Please forgive me while I briefly rant...

OBC has made me dread halloween.  I would have never thought it possible that I could grow to loath my once favorite holiday, but OBC found a way.  Every year, OBC has a short, less then two hour Halloween party for the elementary and junior high students.  The format is pretty simple, each of the three teachers plan a short 5 minute game that can be played by up to 6 people at a time and that involves simple to moderately complex English depending on the skill level of the students participating.  Each teacher is responsible for planning the game, drawing up a plan for the room and then doing the actual decorating.  We are also assigned an assistant for the party itself, and that assistant is supposed to help us with the decorating and brainstorming phase.  This would all be well and good, but OBC has had us planning this party for 3 full months already.  I have only been in this country for 3.5 months!  And remember, the whole party is less then two hours!  A two hour party does not warrant a weeks worth of stressed out sleepless nights and three months of planning.  The general stress level, and the increased workload has finally succeeded in destroying my love for the holiday once reserved only for drunken debauchery and silly antics.   

Thank you for indulging me in a few minutes of work related whining.

On Shinto and Japanese Shrines

On Saturday, I had one of the coolest experiences of my time in Japan so far.  A friend of mine took me to the Shinto shrine in Ise city.  This shrine is one of the most famous in all of Japan, and it is where the Emperor himself comes for special occasions.  Unfortunately, I forgot my camera, so I will have to post pictures that I have stolen from the internet.  I hope the internet doesn't mind too much!!


First, a little background as explained to me by my friend and local expert, Chinatsu.  The basic idea of Shinto, as I understand it is that every single thing has a spirit within it.  It is for that reason that people who believe in Shinto are very caring towards the world in general, from bugs and weeds to rocks and trees.  Chinatsu told me that around her house when she was little, there were lots of frogs and spiders.  Her mom told her to be kind to the spiders and the frogs, because the frogs were her grandma, and the spiders were her grandpa.  (It might have been the other way around, she said she forgot which was which, apparently the lesson didn't stick that hard!)  I thought that was pretty cool.  


When I say Ise Shrine, what I really mean is a sort of gathering of shrines centered on one main shrine called Naiku, which is dedicated to a Shinto goddess.  The whole gathering of shrines is set deep in the woods, and it is some of the most beautiful scenery I have ever scene.  The the entrance to the Shrine gathering is a bridge over a river, and the moment you cross the bridge, you step into a beautiful forrest.  The walk to Naiku is maybe fifteen minutes at a pretty slow pace, and you really wouldn't want to walk any faster.  I found myself stopping every few minutes to look around and see the massive trees or a smaller shrine off on a smaller path.  


Every shrine in Japan, as far as Chinatsu knew, is built in the traditional style using historical tools and methods.  Next to each shrine there is an open area of the same size as the Shrine itself.  This is there because every twenty years, every shrine is rebuilt out of new materials.  They do this in order to pass down the knowledge and craftsmanship from one generation of shrine builder to the next.  


Apparently, when Sydney comes to visit in January, I shouldn't bring her into the Shrine proper, because the goddess to whom the shrine is dedicated is apparently a very jealous woman.  She will make life very difficult for couples who visit the shrine together.  Also, within the shrine gathering area, there are a whole bunch of chickens!  My expert couldn't explain the origins of the chickens, by she did tell me that I shouldn't try and chase them or bother them at all.  I asked what would happen if I did, and she said that the main priest would be very unhappy with me.  I decided that I did not want to be responsible for the next big typhoon or earthquake that hit Mie Prefecture, so I left the chickens alone!  


All around the shrine area, there are wonderful little shops and things.  After we saw the shrine, we walked around the shop district and did the tourist thing for a while.  It was great!  The highlight of the shop district was a little place that sold locally brewed beers, and I was lucky enough to find a micro-brewed porter!  It was fantastic!  Also, we ate some clams, some Ise udon, and some green tea ice cream.  All in all, a fantastic day. 

Tsu Festival

I think that these weekend would be among the top qualifiers if I held a competition for most "Japanese" weekend.  I'll follow that sentence with a brief, situational definition of "Japanese."  In this case, I mean that I got to experience a whole lot of Japanese culture, and see what the people who live in Tsu city get up to when they throw a party.  


This was the weekend of Tsu's annual city festival.  It was cool to see how the city has slowly been preparing itself for the festival; watching the city's many industrious workers prune trees, clean sidewalks, hang banners, signs and flags, and generally scour the city for any unwanted dirt.  One thing is certain, Japanese festivals definitely win the cleanliness award!  The actual festival was amazing as well.  It was a two day shindig centered on the city hall and Phoenix street, which is one of the main thoroughfares in the city, and it featured Japanese dancers from all over Japan, and a wonderful variety of Japanese festival food.  As far as the former goes, Japanese dance is awesome.  The dancers themselves were crazy animated, and they all looked like they were having the time of their lives.  It was also really cool to see the wide range of ages in the dances.  Some of the dance groups were all university students, some were obaachans (old ladies, literally grandmas) some ojiichans (grandpas) and every once in a while, a couple a little kids!  The little kids were the best.  They were usually lost, hidden behind the legs of their elder compatriots, but whenever they made an appearance in the front row, they were most definitely the most entertaining people in the whole festival.  They also had really cool flags that they used in their dance routines! 


I also ate a ton of Japanese food!  The first day I kept it pretty basic, I ate various fried things, some chicken, and a pork chop sort of thing.  I also at some yakitori, which I believe is chicken.  The most interesting food experience was when I bought a kebab sandwich from a stand on the street.  The guy had the most excellent mustache, and he spoke fluent english, so we were chatting about the festival, and how we came to Japan.  As it turns out, the guy was from northern Iraq, and made several jokes (at least I hope they were jokes, other I owe the friend I shared the sandwich with an apology for getting her killed!) about poisoning my sandwich.  It made for an interesting lunch, let me tell you!


It has also been determined that I look like a Japanese cartoon character.  His name is Anpanman, and he is pretty awesome.  He is made out of bread, and he feeds hungry and needy people by breaking off bits of his own head and giving it to people.  Pretty cool, right??  Unfortunately, when he gives away too much of his head, he starts to get weak, and he can eventually die, I think.  Have no fear, though!  Anpanman is friends with a first-class baker who makes new Anpanman heads and replaces the diminished on when Anpanman starts to get too weak.  Anpanman's favorite means of disposing of his enemies is by "An-punch"-ing them.  I was skeptical at first, but I have grown fairly fond of the little guy.  He is also delicious.

The second day of my festival food adventure was a bit more... well.. adventurous.  I ate takoyaki for the first time, and it was... intimidating.  Tako means octopus, and takoyaki is a fried octopus ball.  As you can see in the picture to the right, they make no qualms about the contents of the little guys.  Honestly, they were pretty decent.  A bit chewy, but the taste was not so bad!  Karroll, if you're reading this, we are going to Osaka when you visit, and we are going to eat Takoyaki!  Osaka is the birthplace of takoyaki, as far as I have been informed.


Thats all for now folks, its off to bed!
Good night!!!

Japanese Lessons!

Exciting news!  I just observed a friend's private Japanese lessons, and if all goes well, I should be starting lessons of my own as soon as next week!  The lesson was quite interesting to watch, and it was a major confidence booster, because I actually understood a fair bit of what was going on, despite the fact that it was picking up about 2 lessons after where I stopped studying at SJU.  I have to call Ishikawa-sensei and have a longer conversation about what I want to get out of my Japanese lessons, and where I would like to start in the textbook, and that should happen relatively soon.  After that, we will decide when I can start, choose a day and time, and then I will officially be studying Japanese in Japan!  I'm very lucky, because Ishikawa-sensei lives fairly close to my apartment, and I can get to her house by bicycle relatively easy.  I could also take a train (and when it gets colder I probably will) because her home is quite near the next station down the line.  It will only cost about 150 yen to get there from OBC, and that is less than 2 dollars.  Life is good.


Apart from that, life in Japan has settled down quite nicely.  Work is going really well, and I am starting to get more and more comfortable living in this country.  At the beginning of October, our teaching schedules got solidified for the next six months or so, and I really enjoy almost all of my classes.  As soon as I finish writing this, I will be going back to OBC for the second part of my teaching day, and my first class will be two junior high kids, one boy and one girl.  This class might be my most difficult class, but not for the reasons you would expect.  The kids are both very smart, and their English comprehension is quite good.  The problem is one of motivation.  The girl is very busy with her school sports clubs (a common problem with Japanese school age kids) and she usually shows up to OBC about 15 minutes late.  The boy is self-described as timid, shy, and quiet.  It was actually kind of funny, I asked him to describe himself, and he got out the Japanese-English dictionary and specifically looked up the word timid.  Timid and self-aware seems like an uncommon characteristic for a 12 year old boy.  Both of the kids will do everything I ask them to do in class, and they usually do the work correctly, but as soon as I ask them to be loud, creative, or anything besides just sitting there, I hit a wall.  We're working on it though, and I am trying to make them do more creative activities and get comfortable being silly.


My last two classes today are both low level adult.  The first adult class is one man who just recently got married, and a woman of about 50 years or so.  They make a pretty decent class, and they seem to get along with each other as well as can be expected given the age gap.  Both of them are learning English as a hobby, so they both enjoy coming to their lessons, which is always nice.  My last class of the day is interesting.  It is two women a little older then me, maybe 25 years old or so.  They are easily my least punctual class, and sometimes they show up as much as a half hour late, or they don't come at all.  When they do come though, they are my noisiest adult class by far.  They are both super excited to come to OBC, and they love to talk, both in English and Japanese.  Sydney, skip this next sentence please!  It doesn't hurt that they are both pretty cute!  Sorry Sydney, I love you!!  That class always makes for an interesting end of the work day.


Outside of OBC, I've been doing as many things as I can.  I have sort of adopted a new habit of saying yes to everything I can.  So far, it has worked out pretty well.  In the last couple of weeks, I have gone to Osaka and Nagoya, I have gone surfing, I went to a theme park, and too many other small adventures to count.  In some ways, it feels like I'm not really doing anything worth writing home about (which is why I haven't posted anything in so long) but when I stop to think about it, I have been all over Mie and I have done a lot of really wonderful things lately.  Life in general is pretty wonderful over here, and it is finally starting to feel like I live here.  That on its own seems like a pretty grand accomplishment!

Japan in a Story

I feel like my life in Japan can be fairly adequately summed up by the first half of my day today.  It started out just like any other day in Japan.  I was heading to work on a Saturday morning during a typhoon, and I realized that Japan is a crazy place.  Case in point, I was biking to working during a freakin' typhoon!  That all went pretty successfully, given that as I was biking I was simultaneously talking a cell phone, contributing to the several near death experiences that I encountered on my commute.  I made it to work in one piece, a little sodden, but none worse for wear.  Since it was a Saturday morning, I only have one class, a mid-level adult class with four students.  Now, I new one of the students was going to absent ahead of time, but I was still planning on teaching three people this morning.  I got to work about 40 minutes before class was scheduled to start, because I didn't know exactly how much the typhoon would delay me, and I got my lesson planned nice and early, giving me plenty of time to relax and dry off before I had to go teach.  Turns out that i needn't have bothered planning the lesson, because none of the other three students that were supposed to show came to OBC.  There is nothing like waking up after a night at the bar, leaving your house during a typhoon, and getting stood up by your students on a Saturday morning.

The next part of my day was substantially better.  John and I biked out to the Uni Qlo which is essentially Old Navy and bought some new T-shirts and I bought a hat.  The first two typhoons of the season brought lovely weather after they passed, but this one clearly missed the memo, because it was ungodly hot and humid this afternoon.  After the clothes shopping, John and I stopped off at the supermarket to pick up some stuff to make guacamole for Sarah's upcoming birthday party, and to stock up on "party supplies" also known as booze.  We bought all the stuff for guac, and realized that there was not a single tortilla chip to be found in the entire supermarket.  We called around, and found out that tortilla chips are only sold in the YaMaYa stores (foreign food stores), and the nearest one of those was two stops down the train line.  At this point, we were committed to the whole guac idea, so we had to go in search of the chips.  Actually, John had to teach at 5:00, so I went in search for the chips.  All I had to go on for directions were, "its in Hisai, and its about a ten minute walk from the station, but I can't remember if you turn right THEN walk ten minutes, or if you walk ten minutes THEN turn right."

So, I rode my bike to Tsusimmachi station near my house, rode the train to Hisai Station, and started walking.  After stopping to ask for directions at a Circle K, I eventually found the YaMaYa and bought 6 bags of tortilla chips, because I did not want to run out half way through the party!  The plus side to this excursion was that I found out that the foreign foods store also sells Guinness, so I bough a bottle and drank it on my way back to the station.  (open bottle is legit in Japan as long as you aren't driving!)

I guess the moral of this story is that some things that expect to be really difficult in Japan, like asking for directions actually turn out to be a lot less difficult that going to the grocery store to buy tortilla chips.  Its a crazy country.

Peace and whatnot,
Andrew!

I have no idea what to title this blog, mostly because I meant to post this two weeks ago right after my last post, but I keep getting so caught up in this whole being in Japan thing that writing sort of takes a back seat.  So let me start by apologizing to those who I don't get to talk to very regularly and rely on this blog to keep you up to date on my time here in Japan.  I really am sorry!  As always, the best way to keep up is to stalk the ol' Facebook, but I will try to keep this going more regularly as well.

The one thing that the last couple of weeks have taught me is that I am very lucky that I don't work until 5:00 p.m. on Mondays.  Last weekend can serve as a perfect example.  I went to a friend's sayonara party in Nagoya on saturday night, which entailed getting about 3 hours of sleep, and then Sunday I went with some other friends to a river near Tsu where we went swimming and cliff jumping for 5 hours, then we went to another party for a different friend who was celebrating his 15th anniversary of being in Japan!  I am very very fortunate that my Mondays start so wonderfully late.  I know it is super lame to be complaining about going to so many parties, but as a wise woman once said, "the life of a socialite is hard!"  *Sarah Haugen, I hope you're reading this someday.

I am also at a loss for words to describe the rest of the stuff we have been doing here.  I don't think that I have ever typed that sentence before!  I have met more people than I ever thought possible, and most of them have been pretty great.  I have been to some truly beautiful places, and I have gotten to see a lot of Mie-ken thanks to the great friends that I have made here, and I'm really very lucky in all of this.

I'm going to keep this short, and simply say the weekend ended on a fantastic note.  My mom sent me a box full of American candy and cereal!  It also had some wonderful Dove soap.  My mom is the best.  Hands down.

Good night and good luck!

Andrew

One Hell of a Weekend, and Some Other Stuff

Two weeks have passed since my last post, and I haven't waited so long before writing because I had nothing to write about!  These last two weeks have literally been insane.  On the work related end of things, the old OBC teachers have left, and John and I have been teaching classes on our own for good while now.  Little shout-out to the Angela and Peter, for doing such a great job prepping for this, I only feel like going crazy planning all of these lessons once in a while now, instead of all the time.  So, thanks!!

Apart from getting used to teaching, it has been truly excellent to get to know my students a lot better in and out of class.  Especially outside of class.  My Wednesday night class took me out to dinner after class last week, and it was really cool to get to talk about things other than our textbook and news items.  We went to a kaiten-sushi place near my house, and my three students (all of whom are adults, married and whatnot) had a great time explaining all the little sushi dishes and what was what and good or bad.  They also thought it was hilarious to watch me eat all this stuff that I had never had before!  I think they got the strangest stuff just to watch me try and eat it.  I had a sushi roll filled with what they told me was crab brains.  I was skeptical at first, but as soon as it arrived, it definitely smelled exactly like I would imagine crab brains would smell like.  It also tasted exactly like what you would imagine crab brains would taste like.  Not so good.  Everything else was pretty good.  It was a evening all around.  Especially because I had been struggling to figure out what sort of topics that class liked and I finally found a couple of things they enjoyed discussing.  All around good evening.

On the not-exactly-work-related side of things, we have definitely been keeping busy!  This Monday, August 15th, is a special day in Buddhism.  It is the day of Obon in Japan, I don't know if they only have this day here, or if it is practiced in other Buddhist countries, but it is something of a big deal here.  It is a day not entirely unlike the Dia de los Muertos in Mexico, as far as I have been able to understand.  Similar in idea, but different in practice.  The Dia de los Muertos is a festival, a celebration when ancestors' spirits return to their homes.  Obon is the same idea, where families gather in cemeteries and at the their homes and temples to rejoin their ancestors' spirits.  However, from what I have gathered, it is much less festive than its Mexican counterpart.  It is an interesting practice.  Anyway, OBC is closed for the Obon holiday, and we got Thursday through Sunday off of work.  So, John, Sarah and I took a holiday!

Omiya town.  Real exciting place!

It was truly great to get a vacation, even though we have really only been teaching for less than a month.  We decided to make our trip small and cheap, since John and I still don't have any money, and we didn't want to travel too far.  We settled on the destination of おみやーちょ、or Omiya-town, which is south of Tsu City, but still in Mie.  It is a very small town that is well known as a cycling destination.  Actually, it was a lot like Lanesboro, MN if Lanesboro were in Japan.  Very small tourist town for bicyclers.  I was going to try and find a picture of the town, but it doesn't even show up on google maps!  This picture is the best one I have.   Omiya itself might not have been the most exciting city in the world, but us OBCers know how to make everything interesting, even what should have been a simple single switch train ride to the city!  We were supposed to take a JR line train from the town of Taki to Takihara station which is in Omiya.  Well, all we really had to go on was a small map and Sarah's iPhone.  We made it Taki, and switched trains, and we were all sorts of excited to get to Omiya.  Well, we were listening to the train conductor as he announced the stops, and we got off when we heard our destination called.  We walked according to out map in the direction of our hotel, but we couldn't find it anywhere in this town!  We stopped into a convenience store to get some water and ask for directions, and we were told after much hand gestures and confused looks that we were about 30 minutes from our hotel by car.  We got off at the wrong station!  Our conductor had said TaCHihara, not TaKihara.  So, we had to go back to the train station, and wait for the next train.  TaCHihara is tiny, and the trains don't run very often, so we ended up sitting at an empty train station in Tachihara for close to two hours!

Our view dow the line
as we waited for a train.

The torturous river.

We eventually got a train and made it to Omiya, and found our hotel, and were so worn out by the day that we didn't even want to leave our hotel room!  It was close to 100 degrees outside, and our room was the only air conditioned part of the hotel.  In an unexpected development, the hotel only had a traditional bath, which meant communal shower and bathtub.  It was interesting to say the least.  The bath was pretty nice though.  Hadn't taken a bath in a long time!  The next day, we rented bikes and decided to go for a ride, which might not have been the best idea, given that it was about a thousand degrees again, but we did it anyway.  We struck out downhill, which I thought might have been a bad idea as well, but it was what it was.  We cruised along for about 15 miles along this gorgeous river that was further down the mountain than we could get to from our road.  If I had to choose a situation to define what I think Hell would be like, I think that would be close to it.  We were so hot and sweaty and this beautiful blue river wound its way just out of our reach.  It was beautiful and horrible at the same time.  But it wasn't all bad.  As we started to turn back towards out hotel, we found a place were we could climb down into a smaller creek/stream, and cool off for a while.  It was so astoundingly wonderful, that words can't come close to doing it justice.

Sarah and I at what we thought was
the summit.  We were wrong...

The bike ride ended up being pretty cool, except for the last mile or so, which was essentially reclaiming all the elevation we had been losing during the first 15 miles.  So that was difficult, but we made it, and didn't even die or anything!

So we survived our vacation!

Check back in later for Obon vacation part 2!

All the best!