back to 日本: breaking my カラオケ virginity

Ah...カラオケ. The magic katakana script that, when printed on banners flying next to a building comprised of bunches of tiny rooms with one window, usually with a parking lot filled with people, could only mean one thing:

karaoke.

Pronounced "caw-raw-OH-kay", not "carry-okee" of course.

The great Japanese pasttime. I have to be honest--I never once sang カラオケ before setting foot in the Land of the Rising Sun.

I broke my カラオケ viriginity on the intoxicated evening of my 勧化会 kangekai welcome party, after demonstrating my high degree of tolerance for 酒 sake and my great love of 寿司 sushi and, moreso, 刺 sashimi (forget the rice, just give me the raw fish please!).

Perhaps my tolerance wasn't so high as I believed it to be, as by the 2nd tier of the party I was rather easily persuaded to pick up the microphone and belt out a version of John Lennon's "Imagine" that made my papa-chan cry. I had some formal voice training in University, a general benefit of membership in the University Choir, so I at least could hold a tune without completely embarrassing myself or those around me. However, as time went on, I realized that the カラオケ stage of the party does not usually begin until some rather unfortunate souls have already passed out with overimbibing at the first party...and those of us hearty enough to continue the party down the street at the カラオケ bar would already be drunk enough to believe that Brittney Spears trying to sing O mio babbino caro would sound great.

I soon earned the nickname "Mariah Carey," she who the Japanese equate with a great set of vocal chords (not to mention great, um, lungs--but my chest is hardly something that gets me much attention). I would be presented The Karaoke Bible each time I entered a bar. With a voicebox slicked over with 水割り mizuwari whiskey and water, Karen Carpenter and Tony Bennet would sound professional. "I Lost My Heart in San Francisco" was an oft-requested favorite.

As you can tell, the repertoire of English language songs was slightly limited.

As time went on, other songs came into popularity. "The Macarena" came to town during my third year, and I had my school's 校長先生 kouchou-sensei principal shakin' his booty while I stood atop the bar teaching everyone to dance the macarena correctly.

They liked that.

My sister came to Japan and broke her カラオケ virginity with a little Bohemian Rhapsody duet with yours truly. Nobody in that bar had ever heard that song before. She really got a kick out of how they said "Eric Crapton", also a huge Japanese favorite.

カラオケ boxes are very popular. They are little rooms that you can rent by the hour with a television screen, a big screen, sound controls and a sofa upon which you and your friends can sit, order "room service" of a variety of snacky foods and drinks--both alcoholic and otherwise. Then you sit and sing the hours away.

My Japanese became quite good while in Japan and, through exposure I learned quite a few popular music favorites, which I would be requested to perform. It felt to be a bit of a rite of passage, in a way, to be requested by Japanese to sing in their native language as opposed to yet another round of "Love Me Tender."

I still have yet to open my mouth and sing in the United States, except once at a private residence, where the hostess had a machine that rated you on accuracy and intonation. I found a Japanese song that I could sing, so guaranteeing that nobody in attendance had before even heard the tune. KomeKomeClub's "Funk Fujiyama".

I earned 10 out of 10.

I guess I've still got it!

"may you live all the days of your life"

Jonathan Swift.

I used to use this quote in my signature line of all my emails for many years. It is a simple statement on how I have chosen to, at least, try to live my life. I never thought that it was ever even noticed...

This morning, out of the clear blue, came an email from a former student that I had in my teaching tenure at Tulane back in the late 1990s. She was not my best student; she struggled to get the grade she did get and was, in my opinion, in the midst of truly finding herself when our paths crossed.

We maintained contact while I remained in New Orleans but, when leaving in 2000 we lost touch.

I received an email this morning from her.

Although you might not know it, your example inspired me to save for and live my dreams of world travel after leaving New Orleans and I have since started a Life Coaching practice with a passion for the Life Sabbatical / Long-term Travel niche, so I am continuing to spread the word about changing the world through meaningful travel.

I checked out her website and, gracing the top of her "about me" page is...the above quote from Jonathan Swift.

Congratulations. I am thrilled for you and am sure you are touching others' lives in ways you will never know.

-----------

In other news:

The issue of the ethics/teacher/student seems to be resolving itself. I put myself into contact with the mother of my student, and she agrees with me in that she would like the teacher and the tutor to be in some sort of working contact. She is planning a meeting with that teacher in the next week, so hopefully all will be ironed out. I mentioned my fear of, through my honest attempts at opening lines of communication, having compromised my student's best interests in that classroom and want to ensure that does not, in fact, occur. Hopefully all will be ironed out.

So I feel better. To the gym today for a little bit of ME-TIME. I need to move my body, stand on my head with nobody around to push me over and giggle, stretch, exert...

to laugh, or to cry?

This morning I do not know which force is pulling me more. I had to leave Mom at the airport early and, although it can be stressful having a houseguest for a couple of weeks and juggling work and personal schedules to accomodate, it sure was nice having her here for a while. It would be nice not to live quite so far away...

ethics

My ethical ideals in the workplace have caused more trouble than good in the history of my career in education.

I remember lying to my parents about taking on my very first student when I was a senior in high school. I was already active in way too many activities, ranging from debate team to two different orchestras to being the school board representative, while also holding a part-time job in a new teeny-bopper clothing store in the newly opened Mall in town (this was the late 1980s). And yet I was given what I saw in my 17-year old eyes to be the opportunity of a lifetime: to have a private violin student of my own. I made arrangements with my orchestra teacher to stay after school and reserve the orchestra practice room to facilitate this subversion of my parents' will for one hour a week. I don't believe they ever found out about this student until well after our arrangement had ended, when I ran into that student later while home on break from the University.

Why did I go behind their backs? Only because I really wanted the chance to teach. I had two parents who were teachers, good teachers, and all I wanted since I was a child was to teach. It was what I believed to be a time to start whittling down that which I wanted to teach and that which I did not.

I permitted myself to become emotionally involved in the lives of the Mexican custodial staff at the University and the children of those who had come to the local farms as strawberry pickers while teaching ESL classes. I became an on-campus advocate, a voice for those who worked at cleaning our messes, scrubbing our toilets and disposing of our trash who were essentially invisible to the student population, and spent many hours in the office of the head of Student Services trying to not only bring to light but also to inform and, ultimately, resolve discriminatory practices and what simply boiled down to disrespectful treatment of others. That did not earn me a lot of new friends--but I felt I did not need the friendship of those who would treat Mexicans so badly.

I felt horrible when one of the small children I worked with as a local ESL teacher in the elementary school would test positive for TB; so horrible that I would accompany to the lung x-ray procedure the scared child who did not speak English and who had never before seen machinery as that we see in any local hospital here...all after-hours work, but my conscience would not permit those children to experience that without someone there to hold their hand, make communication easier, and let them know it would all be just fine.

In Japan I entered the 職員室 shokuin shitsu teachers' office one Monday morning in the second Autumn, 1995, of my tenure, to see Mr. ゴ "Go" hollering impatiently and passionately at a male student, who was kneeling at his teacher's feet. Mr. ゴ then struck this child (a seventh-grade student) across the face so hard that he fell to the floor and he then began kicking the child in the stomach. I fled the room and threw up in the bathroom. Extremely bothered by this situation, I later went to speak to the 3rd in charge. His response?
-Oh, he wasn't kicking him that hard.
So, understanding the "see nothing-hear nothing-say nothing" rule that exists among coworkers in order to maintain harmony in the workplace, yet also knowing for a fact that capital punishment in the schools was at that time and continues to be an illegal practice in Japan (although, obviously, still practiced), I went to my head supervisor: the superintendent.
The next day, the air in the 職員室 when I arrived had turned icy cold. "Someone" had gone back to the school and said that I, specifically, had reported this occurance. Mr. ゴ did end up facing disciplinary action on the prefectural level and was demoted in position, and in the spring of 1997 was rotated out of the school to another. However I had to face him each day and a room full of coworkers who did not agree with my ethics in reporting something that was illegal and would never speak to me again. Interestingly, in the "welcome dinner" to the new teachers in April 1997, I had half the faculty of the school come up to me to tell me that they supported me and my decision, but they "could not say anything, of course...I'm sure you understand why."

While teaching at Tulane University in New Orleans after having completed my Masters (I had been in the PhD program but ended with my Masters for various reasons, including having just been married and having lost my father right at the end of my school work) I had a student turn in a paper to me in better Spanish that I could have written. It took my friend and I ten minutes to find the entire paper online, I submitted it all to the Honor Board of the University and this student lost all her scholarships, failed my class and was put on academic probation for plagiarism. She did it to herself; I have always made myself more than adequately available to my students and considered myself approachable and relatively flexible regarding arrangements for, say, handing in a paper late if there was too much happening in Life. There was no need to risk throwing it all away. It was hard not to take personally; did she take me as an idiot, who wouldn't be able to spot a plagiarized paper from a mile away? I did the right thing. But I could easily have ruined her life.

I just ended my teaching tenure at a local University for various reasons. There were interesting experiences had there. One regarding ethics revolved around a colleague who also tutored students. Unaware of the fact that she was tutoring one of my students that term, and considering we were professional colleagues I never thought twice when she emailed asking for a copy of the exams. I thought that, in that term, she must have been teaching the same level and didn't get the exams (this was a basic program 200-level course, so most exams were standardized with reasonable variation between versions). She, however, never disclosed that she was tutoring one of my students. A young man for whom I have since written a law school recommendation approached me following an exam and asked to speak to me outside, and mentioned that in his study group the night before, one of the girls (with whom he usually sat in class) came in waving a couple pieces of paper saying, "I've got the exam!" He said that he left, knowing that his entire future could be in jeopardy if he had remained party to that study session.
So I then decided to go first to the departmental secretary, who had been around for years and who truly ran the Department (everyone knows that is true in every Department) and asked her opinion as to what I should do...this was a strong accusation against a professional colleague. I talked then to my Chair and he took things from there. I, of course, had to deal with the wrath of this hot-tempered latina who had her integrity questioned and suffered what she described being the most humilliating experience of her professional life...all due to some here-say from a "stupid" student (her words, not mine). Did I have reason?

Other events occured and, at the end of last year, I decided to try my hand at having my own business. I have the drive, the discipline, the work ethic and the motivation. I had a room in my home I could make into my own home classroom. It has been a learning experience but I have several regular students, am officially licensed with the State and the Town Business Registries, and did register as LLC to protect myself...just in case. I have dotted all my proverbial Is and am so honestly deducting appropriately for taxes...nothing is "under the table."

A few of my students are high school students in AP or IB classes, and their mothers had contacted me to request that I tutor their daughters for this school year. As a former educator in educational system, I find it respectful and ethical to let the students' teachers know that I am working with their students, in an effort to open lines of communication and so they know that this student is trying to get extra assistance in understanding what they are not grasping in class. We all know that teachers rarely have the time to entertain all the questions and to give the individualized attention that it can take for some learners to truly acquire their skills. I do not do my students' work for them; I do what I did in my writing classes at the University when it comes to their written work, which is mark their papers with editing marks, to which I provide my students a guide (indicating verb conjugation errors, gender/number agreement errors and the like but NOT correcting them) and expect the students themselves to perform the corrections so as to 1) learn from their errors, 2) give them the opportunity to ask me what something would mean and highlight a possible weakness that requires further attention, and 3) teach them how to critically read their own writing so as not to repeat the same errors.

Upon sending an email to one teacher, I received a response stating that she would not normally "waste her time emailing tutors" but felt it necessary to question my ethics. I mentioned we work together with proofing her papers so that she can come to understand her errors (indeed, the teacher herself does not "edit" or mark up papers for improvement but simply checks them off as completed and hands them back) and actually improve herself a little bit...hence the theory behind education...? Anyhow, this teacher said that homework is only to be done by the student and that we have violated this ethic, not to mention that it would be unethical for her to discuss a student's grade with a tutor. I had said that my student had a B and wanted an A, and inquired to the teacher what she sees this student's particular weaknesses and strengths to be, and how she might improve upon her performance in order to reach her goal. That has nothing to do with discussing grades; that is me doing my job in wanting to be on the same page as the teacher for the good of the student...a student who, by the way, has enough interest in the subject to want to actually learn and is willing to spend time weekly with a tutor to actually have her questions addressed in an open, comprehensible, patient manner.

I must note, I spoke to each of my students and had their full permission to contact their instructors previous to making contact with them.

I am astounded. I have never run into this issue before with other students I have tutored and, appropriately, informed their instructor of this assistance I was providing. I wonder how many tutors actually have enough "ethic" to contact their client's teacher and offer to work together. How many tutors have enough "ethic" to not just let their work slide as their student's work just to make them look good as a tutor and to gain popularity as a tutor who will "get you the grade"? How many tutors have enough "ethic" to deduct 35% and report all earnings to the IRS? How many tutors actually, honestly care about their students (I ask the same of a lot...NOT ALL...teachers)?

Now I am afraid I have created for my student an incredible conflict of interest in her classroom, with a teacher who is convinced she is cheating with a personal tutor and might actually grade her harder while doubting the integrity of everything she turns in...all because I tried to do the right thing and let her know that this particular student (and I am sure she is not the only one) has an "ethical" tutor who does not believe that secrecy should govern when the educational benefit to the student is what really counts.

Education...aren't we all supposed to be in this together for the good of those who actually want to learn something, not JUST for test scores?

Or perhaps I am just to leave ethics out of the classroom...? I hate to say that it all makes me wonder...

Or am I just terribly, terribly naïve?

my alphabet

ChiefBiscuit's idea...so I am stealing her cookie! Can be quite insightful, really... and I vow to:
1. keep proper nouns out of the list (or it would be too easy),
2. stay in English or as close as possible (or it would be too easy), and
3. put only one noun per letter, usually the first noun that comes to mind (brutal honesty here!)

A is for art
B is for brains
C is for chocolate
D is for dance
E is for elefante
F is for freak
G is for grace
H is for hugs
I is for iguana
J is for jack o'lantern
K is for kazoo
L is for lasagna
M is for music
N is for nachos
O is for orgasm
P is for piano
Q is for quill
R is for radio
S is for salsa
T is for treats
U is for unicorns
V is for violets
W is for wine
X is for kisses
Y is for yoga
Z is for zilch

tooth fairy, revisited

Dear Princesita, she just can't get this whole losing-teeth thing down.

Deal is, she puts the lost tooth under her pillow so the Tooth Fairy can grace her pillow with a small token of gratitude? of rite of passage? whatever. The point is, she gets something.

This time, a Little Pony and 50 cents for her piggy bank.

But she lost the tooth. Again.

It came out as we were Mingling with the Masses this Black Friday (a tradition my mother enjoys, and it was fun for us as we didn't get too involved with The Masses) at the local Mall.

(sidenote) Mom was hit with some culture shock she hadn't experienced for many years today. She had never seen so many people in a mall as she saw today. In her life.

Okay. So I told K to put the tooth in her pocket so that it would not get lost this time.

I do know it got home. She took it out at some point in our basement, placed it in her new Barbie house, from which it fell and, in her words, "bounced in the carpet". We have a burber carpeting, rather enamel-colored with flecks of other colors, not a shag. So one would think that it would be fairly easy to find this little bottom front baby tooth.

Think again.

Never found. That's two for two. I told her that the Tooth Fairy is going to stop believing that she's actually losing teeth if she doesn't start producing.

The Tooth Fairy likes results.

She wants teeth.

She needs a trade-in for the good stuff.

Now this, of course, made K cry.

--sigh--

I guess we'll work on it for the third tooth.

感謝祭の日 Thanksgiving Day in Japan

感謝祭の日 kanshasai no hi Thanksgiving Day was a very special day in Japan for me, my first being one of the first true demonstrations of how gracious and generous the Japanese can be, once you pierce their formal exterior.

I had an 英会話 eikaiwa English conversation class on Monday nights that I taught each of my three years in 中之条. As the autumn season of 1994 progressed, I was coming to realize that, for the first time in my life, I would not be experiencing Thanksgiving in a way that I had always known through tradition: gathering of family or friends, plethora of food, recounting stories already million times told but yearned for yet again so as to fulfill the requirement of tradition. Even in Guayaquil in 1992 I had a Thanksgiving dinner, along with my North American classmates, at the house of Bostonian ex-pat who had connections and could get a turkey. However in Japan, and much more so in rural 群馬県 Gunma-ken, it was extremely difficult to find a turkey, although the word for turkey, 七面鳥 shichimenchou, does exist in their vernacular.

My 英会話 class pooled together what must have been a great sum of money and imported a Thanksgiving turkey for me. They disclosed this gift two weeks before Thanksgiving, and I put together a list of other foods and recipes for those who would like to try preparing some other "traditions" that I was familiar with, such as sweet potatoes with marshmallows and cranberries and pumpkin pie. The next week we passed around a sign-up sheet and corresponding recipes for the next week's Thanksgiving Potluck Dinner...a first annual event for this 英会話 class.

This was a joyous occasion. We talked about the idea of thankfulness and how our different cultures celebrate and recognize this idea. We had an immense amount of food and the turkey was delicious. It was an enjoyable event, that we reproduced in other forms the other two years of my tenure.

At the end of the night, the group's leader presented the rest of the turkey and the leftovers to me and told me to have the rest on Thanksgiving night, and to invite my other friends who probably would not have any Thanksgiving turkey that year.

So, to my residence came my North American friends Mike, Chris, Laraine and Ted, and our Australian "bug-catcher" cohort John and together we reheated the turkey and spooned out all the side dishes and had a wonderful, memory-filled evening, giving thanks for all that we had and the fact that we had each other to lean on in the middle of our little individual pieces of rented Japanese heaven.

material

Ok, oooooooo-kaaaaaaaaay.

So I am not just thankful for love, peace, goodwill, etc. That is good. That I love. That, yes, I am thankful for. But I also find it necessary to post less profound pedacitos of Thanksgiving I hold dear to my heart. This list I will also limit to 10 in the best interest of available megabytes.

Again, no particular order, I am thankful as all get-out for:

1. Great sex--or rather, the dream that this might actually, one day, come to be.
2. Buckies or any other little coffee house that can fill my being with my daily shot of decaf iced mocha.
3. Dagoba 73% Conocado chocolate...one of the few soy-free chocolate bars I can actually find. Couple that with a good red wine and...well, refer back to #1...almost.
4. The colors black, purple and red. White on a muggy August day. But mainly black, purple and red.
5. My garden...my bugs, my dirt, my caterpillars, my herbs, my rocks, my mulch, my lawn, my compost bin, my trials and errors, my time with God in the midst of His creation.
6. All my electronic toys and gadgets that I just loooove to fiddle with.
7. My sunlamp for these daaaaaaaaaark autumn into winter days.
8. My music...in all forms it takes--the memories of my violining and singing years, the music that now fills my home and car, the music invented by my children.
9. My body. Never given me much to worry about, not overweight (perhaps a bit under, though), could use some touch-ups here and there but I would never really do it, healthy, rarely sick, in good physical shape (but still can't do the splits. Working on that...can now stand on my head, so there is hope yet), figured out how to work Life around food allergies and I feel like I'm doing all right.
10. Toenail polish and lipstick.

Happy Thanksgiving!

10 reasons why I am thankful this year (no particular order):

--my two children who look like sleeping kittens curled up next to me and cuddling with each other at this very moment.
--thus far a wonderful visit with my mother.
--the standards: health, family, friends, roof over our heads, love, etc.
--this year's autumnal colors that brightened my normally dreary fall.
--wonderful memories of past lives lived.
--ability to anticipate the creation of many more memories.
--returning to blogging and making new acquaintances online.
--relative success in my first year as a self-employed individual, and my new students who, this year, put their faith in my abilities to teach them what they needed to know.
--laughter, and the healing power released from it.
--love and liberty.

If you've read this, you are tagged. Drop and give me 10! (jaja) What are you thankful for? I can, indeed, create a list much less "philosophical" and much more material; indeed, there is sooooooo much for which to give thanks.

Have a blessed day!

All settled?

In a matter of speaking, I suppose, yes. But it was an extremely stressful weekend, with me seeking refuge in hard physical labor before my body was really ready for it (this virus lingers...) and I, today, pay the price.

I spoke with my rockin' agent this morning, who took care of me and held my hand over the phone through everything in the wake of the accident of March '06. He surprised me when he said that this kind of thing passes their desks every day, and to them it is a routine job. However, he said, that may not make you feel that much better. "Just leave it to us. We've got you covered," were his exact words.

Just for clarity's sake:

I was run off the road (me traveling left lane on 2 lane freeway) by a big truck/SUV coming into my lane that fled the scene and who probably never knew what had occurred behind him. The car never touched mine; I opted to swerve knowing I'd spin than be hit on the side of the car where my baby was (1 1/2 yrs at the time) and be knocked into the median and probably into oncoming traffic. Amazing the split-second calculations and decisions that went on, and I remember them all. So we spun, then flipped three times according to witness reports, and ended upside down on the LEFT side of our own west-bound lanes, on fire. We had spun across our two lanes of traffic and must have caught on something to make us flip, but I have no idea what. Another car went out as well, but we didn't hit them; it was a result of their avoiding us. That car was driven by an uninsured driver, who is now suing me for damages due to "my negligence."

A part of me wants to get a lawyer and fight it. Try to teach a lesson. Social responsibility. Educated decisions made for the common good, not free-riding off others' insurance benefits.

But yeah, right...like I can change the system? I honestly don't have it in me emotionally, although on principle I'd like to fight.

the nightmare that just won't end

In March 2006 we were involved in a horrible accident that should have left us dead (see guardian angels, healing, erasure posts for details. I really don't want to go back to them.).

Cliff's notes: ruled no-fault, the one who forced me off the road fled the scene, and another car that was behind me went out, too. This was an uninsured motorist, as I learned in our uninsured motorist clause that we have in our insurance when we were paid off for pain and suffering last year.

Well, I just today received a summons to court for January, precisely for the morning after I will be already in Perú, in Tennessee as I am being sued for property damages and for legal costs...by these uninsured motorists.

Can I really expect more from someone who is driving around uninsured? I suppose not. But it still stresses me out. There must be a 2 year statute of limitations in the state of Tennessee, and they figured they would try to sue me now...but I would even find this difficult to prove as the police report, as corroborated by three different witnesses, found this not to be "Defendent's negligence" as purported on the summons but "no fault".

I am fully covered for property damage liability, so I am hoping and praying that my insurance, who has taken excellent care of us thus far (yet we are paying monthly for them to do so...) will continue to take care of this for me, and have it all taken care of, wrapped up with a bow on top, for Christmas.

Will it work that way? I sure hope so. I would like this nightmare to just go away. I thought it was over, and it just keeps coming back to haunt me. I am so tired...

Pre-mother Panic

Okay, it's panic time.

I'm sick. I've got cramps. And Mom shows up in..53 hours.

Sometimes I think God just likes to kick me when I'm down, watch me writhe and then sock it to me.

Our phone conversations over the past month (Mom's, not God's) have been filled with implicit expectations and cleaning hints.

"Yes, I vacuum all the lampshades."
"I take a wet cloth and do the knickknacks. You wouldn't believe all the stuff you get that way!"

You get the picture.

So I have now vacuumed the entire house, I think I have all (visible) cobwebs *inside* the house (the outdoor ones, left over from my Natural Halloween Decor, will remain at least until I feel better), but the lampshades and knick knacks...sorry, I'm just going to have to hope she doesn't bring a white glove. I'll do the bedroom tomorrow and Monday. I'll have to move a bunch of stuff out, since all my stuff is in her room.

I'm tired. I hate house cleaning. I hate cooking.

She, on the other hand, cleans and maintains a spotless house weekly. She always has. It is admirable, but it is not me. She makes out a shopping list and plans all her meals for a week and shops for them. I open the fridge and see what I can throw together into one of my magically delicious salads. And if I can't throw something frozen solid from the freezer into the crock-pot at 9 a.m. and have it melt-in-your-mouth cooked by 5:30 p.m., I just don't even try...except for some spaghetti sauce or the like once in a while.

Perhaps this is partially why we only see each other once a year.

At least I should be feeling better and NOT be PMS-ing while she is here. That already makes the visit much more tolerable!

Ahhhhh...time to split some chocolate with my baby boy. Too much hard word for the day!

Oh my gosh, the *!#$%/&* bird!

Thanksgiving is next week.

Duuuuuuuuuuuuude.

It just hit me. I forgot.

And I don't have the bird.

I AM the Bird Woman. We're feeding 12. One of which is my mother...

MUST HAVE BIRD!

Whole Paycheck (our nickname for our well-known organic poultry outlet), Here I Come!

Got any 18-pounders in?

Phew!

Lucky this time. Better stick this on the calendar for next year.

rightfully returned to her throne

My crock pot died last week

The ceramic pot cracked and with it went my spaghetti sauce.

Today my new pot arrived in the mail. Bigger, better, and right to my doorstep.

Behold, the Crock-Pot Queen has been Returned to Her Rightful Place.

May we all sleep easier tonight.

learning to cook

My kitchen

Before living in Japan, I never really had any experience in the kitchen. Home Ec class in 7th grade was about it. The teachers there would comment on my "geometrically-shaped" pancakes that I would produce due to too much batter on the skillet, which would run to the sides and thus creat perfectly straight lines or arcs, depending on what shape skillet we had in our assigned kitchen areas. The fact that my father taught math just across the hall at that school didn't help the jokes at all.

In university I lived in the dorms all four years. It was a good thing because, being as busy as I was I probably would never had eaten, and avoided the dreaded "freshman fifteen" all four years perhaps due to not finding time to make mealtimes at the UC. I lived, I survived...but I left University an honors gradute, magna-cum laude, double-major and double-minor...and very boiling-water challenged.

So my first job out of college was in Japan. Living alone in a little house with a gas stove. I had never used a gas stove before, only electric. Fortunately I had the basics of water-boiling down, so I could at least make myself some instant-みそ miso soup, done by squeezing a nasty-looking orange fermented soy paste from a plastic-enrapped tube and sprinkling dehydrated pieces of green onion, tofu and わかめ wakame seaweed all over, then pouring boiling water over this mixture. Yummers. This became an integral part of my morning routine...even if my morning meal was to be pancakes, they had to be preceded by みそ汁 miso shiru miso soup.

I soon learned that one cannot live on みそ alone.

So I had to learn to (gasp!) cook.

Unfortunately, this task was much more difficult than I had ever considered it would be since all the preparation instructions on any packages I bought in the store were written in Japanese.

Octopus, anyone?
What can I say...at least I knew it wouldn't kill me.

A simple meal would easily take me two hours to figure out. I would have the directions for preparation, a pencil, paper, and three different dictionaries out for necessary cross-reference. The skill of having learned to count 漢字 kanji Chinese character strokes in my Japanese minor came in extremely handy here. I shall draw the following analogy to help you understand what reading something so tedious and mundane was for yours truly:

qwpoeirdfweqcieaaerionlif 熱 daeraiomdlig寒 dakerni.

Now you can identify and pronounce all the Roman letters. They don't particulary have meaning, but you at least know how they sound and how to read them. This is what two (the hiragana and the katakana) of the Japanese alphabets were like, somewhat, to me in these circumstances. They told me pronunciation but I couldn't necessarily comprehend that which I was reading. That is where my Japanese-English dictionary came in handy. That was the first step.

Second step (mind you, at the beginning of the process...) was to look at these 漢字 characters. Hmm...熱い. It is followed by a hiragana character, so I know they belong together, but how do I go about deciphering what the 漢字 means? I have to count how many little lines make up each character, then go to the handy-dandy character stroke dictionary to try to find that. Let's see...this one has 15...more or less...strokes. So I would go to the stroke-count pages of the character stroke dictionary and skim and scan every single character from 13-17 strokes (being a relative novice to the stroke-counting game, I gave myself a two-stroke margin of error for each character) until I found The One that I was looking for! Sometimes it would not be listed as more than a reference to another page with a more detailed explanation, so I would have to go to that page. Then I would be faced with a variety of different possible pronunciations...the Chinese pronunciation of the character in bold type, and the Japanese pronunciations following in italic type. I then had to depend on context, previous knowledge, or simply mixing-and-matching to figure out which pronunciation to follow. Then I had to go to my Japanese-English dictionary and try to figure out what the words I was making up could mean.

Are you getting the idea of how difficult and time-consuming this task was?

My Japanese friends have absolutely no idea what I went through, nor why I always JUMPED at the opportunity to be invited over either to dine or to "help" make food...I learned much better by example.

In retrospect, this complete and hellish immersion really did wonders for my reading abilities and my 漢字 comprehension, not to mention greatly increasing my speed in counting character strokes. All very important life skills I still use today, mind you.

This is what my first year in Japan was like, a huge trial-and-error effort with lots of dictionary work and what felt like constant research in order to complete the simplest of tasks. But I learned, and my second and third years were much easier thanks to a very solid base I gave myself.

Just last month I was presented with something, I don't remember exactly what, that I needed to decipher. I was able to look at it and say what it was or what it is to be used for...answer the question at hand. It feels good that, even after 10-13 years, it has not all disappeared into the void that I once called "my memory".

Oh...p.s. (speaking of memory JAJAJA): the 熱い and 寒い characters I used above mean "hot" atsui and "cold" samui, respectively. I knew you were just dying to know that.

The 温泉 onsen Natural Hot Springs

四万温泉中之条町
Shima Onsen, Nakanojo-machi

As I lived in a highly volcanic region (well, where in Japan wasn't volcanic? But at least I was in the mountains) I was surrounded by famous natural hot spring resorts on all sides: 伊香 保 Ikaho、水上 Minakami and 草津 Kusatsu hot springs were all within an hour drive of 中之条, so I quickly mastered the art of taking the 温泉 hot spring bath. This was painstakingly explained to me the first day I had been hiking with my Papa-chan and 公ーちゃん Ko-chan. We hiked to the top of a local landmark at the end of my first week in 中之条 then went to 四万温泉 Shima onsen. There was a little place where they separated from me and went into the men's side, and I went, alone, into the women's side. There were two little old ladies who came in right behind me.

As I sat, naked, on a little cane bucket wondering exactly what I was supposed to do naked in this tiny bathhouse made out of what appeared to be bamboo (oh, and did I mention I was naked?), the little ladies came chittering over and sat on either side of me. Quickly surmising my lack of ability to speak their language, they began to show me what I had to do (of course, being Japan, everything has its order, and it is rather strict).

First, sit on bucket (or if plastic stool is provided, on stool) in front of shower heads or faucets.

Second, wash hair. Use either shower heads or pour water over head using buckets provided.

Third, wash body. This could be done never standing up, of course, with some pretty sleek maneuvers of the little dishtowel-sized washing cloth you either bring to use or are provided with.

Fourth, if still feeling the need for mild discretion, take the washing cloth and wring it, then hold over your front as you walk over to the bath.

Here you often had to decide if you wanted to go into the inside 温泉 or the outdoor pool, known as the 露天風呂 rotemburo, as most 温泉 in my area had both. It was not unusual at all to bare all in sub-zero temperatures to go and sit in hot water while snow fell around me. In fact, those are some of my absolutely fondest memories.

Then, as the water gets too hot for you and your blood starts to almost literally boil, you must get out of the water. You can, again, discreetly pull yourself onto the rocky side of the pool of water and cover certain unmentionable areas with your now-seemingly-very-tiny washing cloth, or you could just keep that cloth folded atop your head à la Japanese and proudly let it all hang out.

I got good at the "letting it all hang out" part.

It is perhaps from my 温泉 hopping years that my narcissism that still haunts me developed. I would most often than not sit in front of a mirror to watch myself bathe, comments would come from young and old alike (especially since the 外人 body structure is quite different than the 日本人 nihonjin Japanese) about my "nai-su boh-dee" and I began to enjoy watching myself bathe. Well, they must have those mirrors there for some reason other than to ensure you properly washed all the soap off everywhere...right?

I never went to a コンニョク konnyoku (I forgot the characters!) same-sex 温泉 although I had opportunity. Now, looking back, I wish I would have just to have something to write about. I was too angelic then...JA JA JA.

After bathing as long as you could and turning lobster-red in the process, you go back and shower off, then take that same little towel / washing cloth you've been using all along, wring it until almost dry, and use it to dry yourself off. Yeppers, that is your drying towel as well. Who ever said the Japanese aren't efficient?

温泉 lifestyle became addicting to me. I would seek out opportunities to actually strip down to absolutely nothing and bathe in the nude with a bunch of strangers, who also happened to be naked. Since Japan I have been to only one hot spring, which lies at the base of Machu Picchu in the town of Aguas Calientes in Perú...but that most certainly was not the same.

In Japan, 温泉 bathing was, as are so many other activities Western culture sees in a different light, an art form. Almost could be considered one of the Buddhist paths to Enlightenment...温泉道...hmm, I like that idea. Profound moments of deep thought and supreme bliss could overcome a person while bathing in the 温泉. Almost orgasmic...but as we were a bunch of naked women bathing, I wouldn't go quite that far.

The 温泉 would feel just as good in the heat of the summer as it did in the cold of winter. There was a refreshing feel to the natural waters; indeed, 沢渡温泉病院 Sawatari onsen byouin Sawatari Hot Spring Hospital was located in my town, where chronically ill patients from all over Japan would flock for treatment from the waters rich in minerals from the belly of the Earth.

Of everything about Japan that I miss (excluding individuals), it is perhaps the 温泉 that I miss most.

keeping myself warm...

outside my front window

So, if I had to endure such cold indoor temperatures, you might ask, how did a pansy like me survive three snowy Japanese winters?

Well...

I learned to ski.

In the fall of my first year, Mike (the 外人 from the next town over) took me to a ski shop he had found on the highway on the outskirts of 前橋 Maebashi. All of last season's ski gear was on sale; the Japanese would only ever be seen on the slopes with the newest skis and ski bunny wear.

For us non-fashion conscious 外人, the cheaper the better!

So I went and bought my first pair of 180 cm skis (having never been on downhills before, we figured that would me an adequate length), my poles, my boots and a pair of ski pants. Nothing matching, of course.

At the first good snow of the season, Mike called and he, Chris (a gal from Montana who lived up the mountain from us), John from Perth and I went and hit the slopes. By the end of that first day I was going down the 初級 shokyu beginner's level slope decently well.

thankfully, not my house

That winter, as we lived within 45 minutes of wonderful ski slopes, I went skiing at least 10 times. It was expensive; easily $100/day for lift tickets alone, but as I didn't have to rent any skis, the discounted price I paid for them was validated.

Over my three year's stay I became a decent skier. All speed, no grace. I came close to kissing a few trees here and there but somehow always maintained. Once I went skiing at 草津 Kusatsu and went in jeans, not in ski pants. Some of my students were there and, every time they saw me they would exclaim "かっこいいい！kakkoiii! How cool-looking is that!" Apparently only Japanese who are *really* good skiers would ever go in jeans...they are the ones that never fall.

I was also invited to teach ski school for my jr. high schoolers my third year, which was exciting just to be asked. I had my girls "quack-quacking" down the hill with me as I blew my Oregon Duck call whistle (this was the year they had made Rose Bowl, after all...) to guide my little flock down the white shoulder of mountain.

my rockin' ski school students!

I had two favorite pasttimes that followed my ski adventures. One was going to eat hot ラメン ramen. The salty soup would replenish all fluids lost in the exertion required to ski all day, while heading the body from the inside out. When possible, I loved to visit the 温泉 onsen hot springs. The hot water would warm me, body and soul, washing away all the impending aches from overexertion on the slopes.

More on the hot springs in the next post....!

私の家 watashi no ie, My House, chapter 2: The winter

This post revisits the idea of the winter chill in my little home.

I never honestly knew what cold was until I lived in Japan for a winter. Being the masochistic person I am, of course, I ended up staying two more frigid winters than was necessary to fulfill my initial contract. Somehow love of a country, curiosity and a desire to learn the language and travel as much as possible can burn through even the iciest of experiences.

My home was detached, a true luxury for most 外人。Each week the kerosene gas truck would come around and fill my little red tank that I had out on a cinderblock next to my front door. This made it easy for me to clear the snow away and hand-pump the gas into the tank of the heater every time it went low on heat. As these were kerosene heaters, we also had to always keep some sort of ventilation going or else the air would register "bad" and the heater would shut itself off. I did not realize this, however, until a few months into the winter leg of the first year of my stay, believing that something was wrong with the heater because it would constantly shut itself off with red lights blinking strange 漢字 kanji Chinese characters that I could not read. After a few trips to the hospital for bronchial infections we figured out that I had to keep my front screen door slightly open while the heater was on (creating, might I add, a terrible draft, but at least I didn't have to go to the hospital anymore).

Hence, when night fell and it was time to sleep, the stove had to be turned off.

As mentioned in my previous post, the homes in Japan are not insulated. You could see in the photograph that all that there was between myself and the ground outside was a layer of 畳 tatami and a layer of plywood. It was a step above camping, in essence; I called it "indoor camping". The temperatures inside of my little house would become as cold as the Great Outdoors very quickly, which required me to wear hat, mittens, two pair of pants and three sweatshirts while laying on my ふとん futon with so many blankets over me I could hardly move.

I would awake in the morning to my sponges in the kitchen sink frozen solid, the hose leading to my shower head frozen and my shampoo frozen. I could not open my door as the weatherproofing between my door and the doorjamb had water in it, condensation from the water I would boil atop the kerosene heater as a humidifier, that froze and stuck the door closed.

I learned at some point in the middle of my first winter that there was, in fact, a way to set my heater to kick on automatically in the morning *before* I awoke and to shut off at a specified time at night. This was, needless to say, a great breakthrough for me and my chilly body. However, the key was, as I learned on various occasions, to ensure the night before there was, in fact, enough kerosene in the little silver tank to ignite the heater. If not, it was another cold morning of stumbling out the front door (providing I could get it open, of course), hand-pumping the kerosene into the tank, and going back in to warm up.

My time in Japan definitely gave me a new perspective on and thankfulness for central heating.

My Home, Chapter 1: 虫虫 "mushi"-"mushi"

I inhabited the 外人の家 gaijin no ie gaijin's house in 中之条. It was a small home that included everything I could ever need as a single person living in Japan: a kitchen; a shower; a washing machine next to my sink just outside my shower, off the kitchen; a toilet room; a 六畳 roku-jyou six-tatami mat-sized living room/sleeping room, and a storage closet. The rooms are measured more-or-less by how many 畳 tatami mats create their floor.

My home was north-facing, with a set of apartments twice the height and three times or so the length of my humble abode right behind it, so I could not depend on sunlight for interior heating, especially in the wintertime. This was also an uninsulated home; as in the photo below, there is a layer of plywood and a layer of 畳 that separated me from The Great Outdoors...and all the bugs and creatures that, out there, abound.

The lack of insulation in the summertime was a blessing; the house could keep relatively cool due to the fact that it received very little direct sunlight. I could open the 障子 shouji sliding paper door separating my living area from my kitchen and entryway, open all the windows in the house and a tremendous cross-breeze would keep the ムシムシmushimushi muggy summer air circulating.

In the hot summer months, I didn't have to endure too much lack of comfort. There was an air conditioning unit that I could turn on in my 畳 room if the humidity became unbearable; however, those times were rare. Spring and autumn were beautiful seasons, but the 虫 mushi bugs would seek refuge in my home when the weather became chilly in the fall. One such 虫 that I have now learned is called a "camel cricket" (ugh) I had never before seen. It had a round abdomen, no really separately-segmented head, long legs like a spider but back legs like a grasshopper that would allow it to jump...and consequently scare the living Sh--ostakovich out of me.

The first time I happened upon one of those "buggers", as my friend John from Perth would call them, I didn't know what to do. Was it poisonous? Would it bite? Ick...it just looks disgusting! So what did I do? I phoned John...poor guy had a bad cold but I pleaded with him, there was no way on Earth I would be able to sleep knowing that..that...thing was in my home. So I went to pick him up in my ミニカー and brought him all the way back to my place. Then I directed him to the 畳 room and said, "It's in there!" and closed the 障子 door behind me, as I can't stand the sight of murder.

So I sat in the kitchen and listened:

"uff!"

silence

>thump!>

silence

"dammit!"

After about a two-minute chase, John surfaced through the 障子 door. "That little bugger is quick. You didn't tell me they jump."

"Sorry..."

"Well, I couldn't get him. He hopped off into the closet and there's no finding anything in there." Which was true, as all my suitcases and things were all over in there.

So I took John back to his home in silence, trying to figure out how I would sleep that night.

I must have, and found that 虫 a few nights later when it dared show it's nasty self again. Ew!

I got it that time.

Love those house slippers.

Another one surfaced later that fall, in my kitchen sink. It was early morning and I had just awoken, opened my 障子 door and was going to take a shower and prepare for work when...there it was. Huge. In my kitchen sink.

I screamed.

Loudly.

In a matter of less than a minute, I heard footsteps outside and a subsequent knock. The grandmother of the five-generation family who were my landlords across the narrow lane from me had heard me scream and came running to see what had happened. With a trembling finger, I pointed at the kitchen sink and uttered all I could manage: 大きな虫です。oh-kiina mushi desu.

Big bug.

She went to the sink, looked in, glanced back to me incredulously, asked me for a tissue, and proceeded to take the bug in her hand and, ever so politely, bow as she backed herself out my front door.

That was humbling.

But I must have screamed so loud so as to scare away the rest of the 虫 because not a single camel cricket dared appear to me again for the remainder of my stay.

Happy Birthday!

I can't believe my baby girl...

...is 6 years old today.

Warning for the weak at heart: below is the story of her birth.

11/2001

Dear Princesita—

How happy I am to finally be able to call you by name! Maybe one day you will want to learn about your birth, so I thought I’d write this while the details are still so fresh in my mind!

First of all, we did not know if you were a boy or a girl—we chose to be surprised! Many of our friends were betting on a boy—I am just so happy to have you healthy!

You were due on November 3, but my water broke at midnight on the dot on November 11th. I was very frustrated that evening because you had been kicking me so hard, my ankles were quite swollen and I was feeling all 50 of the pounds I had gained with you. You fell asleep around 11:00 p.m., so did I, then I got up to go to the bathroom around 11:55. Your father had just turned off his light when I felt a gush—and I told him that my water just broke, and to please hurry and grab a towel. He jumped out of bed so fast! He was so excited! He got up and shaved, brushed his teeth, got the final preps on our suitcases ready and called the insurance company. I called my doula, even though contractions had not heavily begun. I got things ready for ‘Huali, our cat, and packed the last few things. We called the hospital and went in around 2:30 a.m. My water kept gushing—a good 4 pounds worth!—and I knew I couldn’t sleep in my own bed that way. So we checked in and the a.m. nurse got a monitor on me to check your heartbeat. They called my midwife at around 7 a.m. and, as my contractions had died off by 9 a.m., the staff decided to induce my contractions with Pitocin starting at 10 a.m. They had to continue augmenting the Pitocin drip because my contractions wouldn’t increase, even when I would walk. I was not dilating very quickly, which was frustrating me and making me nervous because I knew I only had until midnight to have you, or they would c-section me due to risk of infection, which I did not want happening.

Throughout early labor they had me try many different positions, but when the contractions were becoming more intense, I preferred to sit in a rocking chair with my feet in a pan of warm water. I had the chills. When my midwife would check my dilation progress, I was increasingly frustrated to learn I had only dilated to 2, 3, or 5 cm. When I had finally reached 6 cm, my midwife gave me permission to get into the Jacuzzi tub. I was in for probably 30-45 minutes, and in between the contractions I would sleep—I guess that was my body’s way of of dealing with the intensity of the sensations. I never used the words “pain” or “hurt” in a conscious effort to not end up under the influence of pain medication—I wanted a medication-free birth. In the Jacuzzi tub, I was ready to push and have you, and when I told the nurse on duty at that time, she made me get out. I believe the one transition contraction I had was then—as I got out I bit your father in the shoulder, trying not to push while the nurse told me I couldn’t. I somehow got back to the bed, my midwife checked me and, indeed, I had dilated 4 cm in the tub and was ready to push. My best friend arrived at that moment and I pushed a mere 45 minutes until you were out at 9:01 p.m.! I felt your head rip me, and I wanted to you recede a bit, but you kept coming and all that anyone could say was, “Look at that head of hair!” Beautiful black hair crowned, then your head—and then when your shoulders came through I felt such a rush of relief, of emotion, of happiness—then my midwife said, “It’s a girl!” She placed you on my tummy, your color was so good, and you made your way somehow right up to my left breast and wanted to start suckling, but your father hadn’t yet cut your cord and the nurses hadn’t suctioned you out well yet, so that was not possible! But it was so amazing to see you know instinctively what to do.

I fell in love with you the moment I saw you. You had no marks or flaws on your skin, your eyes were dark and you had dark fur covering your back and shoulders. You responded immediately to our voices. You were alert, looking around, and holding your head up already at birth for a few seconds—what a strong neck, my midwife declared. I had difficulties in delivering the placenta, so you had to be taken from me, and your father went with you while I had to be medicated with Stadol and have the surgeon come in and scrape the remaining fragments of the placenta from me. I lost a lot of blood and was quite drugged, so I couldn’t hold you that night. That broke my heart, but my friend was with us so, after your father had fallen asleep, she stayed and held you and we talked until I sent her home around 3:30 a.m. and I had the nurses take you to the nursery; I couldn’t have done a thing for you had you awoken or cried. The next morning, while I was asleep, you choked on some fluid and turned blue, and the nurses had to take quick action. Thank God you were there with them.

I had, with you, the labor and delivery I wanted. I did tear, and I had to be cut with an episiotomy a bit to deliver your 13 ½ inch head, but that did not matter to me. I wanted you to come into the world naturally, without any depressant medication affecting you, making your birth as easy on you as possible. That would be my first gift to you.

You are the most beautiful thing I have ever seen. Your deep, penetrating eyes make you seem older than you are. One woman looked in your eyes and said that you have an “old soul”—I think so, too! How blessed we are, to have such a beautiful creature as you, dear Princesita, in our midst!

I love you so much, Princesita, and I thank God each and every day for bringing you into my life and choosing me to be your guide through life.

learning to drive the ミニカー

The foreign teacher preceding me in 中之条町 was an Australian girl, and previous to my arrival we had arranged that I would purchase her little white ミニカー minika- (minicar). Although Japan is renowned for its highly developed railway and mass transit system, one does not need to travel more than a couple of hours in any land direction out of 東京 Tokyo to find that the majority of the country, although served by rail lines, are inaccessable without a car. In 中之条町 the train arrived once an hour from the city going toward the end of the 吾妻線 Agatsuma line and once an hour going back in toward the city (前橋市と高崎市 the cities of Maebashi and Takasaki) that would permit transfer to other prefectures. Within the town itself, I had work responsibilities that took me to two different middle schools (one within walking distance, one a few miles away, through a tunnel, toward the end of the road that leads through 中之条 and ends in 四万温泉 Shima onsen, a hot spring resort area that is one of 中之条町's most boasted tourist attractions that lies at the base of the mountains separating 群馬県 Gunma and 新潟県 Niigata Prefectures. I also rotated around to various elementary schools for the token "外人 exposure", although I did succeed in teaching the upper-level students (grades 4-6) a decent amount of English; their levels were notably higher upon entry into middle school.

It was thus deemed necessary for the town's 外人 to have one's own transportation, thus a bit more independence. However, as most know, the Japanese drive on the wrong side of the street! (yes, I said that just to poke at a few of my dear readers) The 三菱ミニカー Mitsubishi minicar I drove was also, of course, manual transmission. Fortunately my father had taught me to drive on a stick, so that gave me no problems. In great relief, Papa-chan confided to me the immense frustration he had to endure in teaching my predecesor to drive stick...I can just picture him hopping down the narrow stretch of lane connecting my home with the main road, wondering if they were going to end up patas arriba in the rice paddy. In learning to drive stick, my father often just had me ride in the passenger seat and made me feel when he took his foot off the gas to disengage the clutch, and I would shift accordingly. Little did I know how well this would prepare me for driving in Japan...

Let's start with the obvious differences. They go on the left. We go on the right. The first few times you are a passenger in a car making a right turn across traffic it is enough to make your heart stop, naturally with your life flashing in front of your eyes, sure there was going to be a head-on collision. The driver sits, therefore, on the right and not on the left. The gear shift and emergency brake were in the center, at my left hand. Fortunately there was no difference in positioning the gas, brake and clutch pedals. The ワイパー(waipa-) "wiper" and the ウィンカー(winka-) "winker" (turn signal) were reversed, however; every single $%/&*! time I wanted to signal a turn during my first month at the Japanese wheel, I ended up with my windshield wipers on.

I decided to wait a month, until I had to start driving to school, to start driving. There was a market, albeit expensive, within walking distance from my home. The fact that it was a sharp uphill climb all the way back home didn't help much, but I could shop without driving when need be. Anyhow, I figured, I could observe a bit of the ways of the road, the unstated rules, etc. before I would actually endanger the entire driving public of 中之条 by maneuvering the streets.

Mike, my fellow 外人 teacher from New York who was new in the neighboring town already took the plunge, and one night toward the end of August invited me over to a gathering at his アパート(apa-to) apartment. Well...I figured...there is absolutely NOBODY on the road. I have my International License. My car is appropriately insured, 車検 in place for another year and a half...no problems. That evening would be the best to try this out.

I soon realized why there are so many mini-sized cars on the road. The lanes are really narrow, and some one-way lanes are for two-way traffic. Wow. So I get out of my little rice paddy-lined lane and take a deep breath: a real street. Now, what side of the street do I want to get on? How to I get to 吾妻町Agatsuma-machi? I got out and turned. Right. But across traffic. I was sure all of 中之条町 was peering out their windows to observe the 外人 trying to drive on their streets.

Just up to the school, to feel secure in what I'm doing. Yeah.

Wait. What's that?!

Sirens!

Ohmygosh, they're after me! I see lights!

How the hell do I pull over???? My instinct is to pull over to the right...but no, wait, that is across traffic here. Left. Go left. Left. They're going to GET ME!!! They know, someone must have informed...

Oh...

It's a 救急車 (kyukyu-sha) an ambulance.

At least it wasn't the cops.

Trembling, I put the car into gear and putted up the huge slope to the school, stopped in the parking lot and put my head down on the steering wheel. Is a party really worth all this stress?

Yeah, it is.

Strength. Valor. Think Samurai values. I can do this, for goodness sakes.

I made it, and was aptly rewarded for having the most colorful arrival story of the group.

My little ミニカー took me all over the region for half of my stay. I could somehow fit three other desperate skiers and all of our ski gear inside the car to hit the slopes. I think "desperate" was the operative idea. Even with winter and 中之条町 's snowy roads, my little ミニカー stuck to the street and gave me no problems; I never had to chain up.

I think that one of the most difficult parts of learning to drive in Japan was the return to the United States' roads. Wiper/winker difficulties. Yikes. It also took a very long time for me to, when turning onto a road with no oncoming traffic to assist me, figure out which side of the street I was to be driving on. This still occurs; albeit rare, I still have what I call an "oops...Japan moment."

Just warning you!

Cainz Home adventures

Cainz Home (as romanized on the sign...but pronounced "Ka-een-zu Ho-mu") was a one-stop type of home store that I found out about shortly after learning to drive in the Japanese style (oh...that story will HAVE to be the next blog entry!). The only one in 吾妻郡 "Agatsuma County" was in the town of Agatsuma, that which neighbored my own Nakanojo. I would go to the larger grocery store there as my first stop in my Saturday morning routine and then, as a matter of making a simple loop instead of retracing my tracks, stop in at Cainz Home to see if there was anything new to buy.

I usually arrived before a great deal of people showed up, which was nice in that I did not therefore have to endure the endless stares of a clientele that had obviously had minimal exposure to 外人 (there will be a test at the end of all the 漢字 kanji characters you are learning, by the way. I put them in this way, 1. because it's good review for me, and 2. because, for me, the characters really have meaning--even if they do not mean anything for you, they are like mini-drawings of what I am expressing, mini pictographs in a way.) and who believed that the 外人 could never pick up Japanese, since it was deemed close to impossible by the Japanese that they ever grasp English.

In the midst of this silent existence, one morning while strolling through Cainz Home within my first couple of months living in 中之条町 I turned a corner where I had been looking at bath towels and there was a young child, perhaps 3 or 4 years old, in the middle of the aisle.

I looked at the young one and smiled.

The child was petrified, and ran with a blood-curdling SCREAM back to the safety of its mother's legs.

Embarassed, the mother averted eye contact in a way that I was to learn that the Japanese could do extremely well and bowed as she backed her way out of that uncomfortable situation.

Not a single word was exchanged, yet a thousand were understood. This child had obviously never before seen a foreigner, let alone a 5 foot 9 inch, tall, big 'fawn'-haired white girl and that violently disrupted this youngster's comfort zone. The mother, for that matter, had probably never beheld such a sight either, especially while shopping in the Bed and Bath aisle of Cainz Home. What struck me was that there was not even a すみません...sumimasen "excuse me" ever uttered in the exchange. This lack of 'apology' (for lack of a better term) in a highly and yet needlessly apologtic culture was odd to me, as if I had been the one who was out of place and thus did not merit the consideration of such words.

Many visit foreign countries and are there for a bit, sense some degree of utopia in that which is so different from our own seemingly mundane existence and, as human tendency runs, we are enamored with the place. Living in a country and especially the aquiring a high degree of proficiency in the language permits more transcendence of the boundaries between native and non-native. One begins to see not only the endless positives of new and previously unexplored territories but also starts to tame this utopic sense with the harsh realities that this country is just like any other in that it has its secrets, its corruption, its dark side, its negatives. I am here neither to expose all that is so wonderful about Japan nor exploit all the horrible sides of the equation. Both negative and positive contributed greatly to what I consider to be a rather well-balanced and fair perspective on Japanese society in my little rural town in the three years in the mid 1990s that I happened upon 中之条町. With all the good and all the bad, this town became like a second home to me. Over the course of this series of Japan entries, I hope to show a little of both...the good and the bad, the humorous and the serious, the moral and the corrupt...not to make judgment but rather to acknowledge the humanity, the reality of life in Japan according to my insignificant perspective.

ROAAAAAAAAAR!

Thank you, Chief Biscuit.



Shameless says : Those people I've given this award to are encouraged to post it on their own blogs; list three things they believe are necessary for good, powerful writing; and then pass the award on to the five blogs they want to honour, who in turn pass it on to five others, etc etc. Let's send a roar through the blogosphere! The image above can be copied and pasted onto other blogs. Also, a small size of the award for sidebars can be found over at the writing circle site.

The five blogs I hereby nominate, in no particular order, are:

1. The 4th Avenue Blues by Andrew. His candid storytelling, dialogue and postings involving photo and video are thought-provoking and powerful as he deals with life as a man with certain self-proclaimed issues. He spills his heart and people listen and help.

2. The Thoughts of a Frumpy Professor by PipeTobacco. He, lately, has been able to put powerful words to the loss of his dear mother just over 8 months ago, he exposes his soul in his desire to embrace the upcoming winter chill, and he makes his readers feel raw emotion through his words.

3. Sachiniti by Kaveetaa Kaul. Her writing on feminist issues in India, worldwide current events and moral issues raise questions and not only inform her readers but make her readers question ourselves.

4. No...this is Z's thing by Zirelda. She has a fun manner of storytelling her own life and describing Life as it occurs. Her quick wit shines in her words and the love she shows for her daughter is motivational.

5. She-Ra, Princess of ??? by She-Ra. Her often self-depricating and humorous way of illustrating motherhood and all its variances allows her readers to empathise with the feelings of the experience of what can be in many cases trial and error.

So there you have it!

Can I now say, "I am Lion-Woman, hear me ROOOOOOOAAAAAAAAAAR"?

pot-pourri

In the course of my travels, I have beheld my fair share of toilets.

Some are decked out, all the bells and whistles (quite literally). Others, as those on the isle of Taquile of Lake Titicaca in Perú, are simple, guarded in the middle of the night by a cow just waiting to scare the living s**t out of you before you make it to the hole in the ground. In Thailand we had to flush the toilets with buckets of water; at least there was running water from which we could fill the buckets and we did not have to hike all the way to the nearest waterfall to fulfill this purpose.

My first time in Japan, the most adventurous excretory experiences I had ever had usually involved cutting down Christmas trees in the woods in Oregon, where sometimes we had the chance to create "yellow snow" and sometimes not, depending on the year. Heavily jet-lagged after a fourteen-hour flight from Oregon to Narita, the first day in my new environs found me at Nikko National Park, a park renowned for being the center of the Tokugawa shogunate.

Of course, nature will call following a ramen lunch during which I learned that slurping one's noodles is, indeed, art form in that it is almost impossible to not get the juicy soup all over one's face or clothing in the noisy act. We hiked up the hill to the トイレ--toire (toilet) and I was greeted with a sight never before beheld...an oblong, slightly ovalesque shaped piece of porcelain inbedded in the floor.

Huh?

So, how on earth do I use this?

My host mother and eldest sister came to my rescue, trying desperately not to laugh as my host mother hiked up her long skirt to demonstrade the "straddle and squat"...a position that, after three years of perfecting, really does wonders for the thigh muscles (now millions of blog readers will go and install Japanese-style toilets in their homes just to tone, I know...).

Trick is: when there is plumbing, face the plumbing.

When there isn't, just try not to lose your slipper down the toilet. It happens to every 外人 at least once. Poor John from Perth was blessed with a non-potable hole in the ground benjou at his residence and lost so many slippers down that thing that the sewer sucker-dude who came by every few weeks for taking care of the benjou waste would just, reportedly, laugh.

My episode occurred at the Nakanojo 文化会館, the bunka kaikan, the local cultural center, at an important event. No matter what you wear, you change into slippers three sizes too small for your feet upon entrance. Another story for another day. One of mine plopped into the plumbed fixture by accident. Oops. That was fun to try to remedy.

My parents came to Japan in March 1997 to visit. I took them touring through Tokyo, Hiroshima, Nagasaki, Kyoto, and back up to Nakanojo before we met up with my sister, who had already visited me a year and a half before, and hit China and Hong Kong together. Feeling rather punchy following the longest plane ride of their lives, followed by a 2 hour commute back into Tokyo to their hotel and the experience of passing through customs...it was their first international travel--it would be my father's last and the first of many for my mother--we settled into our rooms. I stayed in Tokyo with them, as Nakanojo was just less than 4 hours away by train, and a good friend's father, a hotel entrepreneur, arranged special deals for all of us throughout our stays.

My phone rang. It was my mother. She sounded relieved to be able to figure out how to pick up the phone and ring my room.

"Can you come over here for a sec?" she asked.
"Sure, what's up?"
"Um...the toilet doesn't seem to work. I can't figure out how to flush this thing!"
"I'll be right over."

The toilets in many nice Western-style hotels are western-style. However, in saying "western-style" this is to mean "decked out to the max." You have next to your hipline an array of buttons you can push for a variety of cool effects: everything from the sounds of rushing water to bells ringing, a bidet feature, a fan feature (to dry you off, of course) are all expertly displayed with lights and little kanji characters that describe, to the trained eye, exactly what each button will do.

But none of them seemed to make the toilet flush.

I couldn't imagine how many of these buttons my mother must have pushed before she called me. But from her uncontrolled giggling I guessed that her efforts must have involved most of them.

"Here, Mom." I pointed to the side of the toilet, where the flush knob is on pretty much any toilet we in the Western World has ever used. This, of course, made her laugh even harder. "They put so many buttons here in plain sight, you'd think one of these would do it!" she roared.

Yeah. That would be too easy.

My little house had a western-style toilet. Pink. Cute. In an itsy-bitsy tiny little bathroom about the size of a 3' by 6' rectangle. It had two manual flush cycles...小 and 大 (little and big)...depending on the purpose of the flush (I will refrain from further illustration). The only other "extra" my little pink piece of ceramic heaven had was a heated seat function. In July, when first arriving, I had to admit to not having any idea as to why in the hell Toto (yes, that was the name of the brand. I heard the music group "Toto" got their name after having been in Japan. All I could think about for three years, every time I went to the bathroom, was "Toto too? Yes, Toto too.") would make toilet seats that would heat, especially being a person who prefers to philosophize in a nice big rocking chair as opposed to "on the pot."

Then came winter.

Wow. Heated toilet seats. What a GREAT invention! At least one part of my body can be warm...

More on Japanese winters on a different blog that I never continued...perhaps I should cut and paste those entries into this series?

The photo included with this post is that of one of the cleanest Japanese-style toilets I had ever seen. That was, however, out of the norm.

日本の思い出 ... Memories of Japan

Wow..it has been so long since I have even typed in Japanese that I had to enable the Japanese keyboard on my computer to be able to make the characters.

As the time going into winter is one of great nostalgia for me, I feel it fitting to delve a bit into some of my fondest memories of my younger days. I spend three years teaching ESL at two different middle schools in the town of 中之条. Nakanojo. "Naka" means "middle, center"; "no" is a possessive or, in this case, used as an "of"; and "jou" (long o, two syllables but not always romanized that way) means "road."













Middle of the road.

Just your average little town cradled in the foothills of active and dormant volcanoes where most citizens have rice paddies, know how to dance the yagibushi in the town's summer festival, and have very limited, if any, contact on a daily basis with any 外人。

Gaijin. Literally, the outside (gai) person (jin).

The foreigner.

Somehow Nakanojo and I were the perfect match. *cue rambling mode* I had been to 群馬県 Gunma-ken (prefecture) in August of 1990. I went as a member of a youth orchestra exchange, and spent two weeks with a host family that spoke very little if any English. The eldest daughter was a percussionist in the 太田 Ohta City Youth Philharmonic, the middle daughter played trumpet and the youngest daughter was, like myself, a violinist. I was selected to play concertmaster (we always called it 'concertmistress', the coveted position being She Who Gets to Sleep With the Entire Orchestra...although in those times I was waaaaaaaay too angelic to take that title seriously), which made my family very proud and they wanted me to give Ayumi-chan tutorials each night on her pieces. What struck me most was the fact that we could not look at each other, open our mouths and say anything that could be understood by the other; however, we could look at the same page of lines and, to the untrained eye, seemingly random dots and various miscellaneous markings and create exactly the same sound. This realization blew my relatively naive mind and marked the beginning of my openness to communication in all forms.

I maintained contact with my host family during my subsequent four-year tenure at University. I completed a double major, one of which was Spanish, and a double minor, one of which was Japanese, and could basically write notes and send them and, obviously, be somewhat understood in my efforts to master at least the two basic phonetic alphabets.

Upon returning from studies in Guayaquil, Ecuador, in the middle of my junior year of University, I felt at a great loss of direction. Indeed, my time in such a poor area made me yearn to go back and idealistically solve the world's problems but also armed me with the knowledge that such goals are impossible to achieve. Best to better oneself so as to be capable of offering more. But how?

In Senior Thesis hell, required for both my International Studies major and my Honors degree, I also started teaching ESL in a local school district, which also meant moonlighting as a social worker and translator. I spent countless hours transcribing interviews my primary thesis advisor had conducted with a variety of female migrants for a book she was authoring, not to mention my own interviews I held with legals and illegals alike regarding their perceived assimilation and acculturation experiences. Fascinating. But leaving me feeling, still, without a defined direction. Life without school? How could I consider my next step, post-University "real life"?

Long story short, I was told I should apply to the then rather selective Japan Exchange and Teaching (JET) Program(me). I figured I had nothing to lose, so I did, interviewed and was offered a position along with one other from my University. As I had previously visited Gunma prefecture, that was where I was again sent, but this time out to rural Gunma perhaps due to the fact that I had, in comparison to some applicants, a decent base of Japanese upon which to grow and actual ESL teaching experience and, of course, living abroad experience.

I arrived in Tokyo in sultry July, spent three days in whirlwinds of conferences, getting to know other 外人 being sent out to my same prefecture, everyone "testing out" each other's Japanese levels in a meager effort of reassurance. The bus ride out to Gunma was interesting in that we were given a crash course in how to accept a business card that is presented to us, as was to occur following a ベントlunch...

You must bow. Try to bow lower than the person you're bowing to, as it's probably going to be your supervisor. But don't fall over. Don't bump heads, either (don't laugh...it did happen to me once!...but fortunately not that day). Don't act overly enthused; keep all nervousness and excitement undercaps.

You will be presented with a business card. That is the way people meet here. You don't just take it and stuff it in your back pocket. You accept with TWO hands and bow. After retiring to your place you keep the 名刺 (meishi) out, in your hands, "study it" or at least feign interest and admiration...a lot of money goes into each individual's 名刺 and you will also soon receive your own set.

And with that, we were off...

Three men came the prefectural capital city of 前橋 Maebashi to greet me and take me back to my new home. The gruff looking Mr. Nakazawa was the Superintendent of Schools for Nakanojo Town. He was also a musician, and brought some of his favorite Stephen Foster scores for me to look over as an ice-breaker as we settled in to a small café for an aisu co-hi (iced coffee). The other two men, Morita-san and Iyoku-san did not speak any English and appeared rather shy; Iyoku-san would, in fact, become my papa-chan, as I so affectionately nicknamed him, as he would take care of all my day-to-day issues while demonstrating worlds of patience for my developing Japanese skills, and we did a lot of things socially together as my Japanese really took off and I could communicate well. There had been two foreign teachers preceeding me in Nakanojo, so although the routine was somewhat familiar it was still far from set in stone.

That is where my stay in my dear Nakanojo begins...

star misalignment?

Hopefully not for long...

Funny, how when one's washing machine does not work, everything else seems to fall apart. Take the Young Prince, for example. He has been potty-trained, for all practical purposes, since 2 1/2 or so. Nighttime accidents were occuring once every perhaps couple months, if that. Since our washer went out, he has wet the bed three times. I am now out of sheets. I hope the people who said they would show, do so today. Unfortunately, I had to give them black-out hours during which I have students in the home and cannot have repair people; I hope this doesn't work against me. However, the kind woman on the telephone yesterday even took the model number and serial number of the washer, and the name of the company that has not come through for me...perhaps they know they have a bit of a reputation here to establish.

To continue with yesterday's thoughts about La Princesita:

It was interesting last night, La Princesita came to me in my office and sat and told me that she missed Rosie. Out of the blue. She became very sad and she wanted to be held, and said that when I speak Spanish or teach Spanish she thinks of Rosie because that was the main connection we had with her and her mother. I have not spoken aloud of my conversation with her teacher to anybody and I know she does not read my blog--perhaps I hit the nail on the head. We read a good book about being a good friend and all that involves, including how hard it can be to extend oneself to make new friends (a problem I seem to be experiencing much more now than in my youth). Afraid? Of rejection? Of judgment? Of getting close and then losing, yet again? I have had my share of loss of friends, from either death or moving away. Neither is easy. Perhaps I am not setting a very good example for her.

and it is Monday!

What a gorgeous morning. Sun shining, birdies singing...

I was unloading dishes when the sound of my eldest wretching reached my ears. Poor thing started her day throwing up. Whatever it was seems to have now, fortunately, passed.

My headache lingers, but I can work today. Goal: finish Chapter 10 of the text by Wednesday. We'll see if that happens. But it's a goal.

La Princesita's kindergarten conference was this morning. She has already demonstrated having exceeded all kindergarten learning objectives. But she's a smarty-pants and a perfectionist, so I'm neither bragging nor am surprised. That is just who she is. However, she has been noticed to want to stay with the teachers during recess or play by herself rather than play with her classmates. There are various possible reasons for this that we brainstormed, one of which could be having had the one little girl she really felt empathy with, Rosie, who left the school as soon as the two girls were really starting to feel close. Although this occurred at the beginning of the school year, we all know what a sensitive soul La Princesita is. She could be afraid of getting close. She could be shy in meeting others, as the only other child from her preschool is in the afternoon kindergarten class, not the morning group. There is also the issue of having been involved in two major auto accidents by the age of 5. I never thought of that, but her teacher said it warrants a further look. One of her friends also hit her on Friday of last week, a friend who does not have a very highly developed speech level yet and who probably hit in frustration, not being able to verbalize her feelings. This, however, really affected mi Princesita and in her relating this story it was possible to see how betrayed she felt. This has occurred with mi Princesita in the past, before she can really remember, with a couple of her other playmates, so I suppose it's possible she feels a bit traumatized.

Academics are not everything. I want a well-adjusted and happy child. I want her to enjoy her childhood. She loves school, so I don't believe that she is having serious problems in any aspect, social or otherwise. And I don't want to be "the pushy mom"...I want to be involved enough to be a part of my children's lives but not demanding how these lives should and will develop.

Do I make sense? It feels like such a thin line sometimes, that which separates "involved" and "pushy". I constantly pray for the guidance to do right by my children....

...and happily accept advice from Those Who Know and Understand!