Sorry about iss13. It being the 13th, when I tried to send it out the computer crashed not once but thrice… So perhaps you did not get it, and perhaps you got it more than once. Its main content was two urls: http://www.greens.org/nc and http://photos.yahoo.com/phuzo album “Issue 13″. So now you are in the loop if you were not before.

My time in Japan is winding down and speeding up these days. I don’t even have time to write this, but I will anyhow. I’m leaving on Sunday the 21st, and after 24 hours of travel I will arrive 12 hours later in Greenville, SC. Mom and Pop- you can expect me to doze off on the way home, and don’t be surprised if I suddenly wake up and scream “Wrong side of the road!” Just preparing you. I hope there are signs for me outside of the airport that say LOOK LEFT.

Actually, wrong-side-of-the-road-kon is probably going to be one of the easiest aspects to deal with of reverse culture shock. My parents warned me that after their eleven days in Japan they received some jolts on reentry. Being able to understand everything around me, American rudeness and largess… these will all take some getting used to. But I am also really looking forward to being home and being with friends, contra-dancing, and eating veggie burgers. Mmmmm… I think a nice fat one on a sesame seed bagel with salsa and cheddar cheese… Sorry to all the folks who have listened to this dream before. Its probably hard for you to imagine how much this vision makes my mouth water. (“-kon” is the Japanese-English suffix for “complex”, i.e. “rori-con” and “maza-kon”… ten points if you can figure out what these mean.)

After six days at home keeping myself as busy as possible its five weeks at the Folk School, doing work-study (finally old enough!). Speaking of being 18, I am really looking forward to all that that means in NC, like voting and buying cigarettes. Not that I smoke or ever would, but now its my choice not to smoke, as opposed to some il-enforced law deciding for me. Then 7 weeks at home, working for cash (if anybody has any leads for a summer job opening, please tell), then college. University, that is. Yes yes, daigakuseini naru. I will be attending UNC Chapel Hill, which everybody seems to call “Carolina”. My Pop says that I have to get used to that, cause everybody calls it that. But for now, in email at least, its CHill. So that’s my plan, and I can’t wait. Not that I have to, with time flying the way it has been.

After the long, cold winter with only one snow worth playing in (not too bad for a seaside town at the same latitude as LA, but if I don’t complain, who will?). What was I saying? Ah yes, the too-cold-not-enough-snow winter, in which I did not get to ski. Winter broke for a bit for my parent’s visit, which was wonderful. We went to all of the tourist spots that I know of, and found some more. The Rotarians put us up in the Prince hotel for five nights, which was the first time I ever stayed in a five star hotel for five nights. It was plush. I do have one fake complaint, the ice machine demanded 100yen to fill up our bite-sized bucket. Green tea, of course, was free.

After the folks left it got chilly for a bit, and then warm again for hana-mi season. Hana-mi is the time of year when everybody eats their special hana-mi bento in the parks while enjoying the lovely, fragile, transient beauty of the blooming sakura. Go see my online pics for some visuals.

It is, as I noticed, quite easy to fall in love while surrounded by this beauty.

Then it got cold again. Finally, in the past couple of weeks, it is becoming that kind of warm that you know will not dissolve till fall. The gnats agree. Whole flocks (flocks?) of the buggers come to meet my on my daily run. The ones that don’t see any reason to go on end their pitiful lives up my nose or into my mouth. But this is the same worldwide, I suppose. Excuse me while I pick Harold from my teeth. (He lost his job, his wife was cheating on him, and there was just no way to cope.) I digress.

On the 7th of April I went to a home game of the Hiroshima Carp with about 15 of the girls form my class. For most of them, it was the first time that I had seen them as they want to be seen; meaning in their own clothing and make styles. When I recognized them (it took a minute) I was taken aback abit at how different each of them was from their uniform uniform school selves. Some went for chunky plats, loose socks, and short skirts; while others were stylin in cons, jeans, and bright plaid shirts. Their personalities were the same as school hours: loud, friendly, and not a bit shy. Here at the baseball game they seemed to match themselves better then at school.

Baseball is a big deal in Japan. (I don’t know why, but I sure am into profound statements today.) The game is one long haka (cheer). I recorded the first inning on MD, one of these days I will get some of these sounds online. The haka is comparable to the Atlanta Braves’ war cry thing: Ooohohoheeohohohohehooh, or the running of the bulls: Badabadapahpaa, Charge! except for that each batter gets his own personalized cheer until he is on base or out. The fans belt out these for their teams’ half of an inning, and then get half of an inning of rest. There are also trumpet players placed strategically behind my head and bass drums throughout the crowd to keep everybody in beat. I did not see a single hotdog, yakisoba is the ballpark meal of choice. Beer, of course, has not been replaced: vendors scurry around with mini-kegs strapped to their backs, vending to all the thirsty souls in the crowd. So that was my Japanese baseball experience.

I got to hang out with my extended host family at a family place near the house. It is a restaurant, ofuro (tens of naked folks in hottubs), and game center all under one roof. We got one of the big family rooms, and had a great supper trying (and even succeeding at) that communication thing. One of the cousins decided to latch onto me, and stood by my side for more than 15 minutes playing with the YKK on the front of my coat. My aunt gave me 10 bucks, and told me to win her one of the handbags from the claw grabber machine. The host mom also gave me 1000yen, and told me to entertain the children. I am pretty good at doing that, especially once I decifered hyakuenchoudai… As a whole, the family reminded me alot of the Oliphant clan when we get together. I had a great time, and this Saturday we are going to sing karaoke. Can’t wait.

way past my bedtime
see you soon
love
f

more online pictures!

http://photos.yahoo.com/phuzo

album “Issue 14″

Guess what? I was just veiled in fresh air with fine-grained lather and subtle fragrance. And I wouldn’t have even known if I didn’t read the soap container. My gosh(!) how I enjoy the new bath time. Hey there! I guess it has been awhile since I last wrote a big ol’ thing. What is this now? 12? Alrighty… Issue 12, here we come…

Yesterday was my last full day of school, and the third graders graduated on Wednesday. It was quite sad to have to say goodbye to them all… I also made a couple of friends in the 3rd grade as I was saying my omedetou s and baibaai s to old friends. I also made my peace with a girl I called scary before. Not that she became any less scary…

The setsugyoshiki was a lot like my graduation ceremony back home, except that only one person from each homeroom class went onto the stage to receive a certificate. Good thing, too… in order to get it there was a large series of bows (the whole 45 degrees, too), and the principal read the whole paper. Another difference between Shisho and HHS was the lack of screaming and hooting after each name.

Another difference (not to exploit differences as something to write about or anything), don’t you hate it when you lose a sentence? It snowed about three weeks ago… the first time Hiroshima has gotten more than 10cm in the past 4 years. 14cm fell that night, most on my back as I was outside making a snowman. Apparently nobody else was as excited as me about the snow, I was the only one in the out in the neighborhood. The snow was a thick silencing blanket over the city. The house is close to two major roads… giving the area constant noise. But I guess it is the type of noise that you only notice once it is gone. And it was gone. Dead quiet in the dead of the city… I think I was out for two hours at least, making a large snow creature. The host parents insisted that I come inside, saying “kaze hitoru yo!”

The only photo that I got of my work was from the next morning. The wind had decapitated her, and the weight of his head broke its blue bucket hat, as well. But you can see the beast the next morning, as well as more snow pictures, at http://briefcase.yahoo.com/phuzo

That’s all for now, see ya next time, love,
f

Where were we… the countdown… the non-end of the world… ah yes.

New Year’s day had a special breakfast, in the traditional Japanese style. Back in the US, I explained, we eat collard greens and black eyed peas for money and health in the New Year. Here in Japan, pounded rice starch (called “mochi”) is the official New Year’s “tabemono” (“eat-thing,” food). There are all kinds of different ways to prepare mochi, but my favorite has a sweet bean concoction inside. This is “mochitsuki.” So back to New Year’s breakfast, Japanese style meals have lots and lots of dishes. (I knew this before I came to Japan, as I was the dish-washer/bus-person at a “Japanese steak house.”) This is to keep the food’s flavors from mingling. The meal’s mochi was in the miso soup… lots of fun to eat the hot goop with chopsticks.

On the 2nd I got to meet my Host Mother’s family. They lived way out in the country, which seemed to make them much more laid back than city folk. The whole atmosphere seemed to have slower pace. Even though they “lived way out in the country” we were still a short car ride from the pachinko parlor and the karaoke center. We did both… My host aunt won about $70 at pachinko–she spent only ~$10. I spent $5 (the least possible). All I won was 3 minutes of watching metal balls fall through nails. Then I was out. I was a lot more successful at karaoke, scoring a 94 on BF5′s “Jackson Cannery.” The machine rates you on tempo and pitch. Pretty neat system, if you ask me.

My host uncle gave me 5000. This brings my total New Years booty to 25000 ($250). This giving money to the young people is called “otoushidama.” I certainly do like this New Year’s tradition. I don’t know how long this money will last me, though… I read last month that Japan is the most expensive country in the world. It is strange to see import CDs that are consistently half as much as the same domestic version. Going to the movies is $15; this is with the student discount. T- and Sweat- shirts are commonly $40-$100+. I did find a “used clothes store.” Funny thing is, all of the clothes seem to come from thrift stores in the US. I even saw a tourist shirt from Lake Lure, NC… about 30 minutes from my Hendersonville.

I discovered that downtown is really not that far from my school. Walking saves me , and gives a better view of the shops, etc. at street level. It takes a long time, but hey, that’s all I’ve got… and It (the proverbial “It”) is in the journey, not the destination.

Walking also uncovered the blood donation room of the J- Red Cross Society. So I went up… At first they said that I could not give blood if I could not read the Japanese “have you slept with racy women lately” quiz. I could read the first question (“Are you feeling good today?”), but after that I was a bit lost. They found an English question list, and decided to let me use that. Based on my height and weight they decided to drain the “Wimp Level” donation from me: 200mL. Just as well, back in the States they couldn’t get enough from me to fill the big bag.

After the draining they showed me the free drink machine, just push the button. I recovered with my new, pale, stranger/friends watching a comedian on TV. His calling-card joke seemed to be to call out “TAmago taMAgo tamaGOooh” (“egg, egg, egg”). Perhaps someday I will be able to understand at least one Japanese joke. That night at supper I told my host family about the day’s adventures. My host mother was very proud of me for giving blood, and they all applauded for a bit.

Coming of Age Day was the 10th… Everybody that is turning 20 this year gets a new Kimono (the women) or suit (the men) and go through some ceremony. 20 years old means that they can now legally buy tobako and biiru. I wasn’t invited to the ceremony, but I can imagine what it would be like… and am not sad at not getting to go. I did see plenty of spiffy twenty-year-olds in the train.

Monday was also a local matsuuri (festival). The main event was a huge bamboo bonfire and mochi roast. Mochi is roasted much like marshmallows are, except our sticks were bamboo. That morning my host Father and several of his friends made sake thermoses out of thick bamboo. (Sake is rice wine. Gross stuff.) They also made cups to drink the sake at the festival. I was not much help to them, because I was busy making two bamboo digeridoo (woo-hoo!).
Signing off,
Wishing you health & wealth & friends by the score this year,
f
ps
Matsuuri pictures at http://briefcase.yahoo.com/phuzo
pps
In exactly 1000 days, 2 hours, and 5 minutes I will turn 21. (Mark it on your calendar!)
ppps
Predictions for Japan’s new century, according to the Gaijin Times:
2028: Karaoke is an official competition at Osaka Summer Olympics.
2033: Number of vending machines surpasses total population.
2042: Continuing with the present post-war rate of growth, the average Japanese now stands 8’4″ tall.
2052: First female Prime Minister is elected. First official duty: serving tea.
2069: Borrowed words from English comprise 80% of spoken Japanese: Mai nemu izu Forresto desu.

The Rotary Club that is hosting my exchange had a Christmas party for all of the exchange students, past present and future, in this area. They rented a room at a ritzy hotel overlooking the bay… a lovely banquet was laid out. Call me a wimp if you will, but I went for the fruit basket (instead of oysters, escargot, and eel). The gai-jin (foreigners) were expected to come up with an impromptu speech in Japanese… I wasn’t booed, so I count it a success. Then the host parents had to say a few words about us. My mom was able to point out one of my weaknesses by shifting the blame to herself. She said that she talks to fast for me to understand… I think she really meant that I don’t respond enough.

We then went bowling in the hotel’s lanes. They have my size shoe (29cm), but they don’t let them go without a show. Eeeeh? 29 senchi? Sugoui! After sinking a couple of gutter-balls, I decided to convey that I am actually South Pole (left-handed), and since my left pinkie is broken, I have to bowl right-handed… very hard to switch.

Our last day of school before winter break was the 22nd, a half day. That evening my Homeroom teacher treated the guys in the class to supper at an oconomiyaki place. We ate in the private party room, where we cooked our own food on the grill. Oishikata desu… (it was yummy…) There was also a Karaoke machine. During the meal, and for an hour after, we sang all of the “best hits” of Japan and the US. I’m getting to the point where I can read the Japanese on the Karaoke screen and sing along… or at least fake it. As far as understanding it, though, that’s quite a different story. What, exactly, are they talking about the inside of a man? Dunno. Once I knew “ai” (love) it was a lot easier to fake-along with my classmates. Ah, love… the official intercultural intergenerational song theme.

J-pop (Japanese pop music) is a lot like America’s music scene. There is ska, heavy, bubblegum, backsteetboys-ish, hiphop… everything. I can hear elements of the old singing style, Enka, in the singing of today’s Rockers. Of course, my classmates think I’m crazy for thinking this.

New Year’s is the biggest holiday in Japan. And the biggest party in Japan is the New Year’s spectacular in Tokyo. As it is near impossible to get tickets, I’m watching the event on the tube. The idea behind the event is a singing war of the sexes. All types of Japanese music is represented, from Enka to J-pop. The most popular singers and groups are invited to sing in the concert… including a couple gender-bending individuals. I wonder what team they are a part of.

The judges are several famous figures, including a sumo wrestler. At the end of the four-hour concert the judges (10 males, 10 females) vote for either the red team (males) or the white team (females). The audience gets one vote as well, which they cast by raising the correct color fan. This is all very exciting, and the tension mounts as the count the 21 votes on stage… Otoko win by one! Yay! I voted for them as well.

Rewind to the 30th of December. Every year at New Year’s the Murakami family makes mochitsuki. These are dumplings of rice starch filled with sweet bean paste. The men boil the rice and pound in into a thick gum outside. The pounding of the rice is done by two people. One has the wooden sledge hammer, and the other folds the blob after each whack. There is a lot of trust in this operation, any variation of the 1, 2 rhythm might break the folder’s hand. Then the women shape the blob into the pastries. These are extremely filling, and I can barely eat one.

Whoa… T minus to 15min until y2k and the power in the house went off. Lucyilk, I’m tkping on a laptop computer… Turns out it was just a blown fuse. 3 min and counting. I have my fingers crossed… I couldn’t make it to the temple, so I will make my first New Year’s prayer here: Peace.
…
No fire, no brimstone. 2000 is here, and all is well. The clock at the big party in Tokyo was 1 min off of CNN’s so I got to count down a couple of times. (In Japanese, of course: go, yon, san, ni, ichi… !!!) My host brother walked into the room, and I said “omedeto.” He was surprised that the moment had past already… I guess there are things in life some sleep through.

I decided to seek out a temple to make my official first prayer of the New Year. I walked from the house, towards the place where I thought there was a temple. After a while, I knew that I had gone too far, and gave up. I was walking home a different way, when I spotted the place that I was shooting for in the first place. I walked through the gate, which shows visitors the place to begin preparing themselves for prayer. Hanging out in the background, watching everybody do their thing, I noticed that my host grandfather was serving the sake (rice wine). Suddenly the voice of my host mother and father saying “doish’tan” finds me. We were not planning to meet here, so it is interesting that we have. After they go through the motions I decide to go for it:

Bow to the greeters and tell them “Omedeto gozaimasu,” bow to the matron of the temple, tell her “Omedeto gozaimasu,” lower head, throw the coins into the wooden box, clap twice, make prayer, clap twice, get a small saucer of sake. “Matron” may not be the correct English word for the woman at the temple. She was wearing a kimono and a tall black hat. As each person makes their prayer she brushes their head with a white zigzag paper thing. I don’t know if I did the motions exactly correctly, but they seemed happy that I tried. After I finished my ounce of sake they asked me what the large piece of bamboo I was carrying was. So I played “Auld Lang Syne” for them on my digeridoo. Everybody was impressed, and clapped for me. What interesting people these outsiders can be…

-Forrest

So I woke up a bit late… Nothing new there. The day couldn’t be uglier if it tried… overcast and gray, giving the looming apartment buildings a menacing look, like Oz’s haunted forest. I get onto a too-crowded monorail train; am pressed tighter and tighter at each stop. At my school’s stop I politely shove my way out of the box. I walk down the stairs. On the way out of the ticket gate I accidentally shove my pass into the metal casing around the slot, entrapping it in a way very difficult to reverse.

Of course, the pass-card-in/Forrest-out process is usually very fluid. So even though I screwed it up back there, I have already gone far enough here to slam the doors shut up there, and set off an alarm in the central office. Doh.

Where is the rewind button when you need it? Ctrl+Z, please.

I prize the pass card loose, put it in the slot, and escape. Funny how I never had this type of problem in Hendersonville, North Carolina, USA.

Somewhere between Furuichi and Fudoin-mae eki it has started to rain. At least I did not forget an umbrella. And at least I did not choose the one umbrella (out of the family’s fourteen or so) that is broken. I will make it to school, a bit late, and mostly dry.

I feel a tap on my shoulder. I turn around, expecting to see the Station Conductor expecting an explanation for my strange actions back at the gate. It is one of my classmates. She gives me a smile, and pulls a scrap of paper from her pocket. “I usually go to school by bike,” she reads. This particular girl likes to give me random bits of information about herself in this manner. The trusty paper comes out, and “aa, so, eto, I have one brother.”

It is decided. We will trek up and up and up to Shisho together.

Have you ever been struck to do something out of the ordinary? Something that some part of you wants to do, but doesn’t seem at all sensible? Next time that happens, do it. Don’t listen to that voice that says: “be rational.” Ignoring sensibility could make your day. Even if that means

Siiiiiiiinging in the rain, just siiiiiiiinging in the rain, What a gloooooorious feeeeeeeeeeling, I’m haaaaaappy again… oh yeah… Happily, after this fountain of song, my companera was not giving me the how-did-you-even-get-a-visa look. She liked it, so I sang some more. I don’t really know much more of that song, so I mixed in some of “Love Machine,” a popular song here.

OK, so no literal shaft of light broke through the clouds, no rainbow majestically arced through the sky… But singing that song gave me the wonderful illusion that everything here makes sense. Point being, there is true happiness to be found in a culture so far from your own.

M. Forrest D. Oliphant
PS All I want for Christmas is… a postcard. If you each send me a postcard from where you are now… I will be the happiest gaijin in all of Asaminami ward.
PPS “Shisho” means “municipal-commercial,” i.e. Hiroshima Municipal Commercial High School, my school.
PPPS Sorry about sending two copies of Issue 8. I messed up sending half of them, but I did not know which half… so I sent it to everyone again.

Hallo from Japan, land of canned coffee, hot from the machine, and corn kernel pizza.

A friend of mine, who went to HHS, visited Hiroshima last month. She came with her friends from Osaka, where they are in a college study abroad program. I had a half-day of school that Saturday, so we planned to meet near the Eternal Peace Flame in Peace Park (to get there you can either take Peace Boulevard or go across Peace Bridge, you can’t miss it). We went to McD’s for some lunch, then they bought some o-miyage in the o-miyage store.

The dictionary translation of “o-miyage” is souvenir, but it is not treated like that. They are usually locally produced edibles. Miyajima, for example, is famous for maple leaf-shaped pastries, filled with sweet bean paste. Hokkaido had wine, chocolate, and cantaloupe. Any time that you go on a trip it is customary (read: obligatory) to buy these presents for your office, class, clubs, friends, and family. You can tell from the word, with its honorific “o-” prefix, that o-miyage have a special place in Japanese culture. {Other words that get the “o-” are o-furo (bath), o-chi (home), and, of course, o-kane (money).}

We took an electric streetcar to Hiroshima Station. For the first time, I noticed that the attached department store is named ASSE. From there we took a train, then a ferry to Miyajima. “Miyajima, home of one of the three famous sights in Japan!”

Chances are, you have seen a picture of this famous sight… the red water torii. On the way to any Japanese shrine there is a torii, a giant gateway over the path. The gate’s purpose is to remind the visitors to begin to prepare themselves to enter the shrine. The water gate was first built in the 8th century, then rebuilt in the 16th. It was for a time when the shrine was secluded on the island, and the only way there was to boat there. Now there are ferries from the mainland, every half-hour, that go to the port.

The water gate is huge,,, and since a photo is worth roughly 872 words, check out http://briefcase.yahoo.com/phuzo , my internet photo album.

The first sight that struck me after deembarkation was a goatdeer having a snack from the trashcan in the boat station. One of the Osaka-Americans I was with added a film box to the trashcan cornucopia, which was appreciated. Human-desensitized animals are a large part of Miyajima. So are souvenir and o-miyage stores.

If you are not careful, you might fall into Miyajima’s tourist trap. It is actually more of a tourist-space-time-warp. Its location is somewhere between the port and the shrine. You think you are going to the shrine, but, in reality, you are going nowhere. You could walk for day past the same stores, over and over, in an endless loop. Some people think that if they buy things, they will be let out. Some people go crazy and start running. They don’t know that the only way out is to take a sharp right.
right.
here.
Whoa, that was scary… don’t let it happen to you.

By the time we made it to the shrine it was closed. We took some pictures of the torii, and made friends with some deer. Then we went back to the port to go across the bay to the nearest town with a youth hostel. The nice hostel man told us about the restaurant next door, whose specialty is okonomi-yaki. I wonder how much business the place gets from next door…

The Hiroshima area is famous for its version of okonomi-yaki, a huge pile of stuff squashed down to nothing on the grill. The raw ingredients (starchy batter, shredded cabbage, udon noodles, an egg, more starch batter) are about half a foot tall. After the grilling and the smashing, okonomi-yaki sauce and nori are added. The finished product is about 1.5 inches tall.

We found a seedy second floor karaoke joint, but nobody was around. Went back outside, and there on the sidewalk… Perfect hacky spot! Drop everything and kick a little beanbag around. Gawd we America-jin know how to have us some fun. At the precise moment of the second hack, a realization stepped on me. Whenever I am homesick, this is one thing I miss most. A group of friends to be loud with and kick a beanbag in the middle of the sidewalk.
(that and veggie burgers)

After eating some ice cream from the 7-11 across the street we gave karaoke another chance. Decide to go for the small room: 2 hrs. The room is as seedy as the stairway, but it is a good kind of seedy… its seediness lends to its character. This was my first karaoke experience in Japan. It was everything I ever dreamed it would be. And fun, too.

The next morning the guys decide to buy the girls breakfast. We were doing it out of the kindness of our hearts, not just to prove them wrong (that we wouldn’t). We tried to go for back-home regional stuff, which meant I bought apple juice. Enjoy NC apples,,, yeah. The milk here has an extremely cow-y quality to it, due to different pasteurization techniques. Not unpleasant, just different.

We groggily dragged our stuff to the station, where I bade my instant weekend friends sayonara. I then went back to the island, where I was to meet another Rotary exchange student. We had not planned a place to meet, but that usually works out. It is quite easy to find tall blond white people in a crowd here. We walk through the shrine, whose advertised attractions had been relocated since the typhoon.

We take a one cable car, then another, to the top of the mountain. There are wild monkeys up here (don’t look at their eyes!) grooming each other, leaving prints in fresh concrete, and stealing from ogling unsuspecting Homo Sapiens. We contemplate hiking to the very top, but the trail is muddy, so we take the cable car down. Some of the maple trees have begun to change color, and look like wildfire in the surrounding pine trees.

Closer to sea level, we watch a monkey doing tricks for en. It was strange to watch him collect the coins from where they were tossed on stage. He asked me:

“Why does the man holding my leash love these bright circles so much? I have tasted them, no good for eating… The hand-shaped leaves that fall onto the stage are much tastier. And why wont he let me off the leash?”

I asked, “If he did, would you run?”

The monkey suddenly became interested in something between his toes. It was obvious that he was ignoring me, so I said “ja mata (see you later).” He gave me a curt little bow, then went back to his toes.
f

I just ate my airmailed Thanksgiving dinner (thanks Mom, Dad & Claire!). It was a “just add water” kind of meal: Stovetop stuffing, mashed potato flakes, and gravy in an envelope. The meal was quite tasty, and left me with that overstuffed-turkey feeling that goes so well with a Thanksgiving evening. I also had soba shiro (buckwheat noodle soup). Could this be a new T-day tradition? You never know. Of course, most of you Americans are just starting your day, so… happy Turkey (holocaust) Day!

Let us see… Issue 6 left you with the amazing abacus acadaemians…

The next day (1999.11.06) a ten-piece all-female Latin-American-music band played for the student body. They sang songs in Spanish, Japanese, Japanish and Spanese… Pretty impressive stuff. They even taught the kids some basic Latin dance moves. Nobody in Hiroshima, it seems, dances for fun. Something I really have been missing is contra dancing.

As I am fond of saying, I’ve been contra dancing since before I was born. In my last year of high school I got back into the swing of things, going whenever I could get a ride. So I have really been missing it. In fact, last Tuesday, in a letter to a dear friend, I said this:
>You know what I would give my left pinkie to do? Contra dancing.

Little did I know how I was tempting the fates with this random phrase… Thursday, two days later (1999.11.18), I got to take a tour of a Japanese clinic.

Don’t worry… it’s only a small break, same joint of the pinkie as last time, same reason (basketball), no pain.

Breaking it seems like a dream to me now. I was in the gym alone, shooting hoops. The ball bounced off of the hoop, I blocked my face… so this is not proof of my clumsiness, rather, its proof of my supafast reflexes. I thought to myself, “I just broke my finger,” then proceeded to shoot (one handedly) until I made my free throw and 3-point shot. My work there was done. I went to the school nurse, who strapped on a menthol-powered cold compress, and gave me a bag of ice. If it swells, come back. And it swole. She did not think it was broken, but we were going for an x-ray anyway…

Hospitals and clinics are closed on Thursday afternoons, except for the one that stays open. The one that smells like a litter box (that an old man peed in). There was a nice doctor that promised to email me the x-ray. (go to http://briefcase.yahoo.com/phuzo , album “Broken” to see)

Have you ever read the story of the Monkey’s paw? You get five wishes, one for each of the monkey’s shriveled phalanges. Your wishes come true, but only under the most horrible of circumstances. A woman wishes for $100, and gets it as a conciliation present for the death of her son. She then wishes her son was alive again, and he comes back. i.e. ba-a-ack. i.e. the undead.

I mean, what possessed me to offer my left pinkie? Now that I have “given” it will I find a place in Hiroshima to go contra dancing? Or will something beyond my control send me home? Or has my left pinkie yet to fall off or something??? These thoughts, no matter how much logic tries to push them out, have been occupying my brain for the past week.

Maybe I made a wish on my own left paw…
f

Today is 11.11.11 on the japanese calander. If that does not deserve an update from me, then I don’t know what does…

Over the weeks in communicating with the locals I have slipped a few times. As in letting idioms and non-self-explanitory phrases slip from my lips. Like “go with the flow.” The scene: a debriefing on the class trip. They asked me if I would like to do anything special, and I said no, I like to go with the flow. Doh. I tried to use the analogy of floating down a river, but that just got me in deeper.

“I am sorry. We will go to a lake. But you can not swim there. And no rivers.”

Eventually we sorted it out. Another phrase (from a movie, not my mouth), “Shit Happens.” This was much easier to explain, with help from the computer translator.

Then there was the time my host mom asked me what kind of jam I liked in my English tea. I looked at her with a surprised expression, and a look of realization swept over her face. She had already had her tea, and there was a plop of orange marmalade left in the bottom of the tea cup. I assume that this intercultural slip-up was a result of the “Do, Re, Mi” song in “The Sound of Music.” (Tea, I drink with jam–) We press on.

One phrase, in a letter that I wrote to the pricipal, is still classified an unsolved mystery: “…as crazy as water running uphill.” Water does not run. You run. Do you run with water? I understand. A river. You run in the river, and this is what is crazy. The river runs? What is “Never mind” ?

I wish there was a better waay to type “arrrgh” than “arrrgh.” Oh well. Ganbarimasho, ne?

The letter to the principal was regarding Shisho’s uniform checks. The main purpose of these checks is to root out the girls who wear thier sailor skirts too short. As far as I know, no male has ever been chastised for wearing his pants too short. My solution was to make the female offenders wear pants. Of couse, I do not know too much Japanese school uniform culture, so my idea could be crazy. As crazy as… (nevermind)

I was invited to go to the ESS (High School English Speaking Society Club) Halloween party. My explaination of Halloween in America was (hopefully) idiom-free. Either they understood me perfectly, or just pretended to. We went trick-or-treating in the various staff rooms, getting food for the party. Something tells me the teahers were let in on this plan beforehand, since plenty of “Men’s Pocky” and (tortilla-shaped crunchy) shrimp-things materialized. I had an enjoy time.

I got my first earthquake (yay!) on the 30th of October. I sleep like a rock, until it is time to wake up. It was 6:30am, almost time to get up, so the quake only woke me half way. I remember being perturbed at whoever was shaking the house. The nerve. Shaking the house when I am trying to sleep. Only when I woke up (and found my books fallen from their shelves) did I realize that no human could have shaken the house that much.

I got to run in the “Hiroshima Kokusai Heiwa Marason” (International Peace (5k) Marathon) on Culture Day, November 3rd. Shisho had its grand Bunkasai (culture festival) that day as well. On the 2nd and 4th I got to see the student’s displays. The classrooms were set up like galleries, each room a different project. Some of the rooms were shoudou (calligraphy), pottery, cartography, and several art rooms.

One art class was assaigned to reproduce several logos from popular companies and stores. My art class’ reproductions were of photographs, using a manual screenprinting method. This entails drawing a grid on the canvas and the origional, then assaigning number (saturation) values to each square, then filling each of the canvas’ squares with the corresponding value’s correct circle size with black ink. Tedious, to say the least.

The 4th was the Bunkasai stage day. A few Hiroshima-native rock and j-pop groups played for the students, plus three bands from within the school. The energy climax seemed to be the song “Rinda Rinda!” done by one of the student groups. There was also a one act play from the drama club, the classic guitar band (~50 students) playing the Beatle’s “Life Goes On,” and a soroban demonstration.

Soroban (abacus) merges the left brain, math, with the right brain, visualization. Or so I have been told. In soroban class class I am still laborously picking my way through multiplication sets of 2 2-digit numbers. The kids on stage, however, are a different story. They are the Shisho Soroban club, champion abacus slingers, wranglers of wily digits, and amazing. Imagine knowing (seeing) the answer to 698×374 as soon as it leaves the MC’s mouth. They did several math tricks, impressing not only the gaijin in the audience.

Be well,
f

About a month ago a friend of my host father came over for dinner. He had been to America under a homestay program, and so he spoke English very well (a pretty rare talent for Nihon-jin). He came with tortilla chips and salsa, so he deserves a medal. During the course of the meal he suggested that my host parents have a Birthday party for me. Birthdays here do not mean much. Many people consider New Years to be their marker day for how old they are. If I did this I would be 19 on Jan 1st. The suggestion was made, next step is planning. In Japan everything must be planned extensively (to death).

“What do you at parties in America?”

“We sit around and talk, listen to music, eat pizza…”

“But what do you do?”

“Uh… well… there is always Twister…”

October 10th five of my classmates, plus my teacher and his family, came over for lunch. My classmates gave me traditional Japanese toys. Many of which were very familiar, as Appalachian folk toys. A flying whimsy-doodle, a whirly-gig, a spinning-top… I wonder which area of the world came up with these things first. My classmates also gave me food, like Cocque D’Asses cookies and a single giant cheese-flavored Styrofoam block (exactly like a chee-to). The chee-to was indorsed by Drymon, the robot cat with a magic pocket.

My host parents gave me some workman’s pants. Japan is letting some of the world’s coolest fashion go to the carpenters and construction workers. Nikaaboka (knickerbockers) and jika-tabi are the two articles I have in mind. Nikaaboka are wide-leg pants with pleats and cuffs on the bottom. Jika-tabi are shoes that go to the mid-shin. They have thin rubber soles, and the big toe is separated from the rest of the toes.

Whenever I try to explain how cool these clothes are, I get laughed at. I guess if these ever catch on in the USA, it will be comparable to the tenga-lahn fashion statement here. “Tenga-lahn” is Japanese-English for “ten-gallon,” a cowboy hat. Cowboy hats are very popular accessories for walking around shopping (and being seen).

I also got something from the host parents I had forgotten to pack… a belt. What kind of belt, you ask? Well, the buckle has a gold rabbit’s head on it. And the rabbit has a bowtie. Yes, this emblem is one of the most popular American icons: the Playboy Bunny. So now I posses one belt, and it has “Playboy Classic” emblazoned on it. It’s a very nice belt.

I was toasted with champagne and sung to. “Happy Birthday” is sung in English. I think that the sentiment, rather than the words, is not translatable. There was a cake with eighteen candles. I blew them all out on the first breath, along with blowing the powdered sugar from the top of the cake. I was distracted by everything going on around me, and forgot to make a wish. Oh well.

After lunch (tortilla chips and salsa, no pizza, but plenty of pizza Pringles) we played twister. Okasan had found the game at SOGO, the eight-story depaato (department store). My long legs helped make me the “kokusai chanpion (international champion).”

That afternoon I met some fellow expatriates in front of SOGO. We decided to get to the highest altitude possible and look out at the city. Rhega Royal (hotel) is near SOGO, so we got into the elevator and pressed 34. We ended up at the restaurant, where the bill for a coffee and a tea is rumored to be 5000 yen ($50). We were content to look out of the windows at Hiroshima-shi. A wait-person even took our picture for us.

I had the chance to make my wish at a temple yesterday. This particular ritual is as follows: write your prayer and name on a bamboo sheet, throw a coin in the box, clap twice, light a candle, spin the clacker, and make your prayer. The clacker is a big pulley with 109 tennis-ball sized wooden balls strung like a necklace. When you pull it they drop on each other and make a clacking sound. I guess you have to see it to understand. This apparatus (as well as clapping) are how you get the attention of the superior being(s) you are praying to.

Be safe, spread the wealth, and give the dogs a kiss for me,
forrest