November 9, 2009-November 26, 2009
GLORIOUS ADVENTURE TIME!!!! Now (finally!), I will try to sit down and form words.
We visited Morioka Chuo High School (Thursday, November 12), a private school that USED to be a boys school, but is now co-ed, so the population is a tad unbalanced. We ate lunch with students (Yuki, our trip coordinator here in Morioka, bought us all bento), observed classes like JUDO and AUTO SHOP. MY GOODNESS. SO INTERESTING. ANNNNNNNND their soccer field is turf. The education at Chuo is a bit different from other high schools-students have MANY options. They can choose a number of different paths (English vs. science, like Ichikoo High School), different levels of difficulty (it was something like A1, A2, A3), different foci (like auto shop, for instance), etc. Also, Chuo is known for creating good athletes, so the gym class, for instance, was judo. WOW. Tamara and I were so eager to join that we did cartwheels along with them as they warmed up…
Friday, (November 13) was an optional meeting with IVIS, the Iwate Volunteer Interpreters Society. The group had previously, and most notably, helped out with the alpine ski championships that were held in the area in 1993. 50+ members helped out at that time, but now around 20 members remained. Five members met with three of us, Yuki, and Kuriya Sensei and enlightened us as to the beauty of Morioka and their individual lives and interests. Twas a wonderful evening.
THEN at midnight:20 (after going home and eating and napping a little; man, napping at night just KILLS you), I got on the night bus to Tokyo. A Greyhound-like bus with pink interior, the comfiest seats you’ve ever sat in/tried to sleep in, and a lightguard/cover to pull over your head so as to block the light and though the bus was kept dark, that was mighty nice to have. AND the heat was cranked up, which made it even comfier. We stopped twice between Morioka and Tokyo at the same kind of highway rest stops that my host family had stopped at en route to Disneyland. Got back on the bus and slept more. Arrived in Tokyo a little before 8am.
Was going for the purpose of meeting up with my host sister and host mother (she had left in the morning, but I had host school and the IVIS meeting) and shopping with at H&M and Forever 21 in Harajuku (hip, trendy part of Tokyo). (Somehow, everything, even the American stores are BETTER in Japan.) H&M was having an event in coordination with Jimmy Choo shoes. SO this meant that a line formed quite early (we were there from ~9:15am) and we all weren’t let in until noon or so (and H&M usually opens at 11am). They DID give us umbrellas and hot coffee though, which was nice. Inside, it was like a MADHOUSE. Everyone was given a wristband that corresponded to a certain 10-minute window when they could go into the Jimmy Choo “booth” and pick out as many items as they could get their hands on. Me being the not-so shoe freak didn’t find the Jimmy Choos (three different styles) all that fascinating, but there were also jewelry and bags. Tsukie and Hanako were really excited and ended up getting some black gladiator-like heels and some very flashy red heels. A successful trip to be sure.
In Forever 21, right next door, I ended up behind a guy with a jacket that was like a varsity jacket, but really just a brand label, that had “DUFFERS” across the back. I couldn’t help but thinking of you, Meg. And then, there was a t-shirt with two flags on the front, America on the left (with a cowboy hat on) and Britain on the right (with a bowler-like hat) and underneath, it said “BFF” as in Best Friends Forever. Liz and CE, it was BRILLIANT.
I also went to Tokyo that weekend to meet up with Yoko for lunch on Sunday. We ate at a favorite lunch spot of hers as her work building is the next building over. Has been SO good to see her.
The next week (November 16-22) was pretty normal, except for the juku (cram school) observation that took place on Thursday (the 19th). The Japanese education system is all about teaching to a test (sounds a little like International Baccalaureate (IB), right guys?) and competition is fierce for high schools and universities. Basically cram school is the leg up students can get in order to do well in junior high school and thus get in to a good high school and consequently a good university. There are the students who go to juku to better understand the material taught in class, though. And that is common sense in my mind. I find the strangest part to be that Japanese students work SO hard from junior high school on (or are supposed to work so hard from then on) and then they get to university and it is a BREEZE. No joke, they can skip class just fine, they may not have class on some days, they don’t have homework, they devote most of their time to clubs or sports. It’s QUITE interesting to observe.
It was a fellow SICEer’s birthday (Abhi’s) that day, but celebrations were from then through the weekend. Saturday (11/21) evening was a nomikai with Abhi’s host mother, two of her friends (she knows through the elementary school her children go to), Abhi, Tamara, and I. We met at 7pm on Oodoori (which means “main road”, but in Seattle terms, resembles Ballard’s Market Street (but narrower and more condensed) or something I would consider anywhere else a busy part of town but not the busiest. ANYWAY, we were at this great small, busy dining establishment, drinking and toasting Abhi on turning 21, then we hit karaoke and sang Michael Jackson like there was no tomorrow. BEFORE all the evening craziness, a few of us had gone together and bought our return shinkansen (bullet train) tickets to Narita Airport. THAT was a surreal experience to be sure.
On that Sunday (11/22), my host family and I (Hanako took the night bus Friday night from Yokohama and arrived early Saturday morning) went to an onsen. We stayed until Monday after breakfast (twas a holiday), so we took a bath shortly after arriving, again after Sunday night dinner, and before breakfast on Monday. Dinner was BEAUTIFUL, some 10-11 dishes served all at once on a tray, including a nabe (boiling water in which tofu, vegetable, translucent noodles, and meat is cooked). It resembled the Kyoto group dinner in a way as everything was in small portions and DELICIOUS. But that’s a Japan thing. Watched sumo (15 day matches take place 4 times a year: September, November, I think April and maybe February…), which was the Kansai competition this time. Kansai being a region in Japan. Sleeping on a futon is SO comfortable, especially with the hard pillow.
Drove back and then had a day I severely felt resembled Earlham in its chaotic brilliance. We arrived at home, then Hanako and I biked to our Aunt Maya’s house (by noon), had lunch with Aunt Maya (who teaches piano) and Aunt Mire. I had agreed to meet Abhi at 1pm at the city hall in order to lead him back to our house because he was a) coming to help Tsukie, me, and Otoosan gather wood in the forest and b) coming to eat some delicious Chinese food that evening. Ended up leaving my Aunt’s house, but Abhi was a little late too BUT there was a marathon or something being run, so we had to meet at a different place, but we got back to the house, left to the forest, and stacked wood already cut by Otoosan (apple trees) into a GINORMOUS pile. Snow on the ground hid some pieces. (We have a wood stove, so we always have to have wood; and there are STACKS at either end of the house; this was prep for next season) After about an hour and a half, we drove back home and then Hanako, Tsukie, and Otoosan cooked up a STORM. And in true “guest/sort of host” fashion, Abhi and I were to sit and we did. And we talked. And then we ate delicious food with wonderful people.
I have been moderately confused by, most notably, the supposed fact that Japanese people do not have many people over to their houses. However, since the families I am shocked by are either host families or the Kuratas (Yoko’s family), I think I need to find a better test pool. Otoosan was SO ready to cook and cook and cook for Abhi. Perhaps Abhi’s interest in Chinese food and desire to eat it is what made Otoosan so ready to devote time and energy to a guest. Spring rolls, gyoza, the egg and greens dish, the chicken and greens dish, meatballs and greens dish, salad and fish…man…
On Wednesday (11/25, our last half day at host school), Sensei wanted to meet because I had written some questionable things in my weekly journal. Every week, we have read about 3 articles for each class (Mondays “Literacy in Japanese”, Thursdays “Cross-Cultural Educational Perspectives”, except when holidays occur, like that Monday, 11/23) and we write a summary and then add our own thoughts. Well, as happens towards the end of most semesters, I was so distracted trying to read the second and third articles for the previous Thursday’s class. I ended up writing in caps out of frustration (and when I do this, it looks a LOT worse than I usually intend it to be) and talking about how I “didn’t want to” and just “couldn’t” read the articles. In the FIRST one, I talked about how I thought teachers should know the backgrounds of their students and combined with my anger, Sensei thought I resented her. I can see where she was coming from, so we had a nice chat and we really connected. That is what I LOVE about people. Or rather, what I love about experiences that involve people (hmmm….they wouldn’t really be experiences without people, now would they…?). Connection. Sitting down and learning about one another. That will forever be the highlight of anything I do and anywhere I go. Unless it’s just me and a pack of emus and the sunset.
Friday, November 27th, was the last day at host school. Bonner paperwork was signed (The Bonner Program is a scholarship program at many colleges and universities throughout the United States. Involved students, 15 per class at Earlham, complete an average of 10 hours per week of volunteer service at a given site. Growth is expected to take place, so often students stay with the same site for two to three years sometimes all four years. The paperwork I am referring to are hour logs for August through November, an evaluation by my site supervisors (the three English teachers I worked with), and the Community Learning Agreement, which documents the goals I set forward at the start of the semester.) And my HDSR field study came to a close. 240 hours. Wow.
The day began with my addressing the school, speaking about the time I had spent at Senboku junior high school, and how the experience will always stay with me. And oh how it will. Some students make the day better by simply smiling at you. Some students you could wait eons for to answer a question just so they will know they can do it. It was a time that I will never forget, that I will constantly think about (I also have letters from every single student, all 393, as well as closer connections with a few girl students who kept up steady communication via letters with me).
That evening, coincidentally, Tsukie, Aunt Maya, Aunt Mire, and I went out to dinner. A girl’s night. It was wonderful to talk about life and love and dreams and hopes. Really. Honestly. That is the BEST time EVER. I have loved learning about other people and through them, learning about myself.
When Saturday (11/28) came, it was time for Noh drama (known for it’s slow pace and even tempo, known to put some people to sleep). Ethan LOVES Noh, so he printed out the stories from a book for us so we would understand what we were watching. That helps SO MUCH. Though it was soothing…and I felt warm and comfortable….like I was on a cloud….drifting off…I KNEW WHAT WAS HAPPENING.
I didn’t stay for the whole thing (1:30pm-4:30pm) because I caught the shinkansen to Saitama and stayed with Yoko and her family for the weekend. That was probably the best. Just as joyful as lunch was with her two weeks previously, being in her home and with her family was something truly special. It felt comfortable. It felt open and real. It was relaxed. It was easy. I was there for Saturday dinner, Sunday breakfast (which was a delicious onion and chicken and egg dish over rice), and Sunday lunch (with her sister Naoko, her husband Shinya, and their 2 year old son, Tomo (Tomo-chan). Took the shinkansen back to Morioka.
THEN met up with the second year English teacher (Osawa Sensei) I have been helping and his son, three year old Kenyu (Ken-chan-“true friend”, I think), who LOVES shinkansen, drove back to his home, picked up his wife, eight month old daughter (Ichika-“one heart”-Ich-chan), and mother (Kiriko-san). We went to a restaurant where OH MY GOSH you sit at a table in a HIGE BOAT and “fish” off the side because it’s surrounded by water and there are fish swimming. Ken-chan caught us some dinner and we also had delicious sashimi (raw fish), sushi, and other various fish dishes. Again, the company was superb. That seems to be a recurring pattern here in Japan.
This week began with wanko soba, served in little bowls, like a shot amount, with 15 “shots”/bowls equaling a regular bowl of soba noodles. It’s an eating contest for half an hour to see how many bowls you can eat. The norm is around 100. My goal was 100, but I ate too slow and paced myself, so I only got 80. (Imagine THAT. Me. PACING MYSELF. WHAAAAAAAA?!??!?!?!?) It’s a Morioka thing and we participated in it with Board of Education members and the ALTs (Assistant Language Teachers) in Morioka right now.
Other than that, this week is about packing. It’s about throwing things away. It’s about buying omiyage (souvenirs) and seeing people before leaving. It’s about finishing the 10-12 page reflective essay on our SICE experience for Sensei (Thursday), studying for a Japanese final (Thursday), and practicing a Japanese speech (Thursday). It’s about looking at Morioka and snow-covered Iwate-san and breathing in the air. And then stepping on the train bound for the airplane and some ten hours of flying back to home. Home. Wow. What a word.
It will be difficult to pack the last of my things, to sit at the Closing Reception (Saturday, 12/5), to try and say “Thank you” without having the language skill or the words to express the never ending gratitude I have inside. It will be difficult to hug my family goodbye (though I know I HAVE to see them again; Hanako went back to Yokohama on the night bus on 11/23). It will be difficult to be back in America. But MAN, do I miss you all. I can’t wait to yell in saga at Earlham, I can’t wait to see your smiling faces, I can’t wait to HUG you and NOT LET GO.
I turn in my cell phone right before boarding the shinkansen at 10:41am on Sunday, December 6th. That’s 8:41pm Saturday, December 5th for East Coast and Earlham; 5:41pm, Saturday, December 5th for West Coast and Seattle. If you’re emailing me now or plan to, sending me an email AFTER that time means that the person on SICE NEXT fall will read it. Just fyi.
Good luck in the last few weeks of the semester, Earlhamites.
See you all very soon!
Hannah
Tuesday, December 1, 2009
Sunday, November 8, 2009
Fall Colors and Conversations
November 2, 2009-November 8, 2009
Another week down. Wow. Hope the time is flying for you too, but in the best way possible.
This week, we continued registering for classes (ah, excitement) and I’m looking at a Japaneseful semester (Japanese 302, Japanese Linguistics, and Traditional Japan), with Counseling and Psychotherapy (Human Development and Social Relations) thrown in for good measure. Also rock climbing and Women’s Chorus I THINK. We’ll see what Bonita the Boss (Bonita Washington-Lacey, the Registrar) says, but Nelson B (Nelson Bingham, my advisor) says I’m good to go.
Monday night (11/2) was joyous-drinking with Abhi at a local bar (Monkey’s Kitchen) and talking about life. That’s basically what I want to do for the rest of my life, so it was time well spent. Rode home (alcohol and biking are NOT supposed to mix) and bumped into a construction cone. Ordinarily, in the not ingenious United States, the cone would have been moved a few inches. Here, it’s attached to the ground, so it just popped back into its original position (very Bobo Doll-like for you Psych majors). Got home safe though, but I never worry so there’s really no need for anyone else to. If you’re worried, it’s dangerous and you should call a cab.
Tuesday (11/3) was a Culture Day, so a holiday. We, as a group, took the train an hour and a half south to Hiraizumi, an old, historyful city that used to be on par with Kyoto in terms of power. Old castle site and temples and gardens galore. BEUATIFUL FALL COLORS. I actually took more pictures of the fall colors than I did of the sites... We met at the station at a shining 7:50 in the morning (some people rode their bikes, some were driven; Tsukie kindly chose the latter though the former is always good because, sing it with me now, “I want to ride my bicycle/I want to ride my bike…”) and many were tired on the train. The day was QUITE chilly…
Motsuji was the old temple, so the site included a few temples (a given) and a gorgeous pond (which was more like a small lake). Lots of iris plants and every tree was planted just so in order to create the beauty we were able to witness. AND THE FALL COLORS!!!!!! RHAHDINBFWNNMDKAMDADNKNFFJ!!!!! SO COOL!!!!! Some trees like fire, some like the color of pears or apples. Tamara, Mitchell, and Abhi made wishes and rang a large bell (by ceremoniously pulling an suspended log into it; you bow your head and think of your wish until the sound stops). Saw a type of spider we don’t see in Morioka with a fatter thorax, but it’s not called a thorax. Hey Bio majors and nature lovers, what’s the hind part of a spider?
Bussed to Chusonji, where we first ate lunch at a noodle (ramen and soba and udon)/donburi (noodles or rice and meat in a bowl)/gyuudon (meat and rice in a bowl) shop and then looked around a souvenir shop next door. Then we began the trek up a stone pathway to get to the main area of Chusonji. First, it was commented on the fact that my snowboarding parka (which is my winter jacket for the semester) makes me look pregnant-“So Hannah, didja get knocked up on the way here?” And I will agree with this because if I have ANYTHING in my pockets, it magically resembles a fetus. (Especially if I have my gloves and hat in there in order to cool off after climbing up the steep incline.)
Continued on, walking along stone pathways through GLORIOUS trees of orange, yellow, gold, red, crimson, cranberry, goldenrod; some trees all green with their tips JUST turning red…Past little “gift huts” selling charms, “rest areas” looking out on the towns and fields below and the mountains across the way. Light streaming through trees JUST so. Displayed close to the ACTUAL Chusonji temple were individually potted tall, leafy stemmed dahlia-like flowers. Also: small Bonsai flowering trees, draping blankets of a single color of flower, large circular and spherical metal frames housing multiple individual flowers (the same Dahlia-like type, or is it Zinnia…?) so it looked like an EXPLOSION of a flowering plant.
Moved on to watch kyogen (comedy) and noh (slow drama) being performed in succession on an outdoor stage. Large crowd, many photographs being taken. One guy in the front row taking pictures had a Yankees jacket with a Mariners baseball cap. Thought that was the BEST. Way to represent the teams with Japanese players. There’s one more team with a Japanese player (and here is where I fail in baseball knowledge) and perhaps the man had that player’s/team’s t-shirt on, but I never saw.
Went to a museum with many artifacts from when Hiraizumi was at its prime. Hiraizumi’s location is near the center of old Mutsu. In the eleventh century, Hiraizumi was ruled by the powerful Abe family and in 1053, Yoriyoshi, a warrior-noble from the powerful Miramoto clan, was appointed peacekeeper and general of Mutsu and attempted to contain the Abe. Conflict erupted and the Abe leader stopped Yoriyoshi from extending his control. (This is known in history as the Former Nine Years’ War, though it lasted a dozen years, from 1051-1062.) The Abe were defeated. A local noble administrator, Fujiwara no Tsunekiyo had sided with the Abe family. He had married an Abe woman and their son, Kiyohira, would found the Oshu Fujiwara Dynasty. (Oshu was another name for Mutsu.) When Kiyohira grew up, he became the leader of Mutsu incidentally (moving to Hiraizumi later) and wished to spread Buddhism to the land. THIS is what I was trying to get at to describe the museum-MANY statues of Buddha all around.
To Konjikido (Hiraizumi’s Golden Temple), which was moved from inside one building (nearby) to inside another though I HAVE NO IDEA HOW. Enclosed behind glass in the “new location”, it stood QUITE IMPRESSIVELY. Gold leaf EVERYWHERE. MY GOSH. Trained back, many people fell asleep, and then we were given money for dinner. (We are told to go out because we should give our host families their own time without us. We’re not offended at all though…*sniff*…not even a little *tear*) Abhi, Nicole, Mitchell, and I found a gyoza (potstickers) place in the basement of the station, connected to Isetan department store. DELISH. THEN, while we stood wondering what to do next, we were happened upon by some Iwate University/Gandai exchange students and one Japanese guy who we met at our orientation in August and often stops to say hi to us at Gandai. They were off to grab a drink on Odoori and why didn’t we join them. Why not?! So we walked, Nicole and Abhi with their bikes, to Odoori. Mitchell parted ways with us to go to the bookstore before being picked up by his host mother. Went to the Moon Soon Café where we nomikai-ed it up for 150 minutes (The usual length is either 120 minutes or 150 minutes and the price was great: ¥1500 I think; however, it always ends up being more because they make you buy food. HOWEVER, it was different at the Moon Soon Café because they only made us buy one plate person, rather than two.). Good drinks, good company, good sharing of experiences/hopes/fears. Two Italians, two French, three Americans (actually two Americans and an Indian/Ugandan), and a Japanese. Wonderful beyond wonderful. And English is quickly becoming a universal language as we spoke mostly English that night THOUGH we also used Japanese in order to communicate across language barriers. THAT was even cooler. Made it home okay AGAIN.
Left a little earlier because walked home (about 30 minutes), but made it back home around 11pm. Had called my host mother when we got to the Café and she had said my curfew was 11:30pm, the same that it is for weekends. I never want to cut it close, so I always leave early. ALSO, when she realized that I come back on time and I’m not stumbling drunk and I always call to tell her my plans, she made the curfew later (it started out at 10pm) because there is faith in my abilities. This I love.
The next day, Wednesday (11/4), Abhi, Nicole, Tamara, Mitchell, and I met after our half days at our host schools and biked to a Moss Burger (like McDonald’s, but better) near Gandai (near where the uchiage party was after the Gandai Festival). There we ate fast food in order to complete an assignment for Sensei about the atmosphere/menu/experience of fast food dining in Japan. There is a May Term (Earlham College, for those who don’t know, offers an additional “class” for about a month during may, depending on the date of Commencement of course. There are about five or six offered per year and they are worth 3-4 credits. Students have gone to Mexico, Argentina, Yellowstone National Park, Germany, etc.) she is doing that is “Food Culture in Japan” and she has given us a taste of what will be on the docket through our food education (looking at school lunches) in a kindergarten, two elementary schools, and a high school (so far).
Thursday (it rained) was our visit to Morioka Ichikoo (Morioka’s #1 high school), which is conveniently across the street from Gandai and where my host brother and Nicole’s host sister go to school. We had to eat lunch quickly (ate there in the cafeteria, which is underused, but convenient if student’s forget their lunch or teachers want a bento) in ~5 minutes. Had a delicious Chinese dish of vegetables and shrimp in a gravy-like substance over rice. Then went into the school (it was lunchtime) and watched the students buying snacks (made in the cafeteria) such as yakisoba, pudding, onigiri (rice balls wrapped in seaweed), mochi with azuki (red bean paste) and whipped cream, fried potato, etc. Some students apparently eat their bento during the morning break (school starts at 8am and some come without having eaten breakfast). Some students studied during lunch. Observed three different English classes: a third grade (10th grade) reading-focused one, a second grade (11th grade) intermediate one, and a second grade (11th grade) writing-focused one. We all helped with pronunciation in the last one, which was quite fun. Seating is not gendered. Classes are quiet. We had free time afterwards, so Elizabeth and I went to a second grade math class, third grade Classics class, and first grade English class. In the first grade English class, the teacher employed more technology than junior high school teachers do-using a PowerPoint and Paint to label parts of a sentence as well as to introduce new vocab.
Students learn 80-100 new English words a week and have English class everyday. It is more and more difficult to push students tough, one teacher said (the first English teacher we saw, of the third grade class; talked with us afterwards for Q & A time), because they are impatient and therefore “weak”. The third graders at Ichikoo use, apparently, one of the hardest English textbooks (which the teachers choose). In 2nd grade, the students have a choice-go on a literature track or a science track (less English classes). Ko is on the science track, though he still has a great deal of English work to do. 3rd graders are more focused on the coming exams, so they have less art, home economics, etc. classes. And though they love P.E., from January to March, they do not have P.E. in order to study more for the fast-approaching entrance exams for university. Like nearly every school, it seems, Ichikoo has received numerous awards for their clubs and student involvement in clubs is active, though I am sure it is even required. The English curriculum emphasizes reading and writing, in line with what the exam asks, so little opportunities exist to converse. The school has one Assistant Language Teacher/Native Speaker who works mainly with the first and second graders. Student government members plan school events like meetings and festivals, have good leadership skills, and are chosen via election process. Juku (cram school) is popular, but the teacher estimated that less than 50% of Ichikoo students go. It is NEVER encouraged because the schoolteachers want students to “trust [them]” to adequately prepare them for the exams. Juku attendance is high in junior high, but drops in high school because students become busy with club activities and homework. In the teacher’s opinion, class participation and homework is demanding enough and enough preparation for the exams. I once asked Ko why he didn’t go to juku and he said he didn’t need to.
Afterwards, attended English Café at Gandai. Basically the companion to the Hello Party we hosted back in (GAH!) early October. Talked only in English with many Japanese Gandai students, exchanged cell phone numbers and emails. What I find the most frustrating is how contact information is exchanged and WHY. In America, you often exchange numbers or emails because you KNOW you will see each other again (or you HAVE to), like you’re working together on a project and need to set up meeting times. BUT here, it’s more like “I’ll-call/mail-you-if-I-want-to-see-you-again.” And that has been a tough idea. Like always, I form plans in my mind and then vocalize them (“Let’s do lunch at Yoshinoya some time!”) and then don’t follow through (because I get busy or I’m tired, etc.), thus frustrating my soul. A habit I’m trying to break.
School on Friday (11/6) was good-helped in three first year (7th grade) English classes because the second years didn’t have English class that day. The first years are at that age and enthusiasm level where they are (a) easily amused and (b) easy to connect with. It was a BLAST. And Tohru Sensei and I just work well together in team teaching situations. He is also VERY energetic, so that helps. In the first class, the principal came in for thirty minutes, took some pictures, gave Tohru Sensei a great scare, and then left. Afterwards, Tohru Sensei said he was SO nervous. Once again, I have realized that something only scares me or makes me nervous if I am given time and context. The principal’s presence didn’t wrack me, but maybe since Tohru Sensei has a REAL job teaching, then he SHOULD be nervous. He, as always, did great.
Was tired getting up for Friday and didn’t want to get any sicker than the sore throat (that always come and goes) and the sniffles, so came home and took a nap and didn’t go to volleyball with Yoriko (Abhi’s host mother). MAN, will ya LOOK at those priorities?!?! Will ya LOOK at that self-care?!?! I surprise myself sometimes. Ah logic, thank you for being with me this semester. W watched ‘Ponyo’ during dinner (the new Hayao Miyazaki film). I HIGHLY recommend it. Has a similar feel as ‘Wall-E’, but without the underlying criticism of the human beings’ treatment of the planet Earth.
Saturday (11/7) was a BEAUTIFUL day. It was Skype time with me madre following breakfast and homework. Having quiet Friday nights and quiet Saturdays (only what YOU make them sometimes) is such a gift. Elizabeth and I met up at 1:45pm and walked the 10-15 minutes to Sakanacho to (covered mall and starting point for the September 14th (ACK!!) mikoshi (shrine) carrying), then to look around. Then the additional 10 minutes to Odoori (SO EASY TO GET AROUND HERE!!!) to satisfy a craving for crepes. Saw a ton of local, non-chain restaurants I think it would be great if we tried. Rather than stick to the “downtown” of Odoori and the “favorite places of SICE students” and the nomikai culture, let’s think OUTSIDE the box and VENTURE around. Alas, Sakanacho is a bit of a stretch for some since its NOT familiar and it’s a WHOLE ‘NOTHER 5 MINUTES further than Odoori. Oh what WILL we EVER do? *sigh*
Got back home about 5pm and watched some more ‘Pure Love’. Then, surprise, sushi arrived at 6pm, a gift from Maya, Tsukie’s oldest sister. “Her treat.” Did SUCH a good job of not repeating the pain of the Kyoto Sushi Incident of 9/30. SO proud of myself. I think I’m cured, Nikki. Let’s eat sushi! Watched some anime during dinner (‘Naruto’, for those who know/care). It’s about a magical world (what TV show isn’t?) and people can transform and they fight and it gets pretty violent sometimes, but it was interesting. I am just about the most non-geeky person on this program and Elizabeth is set on getting me to watch anime when we get back to Earlham. There’s nothing wrong with anime in my opinion, it’s just that it’s never been something I have chosen to spend time/money/energy on.
Ah Sunday (11/8). Began by waking up (NO WAY!!!) and found I was VERY tired. Stayed up late Saturday finishing the second of three articles for Literacy in Japanese class on Monday. I realized earlier in the semester that the logical thing, when one has three articles due on a Monday, is to read one on Friday, one on Saturday, and one on Sunday. Logical, RIGHT?!??! It surprised me too. Well school was busy on Friday (read some of the first one), so I read one Saturday morning (finished it, I mean) and then thought I should read the next one, just to stay on course. So went to bed around midnight, WHICH (I have discovered) is too late for me ESPECIALLY when I am tired BEFORE bed, but not tired when I ACTUALLY SHOULD sleep. Go FIGURE. So I was tired. But I woke up, did some Japanese homework, then went with Tsukie to sadoo (a tea ceremony).
Both her sisters studied tea ceremony about ten years ago and today, the oldest was helping to train a new pupil. (Late 20s, early 30s in age) The place was near Obaasan’s house (grandmother’s house), so we parked there and walked literally almost next door. We were directed to a tatami mat room away from the hustle and bustle of a main activity (looked like a bazaar) and next door to a large gathering of kimono-wearing women maybe doing tea ceremony as well, but it was quite lively. Both Tsukie’s sisters were dressed in kimono and we took our seats, kneeling to the point of, and for long enough to, cut off circulation to our legs. That was the only downside.
In the floor, a large teapot boiled hot water. A long wooden “ladle” was used to pour the water (later) and a small green “stand” was what the “ladle” rested on. A table to the right and rear (as we looked on) of the teapot had a large canister of cold water underneath it that resembled a decorated urn-white porcelain with blue and rust-colored designs decorating it. On top, at the moment, was a small cup (black and red, the top/cap flush with the rest, a little wider than the small cans of juice/coffee you find in supermarkets). Inside that, we saw later, was green tea (macha) powder.
There is a certain way to sit, how to fold one’s hands in one’s lap, when to bow to the person serving you, how to receive the tea (pick up with right hand, hold on palm of left hand), what to say when receiving the tea, how to pick up the sweet that is served with the tea from its plate and then place the chopsticks back on the side of the plate, how to pass the plate of sweets to the person next to you, how to eat the sweet, how to return the bowl when done drinking (wipe where you sipped from and dab that on the napkin that your sweet was on, turn it twice to the left (90 degrees), so that the picture on the bowl shows, hold it with the palm of your left hand and steadied by your right hand, etc). The person preparing the tea has the hardest time-how to pick up the bowls to serve the tea in and in what order, what angle to put the “ladle” at when it is on the “stand”, how to sit in relation to the tea and the people/guests, etc. We practiced entering the room too. All kneeling outside: the first person opens the sliding door, looks in to the right then to the left, puts their fan on the ground in front of them, scoots in, moves the fan further, scoots in further, turns to face the scroll and flower planter that are in their own recess in the room to the left (placing the fan in front of them), looks at the scroll, looks at the flower, bows, stands, moves towards the back corner of the room (diagonally away from where they entered), turns a sharp right to end up in front of the table with the cold water under it and cup of green tea powder above it, kneels, places fan in front, looks at the angles of the water container, looks at the angles of the green tea powder container, moves fan to in front of square cut in floor, turns body towards the square cut in the floor (as well as to the scroll and flowers and bows in unison with the person who has just entered (the second person in), then takes fan, stands, and moves back to the corner (that is diagonal from the entrance) and meets right shoulders with the second person. The first person then takes their seat (kneeling) against the sliding door thy entered through (near the square cut in the floor), places their fan to their right side, and once everyone has kneeled, they bow to the host. It was VERY interesting. VERY VERY VERY interesting. FASCINATING. BEAUTIFUL. INTRICATE.
Off to an E-Club (group of past host families) event out in the countryside/agricultural area (about 30 minutes away, at a house owned by one of the male members who has lived in that spot for 9 years) for imonoko (literally, “potato child” soup; a Morioka specialty), which E-Club members made for us, and relaxing time at a house with a backyard that looks straight out of a book or children’s bedtime story. (The event had started at 10am, but Tsukie and I arrived at about 12:40.) There was a small lake/pond in the backyard that a zipline with a T-bar seat flew over surrounded by trees and pieces of notched wood pieces as bridges across the water, a mossy area to run around on, and steep banks. Karaoke was inside the house and about ten minutes after we arrived, at a smaller house (one room) up the hill, Claire’s host mother (who had also done Kimono Time for us), another woman (I think of E-Club), and one of Samantha’s host sisters performed a tea ceremony. Tsukie and I sat and ate some soup (DELISH! Potatoes, carrots) while the rest of the SICE kids were called to the tea ceremony. I wanted to go check it out, but I had just come from one, so I wanted to also let the group be.
I walked up and past because, more than anything, I just wanted to stand and admire the beauty that was the towering mountains in the distance, the farm with black cows right across the dirt path, and the surrounding houses. It was SO quiet, you could hear the grasses waving in the wind. And the leaves fell with the breeze in such a beautiful way that I just stood and soaked in the tranquility. Shortly, a man (61 years old) who was walking down the road approached me (coffee cup and cigarette in hand) and we began talking. He opened with asking why there were so many cars gathered? So I told him about SICE and who we were and what we were doing. He wanted to practice his English so he began telling me of his days as an IBM computer engineer, how he used to work at a Morioka high school as a computer teacher and hated it, how he has a bone issue in his tailbone (I believe) and is always in pain, how he had a pen friend in America from the ages of 16-21, how his father died of a brain aneurysm (something in the brain), and how he is now retired and spends his days on the Internet and watching English movies without subtitles. Twice, we were approached by someone who wanted me to come to the tea ceremony. First, it was the woman who was from E-Club and helping Hirata-san out (Claire’s host mother) and then it was Samantha’s host father.
I loved just standing and talking and hearing his story. And I think that’s hard for people to grasp: why in the world would someone be talking to a total stranger? But I CAN’T COUNT the number of people I have been SO THANKFUL to converse with BY CHANCE, whose stories where NOT part of the scheduled activities, but whose words made the experience better, brighter, and more exciting. I cannot thank them enough.
So I eventually went back to the small room and tea ceremony that was practically over. It was joked that I knew everything since I had been that morning, but no. Not at all. Samantha’s legs were QUITE numb (I recalled the feeling) from kneeling for the duration (of twenty to thirty minutes probably). Others had changed to sitting cross-legged. Sat and talked with Elizabeth, Claire, Samantha’s host mother, Abhi, and Mitchell after finishing. Yasumi Sensei gave me some mail she had received-the infamous card from the Bonners on campus. (For those who do not know, I am part of the Bonner Program, which is a community service-oriented group of students, 15 per year, who apply for acceptance and receive scholarship money in exchange for performing about ten hours of service a week at a particular sites or sites. I have worked at a therapeutic riding center, a Boys and Girls Club (as a tutor and as a cooking class assistant), and the Mayor’s Office.) The card is infamous as, once a semester, cards for those Bonners off campus are passed around at the applicable monthly Bonner meeting. It brought me SUCH JOY, you all. YOU HAVE NO IDEA. THANK YOU from the bottom of my heart-to those I know and those I don’t yet know, THANK YOU. I can’t wait to yell with you, Topher. I can’t wait to work with you, Kristin. I can’t wait to live it up Bonner style!!! BONNER WHAT?!??! BONNER LOVE!!!!!!
Headed out around 3pm and came home (stopped by a Book Off, which is a used bookstore, because Tsukie was looking for a book-I saw a case of the first season of ‘Bones’, CE, and almost bought it. AND saw ‘The Breakfast Club’ and almost bought THAT. Love to have those reminders.
Tired when I got home, but an ice cream waffle, some episodes of ‘Pure Love’, and laundry perked me up. Dinner was good, delicious as ALWAYS, but afterwards my brain just shut off (maybe I should sleep…?) and I got so frustrated when I couldn’t speak in Japanese and form the opinions I wanted so badly to vocalize in response to questions from Tsukie and Otoosan. But I got through I because Tsukie is so patient. Really. That quality is underappreciated. LISTENING.
I realize I write little about my host school experience and even less about my Japanese class and Earlham classes. Japanese is mostly review, but I need it. The Earlham classes require summaries and thoughts on the articles I read and I’m getting 4/4 points on all of them. I also did REALLY well on my Arabic script paper and my Arabic presentation. So my GPA is getting help (not that is was oh-my-gosh low, but it could have been much better).
More next week! Off to Tokyo to visit Yoko next weekend and see Hanako too! Love to you all!
Another week down. Wow. Hope the time is flying for you too, but in the best way possible.
This week, we continued registering for classes (ah, excitement) and I’m looking at a Japaneseful semester (Japanese 302, Japanese Linguistics, and Traditional Japan), with Counseling and Psychotherapy (Human Development and Social Relations) thrown in for good measure. Also rock climbing and Women’s Chorus I THINK. We’ll see what Bonita the Boss (Bonita Washington-Lacey, the Registrar) says, but Nelson B (Nelson Bingham, my advisor) says I’m good to go.
Monday night (11/2) was joyous-drinking with Abhi at a local bar (Monkey’s Kitchen) and talking about life. That’s basically what I want to do for the rest of my life, so it was time well spent. Rode home (alcohol and biking are NOT supposed to mix) and bumped into a construction cone. Ordinarily, in the not ingenious United States, the cone would have been moved a few inches. Here, it’s attached to the ground, so it just popped back into its original position (very Bobo Doll-like for you Psych majors). Got home safe though, but I never worry so there’s really no need for anyone else to. If you’re worried, it’s dangerous and you should call a cab.
Tuesday (11/3) was a Culture Day, so a holiday. We, as a group, took the train an hour and a half south to Hiraizumi, an old, historyful city that used to be on par with Kyoto in terms of power. Old castle site and temples and gardens galore. BEUATIFUL FALL COLORS. I actually took more pictures of the fall colors than I did of the sites... We met at the station at a shining 7:50 in the morning (some people rode their bikes, some were driven; Tsukie kindly chose the latter though the former is always good because, sing it with me now, “I want to ride my bicycle/I want to ride my bike…”) and many were tired on the train. The day was QUITE chilly…
Motsuji was the old temple, so the site included a few temples (a given) and a gorgeous pond (which was more like a small lake). Lots of iris plants and every tree was planted just so in order to create the beauty we were able to witness. AND THE FALL COLORS!!!!!! RHAHDINBFWNNMDKAMDADNKNFFJ!!!!! SO COOL!!!!! Some trees like fire, some like the color of pears or apples. Tamara, Mitchell, and Abhi made wishes and rang a large bell (by ceremoniously pulling an suspended log into it; you bow your head and think of your wish until the sound stops). Saw a type of spider we don’t see in Morioka with a fatter thorax, but it’s not called a thorax. Hey Bio majors and nature lovers, what’s the hind part of a spider?
Bussed to Chusonji, where we first ate lunch at a noodle (ramen and soba and udon)/donburi (noodles or rice and meat in a bowl)/gyuudon (meat and rice in a bowl) shop and then looked around a souvenir shop next door. Then we began the trek up a stone pathway to get to the main area of Chusonji. First, it was commented on the fact that my snowboarding parka (which is my winter jacket for the semester) makes me look pregnant-“So Hannah, didja get knocked up on the way here?” And I will agree with this because if I have ANYTHING in my pockets, it magically resembles a fetus. (Especially if I have my gloves and hat in there in order to cool off after climbing up the steep incline.)
Continued on, walking along stone pathways through GLORIOUS trees of orange, yellow, gold, red, crimson, cranberry, goldenrod; some trees all green with their tips JUST turning red…Past little “gift huts” selling charms, “rest areas” looking out on the towns and fields below and the mountains across the way. Light streaming through trees JUST so. Displayed close to the ACTUAL Chusonji temple were individually potted tall, leafy stemmed dahlia-like flowers. Also: small Bonsai flowering trees, draping blankets of a single color of flower, large circular and spherical metal frames housing multiple individual flowers (the same Dahlia-like type, or is it Zinnia…?) so it looked like an EXPLOSION of a flowering plant.
Moved on to watch kyogen (comedy) and noh (slow drama) being performed in succession on an outdoor stage. Large crowd, many photographs being taken. One guy in the front row taking pictures had a Yankees jacket with a Mariners baseball cap. Thought that was the BEST. Way to represent the teams with Japanese players. There’s one more team with a Japanese player (and here is where I fail in baseball knowledge) and perhaps the man had that player’s/team’s t-shirt on, but I never saw.
Went to a museum with many artifacts from when Hiraizumi was at its prime. Hiraizumi’s location is near the center of old Mutsu. In the eleventh century, Hiraizumi was ruled by the powerful Abe family and in 1053, Yoriyoshi, a warrior-noble from the powerful Miramoto clan, was appointed peacekeeper and general of Mutsu and attempted to contain the Abe. Conflict erupted and the Abe leader stopped Yoriyoshi from extending his control. (This is known in history as the Former Nine Years’ War, though it lasted a dozen years, from 1051-1062.) The Abe were defeated. A local noble administrator, Fujiwara no Tsunekiyo had sided with the Abe family. He had married an Abe woman and their son, Kiyohira, would found the Oshu Fujiwara Dynasty. (Oshu was another name for Mutsu.) When Kiyohira grew up, he became the leader of Mutsu incidentally (moving to Hiraizumi later) and wished to spread Buddhism to the land. THIS is what I was trying to get at to describe the museum-MANY statues of Buddha all around.
To Konjikido (Hiraizumi’s Golden Temple), which was moved from inside one building (nearby) to inside another though I HAVE NO IDEA HOW. Enclosed behind glass in the “new location”, it stood QUITE IMPRESSIVELY. Gold leaf EVERYWHERE. MY GOSH. Trained back, many people fell asleep, and then we were given money for dinner. (We are told to go out because we should give our host families their own time without us. We’re not offended at all though…*sniff*…not even a little *tear*) Abhi, Nicole, Mitchell, and I found a gyoza (potstickers) place in the basement of the station, connected to Isetan department store. DELISH. THEN, while we stood wondering what to do next, we were happened upon by some Iwate University/Gandai exchange students and one Japanese guy who we met at our orientation in August and often stops to say hi to us at Gandai. They were off to grab a drink on Odoori and why didn’t we join them. Why not?! So we walked, Nicole and Abhi with their bikes, to Odoori. Mitchell parted ways with us to go to the bookstore before being picked up by his host mother. Went to the Moon Soon Café where we nomikai-ed it up for 150 minutes (The usual length is either 120 minutes or 150 minutes and the price was great: ¥1500 I think; however, it always ends up being more because they make you buy food. HOWEVER, it was different at the Moon Soon Café because they only made us buy one plate person, rather than two.). Good drinks, good company, good sharing of experiences/hopes/fears. Two Italians, two French, three Americans (actually two Americans and an Indian/Ugandan), and a Japanese. Wonderful beyond wonderful. And English is quickly becoming a universal language as we spoke mostly English that night THOUGH we also used Japanese in order to communicate across language barriers. THAT was even cooler. Made it home okay AGAIN.
Left a little earlier because walked home (about 30 minutes), but made it back home around 11pm. Had called my host mother when we got to the Café and she had said my curfew was 11:30pm, the same that it is for weekends. I never want to cut it close, so I always leave early. ALSO, when she realized that I come back on time and I’m not stumbling drunk and I always call to tell her my plans, she made the curfew later (it started out at 10pm) because there is faith in my abilities. This I love.
The next day, Wednesday (11/4), Abhi, Nicole, Tamara, Mitchell, and I met after our half days at our host schools and biked to a Moss Burger (like McDonald’s, but better) near Gandai (near where the uchiage party was after the Gandai Festival). There we ate fast food in order to complete an assignment for Sensei about the atmosphere/menu/experience of fast food dining in Japan. There is a May Term (Earlham College, for those who don’t know, offers an additional “class” for about a month during may, depending on the date of Commencement of course. There are about five or six offered per year and they are worth 3-4 credits. Students have gone to Mexico, Argentina, Yellowstone National Park, Germany, etc.) she is doing that is “Food Culture in Japan” and she has given us a taste of what will be on the docket through our food education (looking at school lunches) in a kindergarten, two elementary schools, and a high school (so far).
Thursday (it rained) was our visit to Morioka Ichikoo (Morioka’s #1 high school), which is conveniently across the street from Gandai and where my host brother and Nicole’s host sister go to school. We had to eat lunch quickly (ate there in the cafeteria, which is underused, but convenient if student’s forget their lunch or teachers want a bento) in ~5 minutes. Had a delicious Chinese dish of vegetables and shrimp in a gravy-like substance over rice. Then went into the school (it was lunchtime) and watched the students buying snacks (made in the cafeteria) such as yakisoba, pudding, onigiri (rice balls wrapped in seaweed), mochi with azuki (red bean paste) and whipped cream, fried potato, etc. Some students apparently eat their bento during the morning break (school starts at 8am and some come without having eaten breakfast). Some students studied during lunch. Observed three different English classes: a third grade (10th grade) reading-focused one, a second grade (11th grade) intermediate one, and a second grade (11th grade) writing-focused one. We all helped with pronunciation in the last one, which was quite fun. Seating is not gendered. Classes are quiet. We had free time afterwards, so Elizabeth and I went to a second grade math class, third grade Classics class, and first grade English class. In the first grade English class, the teacher employed more technology than junior high school teachers do-using a PowerPoint and Paint to label parts of a sentence as well as to introduce new vocab.
Students learn 80-100 new English words a week and have English class everyday. It is more and more difficult to push students tough, one teacher said (the first English teacher we saw, of the third grade class; talked with us afterwards for Q & A time), because they are impatient and therefore “weak”. The third graders at Ichikoo use, apparently, one of the hardest English textbooks (which the teachers choose). In 2nd grade, the students have a choice-go on a literature track or a science track (less English classes). Ko is on the science track, though he still has a great deal of English work to do. 3rd graders are more focused on the coming exams, so they have less art, home economics, etc. classes. And though they love P.E., from January to March, they do not have P.E. in order to study more for the fast-approaching entrance exams for university. Like nearly every school, it seems, Ichikoo has received numerous awards for their clubs and student involvement in clubs is active, though I am sure it is even required. The English curriculum emphasizes reading and writing, in line with what the exam asks, so little opportunities exist to converse. The school has one Assistant Language Teacher/Native Speaker who works mainly with the first and second graders. Student government members plan school events like meetings and festivals, have good leadership skills, and are chosen via election process. Juku (cram school) is popular, but the teacher estimated that less than 50% of Ichikoo students go. It is NEVER encouraged because the schoolteachers want students to “trust [them]” to adequately prepare them for the exams. Juku attendance is high in junior high, but drops in high school because students become busy with club activities and homework. In the teacher’s opinion, class participation and homework is demanding enough and enough preparation for the exams. I once asked Ko why he didn’t go to juku and he said he didn’t need to.
Afterwards, attended English Café at Gandai. Basically the companion to the Hello Party we hosted back in (GAH!) early October. Talked only in English with many Japanese Gandai students, exchanged cell phone numbers and emails. What I find the most frustrating is how contact information is exchanged and WHY. In America, you often exchange numbers or emails because you KNOW you will see each other again (or you HAVE to), like you’re working together on a project and need to set up meeting times. BUT here, it’s more like “I’ll-call/mail-you-if-I-want-to-see-you-again.” And that has been a tough idea. Like always, I form plans in my mind and then vocalize them (“Let’s do lunch at Yoshinoya some time!”) and then don’t follow through (because I get busy or I’m tired, etc.), thus frustrating my soul. A habit I’m trying to break.
School on Friday (11/6) was good-helped in three first year (7th grade) English classes because the second years didn’t have English class that day. The first years are at that age and enthusiasm level where they are (a) easily amused and (b) easy to connect with. It was a BLAST. And Tohru Sensei and I just work well together in team teaching situations. He is also VERY energetic, so that helps. In the first class, the principal came in for thirty minutes, took some pictures, gave Tohru Sensei a great scare, and then left. Afterwards, Tohru Sensei said he was SO nervous. Once again, I have realized that something only scares me or makes me nervous if I am given time and context. The principal’s presence didn’t wrack me, but maybe since Tohru Sensei has a REAL job teaching, then he SHOULD be nervous. He, as always, did great.
Was tired getting up for Friday and didn’t want to get any sicker than the sore throat (that always come and goes) and the sniffles, so came home and took a nap and didn’t go to volleyball with Yoriko (Abhi’s host mother). MAN, will ya LOOK at those priorities?!?! Will ya LOOK at that self-care?!?! I surprise myself sometimes. Ah logic, thank you for being with me this semester. W watched ‘Ponyo’ during dinner (the new Hayao Miyazaki film). I HIGHLY recommend it. Has a similar feel as ‘Wall-E’, but without the underlying criticism of the human beings’ treatment of the planet Earth.
Saturday (11/7) was a BEAUTIFUL day. It was Skype time with me madre following breakfast and homework. Having quiet Friday nights and quiet Saturdays (only what YOU make them sometimes) is such a gift. Elizabeth and I met up at 1:45pm and walked the 10-15 minutes to Sakanacho to (covered mall and starting point for the September 14th (ACK!!) mikoshi (shrine) carrying), then to look around. Then the additional 10 minutes to Odoori (SO EASY TO GET AROUND HERE!!!) to satisfy a craving for crepes. Saw a ton of local, non-chain restaurants I think it would be great if we tried. Rather than stick to the “downtown” of Odoori and the “favorite places of SICE students” and the nomikai culture, let’s think OUTSIDE the box and VENTURE around. Alas, Sakanacho is a bit of a stretch for some since its NOT familiar and it’s a WHOLE ‘NOTHER 5 MINUTES further than Odoori. Oh what WILL we EVER do? *sigh*
Got back home about 5pm and watched some more ‘Pure Love’. Then, surprise, sushi arrived at 6pm, a gift from Maya, Tsukie’s oldest sister. “Her treat.” Did SUCH a good job of not repeating the pain of the Kyoto Sushi Incident of 9/30. SO proud of myself. I think I’m cured, Nikki. Let’s eat sushi! Watched some anime during dinner (‘Naruto’, for those who know/care). It’s about a magical world (what TV show isn’t?) and people can transform and they fight and it gets pretty violent sometimes, but it was interesting. I am just about the most non-geeky person on this program and Elizabeth is set on getting me to watch anime when we get back to Earlham. There’s nothing wrong with anime in my opinion, it’s just that it’s never been something I have chosen to spend time/money/energy on.
Ah Sunday (11/8). Began by waking up (NO WAY!!!) and found I was VERY tired. Stayed up late Saturday finishing the second of three articles for Literacy in Japanese class on Monday. I realized earlier in the semester that the logical thing, when one has three articles due on a Monday, is to read one on Friday, one on Saturday, and one on Sunday. Logical, RIGHT?!??! It surprised me too. Well school was busy on Friday (read some of the first one), so I read one Saturday morning (finished it, I mean) and then thought I should read the next one, just to stay on course. So went to bed around midnight, WHICH (I have discovered) is too late for me ESPECIALLY when I am tired BEFORE bed, but not tired when I ACTUALLY SHOULD sleep. Go FIGURE. So I was tired. But I woke up, did some Japanese homework, then went with Tsukie to sadoo (a tea ceremony).
Both her sisters studied tea ceremony about ten years ago and today, the oldest was helping to train a new pupil. (Late 20s, early 30s in age) The place was near Obaasan’s house (grandmother’s house), so we parked there and walked literally almost next door. We were directed to a tatami mat room away from the hustle and bustle of a main activity (looked like a bazaar) and next door to a large gathering of kimono-wearing women maybe doing tea ceremony as well, but it was quite lively. Both Tsukie’s sisters were dressed in kimono and we took our seats, kneeling to the point of, and for long enough to, cut off circulation to our legs. That was the only downside.
In the floor, a large teapot boiled hot water. A long wooden “ladle” was used to pour the water (later) and a small green “stand” was what the “ladle” rested on. A table to the right and rear (as we looked on) of the teapot had a large canister of cold water underneath it that resembled a decorated urn-white porcelain with blue and rust-colored designs decorating it. On top, at the moment, was a small cup (black and red, the top/cap flush with the rest, a little wider than the small cans of juice/coffee you find in supermarkets). Inside that, we saw later, was green tea (macha) powder.
There is a certain way to sit, how to fold one’s hands in one’s lap, when to bow to the person serving you, how to receive the tea (pick up with right hand, hold on palm of left hand), what to say when receiving the tea, how to pick up the sweet that is served with the tea from its plate and then place the chopsticks back on the side of the plate, how to pass the plate of sweets to the person next to you, how to eat the sweet, how to return the bowl when done drinking (wipe where you sipped from and dab that on the napkin that your sweet was on, turn it twice to the left (90 degrees), so that the picture on the bowl shows, hold it with the palm of your left hand and steadied by your right hand, etc). The person preparing the tea has the hardest time-how to pick up the bowls to serve the tea in and in what order, what angle to put the “ladle” at when it is on the “stand”, how to sit in relation to the tea and the people/guests, etc. We practiced entering the room too. All kneeling outside: the first person opens the sliding door, looks in to the right then to the left, puts their fan on the ground in front of them, scoots in, moves the fan further, scoots in further, turns to face the scroll and flower planter that are in their own recess in the room to the left (placing the fan in front of them), looks at the scroll, looks at the flower, bows, stands, moves towards the back corner of the room (diagonally away from where they entered), turns a sharp right to end up in front of the table with the cold water under it and cup of green tea powder above it, kneels, places fan in front, looks at the angles of the water container, looks at the angles of the green tea powder container, moves fan to in front of square cut in floor, turns body towards the square cut in the floor (as well as to the scroll and flowers and bows in unison with the person who has just entered (the second person in), then takes fan, stands, and moves back to the corner (that is diagonal from the entrance) and meets right shoulders with the second person. The first person then takes their seat (kneeling) against the sliding door thy entered through (near the square cut in the floor), places their fan to their right side, and once everyone has kneeled, they bow to the host. It was VERY interesting. VERY VERY VERY interesting. FASCINATING. BEAUTIFUL. INTRICATE.
Off to an E-Club (group of past host families) event out in the countryside/agricultural area (about 30 minutes away, at a house owned by one of the male members who has lived in that spot for 9 years) for imonoko (literally, “potato child” soup; a Morioka specialty), which E-Club members made for us, and relaxing time at a house with a backyard that looks straight out of a book or children’s bedtime story. (The event had started at 10am, but Tsukie and I arrived at about 12:40.) There was a small lake/pond in the backyard that a zipline with a T-bar seat flew over surrounded by trees and pieces of notched wood pieces as bridges across the water, a mossy area to run around on, and steep banks. Karaoke was inside the house and about ten minutes after we arrived, at a smaller house (one room) up the hill, Claire’s host mother (who had also done Kimono Time for us), another woman (I think of E-Club), and one of Samantha’s host sisters performed a tea ceremony. Tsukie and I sat and ate some soup (DELISH! Potatoes, carrots) while the rest of the SICE kids were called to the tea ceremony. I wanted to go check it out, but I had just come from one, so I wanted to also let the group be.
I walked up and past because, more than anything, I just wanted to stand and admire the beauty that was the towering mountains in the distance, the farm with black cows right across the dirt path, and the surrounding houses. It was SO quiet, you could hear the grasses waving in the wind. And the leaves fell with the breeze in such a beautiful way that I just stood and soaked in the tranquility. Shortly, a man (61 years old) who was walking down the road approached me (coffee cup and cigarette in hand) and we began talking. He opened with asking why there were so many cars gathered? So I told him about SICE and who we were and what we were doing. He wanted to practice his English so he began telling me of his days as an IBM computer engineer, how he used to work at a Morioka high school as a computer teacher and hated it, how he has a bone issue in his tailbone (I believe) and is always in pain, how he had a pen friend in America from the ages of 16-21, how his father died of a brain aneurysm (something in the brain), and how he is now retired and spends his days on the Internet and watching English movies without subtitles. Twice, we were approached by someone who wanted me to come to the tea ceremony. First, it was the woman who was from E-Club and helping Hirata-san out (Claire’s host mother) and then it was Samantha’s host father.
I loved just standing and talking and hearing his story. And I think that’s hard for people to grasp: why in the world would someone be talking to a total stranger? But I CAN’T COUNT the number of people I have been SO THANKFUL to converse with BY CHANCE, whose stories where NOT part of the scheduled activities, but whose words made the experience better, brighter, and more exciting. I cannot thank them enough.
So I eventually went back to the small room and tea ceremony that was practically over. It was joked that I knew everything since I had been that morning, but no. Not at all. Samantha’s legs were QUITE numb (I recalled the feeling) from kneeling for the duration (of twenty to thirty minutes probably). Others had changed to sitting cross-legged. Sat and talked with Elizabeth, Claire, Samantha’s host mother, Abhi, and Mitchell after finishing. Yasumi Sensei gave me some mail she had received-the infamous card from the Bonners on campus. (For those who do not know, I am part of the Bonner Program, which is a community service-oriented group of students, 15 per year, who apply for acceptance and receive scholarship money in exchange for performing about ten hours of service a week at a particular sites or sites. I have worked at a therapeutic riding center, a Boys and Girls Club (as a tutor and as a cooking class assistant), and the Mayor’s Office.) The card is infamous as, once a semester, cards for those Bonners off campus are passed around at the applicable monthly Bonner meeting. It brought me SUCH JOY, you all. YOU HAVE NO IDEA. THANK YOU from the bottom of my heart-to those I know and those I don’t yet know, THANK YOU. I can’t wait to yell with you, Topher. I can’t wait to work with you, Kristin. I can’t wait to live it up Bonner style!!! BONNER WHAT?!??! BONNER LOVE!!!!!!
Headed out around 3pm and came home (stopped by a Book Off, which is a used bookstore, because Tsukie was looking for a book-I saw a case of the first season of ‘Bones’, CE, and almost bought it. AND saw ‘The Breakfast Club’ and almost bought THAT. Love to have those reminders.
Tired when I got home, but an ice cream waffle, some episodes of ‘Pure Love’, and laundry perked me up. Dinner was good, delicious as ALWAYS, but afterwards my brain just shut off (maybe I should sleep…?) and I got so frustrated when I couldn’t speak in Japanese and form the opinions I wanted so badly to vocalize in response to questions from Tsukie and Otoosan. But I got through I because Tsukie is so patient. Really. That quality is underappreciated. LISTENING.
I realize I write little about my host school experience and even less about my Japanese class and Earlham classes. Japanese is mostly review, but I need it. The Earlham classes require summaries and thoughts on the articles I read and I’m getting 4/4 points on all of them. I also did REALLY well on my Arabic script paper and my Arabic presentation. So my GPA is getting help (not that is was oh-my-gosh low, but it could have been much better).
More next week! Off to Tokyo to visit Yoko next weekend and see Hanako too! Love to you all!
Sunday, November 1, 2009
Kids, Kimonos, and Krispies
ctober 20, 2009-November 1, 2009
Hope everyone had a great Halloween! It was a thoroughly entertaining experience as Japan does not celebrate the holiday I’ll explain more a little later, for the sake of chronology.
Wednesday (10/21) was a visit to Hakubai Yochien (Hakubai kindergarten), which was BEAUTIFUL. Three, four, and five year old kind of beautiful. We came in and immediately spread out to different groups/classrooms/ages. There was also a camera crew there, taping our visit (it aired later that evening), and newspaper reporters who published a piece the next day. One class of kids had a carnival-like theme: pick up your wallet prior to entering (made of wrapping paper and streamer), pay about ¥100 (paper coins) to go in the haunted house (cardboard, construction paper, and tape), play a shooting game (shoot rubber bands attached to balled up tape from a large cardboard structure that resembled the Star Wars ‘Return of the Jedi’ I THINK big elephant-like machines at a cardboard/paper/tape “target board” with different areas meaning different points), and/or buy origami faces. All the girls in the class made the games because they weren’t getting along, so the teacher used the projects as a bonding activity.
Another class was creating a mural on the floor and selling ice cream (bits of construction paper in an ACTUAL plastic cup that used to hold pudding-LOVE the recycling!) and donuts (balled up paper and tape). They even put your purchase in a cute paper bag and taped it shut for you. Downstairs, the three year olds were playing outside in the sandbox or running around the playground equipment. Great energy. Great smiles. We all wanted to steal one and take one home. About half the students at Hakubai Yochien are only children, a growing trend in Japan. So part of the “education” they undergo is how to share-toys, turns on the slide, etc.
Then we were taken into a room where we had time scheduled with all students-we all sat in small chairs and faced all the students, who did various choreographed dances for us. Then we sang “Twinkle Twinkle Little Star” for them. We could have used an A… Then played “Don Jyan Ken” with the five year old class (whom we ate lunch with later). This game entails the two teams (us vs. them) standing at “x”s taped on the floor on opposite sides of the room. Then they run at each other and try to reach the other team’s “x” before meeting the other person and Jyan-Ken-Poning (rock-paper-scissoring). The winner (sometimes it had to be done more than once) would then progress further to the other team’s “x”. Took a while to get to the other team’s “x”/prevent them from getting to your “x”. They won three times, we won twice.
Lunch was adorable. The four and five year old “students” are served bento lunches (boxed lunches) created by a nutritionist (with the education system guidelines in mind) and made by a private company. We ate separately prepared bentos-pineapple slice, piece of salmon, rice, and two little salads. Three year olds (whom we saw after eating) have bentos made by their mothers (most likely). These mothers have SO MUCH time to devote to cubing apples and cutting carrots into shapes and skewering food on skewers with animals on them. AND the silverware and chopsticks set as well as the bento box as well as the handkerchief/bag that encloses the bento box are all decorated with some kind of cartoon/Disney character, though the three pieces don’t always match. The point is so that three year olds learn how much they can eat and have the chance to see what other students are bringing so that, if they want, they can ask their parents to bring such-and-such a food into the house for them to try (exchanging food at school is not allowed). When they reach four and five years of age and are eating the school lunch, they should be looking to other students who are maybe eating what they themselves don’t want to eat and then TRYING their food (“just try it”), thus expanding their palette. They do not have to finish all their food (unlike the students at Fuzoku Elementary School), but the wasted food is much less than what you would find in American schools of any kind.
Chat time with the principal (a member of Earlham Society; was at the party oh way back in September). Then off to Claire’s host family where we had KIMONO TIME with her host mother. Gosh. So fun. Abhi’s host mother and one of Claire’s host mother’s friends came to help. We females wore unmarried girls’ kimonos and some great pictures exist of us all standing outside in the sun.
Off to dinner at a local hotel, then to a kabuki (Japanese theater) “dance”. Well, the best part was the TAIKO DRUMMING that opened the show (and occurred throughout) done by some VERY strong men who had sleeveless “uniforms”. The main drummer had his back to us and decided to undo his top “shirt” so that his back was exposed. OH MY GOSH. I’m a sucker for backs and shoulders and arms and OH GOODNESS. It kept me awake, let’s say. (Not that it was boring at all. It was from 6:30-9:00pm and we were all pretty tired.)
The next day (Thursday, 10/22), we were off to another school visit: Higashi Matsuzono Elementary School. Arrived, ate lunch with individual classrooms (1 of us big kids with 1 classroom). I was with 4th year, 1st class. We had lunch (soup, sweet and sour chicken-like meat, salad), went outside (played freeze tag), I did a self-introduction, and we did origami in class. Paper airplanes! The whole idea of them being an instructed art form was AWESOME. We then left and went to Sensei’s apartment where we practiced Rice Krispy treat making for the coming Gandai festival (that weekend).
Friday (10/23) was workbook grading at Senboku. Tsukie left early that morning to go to Sendai for training in her, I think, summer job, as a park guide (she would return Saturday evening). I came home, took a nap, and then went to volleyball practice where it was a game! So much fun, as always, and there’s such an inborne order that things just FLOW. When I was waiting in the center to throw to the setter for a chance to practice hitting, I KNEW the line to hit from outside would go before me. That’s how it FELT.
Gandai Festival (Sat 10/24 and Sun 10/25), as a whole, was quite a haul. There from 8am on Saturday, making sure we knew where our tent was. But it was a little confusing as our location and materials were not blatantly labeled/stated. We were directed to the tent and set-up pipes pick-up area, but were not told that ryuugakusei (exchange student) tents #s1-8 were labeled with numbers so that all pieces could be conveniently picked up together. Guess we were supposed to know that. It is logical, which I respect.
Once we set-up, it was great fun yelling at passersby attempting to attract them to buy our ¥100 Rice Krispy treats. Red food coloring made them strawberry, blue made them blueberry. Our hours together in close quarters also gave us all a chance to learn more about each other, which is always fun in my opinion. Throughout the two days, we browsed other tents (other clubs/campus groups) for snacks and lunch-yakisoba, yakitori (skewered bits of chicken), aisu tempura (like deep-fried ice cream), crepes (France WAS right next to us ), takoyaki (octopus in balls of batter? I’m really not sure…), soba, gyoza… Saturday night, I helped Hanako with some English sentences via email since she was taking the TOEFL (Teaching of English as a Foreign Language) test the next day.
We made, the two days combined, ¥61700 total. Profit of about ¥43000. After clean-up on Sunday, (which was also confusing because no signs told us where specific parts of the tent went, BUT we followed the crowds of knowing Gandai-ites), we all went to Sensei’s apartment for our own uchiage (celebration party) of pizza. Then six of us headed back to Gandai, met up with some students, and headed to a previously planned uchiage planned by members of the planning committee of sorts. About 22 of us altogether, Japanese, American (and an Indian!), French, Italian, and Russian people chowing down and drinking.
With Monday (10/26), came more review in the Japanese class, but ALWAYS feels good to know an answer. (Hearing Pachelbel’s Canon on a TV ad during breakfast also perked me up, partly because it always reminds me of you, Mike.) In the textbook, we were doing giving/receiving and one example was from me to my roommate, a t-shirt with “London” written on it. Yup, that’s you, Liz, and you, CE. We had all planned to do spring registration that afternoon, but it wasn’t up yet SO what did we do? Yes, Facebook and email. We’re addicted.
Culture shock/“Homesickness”/Dissatisfaction came today with a vengeance (was bemoaning with Ethan) in the form of wanting familiarity, the freedom to watch movies on couches with friends, to stay out late and come home late, to HUG FRIENDS. MY GOD. But am still enjoying. Never question that.
Twas drying out from typhoon #2, which blew through Monday night. At school on Tuesday (10/27), the only thing to do was a take-home test for Literacy in Japanese (part of the reason why we were able to do Facebook and email on Monday-Sensei gave us the test and then set us free to register for spring classes, but we couldn’t). I was FREEZING at school because I thought, Hannah, don’t take another layer. You always take it and it’s just more weight/a burden. BUT Mom and Dad, let’s hear it: it’s better to have it and not need it then to need it and not have it. Precisely. So I felt a little sicky sicky after school: cold, achy, sniffly. Hoped it wasn’t the swine, so I took a little nap. HA. Can you EVER take a “little” nap? It’s a learned art, that’s for sure. Lied down at 4:45 and oh, two and a half hours later I woke up. Slept through the alarm I had set for 6pm. But man, was it GREAT.
We were at our host schools on Wednesday (10/28) until 3rd period, then we all met at Gandai and taxied to Shirayuri, a private, conservative, Catholic, all girls school (elementary, junior high, and high). It’s on a HILL no less. Observed second and third year English classes. Very advanced speaking abilities. There’s something to be said for the focus that comes with single sex education. One girl approached me and presented me with a letter and her email address and we have been emailing. She is BRILLIANT at English and plays the violin 3 hours a day. She actually, in another example of small worldliness, takes lessons from the same teacher as Yuki’s (our program coordinator) daughter.
We taxied back to Gandai and then some of us embarked on Halloween costume shopping at a store Tamara and I had found way back in September (then to various hyakuen/dollar stores, including Daiso). Didn’t quite know what I wanted to be yet (as is typical me), but conjured a general idea. At home, Tsukie had me CLEAN THE BATH!!!!!!! That was something I had thought before that maybe if I were asked to do it, it would symbolize closeness between me and my family. It felt good.
After class on Thursday (10/29), we all were invited to go to Sensei’s apartment to register for classes. Elizabeth and I stopped at a cool-looking dessert place on the way there (SO awesome to just walk down the street and stop-it frees you from the “woulda-coulda-shoulda” blues). After pseudo-registering (as I did not bring my Four Year Plan with me, along with pajamas), I lined up a few things (mostly Japanese classes, surprisingly) to maybe take next semester. And I emailed my advisor, so I’ll be all set soon. Went to ANOTHER Daiso on the way home and completed my costume. Yessssssss….
On Friday (10/30), I unveiled my “bad angel” costume to the students and staff of Senboku junior high school. It was a simple costume-black pants and black long sleeve top with small white wings and tinsel “halo” and black eyeliner-but it was new and different to the Japanese, so the school went wild. It was a great way to connect with students and staff alike and it helped lighten an already happy Friday.
Came home to Tea Time with Tsukie, which has probably been the most fun I’ve had this whole semester. If not THE most, then in the top three along with my failing to swallow sushi in Kyoto and looking at BEYOND ATTRACTIVE taiko drummers on stage. It was just us, sitting in the tatami room, with the kotatsu, a Japanese room heater covered with a quilt that you stick your feet under, a fashion shopping magazine, and sweets. Loads of new vocab. Great fun. Aunt Maya (piano extraordinaire), her husband, and Obaasan (grandmother) came over for dinner. Ko came back from a two day badminton game. What was interesting was the family members came over, bringing bentos and their dog and ate quickly with no real conversation (the television was on the whole time). Otoosan and Tsukie worked harder than usual, churning out three batches of gyoza while the guests and Ko sat and ate. I would be irate. It was so unequal. And no one acknowledged the inequality, which just made it more so.
Have come to realize, as we close in on the last few weeks, (back in Seattle December 6th), that it doesn’t matter if you’re prepared at the start of the school year or the start of the semester. It’s never about how many assignments you finish or your attendance record. It’s can you pull it out for the second half. Do you have the stamina? When the going gets tough, what do you do? I can do this.
Saturday, oh Saturday. HAPPY HALLOWEEN!!!!!!!!! Woke up naturally at 7:15am NOT hating the world. Otoosan filled my bike tires with air after breakfast (made a HUGE difference MY GOODNESS). Skyped with a friend-which brings me to another point. I took voice for granted before, along with so many other things, but sometimes voice is SO vital. It really does make your day. I mean, when you think about it, the tone of someone’s voice really makes or breaks a comment of theirs. It can lift you up or drop you down. I can’t wait to hear so many of your voices.
To Ueda Kominkan (where the Opening Ceremony is WAY BACK IN AUGUST) to help set-up for our Halloween party Table of candy, treat bags, glowsticks, and face paint. Two tables for food (twas a potluck)-one for real food, one for desserts. Pumpkin carving and drawing in one corner. Walls covered with “Happy Halloween!” banners and paper decals of black cats, witches, and skeletons. Ghosts, glow-in-the-dark spiders and bats and spiderwebs, and pumpkin streamers hung from the ceiling. Plastic spiders and bats as well as Disney Halloween toys covered the tables.
From 4:45-7:15pm, we ate and played games with host family members with great music playing in the background. A Halloween mix had been made, but it ended up being a lot of Michael Jackson. Pictionary/telephone was played (the first person is given a word and then draws, showing the next person, who must draw and show the next person, etc.). Pumpkins were carved. Doughnuts were dangled to blindfolded children who attempted to bite them. Abhi’s host brother kept taking my halo and running away with it.
After clean-up, which was a collective effort (WONDERFUL), seven of us headed to Wara-Wara for a nomikai (drinking party) with a friend from Gandai (who also happens to be the boyfriend of a SICE participant from last year) as well as two guys Mitchell and Ethan met at a music festival earlier in the semester. Lots of fun and good to be in a small group. They went to karaoke afterwards, but I headed home.
Sunday (11/1) was very similar to a typical college day-laundry and homework. However, did have some good conversation with Otoosan and Tsukie. Tsukie is going to visit Hanako the second weekend of November (and I want to go se Yoko again before I head back to the U.S.) and Hanako will be coming to visit the third weekend in November (she, Tsukie, and I will probably go to an onsen (hot springs)). Watched Japanese drama for new vocab, read some Japanese folktales for even MORE vocab. GREAT FUN. All in all, its going well. Learning a great deal just like I set out to do-about the culture, the language, and myself. This trip has fundamentally changed me. Hope you’re having the same experiences if those experiences are what you want. If not, then I hope each day is a gift.
Love love love, Hannah
Hope everyone had a great Halloween! It was a thoroughly entertaining experience as Japan does not celebrate the holiday I’ll explain more a little later, for the sake of chronology.
Wednesday (10/21) was a visit to Hakubai Yochien (Hakubai kindergarten), which was BEAUTIFUL. Three, four, and five year old kind of beautiful. We came in and immediately spread out to different groups/classrooms/ages. There was also a camera crew there, taping our visit (it aired later that evening), and newspaper reporters who published a piece the next day. One class of kids had a carnival-like theme: pick up your wallet prior to entering (made of wrapping paper and streamer), pay about ¥100 (paper coins) to go in the haunted house (cardboard, construction paper, and tape), play a shooting game (shoot rubber bands attached to balled up tape from a large cardboard structure that resembled the Star Wars ‘Return of the Jedi’ I THINK big elephant-like machines at a cardboard/paper/tape “target board” with different areas meaning different points), and/or buy origami faces. All the girls in the class made the games because they weren’t getting along, so the teacher used the projects as a bonding activity.
Another class was creating a mural on the floor and selling ice cream (bits of construction paper in an ACTUAL plastic cup that used to hold pudding-LOVE the recycling!) and donuts (balled up paper and tape). They even put your purchase in a cute paper bag and taped it shut for you. Downstairs, the three year olds were playing outside in the sandbox or running around the playground equipment. Great energy. Great smiles. We all wanted to steal one and take one home. About half the students at Hakubai Yochien are only children, a growing trend in Japan. So part of the “education” they undergo is how to share-toys, turns on the slide, etc.
Then we were taken into a room where we had time scheduled with all students-we all sat in small chairs and faced all the students, who did various choreographed dances for us. Then we sang “Twinkle Twinkle Little Star” for them. We could have used an A… Then played “Don Jyan Ken” with the five year old class (whom we ate lunch with later). This game entails the two teams (us vs. them) standing at “x”s taped on the floor on opposite sides of the room. Then they run at each other and try to reach the other team’s “x” before meeting the other person and Jyan-Ken-Poning (rock-paper-scissoring). The winner (sometimes it had to be done more than once) would then progress further to the other team’s “x”. Took a while to get to the other team’s “x”/prevent them from getting to your “x”. They won three times, we won twice.
Lunch was adorable. The four and five year old “students” are served bento lunches (boxed lunches) created by a nutritionist (with the education system guidelines in mind) and made by a private company. We ate separately prepared bentos-pineapple slice, piece of salmon, rice, and two little salads. Three year olds (whom we saw after eating) have bentos made by their mothers (most likely). These mothers have SO MUCH time to devote to cubing apples and cutting carrots into shapes and skewering food on skewers with animals on them. AND the silverware and chopsticks set as well as the bento box as well as the handkerchief/bag that encloses the bento box are all decorated with some kind of cartoon/Disney character, though the three pieces don’t always match. The point is so that three year olds learn how much they can eat and have the chance to see what other students are bringing so that, if they want, they can ask their parents to bring such-and-such a food into the house for them to try (exchanging food at school is not allowed). When they reach four and five years of age and are eating the school lunch, they should be looking to other students who are maybe eating what they themselves don’t want to eat and then TRYING their food (“just try it”), thus expanding their palette. They do not have to finish all their food (unlike the students at Fuzoku Elementary School), but the wasted food is much less than what you would find in American schools of any kind.
Chat time with the principal (a member of Earlham Society; was at the party oh way back in September). Then off to Claire’s host family where we had KIMONO TIME with her host mother. Gosh. So fun. Abhi’s host mother and one of Claire’s host mother’s friends came to help. We females wore unmarried girls’ kimonos and some great pictures exist of us all standing outside in the sun.
Off to dinner at a local hotel, then to a kabuki (Japanese theater) “dance”. Well, the best part was the TAIKO DRUMMING that opened the show (and occurred throughout) done by some VERY strong men who had sleeveless “uniforms”. The main drummer had his back to us and decided to undo his top “shirt” so that his back was exposed. OH MY GOSH. I’m a sucker for backs and shoulders and arms and OH GOODNESS. It kept me awake, let’s say. (Not that it was boring at all. It was from 6:30-9:00pm and we were all pretty tired.)
The next day (Thursday, 10/22), we were off to another school visit: Higashi Matsuzono Elementary School. Arrived, ate lunch with individual classrooms (1 of us big kids with 1 classroom). I was with 4th year, 1st class. We had lunch (soup, sweet and sour chicken-like meat, salad), went outside (played freeze tag), I did a self-introduction, and we did origami in class. Paper airplanes! The whole idea of them being an instructed art form was AWESOME. We then left and went to Sensei’s apartment where we practiced Rice Krispy treat making for the coming Gandai festival (that weekend).
Friday (10/23) was workbook grading at Senboku. Tsukie left early that morning to go to Sendai for training in her, I think, summer job, as a park guide (she would return Saturday evening). I came home, took a nap, and then went to volleyball practice where it was a game! So much fun, as always, and there’s such an inborne order that things just FLOW. When I was waiting in the center to throw to the setter for a chance to practice hitting, I KNEW the line to hit from outside would go before me. That’s how it FELT.
Gandai Festival (Sat 10/24 and Sun 10/25), as a whole, was quite a haul. There from 8am on Saturday, making sure we knew where our tent was. But it was a little confusing as our location and materials were not blatantly labeled/stated. We were directed to the tent and set-up pipes pick-up area, but were not told that ryuugakusei (exchange student) tents #s1-8 were labeled with numbers so that all pieces could be conveniently picked up together. Guess we were supposed to know that. It is logical, which I respect.
Once we set-up, it was great fun yelling at passersby attempting to attract them to buy our ¥100 Rice Krispy treats. Red food coloring made them strawberry, blue made them blueberry. Our hours together in close quarters also gave us all a chance to learn more about each other, which is always fun in my opinion. Throughout the two days, we browsed other tents (other clubs/campus groups) for snacks and lunch-yakisoba, yakitori (skewered bits of chicken), aisu tempura (like deep-fried ice cream), crepes (France WAS right next to us ), takoyaki (octopus in balls of batter? I’m really not sure…), soba, gyoza… Saturday night, I helped Hanako with some English sentences via email since she was taking the TOEFL (Teaching of English as a Foreign Language) test the next day.
We made, the two days combined, ¥61700 total. Profit of about ¥43000. After clean-up on Sunday, (which was also confusing because no signs told us where specific parts of the tent went, BUT we followed the crowds of knowing Gandai-ites), we all went to Sensei’s apartment for our own uchiage (celebration party) of pizza. Then six of us headed back to Gandai, met up with some students, and headed to a previously planned uchiage planned by members of the planning committee of sorts. About 22 of us altogether, Japanese, American (and an Indian!), French, Italian, and Russian people chowing down and drinking.
With Monday (10/26), came more review in the Japanese class, but ALWAYS feels good to know an answer. (Hearing Pachelbel’s Canon on a TV ad during breakfast also perked me up, partly because it always reminds me of you, Mike.) In the textbook, we were doing giving/receiving and one example was from me to my roommate, a t-shirt with “London” written on it. Yup, that’s you, Liz, and you, CE. We had all planned to do spring registration that afternoon, but it wasn’t up yet SO what did we do? Yes, Facebook and email. We’re addicted.
Culture shock/“Homesickness”/Dissatisfaction came today with a vengeance (was bemoaning with Ethan) in the form of wanting familiarity, the freedom to watch movies on couches with friends, to stay out late and come home late, to HUG FRIENDS. MY GOD. But am still enjoying. Never question that.
Twas drying out from typhoon #2, which blew through Monday night. At school on Tuesday (10/27), the only thing to do was a take-home test for Literacy in Japanese (part of the reason why we were able to do Facebook and email on Monday-Sensei gave us the test and then set us free to register for spring classes, but we couldn’t). I was FREEZING at school because I thought, Hannah, don’t take another layer. You always take it and it’s just more weight/a burden. BUT Mom and Dad, let’s hear it: it’s better to have it and not need it then to need it and not have it. Precisely. So I felt a little sicky sicky after school: cold, achy, sniffly. Hoped it wasn’t the swine, so I took a little nap. HA. Can you EVER take a “little” nap? It’s a learned art, that’s for sure. Lied down at 4:45 and oh, two and a half hours later I woke up. Slept through the alarm I had set for 6pm. But man, was it GREAT.
We were at our host schools on Wednesday (10/28) until 3rd period, then we all met at Gandai and taxied to Shirayuri, a private, conservative, Catholic, all girls school (elementary, junior high, and high). It’s on a HILL no less. Observed second and third year English classes. Very advanced speaking abilities. There’s something to be said for the focus that comes with single sex education. One girl approached me and presented me with a letter and her email address and we have been emailing. She is BRILLIANT at English and plays the violin 3 hours a day. She actually, in another example of small worldliness, takes lessons from the same teacher as Yuki’s (our program coordinator) daughter.
We taxied back to Gandai and then some of us embarked on Halloween costume shopping at a store Tamara and I had found way back in September (then to various hyakuen/dollar stores, including Daiso). Didn’t quite know what I wanted to be yet (as is typical me), but conjured a general idea. At home, Tsukie had me CLEAN THE BATH!!!!!!! That was something I had thought before that maybe if I were asked to do it, it would symbolize closeness between me and my family. It felt good.
After class on Thursday (10/29), we all were invited to go to Sensei’s apartment to register for classes. Elizabeth and I stopped at a cool-looking dessert place on the way there (SO awesome to just walk down the street and stop-it frees you from the “woulda-coulda-shoulda” blues). After pseudo-registering (as I did not bring my Four Year Plan with me, along with pajamas), I lined up a few things (mostly Japanese classes, surprisingly) to maybe take next semester. And I emailed my advisor, so I’ll be all set soon. Went to ANOTHER Daiso on the way home and completed my costume. Yessssssss….
On Friday (10/30), I unveiled my “bad angel” costume to the students and staff of Senboku junior high school. It was a simple costume-black pants and black long sleeve top with small white wings and tinsel “halo” and black eyeliner-but it was new and different to the Japanese, so the school went wild. It was a great way to connect with students and staff alike and it helped lighten an already happy Friday.
Came home to Tea Time with Tsukie, which has probably been the most fun I’ve had this whole semester. If not THE most, then in the top three along with my failing to swallow sushi in Kyoto and looking at BEYOND ATTRACTIVE taiko drummers on stage. It was just us, sitting in the tatami room, with the kotatsu, a Japanese room heater covered with a quilt that you stick your feet under, a fashion shopping magazine, and sweets. Loads of new vocab. Great fun. Aunt Maya (piano extraordinaire), her husband, and Obaasan (grandmother) came over for dinner. Ko came back from a two day badminton game. What was interesting was the family members came over, bringing bentos and their dog and ate quickly with no real conversation (the television was on the whole time). Otoosan and Tsukie worked harder than usual, churning out three batches of gyoza while the guests and Ko sat and ate. I would be irate. It was so unequal. And no one acknowledged the inequality, which just made it more so.
Have come to realize, as we close in on the last few weeks, (back in Seattle December 6th), that it doesn’t matter if you’re prepared at the start of the school year or the start of the semester. It’s never about how many assignments you finish or your attendance record. It’s can you pull it out for the second half. Do you have the stamina? When the going gets tough, what do you do? I can do this.
Saturday, oh Saturday. HAPPY HALLOWEEN!!!!!!!!! Woke up naturally at 7:15am NOT hating the world. Otoosan filled my bike tires with air after breakfast (made a HUGE difference MY GOODNESS). Skyped with a friend-which brings me to another point. I took voice for granted before, along with so many other things, but sometimes voice is SO vital. It really does make your day. I mean, when you think about it, the tone of someone’s voice really makes or breaks a comment of theirs. It can lift you up or drop you down. I can’t wait to hear so many of your voices.
To Ueda Kominkan (where the Opening Ceremony is WAY BACK IN AUGUST) to help set-up for our Halloween party Table of candy, treat bags, glowsticks, and face paint. Two tables for food (twas a potluck)-one for real food, one for desserts. Pumpkin carving and drawing in one corner. Walls covered with “Happy Halloween!” banners and paper decals of black cats, witches, and skeletons. Ghosts, glow-in-the-dark spiders and bats and spiderwebs, and pumpkin streamers hung from the ceiling. Plastic spiders and bats as well as Disney Halloween toys covered the tables.
From 4:45-7:15pm, we ate and played games with host family members with great music playing in the background. A Halloween mix had been made, but it ended up being a lot of Michael Jackson. Pictionary/telephone was played (the first person is given a word and then draws, showing the next person, who must draw and show the next person, etc.). Pumpkins were carved. Doughnuts were dangled to blindfolded children who attempted to bite them. Abhi’s host brother kept taking my halo and running away with it.
After clean-up, which was a collective effort (WONDERFUL), seven of us headed to Wara-Wara for a nomikai (drinking party) with a friend from Gandai (who also happens to be the boyfriend of a SICE participant from last year) as well as two guys Mitchell and Ethan met at a music festival earlier in the semester. Lots of fun and good to be in a small group. They went to karaoke afterwards, but I headed home.
Sunday (11/1) was very similar to a typical college day-laundry and homework. However, did have some good conversation with Otoosan and Tsukie. Tsukie is going to visit Hanako the second weekend of November (and I want to go se Yoko again before I head back to the U.S.) and Hanako will be coming to visit the third weekend in November (she, Tsukie, and I will probably go to an onsen (hot springs)). Watched Japanese drama for new vocab, read some Japanese folktales for even MORE vocab. GREAT FUN. All in all, its going well. Learning a great deal just like I set out to do-about the culture, the language, and myself. This trip has fundamentally changed me. Hope you’re having the same experiences if those experiences are what you want. If not, then I hope each day is a gift.
Love love love, Hannah
Wednesday, October 21, 2009
Hot springs, instruments, and friendship
October 6, 2009-October 19.2009
Well, boys and girls, it’s been a LITTLE too long since I last wrote. And well, there was this report and presentation on a non-Roman script (mine was Arabic) and lack of Internet and etc. etc. BUT I’M BACK! And in line with on reader’s suggestion, I shall NOT force you to sit through “and then we stood here for 20 minutes and then we rode the bus and then we ate this and then we waited”. Or at least I will try to eliminate such language.
The second host family meeting took place (no big problems exist) and afterwards, my host mother returned with ways to improve my Japanese-wants me to spend time watching Japanese TV and this drama, “Pure Love”, from which I gain TREMENDOUS new vocabulary and Tsukie kindly corrects my pronunciation and spelling. She also has me read along in a children’s folktale book while listening to the reading of it on a CD. More vocab and practice reading out loud.
At Senboku, as I may have mentioned before, I am completing my field study for the Human Development and Social Relations major (psychology and sociology). Its coming along great, as it is ALWAYS easy for me to be detailed and verbose (as is evident in this here blog) I almost have two notebooks full. WOW.
We had an Encouragement Party (6:30-8pm) held by the Morioka Board of Education on Wednesday, 10/7, with the current Assistant Language Teachers (ALTs; all Earlham ’08 and ’09 grads if I hadn’t already mentioned that) joining us. Great spread of food platters-sashimi and sushi roll, kara’age (fried food), pork with sauce, potato and mame (soybeans), sandwiches, chips, popcorn, and many soft drinks. Chocolate cookies for dessert. We did self introductions and heard the B of E introduce themselves (~10 people). Played elementary school-level games after. Cleaning up meant we could take leftover food, so I ended up with two HUGE bottles of ocha (tea) and orange soda.
Thursday, 10/8, was Typhoon Day, as in a typhoon came through. Tsukie would not let me or Ko ride to school, so she drove us. It was our first day of Japanese classes with other Gandai exchange students, so Elementary Japanese II was the four of us SICEers and Dian, from Indonesia, Jadan, from Bangladesh, and Kotan and Nin, from China. The next week, Suripon, from Thailand, would join us. The Intermediate class has ~20 people. With everyone back at school, the cafeteria was crowded, something we have grown to dislike since we all like sitting together and talking about our day thus far (and perhaps dreading Sensei’s class if the homework has not been finished ). After class was the Welcome Party-self introductions to the 40some Japanese students and English majors. Games (Pictionary and the human knot), talking for nearly half an hour, exchanging of phone numbers and emails. One girl, Masumi , likes Angelina Jolie, so we want to watch “Mr. and Mrs. Smith” at some point. Met Bethany, from North Central College outside of Chicago, who is there for the whole year.
On Friday (10/9), Ko made varsity badminton!!!! Previously he had been playing doubles, but he beat a number of other boys and is now in the elite seven (I think that’s how many)-cool warm-up suit and all.
Saturday (10/10) was the PTA bazaar at Senboku (all parents serve on the PTA). Bazaars are very popular and, like most others, many different foods were for sale (bought delicious soba). Was able to talk with my English teacher, Osawa Sensei, for a great deal of time as well as four first year girls and didn’t actually make it in to see the bazaar . The students had school that day until around noon. Helped clean up afterwards. Then, I met Keira (from the nomikai with Dan, a previous SICEer and current ALT) for “coffee” –heard a great deal about her life in Scotland and London. Back home, could joke around in Japanese. *sigh* WONDERFUL.
The family went to an onsen (hot springs) on Sunday (10/11) and this is an exceptional experience. We left around 3:45pm to pick Ko up at badminton practice and then drove about an hour out into the mountains. The site is old, but the building was relatively new. You enter, take off your shoes, then pay the entrance fee (¥500 for adults, ¥300 foe elementary students). Then you can buy some snacks (we brought our own) and sit on cushions at low tables in an open room, lit by natural light during the day, and rest before going in to bathe. We snacked on some chocolate and drank tea from the counter and I looked at the people sleeping on the floor. Relaxing.
In knowing very little about Japanese baths and being oh so very naïve in general (I hope…), I thought “Oh maybe this is a place where you keep a towel around you.” Ummmm no Hannah, sorry to burst your bubble. Tsukie and I visited the bathroom, then entered the female bath changing area, where valuables can be put in locked lockers (and the key is on a bracelet you wear while you bathe) and your clothes go n wicker baskets on shelves. The best thing though was that it was so comfortable of an atmosphere. Every body type was present, though most prevalent were mothers in their late 20s or early 30s with children (after about age 8, male children go to the male bath) and older women.
We entered the bath area through a sliding door. Along the wall to the right were seven seats with manual shower heads and spigots, both operated by a push button which ran for eight to ten seconds. Buckets and cups were everywhere in order to throw water on one’s back or over one’s head. To the left along the far wall were another six seats, shower heads, and spigots. Baths in homes have the same things-a plastic seat with a shallow bucket to make sure backs get washed. Above each spigot was a wall-mounted mirror and a ledge on which people put baskets containing their bathing things, like washcloths, loofahs, soap, shampoo, and rinse. ALSO on the shelf were bottles of soap, shampoo, and rinse/treatment akin to Mane and Tail hair care products. The next day, my hair was SO soft. I wanted to go back JUST to get me some of that sweetness.
Two baths existed-the main, larger indoor bath, and a smaller one outside in the chilly air. Such a good, calming experience. Nearly all of the women had towels they used to sweep their hair back or wore over their head as if to cool them OR keep the heat in (though I don’t know how or why). Tsukie and I both washed our hair (I at first didn’t want to because of all the hair that comes out when I wash-didn’t feel like being the gaijin who comes in and whose hair clogs up the drain or some tragedy like that. But we dried ourselves and met Ko and Otoosan back in the relax room, sitting a little while before heading out. Ko, the active adolescent male that he was, was a bit hungry so Otoosan bought him an ice cream. I said I was oaky, but he bought me one too. We had an impromptu English lesson talking about Seattle and snow. It felt good to help Ko and all talk in two languages.
Ate dinner at Bikkuri Donkey (bikkuri means “surprise”), a hambagu place near Aeon Mall, about 20 minutes from home. Busy busy, so looked around at the “gift shop” of sorts, containing keitai charms with Hello Kitty and Bikkuri Donkey, little keychains, chopsticks, pins, etc. We waited about 20 minutes for a table, then fries came as an appetizer. Ending up having a regular: hambagu, rice, vegetables. Then we ate an ice cream dessert dusted with macha powder and containing mochi balls and a senbei cracker (usually accompany tea). Before and during dinner, songs from “Moulin Rouge” played, as did “Take On Me”, “Stop in the Name of Love”, “Like a Virgin”, “I Want to Hold Your Hand”, and “Hotel California”. Ah memories.
Monday (10/12) was a break day (oyasumi) and Otoosan took me to a calligraphy showing in a local furniture store (where all pieces are made from a single piece of wood). A former colleague of his had some of is “art” in the gallery (to the rear of the store). Had gyuudon for lunch at home and then headed to a koto (an old Chinese instrument with many strings and bridges like that of a violin; it’s the size of a keyboard, but much wider) concert of nikoo (Morioka’s #2 high school) students (at a hall, much like any concert hall in the United States). Nicole, Elizabeth, Elizabeth’s host mother, Tamara, Mitchell, Ethan, and I enjoyed nearly two hours of beautiful music-according to Otoosan, the best koto high school program in Japan.
A buzzing announced the start of the concert (at 2pm), then another buzzing at 5 minutes past 2pm. Before every musical selection/”act”, two girls who were part of the following piece came into the spotlight in front of the curtain (which was a tapestry of Mt. Iwate), bowed (we clapped), then explained the following performance. First one would speak and tell half the explanation or one part of the explanation, then the other would finish. Then they would bow, we clapped, and they went behind the curtain, extinguishing the spotlight. The curtain would then lift to reveal anywhere from 7-40 girls seated (kneeling), facing the audience. They bowed in unison, we clapped, then they rose slowly and shifted their seated position to play, taking their cue from an individual or two near the center front.
No sheet music was present. Usually the performers were broken into three groups, playing different parts at different times. At the end of the song, they would turn back to facing the audience, bow, we would clap, and then they would rise, no one moving as the curtain lowered. In some pieces, the coach for that specific piece would be called to the stage by one of the girls and they would explain their method/discuss the meaning of the piece/commend the girls on a job well done. At the end of the last piece played (there were six total with a 15 break halfway through), some girls were crying. It was emotional to watch the result of hard work, to see the energy and time be made a reality. On our way out, female teachers/PTA members/mothers stood on one side of the flight of stairs, while the girls lined the other side, a way of saying thank you to us for listening.
On Tuesday, 10/13, I had another holiday due to the PTA bazaar on Saturday, so I went to Gandai and did Internet research on Arabic for Monday’s Non-Roman script paper and presentation. Did much work on Facebook and in email, which felt good. But also did some great research, ending up with around 25 pages of information (in addition to the 15 I had from an earlier Internet search)-too much for a 5-8 page paper. BUT I am getting much better at paring things down, I have noticed.
On Wednesday (10/14), we visited Fuzoku Elementary School. When we arrived, 6th graders were doing a hands on activity on the “playground”-building an open fire in order to make pottery the way Japanese people did AGES ago. We observed an English lesson (for 4th graders) in which students danced to English songs (“Five Little Monkeys”; “Yes We Can”, by Will.i.am, about Obama) and acted like animals in line with an Eric Carle book. We observed two Japanese classes (one 4th grade and one 3rd/4th grade split) and ate lunch with a 4th grade class. A new program has been implemented in elementary schools where no food is wasted and children must eat all foods on their plate. I thought it was delicious, but I am seven at heart -breaded meat put on bun, soup, kiwi, salad with apples and celery.
Prior to the visit, Yuki selected me to assist a fifth year English teacher as an ALT for a lesson. It was WONDERFUL. We met prior to the class so we could talk over how the lesson would go. Talked about where different international foods are from. Due to the short attention spans of children, teachers were very energetic and active, always asking the children their point of view, engaging them in the lesson very well.
The school is owned and operated by Iwate University, not the Morioka Board of Education, and is very much an experimental study in teaching. English is taught to the children all six years of their elementary school education and Fuzoku is very much an active model of how English can/should be taught. The Japanese education system is always thinking 10 years ahead, so Fuzoku attempts to always make the school better and contribute positively to the question of how Japanese students can be taught best. Teachers are trained, educational research is done, and the school contributes to the regional. Fuzoku teachers lecture at Iwate University and other elementary schools. Teachers from other schools visit Fuzoku classes.
Afterwards, we all went to McDonald’s to celebrate Elizabeth’s birthday (Was the day before, 10/13).
Thursday’s (10/14) Japanese class was very much review, as many have been and seem to continue to be, but I think it is good to continually lay a good, strong foundation. Ethan, Abhi, Tamara, Nicole, and I, the Gandai Festival crew (for the festival 10/24-10/25) attended a meeting of all involved groups. Corrected some 2nd year sentences (“I hope…”, “I know…”) Osawa Sensei had them write to me on Saturday (10/10) to me; when I read “I know Hannah is easy” and “I know Hannah’s golden hair is beautiful,” I loved the kids even more than I already did. Oh English…
Friday (10/16) at Senboku was BUSY. Some third year girls invited me to do origami with them after lunch-wow. Now I have iketori on my desk. (Ikebana is “flower arranging”, but I have an origami box filled with origami cranes (“tori” means bird), so I called it “iketori”.) Elizabeth and I did some more bicycle riding practice (she’s getting great!). I ran and then met Abhi, Nicole, Mitchell, and Tamara for dinner at a Thai restaurant ~10 minutes from my house. Suripon, in our Japanese class, recommended the place and it was AMAZING!
Friday night and Saturday night were great because I didn’t go to bed too late and thus was able to wake up at 8am the next days. On Saturday (10/19), Elizabeth and I explored the Morioka Train Station-the department store within it, had a Baskin & Robbins Halloween sundae, and went to Aiina for her to do research and me to pare down my Arabic research. We talked a lot about how surreal it will be to return, to talk to next year’s SICE students…
That day was also the Aiina Friendship Fest with the theme “the world is friends” and Otoosan and I had planned to meet around 1:30pm. Prior to us meeting (Otoosan became delayed, so he didn’t arrive until ~3pm), an older man (probably in his sixties) approached me while I watched a Philippine dance and then a Nepalese flute/drum/guitar group on one of the stages. He (Yamazaki san) knew of Earlham and had visited the United States many times due to his involvement with a Christian church in Morioka. He was with Amnesty International and later on, Otoosan and I visited the photography exhibit he was with. Unicef, Free Trade, and Amnesty International were prevalent at the festival. Also, Japan makes little things seem important where, in America, one may encounter an “Oh, it’s not enough! What are we going to do?!” or dissatisfied patrons who think something was not done well enough. The Japanese just do things WELL. When they do them, they do not do them halfway.
Met a number of people Otoosan knows through his current work or previous engagements, such as Miya Sensei, the general manager of the 5th floor plaza (where we had first met Sugiwara Sensei OH SO LONG AGO), and a couple who, I think, hosted a SICE student some 20 years ago AND the boss of the 5th floor plaza. Otoosan is very popular. While looking at a series of tables, we met the man Osawa Sensei went to Victoria with last year (as its sister city, Morioka sends students regularly), who also happens to be the director of the Gender Equality and International Relations Division of the Morioka Board of Education. Hmmmm. Otoosan had primarily come to see a concert of the same three individuals playing Nepalese music on flute/drum/guitar I had seen earlier-good group with good music; currently helping a Nepalese elementary school (a “charity concert”). Bussed home since Otoosan had ridden his bike and I had bussed with Elizabeth that morning.
Saturday evening and Sunday (10/18) all day (save for Skype time with my mother), was me working on the Arabic report. And it turned out well. I got the 40some pages I had collected down to nine. WOOHOO. And I thoroughly enjoyed making the Power Point, creating a somewhat silly presentation, but I got my point across. Had another Gandai festival meeting tonight (Monday, 10/19) and afterwards, craved daifuku (mochi balls with ice cream in the middle; two-bite size). SO adventure ensued. Ethan, Tamara, and I found a konbini close by that had a package of two large ones, so Ethan and split that. Then, I succumbed to the box of 21 mini daifuku in vanilla, macha (green tea) and azuki (red bean paste). OH BABY. They were individually packaged and everything. I’ve decided that’s what I just might miss the most.
Hope Early Semester Break went well for all you Earlhamites and I hope winter hasn’t come QUITE yet to the Midwest or to Seatown OR to wherever you are.
Love from the Orient,
Hannah (if you need anything: bananasmile@softbank.ne.jp)
Well, boys and girls, it’s been a LITTLE too long since I last wrote. And well, there was this report and presentation on a non-Roman script (mine was Arabic) and lack of Internet and etc. etc. BUT I’M BACK! And in line with on reader’s suggestion, I shall NOT force you to sit through “and then we stood here for 20 minutes and then we rode the bus and then we ate this and then we waited”. Or at least I will try to eliminate such language.
The second host family meeting took place (no big problems exist) and afterwards, my host mother returned with ways to improve my Japanese-wants me to spend time watching Japanese TV and this drama, “Pure Love”, from which I gain TREMENDOUS new vocabulary and Tsukie kindly corrects my pronunciation and spelling. She also has me read along in a children’s folktale book while listening to the reading of it on a CD. More vocab and practice reading out loud.
At Senboku, as I may have mentioned before, I am completing my field study for the Human Development and Social Relations major (psychology and sociology). Its coming along great, as it is ALWAYS easy for me to be detailed and verbose (as is evident in this here blog) I almost have two notebooks full. WOW.
We had an Encouragement Party (6:30-8pm) held by the Morioka Board of Education on Wednesday, 10/7, with the current Assistant Language Teachers (ALTs; all Earlham ’08 and ’09 grads if I hadn’t already mentioned that) joining us. Great spread of food platters-sashimi and sushi roll, kara’age (fried food), pork with sauce, potato and mame (soybeans), sandwiches, chips, popcorn, and many soft drinks. Chocolate cookies for dessert. We did self introductions and heard the B of E introduce themselves (~10 people). Played elementary school-level games after. Cleaning up meant we could take leftover food, so I ended up with two HUGE bottles of ocha (tea) and orange soda.
Thursday, 10/8, was Typhoon Day, as in a typhoon came through. Tsukie would not let me or Ko ride to school, so she drove us. It was our first day of Japanese classes with other Gandai exchange students, so Elementary Japanese II was the four of us SICEers and Dian, from Indonesia, Jadan, from Bangladesh, and Kotan and Nin, from China. The next week, Suripon, from Thailand, would join us. The Intermediate class has ~20 people. With everyone back at school, the cafeteria was crowded, something we have grown to dislike since we all like sitting together and talking about our day thus far (and perhaps dreading Sensei’s class if the homework has not been finished ). After class was the Welcome Party-self introductions to the 40some Japanese students and English majors. Games (Pictionary and the human knot), talking for nearly half an hour, exchanging of phone numbers and emails. One girl, Masumi , likes Angelina Jolie, so we want to watch “Mr. and Mrs. Smith” at some point. Met Bethany, from North Central College outside of Chicago, who is there for the whole year.
On Friday (10/9), Ko made varsity badminton!!!! Previously he had been playing doubles, but he beat a number of other boys and is now in the elite seven (I think that’s how many)-cool warm-up suit and all.
Saturday (10/10) was the PTA bazaar at Senboku (all parents serve on the PTA). Bazaars are very popular and, like most others, many different foods were for sale (bought delicious soba). Was able to talk with my English teacher, Osawa Sensei, for a great deal of time as well as four first year girls and didn’t actually make it in to see the bazaar . The students had school that day until around noon. Helped clean up afterwards. Then, I met Keira (from the nomikai with Dan, a previous SICEer and current ALT) for “coffee” –heard a great deal about her life in Scotland and London. Back home, could joke around in Japanese. *sigh* WONDERFUL.
The family went to an onsen (hot springs) on Sunday (10/11) and this is an exceptional experience. We left around 3:45pm to pick Ko up at badminton practice and then drove about an hour out into the mountains. The site is old, but the building was relatively new. You enter, take off your shoes, then pay the entrance fee (¥500 for adults, ¥300 foe elementary students). Then you can buy some snacks (we brought our own) and sit on cushions at low tables in an open room, lit by natural light during the day, and rest before going in to bathe. We snacked on some chocolate and drank tea from the counter and I looked at the people sleeping on the floor. Relaxing.
In knowing very little about Japanese baths and being oh so very naïve in general (I hope…), I thought “Oh maybe this is a place where you keep a towel around you.” Ummmm no Hannah, sorry to burst your bubble. Tsukie and I visited the bathroom, then entered the female bath changing area, where valuables can be put in locked lockers (and the key is on a bracelet you wear while you bathe) and your clothes go n wicker baskets on shelves. The best thing though was that it was so comfortable of an atmosphere. Every body type was present, though most prevalent were mothers in their late 20s or early 30s with children (after about age 8, male children go to the male bath) and older women.
We entered the bath area through a sliding door. Along the wall to the right were seven seats with manual shower heads and spigots, both operated by a push button which ran for eight to ten seconds. Buckets and cups were everywhere in order to throw water on one’s back or over one’s head. To the left along the far wall were another six seats, shower heads, and spigots. Baths in homes have the same things-a plastic seat with a shallow bucket to make sure backs get washed. Above each spigot was a wall-mounted mirror and a ledge on which people put baskets containing their bathing things, like washcloths, loofahs, soap, shampoo, and rinse. ALSO on the shelf were bottles of soap, shampoo, and rinse/treatment akin to Mane and Tail hair care products. The next day, my hair was SO soft. I wanted to go back JUST to get me some of that sweetness.
Two baths existed-the main, larger indoor bath, and a smaller one outside in the chilly air. Such a good, calming experience. Nearly all of the women had towels they used to sweep their hair back or wore over their head as if to cool them OR keep the heat in (though I don’t know how or why). Tsukie and I both washed our hair (I at first didn’t want to because of all the hair that comes out when I wash-didn’t feel like being the gaijin who comes in and whose hair clogs up the drain or some tragedy like that. But we dried ourselves and met Ko and Otoosan back in the relax room, sitting a little while before heading out. Ko, the active adolescent male that he was, was a bit hungry so Otoosan bought him an ice cream. I said I was oaky, but he bought me one too. We had an impromptu English lesson talking about Seattle and snow. It felt good to help Ko and all talk in two languages.
Ate dinner at Bikkuri Donkey (bikkuri means “surprise”), a hambagu place near Aeon Mall, about 20 minutes from home. Busy busy, so looked around at the “gift shop” of sorts, containing keitai charms with Hello Kitty and Bikkuri Donkey, little keychains, chopsticks, pins, etc. We waited about 20 minutes for a table, then fries came as an appetizer. Ending up having a regular: hambagu, rice, vegetables. Then we ate an ice cream dessert dusted with macha powder and containing mochi balls and a senbei cracker (usually accompany tea). Before and during dinner, songs from “Moulin Rouge” played, as did “Take On Me”, “Stop in the Name of Love”, “Like a Virgin”, “I Want to Hold Your Hand”, and “Hotel California”. Ah memories.
Monday (10/12) was a break day (oyasumi) and Otoosan took me to a calligraphy showing in a local furniture store (where all pieces are made from a single piece of wood). A former colleague of his had some of is “art” in the gallery (to the rear of the store). Had gyuudon for lunch at home and then headed to a koto (an old Chinese instrument with many strings and bridges like that of a violin; it’s the size of a keyboard, but much wider) concert of nikoo (Morioka’s #2 high school) students (at a hall, much like any concert hall in the United States). Nicole, Elizabeth, Elizabeth’s host mother, Tamara, Mitchell, Ethan, and I enjoyed nearly two hours of beautiful music-according to Otoosan, the best koto high school program in Japan.
A buzzing announced the start of the concert (at 2pm), then another buzzing at 5 minutes past 2pm. Before every musical selection/”act”, two girls who were part of the following piece came into the spotlight in front of the curtain (which was a tapestry of Mt. Iwate), bowed (we clapped), then explained the following performance. First one would speak and tell half the explanation or one part of the explanation, then the other would finish. Then they would bow, we clapped, and they went behind the curtain, extinguishing the spotlight. The curtain would then lift to reveal anywhere from 7-40 girls seated (kneeling), facing the audience. They bowed in unison, we clapped, then they rose slowly and shifted their seated position to play, taking their cue from an individual or two near the center front.
No sheet music was present. Usually the performers were broken into three groups, playing different parts at different times. At the end of the song, they would turn back to facing the audience, bow, we would clap, and then they would rise, no one moving as the curtain lowered. In some pieces, the coach for that specific piece would be called to the stage by one of the girls and they would explain their method/discuss the meaning of the piece/commend the girls on a job well done. At the end of the last piece played (there were six total with a 15 break halfway through), some girls were crying. It was emotional to watch the result of hard work, to see the energy and time be made a reality. On our way out, female teachers/PTA members/mothers stood on one side of the flight of stairs, while the girls lined the other side, a way of saying thank you to us for listening.
On Tuesday, 10/13, I had another holiday due to the PTA bazaar on Saturday, so I went to Gandai and did Internet research on Arabic for Monday’s Non-Roman script paper and presentation. Did much work on Facebook and in email, which felt good. But also did some great research, ending up with around 25 pages of information (in addition to the 15 I had from an earlier Internet search)-too much for a 5-8 page paper. BUT I am getting much better at paring things down, I have noticed.
On Wednesday (10/14), we visited Fuzoku Elementary School. When we arrived, 6th graders were doing a hands on activity on the “playground”-building an open fire in order to make pottery the way Japanese people did AGES ago. We observed an English lesson (for 4th graders) in which students danced to English songs (“Five Little Monkeys”; “Yes We Can”, by Will.i.am, about Obama) and acted like animals in line with an Eric Carle book. We observed two Japanese classes (one 4th grade and one 3rd/4th grade split) and ate lunch with a 4th grade class. A new program has been implemented in elementary schools where no food is wasted and children must eat all foods on their plate. I thought it was delicious, but I am seven at heart -breaded meat put on bun, soup, kiwi, salad with apples and celery.
Prior to the visit, Yuki selected me to assist a fifth year English teacher as an ALT for a lesson. It was WONDERFUL. We met prior to the class so we could talk over how the lesson would go. Talked about where different international foods are from. Due to the short attention spans of children, teachers were very energetic and active, always asking the children their point of view, engaging them in the lesson very well.
The school is owned and operated by Iwate University, not the Morioka Board of Education, and is very much an experimental study in teaching. English is taught to the children all six years of their elementary school education and Fuzoku is very much an active model of how English can/should be taught. The Japanese education system is always thinking 10 years ahead, so Fuzoku attempts to always make the school better and contribute positively to the question of how Japanese students can be taught best. Teachers are trained, educational research is done, and the school contributes to the regional. Fuzoku teachers lecture at Iwate University and other elementary schools. Teachers from other schools visit Fuzoku classes.
Afterwards, we all went to McDonald’s to celebrate Elizabeth’s birthday (Was the day before, 10/13).
Thursday’s (10/14) Japanese class was very much review, as many have been and seem to continue to be, but I think it is good to continually lay a good, strong foundation. Ethan, Abhi, Tamara, Nicole, and I, the Gandai Festival crew (for the festival 10/24-10/25) attended a meeting of all involved groups. Corrected some 2nd year sentences (“I hope…”, “I know…”) Osawa Sensei had them write to me on Saturday (10/10) to me; when I read “I know Hannah is easy” and “I know Hannah’s golden hair is beautiful,” I loved the kids even more than I already did. Oh English…
Friday (10/16) at Senboku was BUSY. Some third year girls invited me to do origami with them after lunch-wow. Now I have iketori on my desk. (Ikebana is “flower arranging”, but I have an origami box filled with origami cranes (“tori” means bird), so I called it “iketori”.) Elizabeth and I did some more bicycle riding practice (she’s getting great!). I ran and then met Abhi, Nicole, Mitchell, and Tamara for dinner at a Thai restaurant ~10 minutes from my house. Suripon, in our Japanese class, recommended the place and it was AMAZING!
Friday night and Saturday night were great because I didn’t go to bed too late and thus was able to wake up at 8am the next days. On Saturday (10/19), Elizabeth and I explored the Morioka Train Station-the department store within it, had a Baskin & Robbins Halloween sundae, and went to Aiina for her to do research and me to pare down my Arabic research. We talked a lot about how surreal it will be to return, to talk to next year’s SICE students…
That day was also the Aiina Friendship Fest with the theme “the world is friends” and Otoosan and I had planned to meet around 1:30pm. Prior to us meeting (Otoosan became delayed, so he didn’t arrive until ~3pm), an older man (probably in his sixties) approached me while I watched a Philippine dance and then a Nepalese flute/drum/guitar group on one of the stages. He (Yamazaki san) knew of Earlham and had visited the United States many times due to his involvement with a Christian church in Morioka. He was with Amnesty International and later on, Otoosan and I visited the photography exhibit he was with. Unicef, Free Trade, and Amnesty International were prevalent at the festival. Also, Japan makes little things seem important where, in America, one may encounter an “Oh, it’s not enough! What are we going to do?!” or dissatisfied patrons who think something was not done well enough. The Japanese just do things WELL. When they do them, they do not do them halfway.
Met a number of people Otoosan knows through his current work or previous engagements, such as Miya Sensei, the general manager of the 5th floor plaza (where we had first met Sugiwara Sensei OH SO LONG AGO), and a couple who, I think, hosted a SICE student some 20 years ago AND the boss of the 5th floor plaza. Otoosan is very popular. While looking at a series of tables, we met the man Osawa Sensei went to Victoria with last year (as its sister city, Morioka sends students regularly), who also happens to be the director of the Gender Equality and International Relations Division of the Morioka Board of Education. Hmmmm. Otoosan had primarily come to see a concert of the same three individuals playing Nepalese music on flute/drum/guitar I had seen earlier-good group with good music; currently helping a Nepalese elementary school (a “charity concert”). Bussed home since Otoosan had ridden his bike and I had bussed with Elizabeth that morning.
Saturday evening and Sunday (10/18) all day (save for Skype time with my mother), was me working on the Arabic report. And it turned out well. I got the 40some pages I had collected down to nine. WOOHOO. And I thoroughly enjoyed making the Power Point, creating a somewhat silly presentation, but I got my point across. Had another Gandai festival meeting tonight (Monday, 10/19) and afterwards, craved daifuku (mochi balls with ice cream in the middle; two-bite size). SO adventure ensued. Ethan, Tamara, and I found a konbini close by that had a package of two large ones, so Ethan and split that. Then, I succumbed to the box of 21 mini daifuku in vanilla, macha (green tea) and azuki (red bean paste). OH BABY. They were individually packaged and everything. I’ve decided that’s what I just might miss the most.
Hope Early Semester Break went well for all you Earlhamites and I hope winter hasn’t come QUITE yet to the Midwest or to Seatown OR to wherever you are.
Love from the Orient,
Hannah (if you need anything: bananasmile@softbank.ne.jp)
Monday, October 12, 2009
Adventures in Kyoto and Tokyo! (2 of 2)
September 28, 2009-October 5, 2009
So we got to
When we got out at Kyoto Station, it was like déjà vu times a trillion. Again, hate to be a broken record, but it felt like I had JUST left. The underground restaurants right outside the station, Kyoto Tower standing pretty, Isaten department store…We taxied to another Toyoko Inn and then went out to get our own dinner (all of us, incidentally, ended up going to Sukiya, a gyuudon (meat on top of rice)/karee (curry) place across the street). In the restaurant, what comes on the radio, MOM<>J
We met back at the hotel at 7:30pm, joined by a friend of Mariko’s, to walk through Pontocho (narrow street/alley off the main drag, full of restaurants and bars) and Gion, if you wanted to (many geisha there). And this “main drag” is the street our hotel is on, so you literally walk thirty minutes in one direction (to get to Gion) and then turn around/cross the street (for a change of scenery) and walk thirty minutes back. Not too hard, which is good for the MALES in our group. Just kidding. J
Ethan wanted to go to a jazz club he had seen on our walk down the “street”, so we (Mitchell, Abhi, Tamara, Samantha, and I, flowing our fearless leader) end up at this tiny bar playing jazz over the stereo. Samantha left faking a phone call because she didn’t feel comfortable (doesn’t like small spaces) and we all paid too much money for beers, some ginger ales, some Coca-Colas, a rum and Coke, and popcorn. It is customary, when going to a Japanese bar, that all people must order a drink. Food is usually a given too. We were being stupid Americans, even with half Japanese Tamara on our side. It was good to get out of there…
Throughout the trip, starting Sunday or Monday, I got bit by SOMETHING on multiple places all over my calves. I still have scabs now, but they were itching like CRAZY. Maybe the bites were going to my head because I woke up Tuesday (9/29) and thought, “Wow. I will not have eaten black olives for nearly four months by the time I chow down on them next. Hmmm.” I don’t know if I was hungry when I woke up at 7am or what, but when I got downstairs, I found something better than black olives: croissant rolls filled with a creamy Danish-like substance. Delicious rice balls and miso soup too. I lost track of my carb intake, which I should start caring about.
All our cell phones died faster in the Toyoko Inns because we got no service in the rooms and, according to Intelligent Indian Abhi, when there is no service, the phone constantly SEARCHES for service, so the battery is drained quicker.
We taxied to Ryoanji, which is currently under construction (and will be closed January-March). I wanted to be alone because of the peacefulness that the garden represents (it is a garden of twelve, I think, rocks representing islands off of
Mariko said that you should sit and think and when you contemplate hard enough, the answer you are searching for will come to you. I think we could always do with a little more quiet time in our lives, a little more time to sit and think, a little more time to just BE. I bought postcards (because post is a great thing) and wandered around for free time (we were to meet @ 10:30am). We walked the ~18 minutes to Kinkakuji (the
Kinkakuji, as always, was a sight to behold (the weather stayed very nice for our stops in
On the way back to meet up with the group, I went into the bicycle rental shop and got myself a t-shirt. Dad, the kelly green t-shirt I brought back for you last time that has the bananas and water bottle on it and says “We are bike riders. These are our fuel” (I think) is from the same place.
So we then rode the bus to Ginkakuji (
Everyone had to switch to another bus (I know not why) to continue on the route (for us, the remaining 10 minutes to Ginkakuji). Listened to Tamara’s iPod with her, we all disembarked, walked around the corner, and up the shop and restaurant-lined street to Ginkakuji.
Ginkakuji was under construction (scaffolding in place), not that it took anything away from its grandeur. Especially beautiful was the sand
So I walked around, took some great pictures, (throughout the vacation), which are going to overload my computer and take an HOUR probably to turn to the left or to the right. J Bought more postcards when we got all the way through (still have a love for gift shops-that’ll never die). Then Ethan had to go to Morioka Station to buy his shinkansen ticket from Kyoto to Tokyo to Morioka (for 10/5), so we all separated into “taxi groups” and were given money to get back to the hotel whenever we wanted to return. I was carrying some of Abhi’s things in my backpack, so we were a package, and along with Tamara and Samantha, we wandered down the shop-lined road. Some Nagoya elementary schoolchildren stopped us to practice English (“What is your name?” “Where are you from?” “What is your favorite color?” That kind of thing. Then, like in 2007, Mom, they had us sign our names on the back of the paper they were carrying.)
Ended up buying a shirt (Abhi told me to) that is mocking Adidas-it has the symbol, but the three top flower-like parts (okay, they’re not REALLY flower-like, but you get what I’m saying, right), are flames instead. And underneath, it says kazides (kazi means fire; des is desu, which goes at the end of a sentence). I felt like such a tourist. In Miyajima, I saw aidesu (with hearts; ai means love) and azides (with fish; azi is fish). Before walking along a nearby little river to get back to the road the bus had come by, we walk past a table where the man whose bar we had gone to last night is sitting (he is somewhat of a silversmith and makes jewelry out of old coins). Very beautiful work. For example, he took an American quarter and cut out everything but Washington’s head and the “One quarter” letters along the top (if that is even what it says). Much precision. Along the river we saw three GINORMOUS carp-one orange and two dark grey ones. Abhi was SEVERELY tempted to jump in and grab one.
Before catching a taxi back, I wanted to go to the post office (I had seen one close on the ride over) and make sure that the ¥70 stamps that the Morioka post office had told me would work for international postcards, actually would work. ¥70 WAS enough, but I needed to write Air Mail on them/use some stickers that they gave me.
¥1620 later, we were at the hotel (cabs vary from ¥550-¥640 depending on place and time (maybe)). Sensei gave us ¥1000 for the cab ride and reimbursed us later the ¥620 we paid out of our own pockets. At around 4pm, when we got back to our room, Tamara and I set to napping. We had alarms for 5:30, but when they went off, we turned them off and kept sleeping. At 6:30pm, I woke up and she awoke shortly after me, saying it was 7:30pm (I’ve heard that excessive sleep inhibits clock-reading ability). We decided it was a good time to get dinner. Still tired and drowsy, we trudged across the street to Yoshinoya, a favorite eatery of hers (saw Abhi and Ethan there), which has much the same feel as Sukiya (both, INCIDENTALLY use red and yellow in their signage and inside, which McDonald’s uses because APPARENTLY the colors make you hungry or you associate the colors with the restaurant so you think of it more often and therefore want it more often; I’m probably getting it a little wrong, so Mike, if you care to help me out here with your accurate knowledge of the corruptive nature of corporations, please be my guest J) Had butadon (pork on rice) and tea, free of course.
After food, we were MUCH more awake, so we set out trucking-down to Takashimaya (famous department store) where Tam saw a ¥13600 ($136.00) Ralph Lauren t-shirt she wanted to buy (had big polo pony on the left front and a “3” on the back, like a jersey). Her mom wants her to change her wardrobe (hmmmm, sound familiar?). We walked to Gion and passed the same corner where Mom took a picture of me as I slumped down, hungry and tired. Took another photo for ya J
We walked around exploring in the dark (I felt like I was with Mike a little) and came back via a McDonald’s bathroom stop, a corner concert by a two-man band, and Baskin & Robbins. Had “Candyman”, the Halloween special flavor, chocolate ice cream with orange crispy candies (Mike) and “New York Cheesecake” (Eric). That night was the only night, thus far, that I didn’t drink since the trip started. Tamara and I talked a lot instead. And went to bed too late (3am), but hey, we napped, right?
Tuesday night, watching TV, Feist’s “One Two Three Four” music came on during a commercial and the “Upside Down” disco song that’s on one of your CDs, Dad, was on another commercial. Then “Take On Me” came on and I almost DIED, Eric. AND there was a commercial for an iPod nano with a built in CAMERA (pictures and video). *GASP*
I was up at 7am on Wednesday (9/30) and downstairs before 7:30am. I ate three plates of two rice balls, a roll, and the croissant filled with Danish-like cream. We left around 8:30am in taxis to Kiyomizudera (Kiyomizu Temple). Mom and I had walked from the bottom of the shop and restaurant-lined street that leads up to the temple last time, but the taxis took us about halfway up. There was a little bit of light rain, so I put my light rain jacket over my backpack and my towel around my neck. Rain for a Seattleite is nothing ;)
In 2007, there were so many people in the actual temple that we didn’t make it all the way inside. We, as a group, went in and it was BEAUTIFUL. There is a saying that to throw yourself fully into something, you must throw yourself like you would off Kiyomizu budai (the stage of Kiyomizu). The view looks out to the main part of the city a little ways away. Near the end, three streams of water come out and over a small platform. You reach out a long-handled cup and drink from each to gain intellectual wisdom, health, and longevity. Abhi, Claire, Mitchell, and I, who were walking through with or close to Sensei and Mariko, did just that.
We slowly regrouped-Abhi went off to find Samantha, Tamara, and Ethan, but when we were all together, Mariko led us (just seconds from the temple grounds) to the studio of a friend of hers who makes EXQUISITE ceramic pottery. He and his wife used to live in the house we were welcomed into, but now it is their gallery. We saw his studio around the corner (he has ~12 people working for him total in Kyoto and Tokyo combined) and saw some of his creations. Beautiful beautiful BEAUTIFUL.
We broke for lunch and I tried to go out on my own (I found the place Mom and I ate when we visited in 2007-YES!) and looked around at the shops. I ran into Samantha and we got karee (curry). Afterwards, we bought strawberry cheesecake crepes and I bought two boxes of the mochi triangles as omiyage (one box for Yoko, one box for my host family) AND I bought mitarashi dango (pieces of skewered mochi cooked over an open oven with this sauce I don’t know how to describe…it’s sweet, but also kind of like teriyaki sauce…).
We all met at 1pm and taxied to Fushimi-Inari shrine, the land of many, many torii gates. I believe there are said to be 1,000. I carried Abhi, Tamara, and Mariko’s paper bags of goods bought around Kiyomizudera (Abhi and Tam bought ceramic sake cups from Mariko’s friend), and we were given an hour to walk through. It was raining a little harder, but not bad.
When we came back together again, after many pictures among the torii and contemplative walking and cats and many alters, Sensei decided that taking the train from Inari eki (station) right across the street to Kyoto station and then taking a taxi from THERE would be better than taxiing from here. It was also cheaper. We got back to the hotel around 3:15pm and they were still cleaning our rooms, so we waited (they were hurrying, apparently).
That’s a cool thing-they tell you when they will be cleaning your room. AND cleaning is an important part of Japanese culture. Tam and I, the day before, had asked them not to clean our room because we could just use the same towels and could sleep in the same sheets. We didn’t care. BUT that was an American mistake on my part. I was thinking of being ecological when in fact, it might have appeared as dirty/unclean/unhealthy.
When we got to our room and I napped 4-5:30, then Tam fell asleep, so I woke her up at 6:10. At 6:15, we all met in the lobby to go to our group dinner at Bistro Nozomi. About 9 courses Kyoto style (small portions). DELICIOUS. We sat on the floor, on a ledge, with our feet under the table (as if we were sitting in chairs). There were two tables-it was me, Nicole, Samantha, Claire, and Elizabeth versus Ethan, Tamara, Sensei, Mariko, Abhi, and Mitchell. Tam and I ended up switching seats halfway through because she came over to tell a story (she had gone to a ski resort with her host family over Silver Week (9/19-9/23) and she had seen some diapers for older people (or something). She took a long time to explain the story, so I went over to the other table to see what was going on. I didn’t intend to stay, but I ended up sitting with them.
The last course prior to dessert is something I now fondly call The Death of Me: a plate of sushi with probably 12 pieces, mostly sashimi (raw fish on top of rice). Nix, I think you would have liked it. Well, there was this one big roll that was, NO JOKE, the width of a clenched fist. I was seriously wondering if I could eat it in one bite (like you’re supposed to do with sushi) and Abhi must have read my mind. He said if I could do I, he would buy me a drink. Now, the drink wasn’t so much the drive-it was the POSSIBILITY that I could get that whole thing in my mouth. BUT as anyone I have eaten lunch with in saga (at Earlham) knows, my mouth really isn’t as big as I think it is. I have SERIOUS delusions of grandeur. SO I tried. And I’m pretty sure I had already scarfed down half my plate and pieces from others. Long story short: I didn’t quite make it. It was hard to swallow/breathe when you have a sushi roll taking up your whole mouth (there’s a video of it somewhere…). Then Abhi tried, I held the same reward of a drink, and he BEASTED it. The secret, I think, (from extensive observation), is to chew looking UP. I tried again, TWICE and they both ended poorly. So after THAT debacle AND finishing 2.5 plates of sushi (because I am The Garbage Disposal) AND ice cream (which I will never say “No” to), I was in SEVERE amounts of pain. Fullness x 34. Because of that, I came out feeling bad juju towards sushi (but it’s all good now, Nix.) I really want to go to Ginza (area in Tokyo) and do dessert hoodai (all you can eat dessert for 1.5 hours) so maybe I will have that SAME reaction to sweets and not eat them.
I REALLY needed to walk so I took and hour and walked to Gion and back, but I still felt SO full. And in my walking realized that I cannot be responsible for others. My eating of their food in order to (in some twisted way) save the planet does not really help anyone. IF we could bring Tupperware everywhere we went, THAT might help. But my getting full for a “cause” doesn’t do good things to my health. Tamara had left the restaurant early because she didn’t feel well and when I got back around 11pm, we went and walked more because she felt full as well (she was feeling better health-wise though). (While walking, I saw a girl with an Utrecht shirt, Dad. Like from the school. It reminded me of the Utrecht art supplies store that was sort of near LeRoi when you lived in First Hill.) We both didn’t want to eat anything more. Ever. The next day, we embarked on our Tokyo adventure.
Ah Thursday. (10/1) Got down to the lobby a little early to send a fax to my mom (that would go my insurance company) regarding my insurance coverage not changing when hers does due to her NEW JOB. I kept pressing the copy button when I wanted to send because it said “start” next to it. Luckily, Sensei came down and she helped me THANK GOODNESS.
We all met at 9:30 (Abhi had left earlier; he was staying with his aunt in Chiba, outside of Tokyo) so Sensei could say goodbye. Samantha had to finish packing and some people wanted to eat more, so we got into our two taxis at around 10:15. When “my” taxi got to the station, I mistakenly didn’t specify south terminal SO our taxis became separated. The other taxi took them on a strange detour and they arrived SOMEWHERE after us. The shinkansen (bullet train) to Tokyo didn’t leave until 12:22, but Samantha still hadn’t bought her ticket. I called Ethan and they were just getting out of the taxi. I called him again and they were in the station, I told him to meet us outside the main entrance, he said okay. Turns out they went to go get the ticket FIRST and THEN come meet us. It would have been GREAT to hear THAT rather than be standing outside the main entrance for 20 minutes wondering if they were all okay.
Due to the Unfortunate Sushi Event of the previous night, I wanted to eat NOT AS MUCH, so when we got into the station and were buying our lunches, I chose bananas and a sandwich. Had a few tiny bites of Tam’s Godiva Chocolate Caramel ice cream because she enjoys tempting me. We got into the shinkansen terminal and still had time, so some of us visited the bookstore, etc. Got on and on our way-the two hour ride to Tokyo went great (read and dozed).
When we arrived in Tokyo and had to train to the Asakusa station (where our hostel was), it was confusing because we were already IN the station, but we needed to buy train tickets. We went out of the shinkansen terminal, bought tickets, and proceeded to the Ginza line. Tamara and her fluency helped. BUT, because I had no rolling luggage/didn’t want to take the escalator, I always took the stairs that a) got me to the same place first, but b) often diverged from the escalator path. I got to the platform for the Ginza line (to Ueno, Asakusa) and Ethan called me to tell me that I was at the wrong place. I read the platform and destinations to him (it was the right place) and everyone soon arrived. Probably shouldn’t have diverged from the group, but we all got to the right place in eight pieces and didn’t get lost.
We arrived at Asakusa (on a very full train) and left out of a different exit than the Sakura Hostel directions said to. Tamara then asked for directions. WHY we didn’t just follow the directions provided by the hostel I DON’T KNOW. This is an instance where some people in the group seem to not TRUST others or have FAITH in them or WANT to make them the leader (as in, relinquish the leadership). It’s a problem that needs to be addressed, in my opinion. So out the exit, down past multiple rickshaw drivers, past the HUGE lantern that marks the entrance to a shrine, past the am/pm konbini (convenience store). Then the road Ts with a busier road and we take a right (at the vending machine with the fighting demons on it), continue past Denny’s and 7-11, and take a right at the restaurant where there’s a pachinko (gambling) parlor down on the left and a porn theater on the right and take the left fork when the road splits at the entrance to the amusement park. We arrived about 4pm and checked into our rooms. Thanks to Elizabeth’s promptness in both ASKING us if we wanted to room with her and in RESERVING the rooms, she, Claire, Tamara, and I were settling in in no time (in a 4 bed room on the 2nd floor). Samantha was in the mixed 6 bed room next door, Nicole was in a 6 bed room upstairs (on the third floor I think; 6 floors total I think), and Mitchell and Ethan were two floors up. For our four bed room, it was ¥12600/night, so essentially we (due to our four night stay) owed ¥12600 each. When I had taken money out of the Gandai ATM before leaving, I thought I was ROLLING in money. Like always, however, things take money. And I was humbled in the first few moments as we paid before “moving in.”
The rooms were clean, a window looked out on the street we had just entered from, 2 sets of bunk beds with 4 lockable cubbies (could get a lock from the front desk for ¥250), and there was a power outlet up by the top bunk! We made our beds with the sheets waiting for us on the beds (instructions were on the back of the door, as were rules like no eating or drinking in the room (do so in the lounge downstairs) and noise stops at 9pm (if you want to talk, use the lounge downstairs).
Elizabeth, Nicole, and Claire went to Mos Burger for dinner (on the way from the station to the hostel). Ethan, Mitchell, Samantha, Tam, and I went to Shibuya (30 minute train ride; Asakusa is one end of the Ginza line, Shibuya is the other) to meet up with a friend of Samantha Lynch’s (Ethan’s girlfriend), Amelia, and Amelia’s friend Anneliese. (Kelsey, it was Anneliese Irby, who went to NOMS and then to Ballard-WHAT a small world). Amelia goes to Temple University and is on a study abroad program, much like us. Anneliese is studying too and staying with her sister who is living in Tokyo currently. Meting them was relatively easy though Shibuya is the location of “Japan Times Square”, which is REALLY a sight to see, especially at night. We walked around for a great deal of time, in true Japanese fashion, wondering what to eat for dinner. After about 30 minutes and looking and asking the group and indecisiveness, Ethan saw a good spot. Bowls of raamen (noodles) or dinner sets of rice, miso soup, and noodles. I had rice and gyoza (potstickers)-small and good. AND cheap! (It has been interesting to hear people in our group talk about how much they need to save $, but order too much food and don’t finish all of it.
Ethan, Amelia, Tamara, and Anneliese craved bubble tea (at First Kitchen, a fast food-like place that was just a few feet away; in Tokyo, people call it “fuh-ki” for short; sounds like a swear word). In a moment of “What do we do now?” (it was 8:30pm) we discussed purikura (picture booths). Middle and high school students decorate their pencil cases, planners, cell phones, etc. with pictures of them and their friends in picture booths. A number of different backgrounds are available and then afterwards, you DECORATE the pictures with pen-wands and can put nearly everything imaginable on them. More background detail, stars, glitter, hearts, sparkles, cartoon characters, numbers, kanji characters, glasses, hats… So we did THAT for an hour. (The place we went was part of an arcade and the sign at the entrance to the purikura area had a message to all who wanted to enter: pictures of a girl, a girl and a boy together, and a boy (but with a red X through the picture). Boys cannot go in by themselves or in groups of JUST boys. It is more popular for many girls to go together or for a couple to go together or for a large group of mixed gender to go, but only boys is dame (bad).)
When we were done, Anneliese walked back to wherever she and her sister are (might have taken the train or a bus) and Amelia took the Ginza line with us and got off at her stop (she had to be home (host family curfew) by 10:30). We proceeded to Asakusa, I showered, and went to bed around midnight.
It rained on Friday (10/2). There was a breakfast at the hostel-¥315 all you can eat toast and soup. Didn’t seem worth it (Elizabeth and Claire said so after eating). I had set an alarm for 7am, but I slept through it and got up at 9am. Now that we didn’t have to be anywhere at a given time AND it was the tail end of our glorious adventure, I was much more fatigued, I think. I had set the alarm specifically to do laundry. The Toyoko Inns we stayed at had laundry too, but Tamara and I (at least) figured that we would do our laundry when we got to Tokyo. Well, it wasn’t getting done THAT morning.
I was ready to leave around 10. Nicole, Elizabeth, and Claire set out to the Edo museum and Akihabara (anime/geek central is what it’s known for). Tam and I waited for Ethan and Mitchell and then got a little breakfast (at a nearby Lawson, the BEST konbini ever, though I think my loyalty lies with Lawson because it was the first convenience store we all visited due to its close proximity to Kumagai Ryokan (where we stayed when we first arrived in Morioka)). I had eaten one of m leftover bananas, but I bought an onigiri (in a continued effort to eat less and NEVER feel like how I felt post-Sushi Experiment). Mitchell, Ethan, and Tamara all bought raamen or rice and shrimp tempura (in Mitchell’s case). Mitchell offered me his leftover rice, but I refused (and was SO proud of myself) and they all ended up MORE than satiated.
By 11, we made our way to the large lantern we passed en route to the hostel the previous afternoon and met up with Masaki (Ethan’s plans), a Waseda University student who came to Earlham two years ago, during our first year (07-08). Waseda is a VERY good school in Tokyo and Masaki and Ethan had been roommates during that year. Masaki helped us decide where we wanted to go and what we wanted to do, saying that a tower in Roppongi may offer a better view than Tokyo Tower (Mitchell’s suggestion) and Tamara added that the tower in Roppongi also had an aquarium. We ended up train-ing to Roppongi and up to the sky view floor of Roppongi Hills Mori Arts Center, which USUALLY offers a panorama of the city. BUT due to the rain, we were in the clouds on the 52nd floor and thus all we saw was WHITE. Which was WICKED cool. The student ticket for the view, the aquarium, and the arts museum (3 attractions in one!) was a fabulous ¥1500. We did purikura at the top (though no decorating, just the city behind us) and hit the aquarium.
OH. MY. GOSH. Glass tanks like you wouldn’t believe. Use of color, of light, of darkness, of shapes. Wow. The art museum was doing a special exhibit on Ai Weiwei, (the architect of the Bird’s Nest stadium in Beijing), which was ABSOLUTELY FANTASTIC. I never knew I loved modern art so much. The audio tour was a great addition, too. The exhibit (and the art) was clean, uncluttered, and utilitarian but at the same time genius. For instance, “One Ton of Tea” is a three dimensional cube of compressed tea. Yup. GENIUS. I wanted to buy a t-shirt of a great piece-bicycle frames joined together in a ring, four high. But I bought a postcard instead. AND they let you take pictures, so that’s great. The exhibit was very much about past tradition vs. the present modern age. Interesting. CAPTIVATING.
For lunch, we headed back to the station and a plethora of choices. Decided on a raamen place with a great price-¥880 for noodles with vegetables and chicken. We then all took the train to Akihabara (Masaki left us to go to a meeting at Waseda) and went to Don Quixote, where Tamara got the Pikachu costume she has. It’s a full body zip up and it’s probably on of the greatest things I have EVER seen. So she bought an Elmo one. J Don Quixote (8+ floors) also has a maid café and the cheapest SoyJoys around (¥98) and lotion (YEAH! I was SO glad to see that because it was on my grocery list) and slutty Halloween costumes (you got about eight four different “student” outfits or “tutor” or “schoolgirl”, your “pirate”, “pirate captain”, “maid”, “nurse”, “bumblebee”, etc.).
We then got dinner before Ethan was to meet Amelia for drinks. Mitchell and Ethan chose McDonald’s (which Tamara gave them a hard time for) and Tamara and I stepped into a small place nearby and got noodles (Tam) and toridon (chicken on rice, me). We thought we should regroup, so we found them at McDonald’s and all took the Ginza line together back to Asakusa (Ethan then took the Asakusa line to Gotanda). Since he was a little unfamiliar with the area of Asakusa and then way back to our hostel, I said I would meet him at 11pm/11:15pm at the lantern so he could find his way back. I told him directions (akin to what I typed previously-the route we took from the station the first time), but I really didn’t want to risk losing him.
Tam had the idea to go to a public bath nearby, so I asked Mitchell (who was walking with us) Nicole and Elizabeth (and assumed Claire’s “no”) just to make sure everyone felt included. Everyone said no and frankly, I wasn’t so up to being naked PERSONALLY. Tamara was a little let down though, I think. I had one priority that night: laundry. And Tam seconded that. We got back to the hostel (to a BUSY lounge), Nicole lent us the remainder of the laundry soap she had purchased, we paid ¥200 each for a washer , then (when the time was up) put our laundry in together on HIGH for 30 minutes (¥100x2). The putting it on “HIGH” was a detail we learned from Nicole and Elizabeth-people who DO not do something first get to learn from others. Thank you Elizabeth and Nicole. ‘Wanted’ was on TV (yeah Liza, you Israeli street fighter, and Breanna, you mixed martial artist!)-so THAT was nice. And it was dubbed in Japanese, so that was even nicer. I got distracted from writing in my journal by Facebook (on Samantha’s computer) via the free wireless and by Tamara’s bottle of sake (she bought it in Kyoto station at the grocery store where most of us bought lunch), yuki (fragrant orange/lemon) flavor. We had a few cups of that and I also bought a ¥150 can of chuuhi, a type of sake…maybe….Went to the lantern at 11pm and Ethan’s phone had died previously in the day, so there was no way to communicate with him. He came at 11:30 and we walked back fine. (I sometimes wonder why I put myself at the mercy of others, abiding by their schedule-first trying to help Tamara get to yabusame (archery on horseback), now waiting for Ethan to make sure he gets home okay. It’s because people matter. That’s my conclusion, the only one I’ve got.) Showered and went to bed around 1am.
Oh (10/3) Saturday. Slept through my 7am alarm again; awoke at 10:45 moderately upset that I had just slept 1/3rd of the day away. It was raining less and Tamara (who had ALSO slept late), Ethan, and Claire (who had been awake for hours WAITING for us to wake up) waited in the lobby for Mitchell to finish showering. Ate a banana. Then when the five of us were ready to go, Ethan, Mitchell, and Tam were hungry. So we stopped at an Indian restaurant on the way to the station. HUGE naan. No joke, the actual size of baby elephant ears. The menu pictures are a tad deceiving. I bought ¥250 turmeric rice (which the man/owner didn’t fully understand, I think, since restaurants are where you EAT; Japanese people don’t eat on the go usually and they don’t snack much) and felt great when others felt full from their curry sets.
Tamara took us to Ginza (via the Ginza line; about halfway to Shibuya), one of the most expensive areas of Tokyo. Up out of the station and into a gift shop kind of store (within the Sony building) with great pencil bags, stickers, bento boxes, planners, etc. Z, I think you would have loved it. A great place, I think, for middle schoolers and high schoolers. Plus, the Halloween display was very cute. We went up to the next floor and it was the headquarters, maybe, of the Miracle Project, a Sony driven photography project that I’ve seen on television commercials-a bunch of elementary school students create sea creatures with arts and crafts supplies in their classroom and a man with a Sony camera documents the project. Above that space were headphones/cameras/iPod-like mP3 players (all Sony) for people to test out. Picked up one set of headphones and what song is playing on the mP3 but “Beautiful Girls”. I’m glad you’re with me, EJ.
After a little while, we went outside and tried to decide what to do for the limited time we had since it was already around 1 (Ethan was going to meet up with Amelia and Anneliese at Shibuya station at 2:30). He chose the Asahi Shinbun (newspaper company-owned building I think) building across the street and looked around at the shops inside for about twenty minutes. Hello Kitty, lingerie, shoes. It’s like a totally magical world here, so I love to just LOOK.
We hopped the Ginza line to Ginza (~20 minutes) and Amelia found us before we left the station. We waited for Anneliese outside while Amelia complained about her friends who would rather write papers than come meet Ethan and his cool friends. I said I liked doing homework too. J
When Anneliese showed up, we walked in the direction of the karaoke place they wanted to go to. Amelia was hungry, so we stopped at a Sunkus (like “Thanks” perhaps; a konbini), but then Anneliese was thinking Wendy’s while she was inside, so then we went ACROSS THE STREET to Wendy’s. I didn’t get anything (had 2 fries, one from Tam and one from Anneliese, who both bought kid’s meals and received handkerchiefs! SO much better than toys.). It’s not really my thing…AND I wasn’t hungry. Tam had been so adamantly against Ethan and Mitchell going to McDonald’s the previous night, but now freely bought Wendy’s. That was a little strange in my mind. Yes, you’re in Japan and should eat Japanese food (or at least not “American” food). Yes, burgers are great when you need a reminder of home. Now I see why, when I agree with two viewpoints and DON’T have an opinion (CE), it’s frustrating. Sorry about that.
We continued walking in the direction of karaoke and had to ask a policeman for directions because Amelia and Anneliese couldn’t exactly remember where it was-after going in circles in Shibuya, many intersections/streets look the same, so I don’t blame them. We found it and went in and they were all planning to stay for two hours or so. I, however, had scheduled dinner with Yoko, an old exchange who came to stay (at the age of eighteen) with my mother and me when I was eight. Our original plan was to have dinner at her parent’s home in Saitama (about 40 minutes outside of the city; where she still lives) so that we would all be able to see each other-her mother, her father, her, and me. Then Naoko, her sister, was going to be available for dinner and we were going to go to her house in Iriya, about 20 minutes from Asakusa (on the Ginza Line then on the Hibiya Line). We were going to meet at 5pm at Ueno (the transfer/shared station) and then go on to Naoko’s together. THEN Yoko’s father said we were going to go out to a shabu-shabu (cooking meat in boiling water) and sukiyaki (thin noodles cooked in boiling water with lettuce and meat) restaurant in Ueda on him (only about 20 minutes from Ginza on the Ginza line). Yoko emailed me the final plan when we got into karaoke at around 3pm. Yoko and I would meet at 5:40 at the station and walk to the restaurant where we (Yoko, Naoko, Naoko’s 2 year old son Tomo-chan (chan is used after children’s names normally), Yoko’s mother, Yoko’s father, and I had reservations from 6pm). That meant I would leave Shibuya at ~5pm instead of the 4pm/4:30 I had previously thought. SO I joined Ethan, Amelia, Anneliese, Tamara, Mitchell, and Claire for karaoke. Sang ‘Mamma Mia’, ‘Take On Me’, ‘Stronger’ (Kanye West), ‘Smells Like Teen Spirit’, ‘Glamorous’ (Fergie; wish it could have been more T-O-P-H-E-R-O-U-S). Ethan sang some Frank Sinatra, Mitchell sang some Queen, Amelia sang some Prince. Great variety.
I left at around 4:45pm to get back to Shibuya station (paid Tam back), bought my train ticket, got on the train (they DO come every 2-3 minutes) and got to Ueno with no problem and time to spare (in at 5:25pm). Was a little nervous because I wanted to make sure I was in the right place at the right time. Early is ALWAYS good, especially in Japan. Yoko arrived shortly (we were mailing each other to make sure we were in the right places) and she looked/looks as young as always. The restaurant was a short walk from the station and until around 8:30, we had a delicious dinner and great conversation. We had our own private room with the same table as was at our group dinner in Tokyo-we were seated on the floor with our feet under the table.
We (Mom and I) saw Tomo-chan as an infant-now he is 2 years and 4 months old, in his words. J Talking a great deal and likes to touch everything. Before her mother, father, Naoko, and Tomo-chan arrived, Yoko gave me omiyage (gifts) because she did not want Tomo-chan to destroy them: 2 sets of exquisite chopsticks (with one containing a rice scoop) and a beautiful handheld, hand painted mirror. Later on, Okaasan (Yoko’s mother) gave me a key clip with a mini fan on it. Tomo-chan was very well-behaved though, which is a constant with Japanese children. Though he was tired towards the end, the idea of pears (2 plates came: one with plain slices, one with slices toped with wine-like flavored jelly topping) and ice cream (we had macha (green tea), he had vanilla) kept him in good spirits. Tomo-chan had some bread from a bag decorated with Anpanman, a cartoon character. Yoko said that because it has Anpanman on the bag, children want to eat it though it is just regular bread. Naoko’s husband works late on Saturdays, so he was unable to join us.
Naoko talked about her visit to Seattle while Yoko stayed with us and a restaurant chain called Boston Market (that specialized in mashed potatoes, gravy, rotisserie chicken, etc.; don’t know WHY in the world it would shut down, not from lack of interest at least) and how much she LOVED it.
After dinner, Naoko and Tomo-chan got into a taxi to get home and Yoko, Okaasan, Otoosan, and I walked back to the station (I saw a Sweets Paradise-dessert hoodai (all you can eat dessert for an hour and a half)) via a narrow street marketplace of booths and garages (the kind of marketplace/back alley greatness that is so characteristically Japan to me). In the station, Okaasan bought me two boxes of different sweets omiyage (gifts), one for my host mother/family and one for my friends, if I wanted to share with them. Both sweets were small, roundish, and soft with soft filling. One was whitish and usagi (rabbit) shaped, the other was brown. The insides of both were matching in color to their exterior. Okaasan also bought me a pancake sandwich, two pancakes with azuki (red bean paste) between them to eat as a snack sometime later.
They walked me to where I could get a ticket and then I bought and proceeded through to where I would descend to the platform. BUT I almost went down the stairs to the wrong side of the tracks (I would have read the sign on the track and KNOW I was in the wrong place), but before I could go any further, they were calling to me, telling me to go to the other side. AS much as I LOVE Shibuya, I don’t think I wanted to go back there that night. J I was thankful. I walked towards the right stairwell and there was much smiling, waving, and “Jyaa ne”-ing (“See you later.”) I think I was also a little nervous-Yoko is a very important person to me and my mother and there is no way to say “Thank you for letting your eighteen-year-old daughter come stay with us, foreign people in a foreign country, for three years and for letting her stay in the United States for five. Thank you for having a daughter who loves adventure and who really made me love Japan, the language and culture. Thank you for all you have given me and my family, both tangible and otherwise. You and YOUR family have changed my life.” So I will attempt to say that IN Japanese. Also, in America, we hug goodbye (and sometimes hello too!) and in my vain attempt to thank them enough, I hugged them goodbye. They were caught a little off guard I think AND the Japanese way is not one of hugging. So it was funny. While on the train, I emailed Yoko a thank you and perhaps I will make it back to Tokyo to see them before I head out of this beautiful country. On the train, I saw a guy with combat boots, Eric.
Walked back to the hostel and thought everyone was asleep or no one was back (because from the outside, I didn’t quite know which room was ours). However, much to my glee, Elizabeth and Claire were in the room talking. It was such a déjà vu to last year-me and two of my very good friends (Liz and Clairellyn) roomed in a triple in the basement of one of the residence halls on Earlham’s campus. There were three windows that were right at ground level and often I would be coming back from a meeting or a friend’s room at 10 or 11 at night and I would usually be exhausted. I would look at the windows, which I could see when I came across the Wellness Center parking lot, and if the lights were off, I would think, sadly, that I was coming back to a room of sleeping roommates and I didn’t want to wake them up when I came in. HOWEVER, usually when I turned the key and opened the door, light greeted me (the shades had been pulled on the windows AND/OR the lamps were on and so the light wasn’t bright enough to be seen from outside) and my two smiling roommates (probably watching an episode of “Bones”, “Veronica Mars”, or “Gossip Girl”), and maybe an empty pizza box, were there, making me one of the happiest people on the face of the planet. And no matter how tired I was walking BACK, I woke up the minute I entered that room. And I loved that. And I told Elizabeth and Claire that and now writing this, I think I just might cry.
Elizabeth and Claire and I talked a lot about the program, the trip we were on, the people we were with…it was really good (it always is) to talk openly with people, to build trust with others, to hear the viewpoints of others. Borrowed Samantha’s laptop (she had said I could use it) from where it was plugged in in her room and was able to Skype with a friend while taking advantage of the wireless on a landing between the first and second floor. Talked for about an hour, Samantha and Tamara came back while I was talking, and I soon returned Sam’s computer.
In the lobby, I talked with Mitchell and Ethan while ‘Man on a Wire’ played on the TV (dubbed in Japanese). Once again, god to hear people’s points of view on the program, trip, and people. Went BACK to the room and Nicole had come in to visit, so the four of us (Elizabeth and Claire were still there) talked more. Showered around 12:15am, started writing in my journal around 1am (lights were mounted on each bunk; I used mine and covered it with my jacket to try and allow Elizabeth and Claire to sleep), and fell asleep around 2. Tamara came in around 1:30. AND I was getting up at 7 to go to Yokohama the next day…
Light rain continued to fall on Sunday (10/4) and FINALLY we were up at 7, though I did have to wake Tamara up. Left around 7:45am after calling Samantha to ask if she wanted to join, but she sleepily declined and said se would talk to us later. Apparently, we three were originally were going to go to Yokohama to meet Haruna (another Waseda University student who came to Earlham during our first year, 07-08). Got to Asakusa station around 8:15 (after Tam stopped to get an onigiri (rice ball) and an energy drink). Went on the Ginza line to Ginza (20 minutes), transferred to the Hibiya line to Naka-Meguro (15 minutes probably), then got on the JR (Japan Rail) Tokyuu Toyoko line (I think) to Minato Mirai (around 30 minutes). Minato Mirai is also the name used for the amusement park that sits on the Yokohama waterfront, which was our MAIN destination.
We, thanks to my desire to be up and at ‘em (to sort of prove that YES I COULD use an alarm), got to Minato Mirai station at around 9:30, too early to shop at the shops. So we rode the escalator (one of Japan’s longest escalators; maybe 30 seconds) up and down and up to the sunshine. We hit the ATM and then sat at Starbucks so Tam could rink coffee and smoke and we could watch the time tick by via the GINORMOUS Ferris Wheel CLOCK. Yes, that’s right ladies and gentlemen, the wheel has a digital clock and it is PROBABLY one of the greatest ideas since hand sanitizer, but motion sensor lights are good too. We also were at a GREAT vantage point to witness child-parent relations on the plaza-like, park-like open space (you knows, you’ve got your planters and your benches and your wide open space where street performers can do their thang) in front of the station and across from the amusement park. FOR EXAMPLE, a boy (probably 8 or 9) fell on the ground and did not cry, but rather crawled on his stomach towards his mother who was continuing to walk, then got up and walked with her. LOGICAL young lad. A father and a young daughter (who later met the mother and came to sit outside Starbucks) were holding hands and walking down some nearby steps. When she slipped and became a little flustered, he just changed the way he was helping her: rather than walk next to her, he faced her and walked down the steps backwards, but if she fell, she fell into him and I’m sure she felt more secure. The important thing to notice here, class, is that he did not coddle her. He did not make her slipping a big deal. This is why the Japanese are the most successful people in the world.
We went back into the station around 11am and looked around the Snoopy Store and the Disney Store. I had called Hanako, my host sister, who goes to school in Yokohama and thus lives there now (went back after Disneyland trip) and she said she would come after washing her clothes, bussing to the train station, and training to Minato Mirai. After about 20 minutes, she called again and asked if we could meet her at Sakuragicho Station instead, a 5-10 minute walk away. The answer is ALWAYS “Yes” on Sundays, SO we met up with her around 11:15am. We did a little dance for getting together (HOORAY!) and headed for lunch with our capes rippling behind us. Found a soba restaurant in the building between the two stations. Tam and I had ocha (tea) soba (green noodles) (LOVE soba, just btdubs) and Hanako had the manager’s recommendation-soba with some hard boiled egg and radish in it. We all ate fast. We’re like a secret SOCIETY of Should Eat Slower-s. Went for Coldstone Creamery (YEAH. Seriously, with Starbucks, Krispy Kremes, McDonald’s, Wendy’s, and COLDSTONE, HOW can you be homesick?) and all had Like Its (the smallest size, which I THINK is smaller in Japan, as is everything). Chocolate Decadence for Hanako, Romancing the Cheesecake for muah, and Very Berry Cheesecake in a waffle cone in a bowl for TamTam.
THEN we went to Sweet Factory, another way you are never left wanting in Japan. We had seen it en route from Minato Mirai to Hanako and we just HAD to go. Dried grapefruit, pineapple, and watermelon; chocolate-covered strawberries, Ramune hearts and stars; the small, spiky candy Claire loves so much (for her). So almost $10 LATER (for me; Tamara spent nearly double probably), we were off to the park! Tam spent ¥2800 worth of tickets which was actually worth ¥3500 (which maybe gives the illusion that you’re getting more for your money…) and we went on a spinning ride together-it went on a half-pipe like base, up and back down, and spun too. It was then suggested by Tam that we should each by our own tickets, though I don’t think it was ¥2800 worth. THEN we went into the Polar/Ice Room, literally FREEZING. MY GOODNESS. ICE and BREATH and PAIN and everything.
Went across the bridge to another section, the “big kid” rides, like the Ferris Wheel and roller coasters and a water log ride. Went on a sort of scary (it was attempting to be scary) ride where we were in a cage that went on tracks through various scary incidents (much dropping down and popping out, so if you’re scared by such things, go ahead). Then we went on a roller coaster that spun the seat as well (4 people total in a small round “car”; much back and forth movement). My head kind of hurt afterwards, which worried me. Haven’t had bad headaches here so far, but I’m thinking the kind of movements on roller coasters and jolting rides like that might adversely affect my brain case.
Went on the BIG rollercoaster that wove in an around the base of the Ferris wheel and the large arcade center there on that side of the bridge and THEN up in the gondola. WOW. 60 gondolas (reppin’ the 60 seconds of a clock)-it was quite warm with the sunshine and we could squint and look out onto the bay and the city. BEAUTIFUL. Afterwards, we killed the remaining ¥ left on our cards by going to the kiddie area and riding on this pedal car ride and a carousel.
We hit the Snoopy Store and the Disney Store on last time and received a call about dinner-meeting Machiko (another Waseda student who was at Earlham our first year, 07-08) in Shibuya. Hanako was invited, but the trouble was, Shibuya was the OPPOSITE direction Hanako needed to go (as we were in her ‘hood). I thought this kind of problematic, but she said she didn’t mind riding the train at night and had done it before from inner Tokyo. We called Machiko to explain this and she said, after much shuffling by us and ‘What would be better?” and Hanako saying Yokohama station was the most convenient for her, Machiko said she could meet us at Yokohama station, just a short ride from Minato Mirai and Sakuragicho. We all got there, met up with Machiko after looking around a little, and had okonomiyaki for dinner in one of the MANY restaurants to be found in the station. Like usual, I was given the pleasure of deciding since Hanako and Machiko (and Tamara too) could have this food whenever they wanted. We ordered three, and then cut each one into 1/4ths which was GENIUS (Thank you, Machiko!).
Afterwards (around 9:30pm), we said goodbye to Hanako (who bussed home), and Machiko, Tamara, and I took the Hibiya Line to Ginza, a very full train back. At Ginza, we parted ways-Machiko to home, Tamara and I to the Ginza Line to Asakusa. It was AWESOME. Got back to the hostel and did a little bit of packing in preparation for leaving the next day.
Monday (10/5) was relatively easy-we prepared enough ahead of time so that we weren’t rushing that morning. In other words, we left the hostel at 10:15am and got to Asakusa Station, then took the Ginza Line to Ginza I THINK and caught the shinkansen from there. We were in the waiting area at 11am and our train didn’t left until 12:59pm. We all had bento (boxed lunches) and went up to the platform around 12:45. There, like clockwork, was our train. We got on and it rolled. We were in Morioka around 3:15pm and we all got home in various ways. I took the bus with Elizabeth and Claire to the bus center, then got on another bus (with Elizabeth) that dropped me off 7 minutes from my house. Claire got on another one at the bus center. Some people took taxis, some called their families.
Walking out of the station into the afternoon sunshine and knowing that we were back in Morioka (which has 30,000 people, not the 300,000 I thought; you would think I would notice a big difference like that…), it was such a good feeling. Like being home.
Hope everyone at Earlham has a good Early-Semester Break and plans for Halloween are proceeding nicely. Love to all the students, parents, and family. May your days be rich in joy.
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