with my apologies. Ever the awesome person, Becca invited me to go with her and Andrew to the festival to see them perform on Saturday and get to experience a bit of local flair. She said that the festival was a little far to bike so a taiko friend was driving them and assured me it was fine for me to come.

So as 6:00 approached on Saturday I was headache free and ready to see some cool drumming as I met Becca and Andrew out front of the apartments. The only problem? It had been raining off and on all day and was drizzling now. Becca expressed her concerns that they might not be able to perform since the drums are large and hard to shelter properly. Regardless, our ride showed up and we all climbed inside with me rather awkwardly in the front passenger seat next to a lady I didn’t know. I was quickly introduced to the nice lady whose name I can’t remember (seriously, you guys have no idea how many names I was told in my first week) and we started down the road.

Along the ride, Ms Taikolady (as I will now call her) told Becca that the drumming had in fact been cancelled but they had already gotten tickets for food so they figured they should go ahead and enjoy their food anyways. This was all said in Japanese, by the way, with Becca translating for my benefit. Ms Taikolady tried to engage me in basic Japanese and Becca helped out allowing some introduction and pleasantries to be passed. At some point in the ride the cd in the car changed and Ms Taikolady said that this was a cd that Becca’s predecessor Sarah had given her (Sarah was also in the taiko club, apparently).  I wondered what type of American music Sarah might have given Ms Taikolady when – wait a second, that’s totally Allison Kraus. Yeah, my dad had her live cd and played it a bunch. Huh. Interesting cultural exchange. During a trip with Namba-san later in the timeline he was playing a Coldplay cd, so I guess American music is pretty accepted over here (based on these 2 cases of anecdotal evidence, and really what more do you need?)

This was also the trip that I mentioned earlier where Ms Taikolady had to navigate an incredibly tight road and did so incredibly well in the rain and dusk. Seriously, everyone here is an insanely good driver.

The festival itself was a small neighborhood event in what seemed to be a neighborhood park space. It was set up with a stage area, benches for seating, and a horseshoe of small stands of food, games, and children’s toys around the stage and seating area. Again, I dearly wish I could share pictures but there were a crapton of kids running around and I felt uncomfortable taking pictures. You’ll just have to imagine the red paper lanterns strung along the stands casting a soft rose tinted light on everything as dusk began to fall. Some of the children had been dressed in yukata for the occasion, often in shades of blues with flowers or koi dancing across the fabric.

The taiko group was gathered and dressed plainly in black shirts with white kanji and plain black pants. I felt right at home among their sense of fashion. You know, minus not understanding a single word anyone said.

Ms Taikolady called everyone to a huddle to confirm that they were not performing and say some other things. She also had everyone say farewell to Becca (who was leaving the next day) and also introduced me to them as many were my future students. I bowed awkwardly from my corner of being distracted by shiny lanterns and lack of Japanese competency. I am an impressive teacher.

The group divided up their food tickets and broke to enjoy the festival. I was just contemplating what I’d cook for dinner when we got home when Becca came over and handed me a set of tickets as well. She assured me that they were extra and it would be a waste for me to not use them but I was still really grateful. I was certainly not expecting to be provided food from all of this! Speaking of the food, let’s talk about festival food!

Japan has some really good ‘on the go’ type festival foods. As I have limited experience with festivals I haven’t had a lot but one I am familiar with is takoyaki. The prefix “tako-“ means that it’s an octopus based food, by the way. Basically, it’s little balls of fried octopus. It’s quite tasty as long as you eat it in one bite and don’t nibble and make eye contact with tiny suction cups. Incidentally, I don’t really eat takoyaki anymore.

Om nom nom?

The food I got at this event was (left to right) karage, a choice of soda, and a box of food I didn’t catch the name of. Karage is the greatest homesickness food ever. It’s basically super delicious boneless fried chicken bites. Out of my choices for soda I chose Calpis because I like to giggle at the name it is tasty and has vitamins and stuff. Yes, it is pronounced in English just how you’re thinking it is. Good thing it isn’t yellow, huh?

The other stuff… I genuinely have no idea what most of it was. I discovered that the round thing was an egg and that was my only breakthrough. I did try each of the 4 other things and found them all strangely chewy and rather unappetizing. For the record, that yellow stuff is spicy mustard on the gray triangle. The karage was delicious though!

Food aside, the festival was a fun chance for me to interact with some of my future students. At this point I was still really nervous so the only things I really managed were hellos and nice to meet yous. It was fine though since the children all treated Becca like a celebrity and flocked to see her before she pointed to me and let some of the celebrity status rub off. Apparently one of the younger girls told Becca I was “beautiful” which was both flattery and somewhat baffling as I was in a videogame tshirt and cargo shorts with wild humidity hair. But I’ll take it!

There was also a band of 3 women in what looked like blue shiny prom dressed performing songs on stage (2 singing and one playing keyboard on occasion). I mention them because they performed… “Let it Go”. I really, really need to memorize the lyrics to that song. If I was keeping a counter of times I’ve heard that song out in the world in Japan I’d be up to around 4-5 times.

So the festival was entirely fun though a bit disappointing that Becca didn’t get to perform a last time with her group. The other event I have to share happened the following Tuesday; my Welcome Ceremony!

On the Friday of that horrible headache before the end of the work day Inaho-sensei told me that my welcome ceremony would be happening on Tuesday and that I would need to write a “speech”. At this point I was horrified and alarmed and immediately asked if it needed to be in Japanese. Inaho-sensei told me English was fine, that he would translate it, and that it should be a “medium length speech” when I inquired about length. What in the hell does that mean? Baffled, I began trying to think what about myself was interesting enough to talk about when Inaho-sensei gave me one more suggestion; say something about tea. …Seriously? Oh freaking… I’m pretty sure “Hi, I’m your new ALT Madeline and I can’t stand bitter tea” would not be a good way to introduce myself. This was going to take a deft hand. Ok Madeline, time to impress.

On Monday I brought Inaho-sensei my finished speech to be perused and so he could have it translated for the next day. He read over it and smiled happily and told me I had done a very good job. Awww yeah, professional schmoozer Madeline strikes again.

On Tuesday I arrived to work dressed up (minus my suit jacket) and ready to be welcomed. Alas, my ceremony wasn’t until 10 (I come in around 8:15) so I had to try to be productive a while until it was finally time. At like 9:57, right as I was getting worried, Inaho-sensei came to collect me. Times are very precise here. Not to digress too much, but if I stay until 12:01 at lunch time Inaho-sensei stops what he’s doing to tell me to go eat. Times are pretty on the dot.

So by 9:59 we are standing outside the room apparently waiting for some cue to enter. Apparently that cue came as Inaho-sensei instructs me to walk in and sit in the middle chair before gesturing me on my way. The room was arranged with 3 seats in the middle front and 3 rows on the sides facing the center (2 on the left, 1 on the right). I walked to the middle empty seat between the mayor and …middle school principal I think? I think I stood awkwardly for a bit and probably bowed a little while waiting for an idea of what to do while people clapped. After a moment Inaho-sensei showed up behind me and began giving me instructions. Sit down. Now listen to a welcome by the mayor. Now  clap. Now listen to a welcome by principal-man. Now clap. Now listen to a speech by a middle school student. Now clap. Now you give your speech.

I approached the podium remarkably calm, possibly because I knew if I messed up a word only one or two people in the room would even know. I read my speech a line at a time after which I paused to let Inaho-sensei read a translation. For those curious here’s what my speech was:

I’m [name removed] from North Carolina, on the east coast of America. I first came to Japan 3 years ago as a student and found I loved your country and wanted to return. Now I am here in the beautiful city of Ujitawara excited to learn more about this town, Japanese (language), and of course green tea. I have not had much green tea, living in America, so I’m grateful for the chance to learn about it especially from its origin. I love taking pictures and I look forward to getting to see the town in all four seasons. I hope to show my pictures of Ujitawara with my friends and family back home and share what a great place this is. I have also enjoyed meeting the many children of Ujitawara and eagerly await having them in class and teaching them to love English. Thank you for having me as your assistant English teacher, I promise to work hard and do my best!

I tried to speak very clearly, at a slow pace, and look up and around the room as I spoke. As it happens, I have a few pictures from this event but I’m going to stick to pictures of me for good measure.

Yup, that's me all right.

Hey look, the backs of people's heads! Riveting.

After the speech a troop of nursery school kids came in who I now recognize as the kids I’ve been working with the last 3 days (5-6 year olds). They performed 2 songs with little dances while their handlers tried to keep them focused and from wandering off in between the songs. It’s kind of fun looking back at the pictures and knowing several of the kids personalities.

After their dances a girl and a boy were led up to me by the teachers. The girl presented me a necklace of paper flowers with a large paper medallion saying in English “Welcome to Ujitawara”.

They made me morning glory paper flowers :) <3

After that, a small boy was ushered forth and given a bouquet of flowers about as big as him to hand to me. He got super bashful when it came time to give it to me and couldn’t look me in the eyes and stalled until his teacher lightly pushed him forward. It’s kind of funny because after seeing him in class I know he’s a super energetic kid who’s always leading other kids but he just did not know what to do about me. A really excellent picture of him handing me the flowers got put in the local newspaper with an article about the event. Sadly, I don’t get the newspaper so  I don’t have a copy to show you (and I couldn’t anyways).

Now imagine a tiny, sheepishly smiling kid.

The kiddos were then arranged in 2 lines in front of me and the mayor/principal for a quick set of pictures before being ushered off to do more child things. I sadly did not get to go with the kids and had to hang around for pictures with all the teachers and other people in attendance (all of whom were education/city based jobs).

After a bit I was told I was free to leave and went downstairs to work another hour before my lunch break when I could arrange my lovely flowers.

Little did I know those roses hid a feasting caterpillar.

I actually struggled to find a container big enough for them.

That afternoon I went out to the local drug store in search of mosquito go-away spray and while trying to determine what was and was not lethal indoors I stood around while several people went by. One group was a mother and 2 of her little kids one of whom was a little girl I recognized from the Welcome Ceremony performance. She gasped at the sight of me and I smiled and waved back to show I remembered her. She absolutely melted and did not know what to do, it was pretty cute. Eventually her mother grabbed her hand and hurried her along, with a friendly greeting to me. Celebrity status obtained!

Post Writing Edit: If you’re wondering why the word of the day was ‘ketai’ it’s because I finally got my Japanese phone, yaaaay! As a longtime semi-professional Apple-basher I am slightly ashamed to admit it’s an iphone. What can I say, in this bizarre backwards world it was the 2^nd cheapest phone option (and the cheapest had an absolutely terrible design). So yeah, I now have 2 redheaded stepchildren Apple products. What this also means is (according to Allen) ya’ll American iphone users will be able to message me, so that’s pretty exciting. There are also an insane amount of cases available for iphone. Like my American phone was a Windows phone so I had literally 2 choices and now there are thousands.

Once I get the messaging thing set up I’ll let people know how to contact me, though I won’t be posting it here (for obvious privacy reasons).

It's green too! Also, I swear my desk isn't full of gummy worms.

The Sky is Cryin'

Japanese Word of the Day:
English: Rain
Japanese: Ame (あめ or 雨)

Today, it is raining sideways here.

Yeah, there's normally mountains in that view.

Basically a typhoon is blowing through this weekend which means lots of rain, rain, and more rain. Also there’s some wind. So yesterday after nursery excitement I grabbed a ton of snacks at the grocery store, came home, and tucked in knowing I wasn't going anywhere this weekend. That means ya’ll get more blogs, yaaay! And this is the long promised “what my apartment looks like” entry, yaaaaaay!

I’m excited, anyways.

In honor of my mother’s love of floorplanes I cobbled together a rough idea of the layout of my apartment. Please note this is not to scale because I made this in MS paint and scale is hard. For the record, my apartment is quite large based on my understanding of normal Japanese apartment sizes.

So let’s dive right into the tour, shall we?

Yup, that's a hallway all right.

From the front door we have the shoe removal area and main hallway. In Japanese homes you don’t wear your shoes around the house for a number of reasons. First off, shoes damage tatami mat and secondly they track in the dirt and grime from outside. When your bed is literally on the floor you don’t want your floors to be dirty all the time so upon entering you switch out your outdoor shoes for usually slippers of some type. You can see my outside shoes hiding in the shoe area and an extra pair of sippers waiting for use. See that room on the left in the picture? That’s the…

Despite being a large apartment the rooms are still too small to easily photograph. Don't mind the panorama distortion.

That's my bed. No, really!

Tatami room! The flooring is tatami mat which is supposedly softer than normal floors. The softness is the reason it’s used in bedrooms since futons in Japan are not very thick. Except mine. Because I am currently layering 2 futons and a plush comforter to make my bed softer.

Fellow futon sleepers: Stop judging me

I actually slept on the single futon my first night or two and then decided that was silly and it was my apartment and I could do what I liked. Japanese believe that a firm bed is important for a healthy back and blah blah blah. I had really bad shoulder soreness (which I fully admit could be attributed to the massive luggage I was carrying around not my bed) but I decided to go with a softer setup. Maybe later in the year I’ll splurge and just get a plusher futon. If you’re wondering why my futon is folded up it’s certainly not because I need the space. Futons absorb the liquid you sweat out in your sleep and if you leave it on the tatami it will cause mold. For this reason you need to air out the tatami you sleep over during the day and the futon itself weekly. Since it’s been raining so much I haven’t been able to air my futon. : (  Anyways, from the tatami room we take a left to go into…

Yeaaah, photoshop didn't like this one much. Sorry! I tried to tidy it a bit so the distortions would be less distracting.

Oh good, photoshop was kinder to this one.

This is my base of operations and where I am sitting as I type this. Not only does this room have a great desk, a killer view, and comfortable chair but it also has the AC unit (it’s above the tv). All the piles of papers are important things I need to figure out. I have a lot of piles. Through the other door we go to…

That phone is actually an intercom to the front door.

Those flowers are from my Welcome Ceremony I haven't gotten around to telling ya'll about. Opps.

My super awesome kitchen! Seriously, I know it seems small by American standards but I get so much cooking done in here. I’ve been getting pictures of all the things I cook so I can show off but that’s a later article. Also, that window looks out on the side of my office. I often leave the door to the kitchen slid closed because the kitchen is hot and I like privacy. Back into the hall!

I spent the longest time trying to figure out what the thing on the top of the toilet was;

It's a sink! When you flush it puts clean water through the sink part so you can wash your hands off. Pretty nifty!

I don’t think Japan believes in simple toilets. Aside from the built in sink, Japanese know-ers will notice that the flush lever has the kanji for “big” and “small”. If you turn the lever towards “小” you get a small flush that will remove liquid waste without using a lot of water. The “大” direction does a full flush. Handy way to save water and sure beats the Japanese squat toilet.

You may have noticed on my floor plan that there is no door separating the bathroom proper from the hallway. I have a curtain though!

I actually rather like the curtain.

Oh, and there's a washer too!

I really don’t have much to say here. Yup, that’s a bathroom. To the right is…

Take a moment to notice that the shower head is detachable and not over the tub.

The shower/tub room. The picture doesn't show it but there is a step up into this room and the shower style door slides shut completely closing the room off. You may also notice that strange spot on the floor near the middle of the tub; that’s actually a drain. This entire room is actually a shower that drains into the spot on the floor. In fact, if you try to use the shower head holders to hold the shower head you will get water all over the floor (which is fine). I was so, so very confused my first night. I also don’t know who decided I needed a window in the middle of my shower room but I want to stab them. It’s frosted so you can’t see anything but it always makes me nervous as it faces the front of the apartment complex and the street. Also, the mirror is low because people often sit on a bucket or something similar instead of standing. Also Also, that little box on the wall by the faucet controls the warm water. My first time showering here was very, very confusing.

Last room!

I actually forgot to turn on the light for the picture. Woops!

I don’t actually use this room. It’s at the front of the apartment so I keep the door shut to cut down noise and heat in the house. It’s got a bunch of books, movies, and craft supplies from my predecessors so it’s a great storage room but that’s about it.

So pretty sweet apartment right? I mean, except for the fact that everything is in Japanese. Yeah, I have had to constantly google to figure out how to do things like work my AC, use my shower, not destroy my tatami, have hot water… etc. For the record, my policy of “hit all the buttons until you know what they do” is remarkably effective, though I might not recommend it for everything (like the stove). There are also the perils of low sitting; my headphone cord snagged on the bottom of my chair and almost broke the jack. It’s also substantially more work to take a nap when you have to literally make and unmake your bed to do so (which may be why I've been so productive, hmm..) In addition to all that there is the fact that the Japanese trash/recycling system is insanely complicated. For the record I only barely understand the gist of this.

Each section has to be bagged separately and put out on different days.

.

But aside from trash, for the most part I know how everything works now and I’m quite comfortable. It only I could get internet going I’d be set. Oh and maybe be able to magically translate the mail I’m getting so I know if it’s spam or like a warrant for my arrest.

Oh well. Can’t have everything!