Jen in Japan

New Year's Etegami

2012-01-02T16:45:00.001-08:00

A year ago today

2011-08-10T17:00:00.000-07:00

I moved home from Japan. I never did blog about it. I think that was because I was so emotionally numb at the time. It almost didn't seem real. I had spent the whole last year I was there counting down the days until I could come home since after Nate left and my close friend Marie got a full time job I was pretty lonely. I hurt my shoulder that last year and was pretty miserable with that as well.

Then the closer I got to the date the more I realized how much I really did love Tahara. I spent weeks saying goodbyes - to friends, to students, and to co-workers. I cried only a little at my favorite elementary school. I didn't shed a tear until my very last day when I gave my goodbye speech at Tahara Junior High. I sobbed on the walk home, but even then I still had three weeks to spend with friends.

I packed, traveled, cleaned, went paragliding, took a weekend trip to Osaka and Kobe, biked to the beach, cleaned some more, had several goodbye parties, and met with the mayor to take my official leave. Finally it was time to go.

Goodbye party with friends. I also had one with the International Association and the Board of Education. I didn't cry at any of them, even when I was giving my little speech that Marie helped me compose.

My supervisor from city hall met me at the station to give me one last goodbye present (this time from her rather than the BOE.) All of my friends who didn't work that day (and a few who did but took nenkyuu) escorted me all the way to the airport. It was a party atmosphere on the train with Sue taking pictures and me passing around a last minute address book for them to fill out. We got there super early and checked in. I was excited to see on my boarding pass that I had an exit row seat. We walked around at the shops some and went out to the observation deck. My friends Sue and Masako kept pretending to steal my passport so I wouldn't be able to leave. I remember being nervous about getting through security with enough time to get to the gate.

Bob, Saori, Sue, Me, Miwa, Kaoru, and Masako

And then it was time to go. I said goodbye at the entrance to the security line. And that's when I finally began to cry. I gave them each a big American hug and we all made promises to keep in touch (which with Facebook we've done a pretty good job.) I didn't stop until I was at my gate. I'm sure the man in immigration thought I was nuts as I handed over my gaijin card with tears in my eyes.

You can't tell in this picture but I'm crying pretty steadily.

Once on the plane I realized that my seat was not in the exit row but behind it on top of it being a middle seat. Any other time I would have been more annoyed than I was but I was distracted. I was fine for awhile but almost as soon as I got settled in I started crying again. The people around me politely ignored my sniffling.

My friends actually waited around and waved goodbye as my plane taxied and took off. I couldn't see them waving but I suspect I started crying again right around when this picture was taken.

It was hard to balance the sadness of leaving with the joy of going home and at some point my emotions just switched off. I know they did because the man sitting next to me had a baby who cried and who he kept getting up with, jostling my seat every time, or who he would rock, also rocking me and I didn't get annoyed. Normally I would have been very irritated by the middle seat, no exit row, and a crying baby but I didn't feel anything. I just slept the best I could, watched a movie, and listened to my podcasts.

There I go

I landed in Detroit, got through immigration and customs fairly simply. I remember chatting with a grandpa and his two young grandsons while I waited for my flight to Cincy. And then I was home, hugging my mom, dad, sister and nephew. My mom and sister had fought over who got to hug me first (my sister won out.)

This last year at home hasn't always been easy (is moving back in with your parents in your late 20s ever easy) but I don't regret my decision. It was time but I still miss Tahara. I miss my friends. I miss my students. I miss being able to walk everywhere. I miss hiking up Zao-san or in Takigashirakoen. I miss the Pacific Ocean. I miss Japanese food. I miss onsens. I miss being a rockstar. And living by myself.

On the other hand I love seeing my family all the time, especially my new niece and nephew. I'm not missing anything like I did with my other nephew. I love re-connecting with my friends here. I love my bed. And driving my car. And the ease in simple tasks like shopping, getting my hair cut, or going to the pharmacy.

Travel is my passion but it comes with its own setbacks. It widens your horizons but then you know what you're missing. No matter where I am I don't quite fit in because I'm always missing somewhere else. Tahara is truly my daini no furusato or second home. My plan is to go back next spring for a visit (the first of many I hope.)

Paris - Days Six and Seven

2011-08-07T15:39:00.001-07:00

Day Six - We got up early again which with jet lag still lingering was just barely tolerable to the Roommate and headed to Giverny to see Monet's home and famous gardens. You have to take a train and then either a shuttle bus, taxi, or bike the rest of the way. I was hoping to bike through the countryside but the Roommate had twisted her knee early in the week (we suspect on the stairs up Notre Dame) and was in no condition to bike. The shuttle bus got us there faster and without the possibility of getting lost. We wandered around the small town, had some coffee and a snack before heading to the main attraction. What to say about Monet's garden other than it was one of the absolute highlights of the trip. We had seen the paintings in Paris and seeing its inspiration was amazing. I'm not sure which is more beautiful.

After crowding on a train full of like minded tourists we took a nap at the hotel before heading out for the night. We took in dinner, dessert, and the view of Paris atop Montmartre. Then we wandered around and down through Pigalle to see the Moulin Rouge. We finished the night off with drinks at the bar next door to the hotel. I'm missing those photos since they were on the Roommate's camera and she has yet to give me her pictures, being a perfectionist and going through them all and "fixing" them in Photoshop. She's much more artsy than me - hence the many many art museums we visited.

At Monet's home in Giverny

Inspiration

And masterpiece

Day Seven - Our last day in Paris we took a train to Chartres. I even managed to buy the train tickets in French, well except for the number 28. For the life of me I couldn't come up with the right word and it came up twice in the conversation. My French is almost non-existent these days. Sad since I was getting fairly proficient in 2005 when I spent almost a year in Burgundy. Oh well, Japanese and Spanish are crowding it out. I hope to come back to it one day.

It was spitting rain when we arrived in Chartres but we didn't let it get us down. We visited the famous gothic cathedral, had a delicious lunch, and wandered around the medieval town. We got lost several times but at least once it worked out in that we stopped at a shop selling nothing but macaroons. There are no pictures because we ate them too quickly and we were very sad to have discovered them our last day in Paris. I've since discovered the one and only bakery in Cincinnati where you can buy them - not quite as good but the best I can do without buying a plane ticket to France.

Back from Chartres we finished up our trip with a night bike tour. We started at the Eiffel Tower and rode all through Paris, stopping for gelato near Notre Dame, pedaling past L'Academie Francaise and the Louvre, before catching a cruise down the Seine. We biked back to the Eiffel Tower just in time to watch it sparkle.

Chartres was built in 30 years amazing quick for the time period so it's a pretty pure example of Gothic architecture.

The veil of Mary. This relic has made this a pilgrimage site for hundreds of years.

I was most excited to see the Labyrinth on the cathedral floor - only to find it covered up by chairs!

Outside the cathedral.

Around the medival part of town.

On the bike tour.

Behind Notre Dame

A new tradition is to come to this bridge near Notre Dame with your lover, lock a lock on the bridge, and throw the key into the Seine.

Sunset at the Louvre

Getting artsy on our river cruise

And that was our trip. Absolutely exhausting, filled a little too much with art and not enough wine in my opinion, but I got my fill of espresso and French food, and a great time with my best friend. Now I just have to convince her to go to Japan with me next spring.

Goodbye Paris!

Paris - Days Four and Five

2011-08-07T14:48:00.000-07:00

Day Four - was another day of museums. We started out back at the Louvre. We'd already seen the Mona Lisa and the Italian wing so we started out in the Middle Eastern and Egyptian wings before lunch. After four hours of wandering through the castle (and one worrisome 30 minutes where we got separated) we headed out to the Tulieries for a yummy lunch bought from a cart and eaten picnic style in the gardens. We did some geocaching too. The Roommate even ducked behind some official looking tape cordoning off one corner of the Louvre courtyard to grab one.

Then it was down to the other end of the gardens for a quick visit in L'Orangerie to see Money's Water Lilies. We got soaked in a sudden downpour looking for another cache. Then got a coffee, did a little shopping, and headed back to the Louvre so the Roommate could check out the Flemish wing while I sat and read. We finished the night out by taking the metro up to the Arc d'Triomphe where we climbed the steps to the top. I'm not sure cramming all that in one day was really wise. We were both pretty tired at the end of the day but we definitely got our money's worth out of our museum passes.

Hammurabi's Code

Aphrodite. It was surrounded by a horde of tourists.

Outside the Louvre

Monet's Water Lilies - displayed in two rooms especially designed for them.

View from the Arc d'Triomphe

Day Five - we got up early; no mean feat for the Roommate to take the train out to Versailles. We got there fairly early but still waited 45 minutes to get in. Once in there we experienced a crush rivaled only by the Taxi Line of Doom in Beijing. After escaping the palace we wandered through the gardens. It was the weekend for the Musical Fountains so even though our museum passes were supposed to get us in for free we had to pay the 8 euros for the "pleasure" of them turning the fountains on full and playing classical music over the loudspeaker. Neither of us thought it was worth the money, but the gardens were still beautiful and we did some more geocaching. We even met a French cacher from Paris!

Then it was back to Paris where we had dinner, bought some souvenirs, and then headed to the Pompideu. The museum had great views of the city, just as good as Notre Dame and the Arc d'Triomphe.

In the Hall of Mirrors

Gardens of Versailles

A sculpture on the roof of the Pompideu with Sacre Coeur in the background.

Next up: Monet's gardens, Chartres, and a bike tour through Paris.

For a friend's birthday

2011-07-27T17:11:00.000-07:00

The Account Manager I support at work loves art and of anyone I've shown my etegami to is the most supportive and excited. She told me months ago that she expected me to paint her something so I've done her one better - I've made her a whole stash of miniature blank cards to give away or keep for herself. Here are a few in the batch.

Paris - Days One to Three

2011-07-16T09:07:00.001-07:00

Day One: Roommate did a really good job of buying tickets and selecting seats so we had a row by the window to ourselves on the way over. It was really nice to be traveling "with" someone rather than just traveling to meet someone.

We arrived in Paris early in the morning, made our way to our hotel, dropped off our bags since it was too early to check in and then headed out. We enjoyed some espresso and a croissant sitting at the bottom of the hill near Sacre Coeur, ate a picnic lunch under the Eiffel Tower, walked the Champs Elysees, drank more espresso, checked out the Place de la Concorde, and then called it a day. We headed to bed early since we had had only 4 hours sleep on the plane the night before.

Sacre Coeur - very near our hotel. We actually requested a room with a view but either we were too late or the guy in reception didn't understand.

Eiffel Tower.

Arc d'Triomphe

Day Two: We headed out early to see Saint Chapelle which although I have been to Paris several times had never seen. Here's a tip - don't leave this off your list. It is a must see and the Roommate's favorite place we saw the entire trip. (Mine too after coffee and French food.) Then it was across the way to Notre Dame where we waited in line to get in the church and then a 2 hour wait to go up to see the gargoyles. Both were worth the wait but since I have never been to Paris during the high season I was a little annoyed by the lines everywhere we went. If you don't want lines visit Paris in the winter. If you want nice weather and flowers then be prepared to stand in line. After Notre Dame we wandered around the Latin Quarter and visited the Musee de Moyenne Age where we saw the Lady and the Unicorn tapestries. Since we had a Paris Museum Pass we did a quick stop at the Louvre to see the Mona Lisa and Victory before we headed back to the hotel and fell into bed. The whole six days were non-stop and filled with little else other than art museums and espresso at sidewalk cafes.

Saint Chapelle - Downstairs

And upstairs. The stained glass was amazing.

The floor of the chapel.

Me and the roommate

The view from Notre Dame

The Lady and the Unicorn - Touch. I had tried to get to this museum when I'd been in Paris before and never made it so I was super happy I finally got to see these. They really are stunning although it's hard to take good pictures. They have to keep the light level very low to preserve the color.

The Roommate was there for the art - I was there for the food.

A Canadian bookshop in the Latin Quarter with more books than shelf space.

Victory

Day Three: We hit the Musee Rodin (where we saw the famous statue The Thinker) and the Musee d'Orsay. The weather was cold and rainy so it was a great day for being inside. We had scheduled a bike tour that evening but we weren't attired for the rain and the cold so they took pity on us and let us reschedule to later in the week.

I wonder what he's contemplating.

Next Up: The Louvre, l'Orangerie, Musee Pompideu, Giverny, and Chartres

To bee or not to bee

2011-07-05T18:47:00.000-07:00

I've been a bit obsessed with bees lately. This latest card is made with a piece of a brown paper bag from the grocery torn and pasted to a watercolor card.

Summer Etegami

2011-06-28T18:50:00.000-07:00

No more summer breaks for this working girl but I like to take a coffee break every day at 2:30. We have beautiful purple hyacinths outside the windows I pass by on my way to the cafeteria and there are lots of busy bees hovering around this time of year. Those bees inspired this etegami that says I look forward to summer.

Jaa ne

2011-03-13T07:15:00.001-07:00

I've been trying to introduce some Japanese words to my 3 year old nephew's vocabulary. Supposedly this is the best time to learn a second language because his baby brain is still developing but he gets pretty upset when I tell him something is a different word so that we have some version of this conversation over and over.

Me: *points at a tree* Ki. Sore wa ki.

Nephew: Noooooo, that's a tree!

Me: Ki.

Nephew: Treeee!

Having two words for the same thing just isn't jiving right now so I decided to just stick with a few phrases. He already knew oishii (delicious) and the next phrase I tried to teach him was jaa ne (see you later). For the longest time I would say jaa ne when they would leave and wave. He always answered back with his name. We couldn't figure it out. It finally dawned on us that he thought I was saying Jenny (I am Aunt Jenny after all) so he said his name.

He's just stopped doing that and was finally saying jaa ne back. Well, really it still sounded like Jenny but it was progress. Until yesterday when Mom said jaa ne as they were leaving and he responded with a confused look, "No you're Nana."

Maybe Japanese lessons need to be put on hold until he gets a better handle on English.

More etegami

2010-12-11T12:04:00.000-08:00

Here are my latest etegami. It's a winter series and I wrote in Japanese this time. It's probably not correct Japanese since I'm out of practice but it's my best effort using my dictionary and the internet. I'm sending these to my friend Marie. I sent the first one already and I'll send the last two a few days from now staggered so she gets them at different times.

I just realized my scanner chopped off the bottom of this one but it says "It's getting colder and colder"

"Don't catch a cold!"

"Warm hands and a warm heart."

My latest hobby

2010-12-05T11:29:00.000-08:00

Right before I left Japan I got really interested in etegami. It's a kind of Japanese folk art. The word "e" means picture and "tegami" is letter so "etegami" is picture letter. Really they are postcards.

I love postcards. Ever since I was a little girl I have collected post cards. I have hundreds from everywhere I've traveled, some from you here on my flist, and a large selection of old postcards my grandmother gave me when she cleaned out her desk. My favorites are the ones my grandpa sent from Germany when he was stationed there in the 50's. So postcard art is right up my alley.

Etegami has several components. First you ink in the outline. Sumi ink is traditional You hold the brush at the very top. It makes it very hard to draw precisely that way but you end up with what is called a "living line." Second you lay in the color with gansai water colors. Then you add words - a saying or a phrase that goes along with the picture. Then you put your stamp on it. I use the smaller of my two stamps that my calligraphy teacher, Maeda-sensei, made for me.

Finally, and this is the most important part, you give the postcard to someone. A little old lady in Kobe told me "it's not etegami unless you give it away." I love getting mail and I hope the people I send them to like getting mail too. So far it has already prompted a nice long email from my friend still living in Japan.

Below are a few samples of what I've drawn and also ones that Marie painted and sent me before I left Japan this summer. She helped me find a book to bring home and I bought most of the supplies before I left since they are much harder to find here in the States. I did a bunch that were fall and Halloween themed and sent them to friends.

I made this one for the Roommate.

And then I gave her this one the next day.

You and me are like cherries - Marie gave me this one.

Let's go eat delicious sushi - Marie gave me this one.

Larry Travels the World

2010-11-13T09:07:00.000-08:00

Many years ago - almost ten now - my sister and I got a Larry the Cucumber for Christmas. I don't remember how soon after we started taking pictures of Larry but it wasn't long before he was all over town. From there it was a very short step to taking him along on vacation and my many trips around the world. Since I've lived in France and then Japan, Larry has had the opportunity to have his picture snapped all over Europe and Asia.

This is the work of nearly 8 years and you can see where at the beginning I didn't have a digital camera (or the ability to get anything focused correctly.) Here are just a sampling. You can see the rest in my Flickr set here.

At the grocery store in town.

In London

In Paris

In Rome

In Sydney

In Beijing

On the Great Wall

In Tokyo

Near Mt. Fuji

The other reason I came home

2010-10-14T17:38:00.001-07:00

Painting with my three year old nephew.

Or rather painting on my three year old nephew.

2010-10-02T16:23:00.000-07:00

This is why I came home.

Introducing Bob. Not her real name of course but since my dad calls me and my sisters Joe he has decided that the grandkids will all be Bob. This is so he doesn't have to remember anyone's name at any given point in time. They are either Joe or Bob.

This Bob was five weeks early and spent most of last week in the ICU because she couldn't keep her temperature regulated but she's finally home with her older brother Bob who still doesn't know what to make of her. Being two and obsessed with Thomas the Train he has dubbed her Salty. I kind of hope that one sticks because I think it's hilarious.

Yukatta party

2010-09-06T10:29:00.000-07:00

Somewhere between paragliding, a trip to Osaka, goodbye parties, and packing to come home, my girlfriends and I had a yukatta and hanabi party. There wasn't a festival going on nearby before I left so we decided to make our own.

We met at my house and then headed to the arcade to take purikura pictures in our summer kimonos (called yukatta) and then we went out by the water where we set off fireworks. It was really windy so we couldn't get them lit without some effort and then we had to be careful that no one caught on fire. (No one did thank goodness.) My friend Sue's goal was to "make a good memory" and get some picture of dressed up. Mission accomplished.

Paragliding

2010-08-04T19:17:00.001-07:00

I'm bogged down in cleaning, packing, and going to sayonara parties at the moment. But last week when I was chilling and only thinking of packing/cleaning/sayonara partying I decided to get something off my want-to-do list for here in Tahara and that was go paragliding. I'd caught glimpses of paragliders in Takigashira Park and near Mt. Zao and I've always been intrigued. I finally convinced my friend Sue to go with me and she was very kind to do all the research, scheduling, and translating safety instructions for me.

The first day we tried to go the wind wasn't so good so we had to wait a long time. I didn't really mind because we were in the shade, there was a breeze (even if it wasn't good for flying) and we had a spectacular view of the Pacific. We ended up getting to go finally but it was only for 10 minutes. We paid the guy but he said we could come back another day for free since we really hadn't gotten our money's worth.

So the next day we tried again. This time the only waiting was for Sue to finish her turn. Then I went for over an hour and a half. We flew a total of 22 kilometers - from the launch point in Toyohashi all the way down to Tahara. This was quite the deal since at the rate we paid we were only supposed to be up for 30 minutes. And I think I paid less than advertised because either the guy doesn't know how to make change or he gave me a discount because I'm foreign and/or the wind wasn't good the first day. Either way I was definitely a satisfied customer!

An hour and a half ended up being a little too long actually since my legs were starting to cramp from not being able to move but it was worth it. Great views and it was oddly relaxing. It wasn't jarring at all (even the landing) and I tended to forget that we were 100m in the air until I looked down to see my feet dangling.

Ready to go.

Looking down.

The amazing view.

3 weeks left

2010-07-20T03:38:00.000-07:00

I was a little leery of giving myself 3 weeks after I finished school before coming home but I'm starting to think 3 weeks is exactly what I need. I was afraid I would be bored but now I can pack at leisure and spend lots of time with my friends before I go.

I rode my bike to the beach yesterday and then met Sue, Saori, and Miwa for dinner. At one point they all had their calendars out while we planned multiple events with me before I go back. We're going to karaoke on Friday. Once we realized there are no festivals nearby before I go back we decided to have our own yukatta party here in Tahara. We're going to dress up, go to the beach and set off fireworks and then maybe hit up some more karaoke. (I need copious amounts of karaoke before I return home.)

Today I went to the beach again with my friend Miyuki and her husband. Friday and Saturday my friend Danielle is coming to stay and we are going to try and bike down to the end of peninsula. I might be going to a festival on Sunday in Toyota and my friend Allison also wants to come and stay. I have lots planned with Marie. There is a sayonara party to go to with the Board of Education and I have a meeting with the mayor before I go as well. I don't know why I thought I was going to be bored these three weeks. I'll be lucky to have a moment's peace honestly.

Sue and Saori are even going to take me to the airport the day I leave. This of course means there is no chance I won't be absolutely sobbing when I go but I just feel so blessed to have such amazing friends here.

2010-07-19T19:30:00.000-07:00

My last day of work was on Friday. I taught four classes, had lunch, gave a speech to the 9th grade and then went home. I really didn't think I was going to cry. I only teared up a little at Tobu-sho, my favorite school two weeks ago. And I didn't cry a single tear at Tobu-chu, Takamatsu-sho, or Okusa-sho.

Each of those schools had short ceremonies where I gave a speech and they presented me with a book where all the students had written me cute little messages that all said the same thing. (Thank you for always teaching me English. Your classes/games were very fun.)

Tobu-chu's student message was funny in that it mentioned the lesson where I talked about the differences between American bathrooms and Japanese bathrooms. Apparently the radical idea of the shower and toilet being in the same room had the most impact in three years.

At Okusa-sho we didn't really have a ceremony but we spent what normally would have been class time playing dodgeball (American rules because I've never quite understood the Japanese version) and then playing water basketball in the pool.

And during none of this did I shed a tear.

Then I gave my very last speech to a group of students who have been with me almost since I got here. Yusuke and Taiki who used to throw themselves on the floor if they couldn't answer "What sports do you play? during the Q&A warmup. When they could answer they shouted as loud as they could "I PLAY BASEBALL!" And the boys in 3A who spent last week asking me to sleep with them. And Koyo whose name tag said "Koyo da yo!" And Sachiko whose English was always very good and whose sister Ayako I taught before too. Touru, Akinori, Rino, Manami...and dozens more whose names I never remembered because I taught 1200 students a month. They presented me with a picture book and beautiful yukatta. I gave the speech in English and then I read it in Japanese. It wasn't until I was reading the Japanese that I started crying.

三年間楽しかったです。最初は日本語がぜんぜん分かりませんでしたでもみんなとても親切にしてくれました。ありがとうございました！私は日本語の勉強がんばりましたそしてあなたたちは英語の勉強がんばりました。だからcommunicationとることができました。あなたたちと話すことが楽しかったです。もうすぐアメリカに帰りますけど田原中学校のことをぜったい忘れません。

The last 3 years have been fun. At first I didn't speak any Japanese but you all were so kind to me. Thank you! I studied Japanese hard and you studied English hard and then we could communicate. I had fun talking with you. Soon I'll go back to America but I'll never forget Tahara Junior High.

I managed to only sniffle when I said goodbye in the teacher's room but I cried all the way home. I can't believe I'm really done. I have the sense that I'm doing the right thing even though I don't have anything lined up next but I have really enjoyed my three years here and even though sometimes I could get so frustrated with being in Japan I always had fun with the students.

Would you like to...

2010-07-13T03:58:00.000-07:00

This is what I've been teaching to the 9th graders this week and last. P.28 of the New Horizon textbook where Judy asks Shin to go to a rock concert with her on Sunday. They're meeting in front of the station at 1:30. I've convinced most of the students that Judy is really asking Shin on a date. One of my teachers pointed out that Mike and Emi are probably a couple as well since they went on a picnic together in the 7th grade textbook - famous for the line "Oh! My cola!" (Don't worry Emi wiped up the spill with her hankie.)

We tried motivating them by telling them this is very useful English to use on cute foreigners. The unfortunate side effect however is that several of the boys have decided to practice on me. I love my students and there are several of the boys who if I were 14 I would be in love with. But I'm not 14. I'm 28 and their English teacher so when Kazuki asked me if I would like to come to his "Go to bed early party. It very enjoy," I threw my pen at him and told him "No!" and then a calmer "I'm sorry I can't. I'm busy." per the dialogue.

That was last week at Tobu JHS. This week at Tahara JHS I had 2 "Would you like to sleep with me?" 1 "Would you like to go to bed with me?" and 1 creative "Would you like to make a baby?" And I'm only half done with the 9th grade. I didn't realize my last week of teaching in Japan would consist of being repeatedly propositioned by 15 year old boys.

It reminds me of the time I was in a supermarket in Lyon, France and a teenage boy informed me that he had a "big tick." He seemed quite proud and repeated it over and over. I told him he should probably get that checked out by a doctor. At least my Japanese students are using correct English and polite English at that. One thing you can count on the world over though is that junior high school boys are all the same

Tanabata

2010-07-06T23:20:00.000-07:00

It's July 7th - the seventh day of the seventh month - which means it's Tanabata.

Tanabata is a Japanese version of an old Chinese myth. A weaver princess named Orihime and a cow herder Hikoboshi fell in love but they never got any of their work done so they were banished to opposite sides of the Amanogawa (Milky Way.) They are only allowed to meet once a year on the seventh day of the seventh month.

To celebrate Tanabata people write their wishes on long strips of colorful paper and then hang them on bamboo poles. The poles are also decorated with streamers and other ornaments. In Tahara lining the Hanatoki-dori there are bamboo poles filled with wishes. The tables at Centfaire where the high schoolers hang out in the evening also have decorations.

I wrote my wish last week at Takamatsu Elementary. The teachers wouldn't let me write it in English so I had to do my best in Japanese. I wrote it in pencil first, then Suzue-sensei corrected it for me and then I wrote in pen. You can see it below. It says raigetsu america ni kaerimasu kedo mata nihon ni modoritai desu. That translates to "Next month I'm going home to America but someday I hope to come back to Japan."

The only thing is that if it rains then they can't meet and they have to wait an entire year for another chance. I'm afraid poor Orihime and Hikoboshi won't meet this year since it was pouring buckets the last time I looked out the window. I hope that doesn't affect my wish because I really do want to come back to Tahara someday. Either way, Happy Tanabata everyone!

BBQ Party

2010-07-03T22:58:00.000-07:00

Happy Independence Day! I celebrated with a BBQ in the park. Actually it was a sayonara party for me thrown by the Tahara International Association but we fixed hamburgers, hot dogs, and threw water balloons so I could almost pretend it was a real 4th of July party.

They advertised the party in the paper and with a flier to the schools so quite a few of my students showed up. I'll see some of them again in the last two weeks of school but the students from Tobu Elementary already had their last class with me so today was our last-last goodbye. I'm really glad we had one last chance to have some fun together.

I think my friend Emiko had more of a structured plan at the beginning but it ended up being low key and relaxed. The water balloons for the water balloon toss ended up being broken before we could play any games with them but with most of the kids soaked they didn't really care. Some of us played the shingo game (also known as Red Light, Green Light) which I taught them how to play in school last year. After hamburgers and hot dogs we made s'mores. At the end they gave me a present, I sang My Old Kentucky Home one last time, and we took a group photo. I had a great time. Throw in an afternoon nap and this could be the perfect Sunday.

Some of my 3rd graders (and 1 kindergartener)

We were supposed to do a water balloon toss but the kids broke them all before we could. We had fun anyway.

Some TIA members cooking up our lunch.

Eri and Mina making s'mores

Daichi eating his s'more. Everyone said they were really sweet but delicious.

Everyone had a great time!

Tanjoubi Omedetou!

2010-06-13T04:05:00.000-07:00

Me and surprise parties just don't go together. Two years ago my friend Marie tried to plan a surprise birthday party for me but she scheduled it on a Tuesday - the same day as my choir practices at the time - so when she asked if I wanted to go to dinner with her I told her I was busy.

"Oh well I'm planning a party for you and I already booked the place so can you skip chorus?"

The answer of course was yes. I can always skip choir practice for a party. Especially if it's for me!

This year she almost got away with it. I thought we were having lunch and then going to have a bath today but I had music practice with our mutual friend Masako yesterday and she gave away the secret. Just as we were leaving Masako said she would see tomorrow at Marie's house party.

Huh???

Aaaaand surprise ruined.

Masako felt really bad about it and emailed Marie right away to apologize. But I don't really care. I just love that Marie tries to throw me surprise parties and that she cares enough to convince me to stay in Japan longer so we can take one last weekend trip together (to my dad's chagrin.) I'm going to miss all my friends in Japan but Marie most of all.

O saki ni shitsure shimasu

2010-06-11T01:19:00.001-07:00

As you may or may not know the Japanese have a lot of set phrases that are polite to say throughout the day. Living alone, I don't get to use the ones for leaving and coming home but I do have to say the ones at work. For example, I say a loud "Good morning!" or "Ohayogozaimus" to everyone in the teacher's room every day.

When I leave I say just as loudly but somewhat apologetically, "I'm sorry for leaving before you" (osaki ni shitsure shimasu) Then they respond with "Wow you worked hard today!" (O-tsukaresama deshita) Or sometimes they just say sayonara. I actually get kind of offended when I don't get an o-tsukaresama deshita when I leave. I mean I know I'm just part time and leaving before it gets dark but still I taught 4-5 classes so I deserve a "you worked hard today" goodbye.

They say o-tsukaresama at other times too. When a train arrives somewhere they thank you for your hard work sitting there patiently while the conductor drove the train. The hair stylist tells me thanks for your hard work after she has washed my hair, which always confuses me because shouldn't I be saying it to her instead? And a teacher told me that after I finished washing my hands the other day. She was waiting for her turn at the sink so it's possible she was being sarcastic about how long it takes me to wash my hands but I couldn't be sure. I've encountered very little sarcasm here that I'm unsure it even exists. But who says thanks for your hard work after washing their hands? I mean really.

Anyway, I was explaining all of this to my dad the other day - the ins and outs of Japanese greetings in the workplace and how they don't say things like "Have a good weekend!" on a Friday evening when they leave work because they know they will all be back on Saturday morning. They don't even say "Have a good night" because apparently no one should want to be anywhere other than at work. My dad pointed out that we would never apologize for leaving early in the US. We're much more likely to say "See ya later suckers!" as we waltz out the door at 4:59 on Friday afternoon.

He asked me if I ever smiled when I said "sorry for leaving before you."

"Oh no," I told him. "You have to look like you feel awful about leaving them behind to do all the work. You can't look happy about it."

There is no "See ya later suckers!" in Japanese although if you did translate it it would be something like "O-saki ni suckas!" which for some reason makes me laugh. Maybe it's the thought of my uber-polite coworkers shouting the word suckers and looking happy to be going home that is ridiculous enough to put a smile on my face. The only problem now is that since this conversation I have a mental picture of me shouting O-saki ni suckers! as I leave the teacher's room everyday to go home. It makes looking apologetic hard.

2010-06-10T05:26:00.000-07:00

For the record, just because I can swim 1200 meters doesn't mean that I can run around for two classes playing tag without feeling like my legs are going to fall off. Which is exactly what I've done the last two days and exactly how I feel at the moment.

Told my elementary students that I'm leaving at the end of July and we only have two more classes left together. Most of them didn't seem that sad but maybe that's because they're 10 and they don't really think about the future. The teachers have been really sweet though and I know I'll be crying buckets when it's time to say goodbye.

Back at junior high school tomorrow. We have exchange students from Indiana and Kentucky visiting so it will be nice to have someone to speak English with. And two weeks from now a delegation from Georgetown is coming to celebrate the 20th anniversary of the sister city relationship with Tahara. As the year-round representative of G-town I am not only going to the ceremony/reception but I'm also singing a solo. (Amazing Grace - because that's symbolic of international cooperation...)

People from the same delegation are coming around to watch me teach at Takamatsu-sho. That means I'll have to dress up to go to elementary school, which sucks because this time of year I try to wear clothes I don't mind getting dirty and sweaty since just standing around is hot and my teaching style usually includes a lot of me jumping around and acting like a clown and then playing games that have me running until my legs feel like they're going to fall off.

With any luck they'll actually replace me with another Georgetown College graduate and I won't be the last of my kind. No one tells me anything though.

Now my main concern is convincing the Board of Education that they shouldn't charge me to haul away everything in my apartment but that it should be left to the next ALT (unlike me who had to buy everything new.) I'm trying to appeal to the Japanese dislike of wasting things. I've used the word waste at least twice in every conversation regarding this topic. So far all I've gotten is that they have to talk about it and they'll let me know. I can't decide if they are really talking about it or if this is their way of saying no. It will be nice to be back in the land of yes means yes and no means no and by that I mean America.

Only six more weeks to go!

Japanese medicine

2010-06-01T18:00:00.001-07:00

There is a reason I have my mom ship me my allergy meds from the States and that is because I don't like taking things when I don't know what's in them. But sometimes I go with convenience over complete understanding. Especially here in Japan.

I ran out of both zyrtec and benadryl two weeks ago. My mom had just sent me a package so I didn't feel like bothering her for another one so soon so I went around the corner and asked the little old lady at the pharmacy to give me something for itchy eyes and throat. She picked up a box and very kindly read it for me to confirm that was what I needed and then she even threw in a free vitamin drink that tasted a lot like cough syrup.

I called home afterward and tried to sound out the ingredients on the back of the box while my mom translated them into real words. If you've ever tried to read words written in katakana then you will understand what this conversation sounded like.

"Pu...so...fu...e...do...ri...n?"

"Pseudoephedrine. That's a decongestant."

There's also belladonna in there along with some caffeine. Yesterday I started noticing I was having vertigo and dizziness. I'm sitting on the couch and suddenly the room will spin. At first I thought it was because my ears have been stuffy. It still could be that. It's happened before when I haven't consistently taken my decongestant. Fluid builds up in my ears and my balance goes out the window.

But I took two sudafed this morning and I'm still dizzy. I also took another one of my allergy pills. I'm starting to think I'm having an adverse reaction to the belladonna alkaloid in the allergy medicine. Actually another call home to Nurse!mom brought that out as a possibility. Either way I stayed home from school. Riding my bike and teaching 5 classes didn't seem like a good idea when every 10 minutes or so the room shifts position. At least I don't have hallucinations...that's another side effect of belladonna. Although that one might be more fun that this.

Hamamatsu Kite Festival

2010-05-20T04:12:00.000-07:00

On Monday May 3rd my friend Marie (Mah-ree-ay) and I headed to Hamamatsu to see their famous kite festival. It was Golden Week so it was packed. The line for the shuttle bus from the station to the festival was over an hour long and wound around two blocks! Marie is much more patient than I am and when I complained she just said, "It's Golden Week. You have to wait everywhere now." But it turned out to be worth the wait.

It was the perfect opportunity for people watching. Almost everyone was wearing hoppi - the jackets worn during festivals. Most people had the pants and split toe shoes on as well. And almost every girl I saw looked like she had been to the salon that morning to have her hair done. This is no small festival! It's really billed as the Hamamatsu Festival rather than the "Kite" festival per say but the kites really are the biggest draw. Even so we also saw some taiko drummers and nearer the station we saw some floats that I imagine are carried around town in much the same way they are in Tahara.

But we were there for the kites. They weren't battling that day but instead each neighborhood kite association would gather around one of their enormous paper kites. Each kite had the name of any new babies born in the last year emblazoned in the corner. Those same babies were hoisted up on the shoulders of one of the men and then a small band of elementary school children toting trumpets would play and the adults would cheer. It was really cool to see each group welcoming the new child to the community. And because Hamamatsu is a large city there were lots of bands and lots of babies and lots of kites.

Once the ritual welcome was performed then the kites were ready to fly. The wind wasn't being very cooperative at first but eventually the sky was filled with hand-painted paper kites. Marie tested my Japanese reading skills by making me translate the kanji (or hirigana) on each. After some festival food and a nice time watching the kites we stood in line again for the bus ride back to the station. We spent more time getting to the kite festival than we did at the kite festival!

Marie and I pose in hoppi.

These cute old ladies are taiko drummers. They were so nice to let me snap their picture.

Everyone was wearing their festival clothes.

They are big kites.

They took several people to move.

You can see the baby just under the flag. The adults are dancing around him.

There were bands of children everywhere playing their instruments.

Getting the kite ready to fly.

A view from a small hill.

These guys had a better vantage point though I think.

Ninja Festival

2010-05-13T01:04:00.000-07:00

During the month of April every weekend in a small town called Iga-Uneo in Mie Prefecture hordes of people show up in ninja costumes hoping to practice their ninja skills. I had no idea this town existed and I certainly didn't know about the festival until I listened to the How Ninja Work episode of Stuff You Should Know. (Consequently if you are not subscribing to this podcast then you should be because it is awesome.) As soon as I became aware of this knowledge it became my mission to make it to the Ninja Festival in Iga.

I convinced my new friend Allison to join me. We met in Nagoya Station and then headed to Iga. It takes forever to get there. Because ninja were secret warriors their training centers were in the middle of nowhere. There are two areas in Japan known for their ninja training schools - one in Mie Prefecture (right next to Aichi where I live) and the other in Shikoku. We took three trains from Nagoya. The last one was a local train with a ninja theme painted on it. They even had some high school aged ninja reading off the stops.

The ninja train

In the train station. They were all over town though and honestly were a bit creepy.

When we finally arrived we were greeted by more ninja who gave us some mochi and if we could win at janken then we could have some sembei. My ninja kindly threw paper every time and let me play three times until I beat her and could get the sembei. Who said ninja aren't kind?

Adorable elementary school ninja!

After some wandering around we finally figured out what we were supposed to be doing - testing our ninja skills! For a small fee we got a piece of paper and a map. We went around town to different stations where they tested our skills. I sucked at most of them. But Allison was really good at throwing ninja stars. Remind me not to make her angry! There might have been some sort of prize at the end but we never did figure it out.

We had to blow out 10 candles with only 3 tries. Failed!

Throwing stars. Failed!

And shooting arrows. Also failed! I suck as a ninja. :-(

After lunch we headed to the ninja museum where we saw a ninja show and toured the ninja house and museum. In the show they showed several different weapons and methods of fighting. I was the most impressed with the way a ninja could fight a man with a sword with just a piece of long rope. The little boy sitting in front of us though seemed more interested in Allison and me than the ninja.

Demonstrating these scary looking weapons.

A fighting demonstration

Our new blue ninja friend.

The ninja house had lots of hiding places and secret places where they could see you but you couldn't see them. The museum portion explained that most ninja did not wear the bright blue or even black costumes we kept seeing around town but usually wore the clothing of a farmer so they could pass by unnoticed. The problem with a ninja costume is that then everyone knows you are a ninja!

A ninja house looks pretty normal.

But it has secret doors.

And secret hiding places.

Because Iga is so far away we couldn't stay as long as we wanted but had to catch the train back to Aichi. It took me over 3 hours one way but in the end it was definitely worth it.

Ninja Festival 2010!

2010-04-30T20:58:00.000-07:00

Before I went to China I took a quick weekend up to Nikko with my good friend Marie (pronounced Mah-ree-ae).

Nikko wasn't really on my radar of places to visit in Japan until I read a book on early Japanese American relations and it said that the must see sights for early American tourists were Nikko, Fuji, and Kyoto. So on Friday night we hopped on the overnight bus to Tokyo. After breakfast at McDonald's (and some freshening up in the bathroom) we took the train from Tokyo to Nikko. Then it was another bus to see Lake Chuzenji where we wandered around, shopping and visiting a local temple.

Lunch on Saturday. Nikko is famous for yuba-soybean paste dried and rolled into noodles.

On Sunday we got up and made our way to visit the famous Tosho-gu temple. It differs from other Japanese temples in its ornate decorations and colorful carvings. Since it was a holiday weekend it was packed but we still had a nice time. We even managed to do a little geocaching.

I like how someone created this small turtle. :)

After the temple we headed over to the Kinugawa Onsen area to try some more modern attractions. The first was a maze. The told us that the average time to get through it is 40 minutes but if you made it in less than 20 then you could have a free drink afterwards. Marie and I thought we were way above average and we totally had this. Then we got in there and realized we would be lucky to make it out in under 40 minutes. We got through in 43 minutes.

At the start.

This is when we realized that this wasn't going to be easy.

A give up door and a sign saying we went the wrong way.

Then we went to the Trick Museum. It wasn't really a museum but they had lots of paintings on the wall that played with perspective. They encouraged you to take lots of different and fun pictures. We only had an hour before they closed and even though we could have definitely stayed a lot longer we took advantage of the little time we did have. It was really really fun. After the Trick Museum we grabbed dinner and then found a hotel that had an onsen. Our feet were aching and it was nice to soak and relax.

Monday morning we woke up and caught the train back to Tahara. Tuesday I went to work and Wednesday I caught a flight to Beijing. I'm almost caught up on my travelogues, but not quite yet. I still have the Ninja Festival to post about and Monday I'm going to Hamamatsu to see the Kite Festival and Tuesday I leave for Seoul, South Korea for 4 days. So much to see and so little time. Sometimes I think 3 months is too long to wait to go home and other times I wonder why I didn't re-contract to stay another year.

Back to Beijing

2010-04-30T00:28:00.000-07:00

After another 12 hour train ride we arrived back in Beijing. There was more staring but that was nothing compared to the taxi line of DOOM! We waited in line with hundreds of other people fresh off the same train as us.

Let me start by explaining that in Chinese society the idea of queuing up is not as natural as say in countries like the US or Japan. Most places there are no lines. My mom kept getting flustered and irritated when she would try to politely wait only to have people push right by her.

So we come to this line which was only enforced by two metal handrails to corral us all. Pushing was still part of the game but in this crowd it only got you so far. At one point there was no part of my body save my face that was pushed up against someone else. It was like a huge group hug except with strangers and luggage.

After finally getting a taxi and arriving back at our hotel, Dad and I headed back out to see the hutong. These are old traditional neighborhoods that are quickly disappearing and being replaced by high rises. The Lonely Planet was very sentimental and made them seem like they were quaint and picturesque. In truth they were a maze of dirty narrow streets with closed doors and very few hints of what lay behind them. We took a rickshaw tour which was ok. We negotiated a really low rate which was good because I would have been irritated to have spent more money just to see the little that we saw. It might have been grumpiness left over from the taxi line of DOOM but neither Dad or I were impressed.

That night we went to an acrobatics show. And that was far from disappointing. After the Great Wall this was the next thing I was really excited for. Mom almost smacked me on the subway ride over because I decided she was not exhibiting enough enthusiasm for the show and tried to pump her up. (She still wasn't feeling well at that point.)

The show itself was awesome! They had lights and fogs. They sold popcorn and icecream. And the bendiness...oh the bendiness of those Chinese acrobats. They had 12 girls on a bicycle. They had two guys running around in a ring of death. And we had front row seats for the whole 1 1/2 hour extravaganza. Sadly, they didn't allow pictures so here's a shot of the three of us before the show started.

The last day Dad and I headed back out without Mom to see the Forbidden City. Not surprisingly it was a lot less crowded on a Thursday versus Sunday. Members of the royal family lived here and were not allowed out. Certain people were allowed into the first two thirds of the city but only eunuchs, servants, and royals were allowed in the inner court. It was beautiful although I will admit after awhile all of the courtyards started to blend together. The audio guide was nice though. It was full of stories of palace intrigue and scandals.

One of several throne rooms

The royal "climbing wall." The emperor and his concubines climbed this for fun in the spring.

They have this clock exhibit inside the Forbidden City. You have to pay extra but it wasn't much so we shelled out and went in. We actually timed this for 11am so that we could see the clocks go off. A wonderful plan except that we didn't realize there were two rooms in the exhibit and only discovered where the clocks went off the last 20 seconds of the last clock. Cue my Dad's sad face. Oh well he still enjoyed the other clocks. I have kindly chosen only 3 pictures to show you out of the dozens he took in there. ;-)

This one was cool because this little man writes a Chinese character on the hour.

After leaving the Forbidden City we went across the street to the park and hiked up the hill to see a view overlooking the palace. But not before Dad excitingly pointed out the moat. I tried to tell him there was a moat at the front where we came in (and had crossed over 3 times before during other trips to Tienanmen) but he didn't believe me.

Look! There's a moat!

The view overlooking the Forbidden City

He really liked that moat. ;)

After lunch we headed back to the hotel where we spent our last night relaxing and packing. We had one last lunch with our new American friends from earlier in the week and then it was off to the airport. Mom can mark the Great Wall off her bucket list and I didn't have to wait a whole year between seeing them both.

Xi'an

2010-04-24T20:02:00.000-07:00

After 12 hours on the overnight train we arrived in Xi'an and met up with our tour guide for the day who took us out to see the famous Terracotta Warriors. First we watched a video that looked like it had been made in the early 80's, not too long after the site was discovered, and then we got to meet the farmer that actually found them. And by meet I mean we bought a book and he glanced at us and then signed it for us.

This Chinese peasant farmer, whose picture we unfortunately did not get, had been earning the same meager existence he had before he found the treasure trove for many years after until President Clinton came to China for a visit. Clinton requested that during his visit he have his picture taken down among the Terracotta Warriors and that he get the autograph of the farmer who had discovered them. The only problem was that the farmer was uneducated and unable to write his own name. So the government sent him some tutors who decided what characters he should use and how to write them. He's been signing his name ever since.

On a side note, Clinton was also the only person to ever have his picture taken down among the soldiers. Even Chairman Mao had his picture taken from the observation platform.

Once we had our autograph we moved to the first warehouse that protects the biggest group of warriors from the elements. They estimate that there are about 6,000 warriors housed in there, but only a small percentage have been reconstructed. Even still there were enough reconstructed to instill a sense of amazement. They say that each face is different, modeled after a real soldier. And every last detail is sculpted, even the tread on the archer's shoes.

The first pit was the largest

The Terracotta Warriors were commissioned by Emperor Qin who declared himself the first emperor of China in 221 BC. The warriors were meant to protect his kingdom from any invaders or usurpers in death. They all face east which is in the direction of where Emperor Qin's enemies and defeated lands lay. There are generals, infantrymen, archers, and chariots. Only the horses and iron pieces of the chariots remain. The wood has long since rotted away. The warriors were also painted at one time but as soon as they excavated and the figures were exposed to the open air, the paint disappeared. The archeologists are now working on techniques to excavate the remaining pits in such a way as to preserve the colors.

After checking out the Terracotta Warriors we had lunch and then headed back to our hotel in Xi'an. We decided to explore the Muslim Quarter for dinner after being told that very good and very cheap food could be found there. We wandered around until we found a place that wasn't too crowded but still had a decent amount of people in it. The menu was overwhelming and lucky for us one of the waiters spoke some English so we convinced him to order for us. We ended up with cold sesame noodles, some spicy chicken, and a cooked cabbage dish, all of which were delicious. It was way more than we could finish and even with me ordering a beer the bill only came to roughly $8. It was like that almost everywhere we went in China. If you went to a McDonald's or a Starbucks you could expect to pay roughly the same as you would back home but if you were adventurous and went in a Chinese establishment then the prices dropped dramatically.

After dinner, we toured a traditional courtyard house that also had a shadow puppet show and perused the market. Back at our hotel we enjoyed spectacular views of the Bell Tower.

The Muslim Quarter at night.

The view from our hotel room.

The next morning mom, who had been feeling sick the last couple of days thanks to the pollution in Beijing, woke up feeling horrible. So Dad went out to see another nearby tomb while Mom and I slept in and checked out late. I ran out in the late morning to get her some medicine and was surprised to be offered a Z-pack at the pharmacy. I didn't buy it then but we did go back later and bought it for her and some more antibiotics for me to take back to Japan because doctors here seem disinclined to prescribe a full 10 day dose and I get sinus infections on a regular basis. (The last time I got 4 days worth.) It cost me less than $2!!!

Once we met up with dad we went back to the Muslim Quarter to do some more shopping, see the Great Mosque and have some lunch. The mosque was of particular interest because unlike any other mosque in the world it is built with Chinese architecture rather than Middle Eastern (although those elements are also present, they are more subtle.) All the flowers were blooming and it was really a lovely place. And the fact that in order to get to it you had to go through these small back alleys crammed with shops made it even more romantic.

In the market on the way back from the Mosque.

Birds for sale.

Before we caught our train back to Beijing we went in the Bell Tower, where we saw a short show featuring traditional Chinese music and I got to ring the bell three times. Dad also tried his best to get a picture of the city wall (the only city left in China that still has a wall intact.) The Bell Tower was traditionally used in the morning to signify the start of the work day and the drum tower down the street (which we didn't go in) signaled the end of the day. Both were impressive. We could hear the bell being rung by tourists from our hotel but we never did hear the drums.

Looking down to the main gate of the wall.

And then it onto the train station for more staring and another 12 hour ride back to Beijing. We all three agreed that we wished we could stay longer in Xi'an.

Next up: The taxi line of DOOM, the hutong, acrobats, and a huge photodump of the Forbidden City.

China: Summer Palace, Pearl Market, Temple of Heaven Park

2010-04-16T18:56:00.000-07:00

On day three of our trip we made our way out to the Summer Palace on the edge of the city. I should mention that anytime we went anywhere it took a long time to get there. We started off the week with all of these grand plans of seeing more than one sight in a day and quickly realized that was impossible with the travel times. The city of Beijing is roughly the same size of the entire country of Belgium! And with a massive place like the Summer Palace it is easy to spend an entire day there...in fact that's just what we did. We got there around 10 am and didn't leave until almost 5. We got back to the hotel, ate some dinner at a cafe nearby and then collapsed. Sightseeing is hard work!

The Summer Palace itself was absolutely beautiful. I wouldn't rank it as high as the Great Wall but it was a highlight of the trip. We were still pretty energetic and not beaten down by the crowds or sickness this early in the trip either so we had a very pleasant day.

The more animals on the roof the more important the building is.

A shopping street so the royals could see what it was like to be a commoner...kinda.

These two little girls were adorable with their princess headgear.

One of several temples in the palace.

For 10 yuan (about $1.50) I dressed up as a royal princess.

Sunday our plan was to take our bags to the train station and put them in lockers and then go to the Forbidden City. Then head back to the train station to catch our overnight train to Xi'an. We had scoped out the route and where the lockers were our second night in Beijing. This was a perfect plan on paper. But in reality we were at the wrong train station. Beijing has six million different train stations apparently and we were supposed to be at West not at Central.

Thank God I can read some Japanese because the girl trying to explain we were at the wrong station could only say, "Not here." So we hopped in another taxi and got to the right station. Where after a little trouble and finally some help from a very cute attendant we were able to get our things in a locker. Then we tried to look for the non-existent subway station that is on the map but hasn't been built yet. Completely frustrating! Throughout the entire trip the train stations were crazy - packed to the rafters with people inside and outside. A lot of them were from the countryside and they carried these large sacks of who knows what (we never did figure out what was in them) and they stared at us like they had never seen a white person before (which they probably hadn't.)

Now I'm used to be stared at in Japan. People stare and tell me I'm beautiful and I have a high nose. My tactic here is to either stare back or to say hello. This usually gets me an embarrassed hello back and the staring stops. In China they wouldn't stop! Even after I said hello and stared back. I was having staring contests with strange Chinese men who weren't just looking at my face but undressing me with their eyes. It was soooo uncomfortable.

So after losing several staring contests and wanting to punch someone or something we finally figured that we needed to take a taxi back to Tienanmen and where to catch that taxi. We get to the Forbidden City and it too is absolutely packed to the gills. It was a Sunday after all and it felt like everyone in Beijing had decided to see the Forbidden City that day. So already tired, frustrated, and striking out on all aspects of our plan we abandoned it and caught the subway to the Pearl Market where some coffee and a little retail therapy perked me up. (Dad had tried en route but I warned him that any comfort he tried to offer would just make me turn my frustration at the situation onto him. Maybe this is why I travel better alone?)

We had a card for a pearl retailer named Kathy from our friends back in the States and she offered us rock bottom prices. I bought birthday presents for my sisters, several necklaces for myself, earrings, and talked my mom into getting me a beautiful string of pearls for my birthday. It was a relief not to have to bargain and I only ended spending $60 for a huge haul. The market had more than just pearls and I also bought a jade stamp with my name carved in English and Chinese, some Diesel shoes, and some new ear buds.

Then we headed over to the Temple of Heaven park to relax before heading back to the train station (Beijing West!) The park was beautiful and also packed with people. There was a large group of people dancing. A choir performed and local people wandered up and joined in. Groups of young and old were playing hackey sack. I saw about 20 different cards games going on and several people had brought karaoke machines and were performing. We watched all of the activity for awhile and then found a quiet spot to relax for a little bit.

Then we caught another taxi back to the train station where we were frustrated again trying to find a place to sit down. It took us awhile to figure out that our first class tickets gained us admission to the soft seating waiting hall but once installed there we comfortably waited for our sleeper train. Then it was off to Xi'an!

Next up: Terracotta Warriors, Muslim Quarter, and the Bell Tower.

China - Tiananmen, Sacred Way, and the Great Wall

2010-04-10T23:13:00.000-07:00

The first day of China was not exciting but was instead spent traveling and then waiting in the airport for mom and dad to arrive. Pretty much a wash. We got to the hotel, checked in, ate in the restaurant downstairs and went to bed early.

We were up bright and early the next day thanks to jet lag on mom and dad's part. We started the day off geo-caching in a park with views of the Olympic area and then we met some lovely people - friends of a friend back home. Mom had taken requests via email on things they missed from the States and we delivered bags of candy, cereal, and coffee creamer. They in turned bought us lunch and gave us tips on things to do and see.

The view from our hotel room.

Then we headed over to Tiananmen Square where we got our first taste of annoying salespeople trying to sell us postcards, books, hats, and English tour guides. We resisted them all and stayed around until sunset when the national guard lowers the main flag in a special ceremony.

The flag goes up at sunrise and comes down at sunset.

A patriotic little girl.

The next day we joined a tour to see the Sacred Way and the Great Wall at Mutianyu. Of course they also take you to a jade factory and a Chinese medicine center where you are encouraged to buy jewelry and herbs. Although all cynicism aside, the doctor of Chinese medicine did accurately pinpoint most of my annoying health issues, especially the fact that I have "too much heat in my belly." Apparently my tongue is not the color it should be. Still, I didn't buy any herbs. I was there for the Wall.

The doctor diagnoses mom.

But before the grand finale of the day we visited the Sacred Way which is a long road book ended with large gates and lined with statues that leads to the Ming Dynasty tombs. Each year the royal family would make a procession down the Sacred Way to inspect the construction of the royal tombs.

We learned all of this from our super cute English speaking guide, Mary. She spoke really good English but she had a very thick accent and when we got off the bus here the three of us had to have a short conference to determine why she was talking about "janitors in Asian times." We finally realized she meant "generals in ancient times."

Then finally after lunch we headed to the Great Wall. It really was amazing. We had talked about doing a section of the wall where you hike 10km but we knew mom wasn't going to be up for that due to her bad knees. After hiking just a very small section of it that we did this day I wondered if I would have been up for it. It's not just long. It's steep. We took a cable car to the top since we only had 2 hours to explore but even just getting to the cable car station almost did mom in. Dad and I had to leave her at the first guard house and continue exploring without her.

We walked quite a ways, through many guard towers until we came to a huge flight of steep steps that went took the wall up over another peak. Dad walked about halfway up and I think regretted it the next day. Most of the wall we were standing on was built during the Ming dynasty but other walls had been built for hundreds of years before, as early as 220 B.C. The part we were on is touristy (there was a Subway next to the car park) but a lot of the Wall is poor condition. I would have loved to have seen some more of the "wilder" Wall but even this tourist safe version was easily the highlight of our entire trip.

Next up: The Summer Palace, a mistake you wouldn't want to make on the Amazing Race, the Pearl Market, and the Temple of Heaven park.

Mt. Fuji...finally!

2010-03-18T01:29:00.000-07:00

I have finally seen Mt. Fuji! And it only took three separate trips to do so, but I think I appreciated it that much more.

This past weekend I went up to Fujinomiya with my friend Danielle to meet another ALT, Ashley, who lives and works in the shadow of Japan's most famous mountain. She took us around to some scenic sights on Saturday - Lake Tanuki, Shiraito Falls, and a temple whose name I have forgotten but is easily the largest temple I have yet to see in Japan. Of course it was still kind of cloudy so my pictures from that day aren't the greatest. You can't see the tip top of Fuji in them.

After a long day of walking and sight-seeing we headed to the local onsen - hana no yu - to soak our sore feet and legs. I couldn't get over that Ashley gets a Mt. Fuji view AND an onsen in her town. Tahara is nice but I think she wins when it comes to job placements!

On Sunday, I got up early and took a walk since the best time to see Fuji is in the morning. Turns out I didn't need to be worried because later in the day we headed to a local sake brewery in town for their yearly festival and had a perfect view. We drank and ate and relaxed under its shadow. Then it was back on the train and ready to work on Monday morning.

It was a great weekend with friends, Fuji, and sake. Thanks to Ashley for her hospitality! Because of her I can go home this summer knowing I've seen Japan's most famous mountain. It's definitely Japan's number one icon and I finally know why. ;)

The view from Ashley's bedroom window. I'm soooo jealous!

Early Sat. afternoon we were having no luck so we had some Mt. Fuji cookies instead.

Shiraito Falls

I've tried a Wasabi Kit Kat but there was no way I was trying Wasabi ice cream but it's a specialty in Shizuoka prefecture.

How awesome would this picture be if you could see the top of Fuji? le sigh!

Lucky for me there was other beautiful scenery to look at.

On my walk Sunday morning. A very peaceful and relaxing way to start the day.

My friend Danielle at the sake festival.

Onegaishimasu!

These guys had more fun than we did. ;-)

My favorite picture of the weekend.

卒業式

2010-03-08T01:31:00.001-08:00

Today was graduation or sotsugyoushiki. My ninth graders are moving up to the big and scary world of high school. In the next couple of weeks they'll be taking high school entrance exams and choosing which high school they want to attend. And to celebrate that next step in life we had a two hour ceremony in a freezing cold gym with a few songs, several very boring speeches, and not one person who did a back flip when they received their certificate (unlike at an American graduation ceremony forever fixed in my memory.)

I thought I might cry since when I started this job these kids had just started junior high but the shivering cold of the gym and the intense boredom that comes with listening to speeches in a language you don't understand overrode any extreme emotions. The picture taking session in the courtyard after and the amazing bento lunch the teachers ate together later when the students had left made up for the uncomfortable morning. (Seriously amazing food and so much of it I won't need to eat dinner tonight!)

Good luck to my kiddies! Ganbatte kudasai!

Momo-sensei in her hakama - a special kimono worn at graduation. (But only by the 9th grade female teachers.)

Seijin no hi

2010-02-26T17:01:00.000-08:00

On the second Monday in January each year a massive horde of 20 years olds dress up in their fanciest kimono and strut around town as new adults, finally allowed to drink, smoke, and vote. It's Coming of Age Day or Seijin no hi. This year I had planned a trip to Irago and Ise on the same weekend, not knowing I was about to stumble onto one of the busiest times of the year at Ise Shrine.

The crowds almost sent me into anxiety overload but the beautiful kimonos and outrageous accessories on both girls and guys was enough to make up for hyperventilating. We took the ferry from Irago to Tobu and then caught a train to Ise. Then we tried to catch a bus to the Inner Shrine - Naikyu - but we quickly realized that we would get there faster if we got off and just walked. Everywhere was packed full of people and we weren't able to eat lunch or do much souvenir shopping. We tried to get a taxi back to the train station but had to give that up as well and ended up walking.

I've been to Ise Shrine before and I think without the crowds it's a very beautiful and peaceful place but this weekend it was just chaos. Still, I was glad we went. If you want to see some more pictures (and ones that are better than mine frankly) then check out this website.

Waiting for the train to Ise we got a preview of what was to come.

Check out the big as your head hair accessories!

Walking was much faster than the bus.

The main shopping street. I don't do well with crowds so I'm hyperventilating at this point.

At the entrance to Ise's Inner Shrine.

Even the boys had on fun kimono.

My Japanese twin

2010-02-15T02:37:00.000-08:00

Almost since I stepped off the plane here in Japan people have told me how much I look like a popular Japanese singer, Angela Aki. I had no idea who that was so I just smiled and nodded (this is my response to almost everything here in Japan now that I think about it.) I finally looked her up on wikipedia after my students started saying "Good morning, Angela" instead of "Good morning, Jennifer."

I guess I see the resemblance but I still think it's mostly the glasses. And then last spring we sang her song Tegami in chorus. I really like the song and since it's right in my range it's one of my karaoke standards now. My Japanese friends love to hear me sing in Japanese and with enough beer in them it's almost like their own personal Angela Aki concert. ;-)

What do you think? Were Angela and I separated at birth?

Pasta for Pennies

2010-02-12T15:54:00.001-08:00

I am so proud of my high school! When I was a senior my best friend was the president of the service organization, Key Club, and I went along to the weekly meetings too. (There were also several cute boys in the club as well.) We also both spent our study hall in the Key Club advisor's classroom where for several weeks during the fund raising campaign for the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society I counted out and rolled $7,000 worth of change. Our goal that year was to beat the $700 we had raised for United Way. We not only did that but raised enough to be one of the top schools in the program.

I don't know if it was the free Olive Garden lunch for the homeroom that contributed the most or Ms. Goohs' relentless enthusiasm, or if the students and parents just feel passionate about taking care of leukemia patients, but Princeton stepped up. I graduated that year but Princeton has continued to raise money for the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society. Many years they are the top or the second highest school in the country! Last year they raised $38,000. The year before that it was $46,000.

It's amazing to look back and think that I had a hand in starting that tradition. And I'm happy to note, and a little jealous, that the students don't have to count out the change by hand anymore. Coinstar now donates a change machine. In fact, I think most of the money doesn't come from pennies found in the couch but from corporate sponsors and proud alums, but they still do collect change and they still have homeroom competitions. Their goal this year is $42,010. Hope they can do it!

Check out the school's website if you're interested.

http://www.princeton.k12.oh.us/HighSchool.cfm?subpage=305

Or the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society's website.

http://lls.org/hm_lls

Winter Vacation - Beppu and Fukuoka

2010-02-08T01:30:00.000-08:00

Our last day in Beppu we decided to hit the baths again. I'll admit my one and only goal for this trip was to take an obscene amount of baths and the rest of the itinerary was Danielle's idea. I'm glad we also went to Kumamoto, Aso, and Usuki but I was there for the baths. And on December 30th I got just that. We started the day off with a hot sand bath where we were buried in sand for fifteen minutes. Once I figured out how to breath under a mountain of hot sand I was able to relax and really enjoy it. And unlike the mud bath, this place had a nice shower and water bath to rinse off in.

A picture of how the sand bath works.

Then after some lunch we headed off to Suginoi Palace, a ryokan on top of a hilltop that boasted baths and spectacular views of the city and bay. I was a little bummed at first because the weather was not cooperating. It was cloudy and was spitting rain so we didn't have the best view, but then the sun came out and we saw a spectacular rainbow. Since we were in the bath surrounded by lots of naked women, I have no pictures so you will just have to believe me when I say it was very very nice.

We tried to stay long enough to watch the sunrise but even after getting out and having a snack and a short rest, we just couldn't make it. After almost three hours in various baths and the sauna I was cooked and ready to get back to the hostel. Turns out there is such a thing as too much bath time because I ended up with what I call an onsen hangover. All that hot water dehydrated me and I ended up with an upset stomach, a horrible headache, and the general grossness that you usually get when you've had too much to drink.

The next day we got up late and got ready to leave. We had reserved bus tickets back to Fukuoka but right before we left the guy at the front desk called the bus center and found out that our bus had been canceled. Snowy weather had closed the roads higher up in the mountains. So we had to take a later train. I was a little worried we might not get tickets since it was New Year's Eve and many Japanese people were traveling to be with their families on New Years Day. It's like Christmas Eve back home.

The line for train tickets!

We eventually made it to Fukuoka, albeit a little later than we had planned. We dropped our stuff at the hotel and ventured out to see some of the city. We visited Shofukuji Temple - Japan's first zen temple. And also Tochoji Temple which also houses a very large wooden Buddha.

Then it was on to Canal City to do some shopping. I bought some new gloves and also a fukubukuro or a New Year's grab bag. Mine was a cheaper one so I paid 525 yen for a closed bag filled with equal or greater value than what I paid. I ended up with a bunch of cute accessories. I probably won't wear most of it but it was fun and worth the small amount I paid for it. Other stores sell more expensive ones and they are very popular at New Years in Japan.

Tochoji Temple

People paid $500 to write their wishes for the coming year on these roofing tiles.

A very large wooden Buddha. (I got yelled at for taking this picture...oops.)

Japan's first Zen temple.

Canal City

My fukubukuro

Since I was still recovering from my onsen overload from the day before, going out and doing much for New Year's didn't seem like a good idea. It's not very Japanese anyway. So we stayed in the hostel, resisted the efforts of the staff to get us to eat the traditional New Year's Eve meal of soba noodles, and went out around 11:30 to a nearby shrine. When we got there the line to pray was already incredibly long so Danielle (who is Buddhist) decided it was too cold to wait. A security guard invited us to stand near him and his kerosene heater so we chatted with him about where we were from and asked him questions about the New Years traditions. At midnight, a priest played the taiko drum and people started praying for good luck in the new year and throwing their coins.

We left soon after and headed back to the hostel. The next morning we got up late, packed slowly, and headed back to the airport for our return flight home. All in all in was a great trip!

The line to pray at the shrine. Happy New Year!

Winter Vacation - Usuki

2010-02-04T05:29:00.000-08:00

Our second day in Beppu we decided to skip the marathon baths and take a day trip out to Usuki, a nearby town that is famous for its ancient buddha statues carved into the nearby cliffs. There are around 50 buddhas and they were only restored in the last ten years or so. I wish I had more information on them but the English explanations in the brochure were not very enlightening. We did see some fierce looking non-buddha statues that were buried up to the waist by soil after a typhoon. I believe they were protectors of a sort. Either way it was a cold but clear day and unlike some places in Beppu there were very few people about so it was worth the trip.

On the train ride there though I was accosted by an older Japanese gentlemen who wanted to show me his vacation pictures. He even gave me some of the doubles to keep. This has happened before. Erin and I left Meiji Shrine back in May with vacation pictures AND cake last May from an elderly Japanese man who talked our ear off. That guy at least spoke English. This one didn't and because of the noise from the train and his weak voice it was almost impossible to understand him so I just smiled and nodded. Danielle thought the whole thing was hilarious and was very unhelpful since in her words, "he wasn't talking to me." I promised to look more unapproachable on the train ride back to Beppu but even reading a book I still was approached by another man who wanted to know if I was from America and could he take my picture. When I go out to tourist attractions in Japan I have to be careful not to become one myself!

My new friend.

Once in Usuki, we visited the buddha statues and then grabbed lunch. I ordered the tori-ten or tempura chicken, which sounds like it would just be fried chicken but it was so so much more.

Next is our last day in Beppu and New Year's in Fukuoka.

Yippee!

2010-02-02T22:30:00.001-08:00

JLPT results came today and it was happy happy news.

I passed!

As I suspected I did the worst on the listening and best on the vocab.

Vocab - 79%
Listening - 57%
Grammar/reading - 68%

For a total score of 68%. Woohoo! I officially have me some low intermediate Japanese skillz.

Winter Vacation - Beppu

2010-01-28T22:13:00.000-08:00

After leaving Aso we took a bus to Beppu where we checked into our hostel for the night. The next morning we were up early and on the onsen/hot spring trail.

We started off at the Takegawara onsen which was only 100 yen and very basic. They didn't even have showers - you just dunked your bucket into the pool and rinsed yourself off before climbing in. It was full of other tourists and wrinkly bent over old ladies. And the water was very very very hot.

Then it was onto one of the famous Hells. The hells are hot springs that you don't get in but just look at and are unashamedly tourist traps. There are eight in total but Danielle and I narrowed it down to four we wanted to see and even then I skipped the last one. I was much more interested in sitting in hot springs rather than looking at them.

The first one we visited was Chinoike Jigoku or the bloody hell. It's name comes from the color of the water which is a nice red. Although I was disappointed to learn that it's not really the water that's red but clay at the bottom of the pool.

I was dressed to match!

A statue of an oni or devil at Chinoike.

Then it was onto another onsen. We visited Hyotan Onsen for lunch and a post-meal bath. The food was delicious and the baths were beautiful. They had a variety of indoor baths, including a waterfall bath that massaged your shoulders and an outside bath with another waterfall and momiji (autumn leaves) that floated down and into the water. They also had a spring that we drank from because the brochure said it was good for your health. What it didn't mention was that the water tasted terrible!

My lunch came with an onsen tamago-an egg boiled in the onsen water.

Still smiling because I haven't tasted the water yet.

We visited the nearby Shiraike Jigoku (White Pond Hell) next. Honestly, it wasn't that exciting. It was just more hot water, which I could see for free just by walking around Beppu. Even the water running down the street gutters steamed. But it was a nice break between baths.

While the Shiraike Jigoku was boring, the Oniishibozu Jigoku was not. It was hot bubbling mud. The name comes from the mud bubbles that look like the bald heads of Buddhist monks. I skipped out on the last hell of the day and waited impatiently for Danielle to get through it so we could try out some of the mud we had seen at Oniishinozu.

We caught a bus to Hoya Land Onsen where we had a mud bath. And not just a mud bath but a mixed mud bath! The inside baths were separated by gender but the big outdoor mudbath was not. We were a little worried when we got there and realized this but the woman at the desk assured us that it was faces only. They had a privacy entrance for women to enter the pond. I assumed, mistakenly, that they also had one for the men. But no, the poor guys had to stroll outside with nothing but a very small towel for modesty (choosing between to cover the front or the back) which they had to discard before they got in. I learned if that I focused my gaze in one certain direction I was much less likely to get a frontal view, although I did see a fair share of butt cheeks. Danielle, however, did not and I couldn't tell by her shrieks if she was traumatized or slightly excited. ;-)

In the end it was definitely an interesting experience. The mud bath itself was great but the rest of the facilities were so run down and poorly heated that we were in danger of developing frostbite when we got out of the water. Nothing beats being stark naked in a unheated shack in the middle of winter! They also didn't have very good showers so after we got back to the hostel that night we took another fourth bath in order to make sure we were completely clean of the mud and some alcohol helped scrub clean our poor afflicted minds of the images of naked middle-aged Japanese men.

Mud!

Next up: Usuki and finally Fukuoka

Winter Vacation - Aso

2010-01-20T02:38:00.001-08:00

After leaving Kumamoto, we headed to Aso, a small town with a large volcano as its main attraction. We stayed the night at the newly opened Aso Base Backpackers Hostel and I can't recommend it enough. It was beautiful inside and the couple who own it are very friendly. But the best part was the samurai suit in the corner of the common room that said "Try me on!" Of course we had to try.

Don't I look fierce? And this is only half of the outfit. I was too lazy to put the rest on - this was heavy enough!

The next morning we hitched a ride with two American guys we had met the night before. We stopped along the way to take some pictures of the wild horses that live in the national park around the volcano.

Then we crossed our fingers as we approached the entrance to the caldera viewing area. The guys we were with had tried to see Mt. Aso's famous caldera three times already but kept getting turned away because the conditions weren't safe. There are four levels of alert and concrete bunkers in case the wind starts blowing the toxic gases coming up from the volcano the wrong direction or if the volcano erupts. We only had one day scheduled for Aso so we were extremely lucky to make it up to the top and see everything in only one try.

It was on blue level alert so we had no problems seeing the caldera.

We peered down into the caldera and then hiked up a large incline for a view of the surrounding area. Our new found friends continued up the trail while Danielle and I made our way back to the visitor center to grab some food. We took the bus back down the mountain where we were able to see views of another interesting feature in Aso. It's a mountain with a large divet in the top. The mythology surrounding it says that it was a mountain of rice meant for the local god but then a famine struck the community. The god took a large scoop of rice from the top and gave it to the people so they wouldn't starve and that's why it looks the way it does today. Or at least that's what someone at the hostel said...

The caldera - you wouldn't want to be breathing that stuff in.

Hiking.

Another view of the caldera from where we had hiked.

After checking out and grabbing a quick bite to eat we said goodbye to beautiful Aso and caught a bus to Beppu. But more on that later.

Some more palace pictures

2010-01-18T02:36:00.000-08:00

Here are some I missed in the last post...

To give you an idea of the size of the room. That's a lot of tatami mats.

This is a little blurry because we weren't allowed all the way in, but you get the idea.

The ceiling.

That's all for now. Thanks for looking.

Winter Vacation - Kumamoto

2010-01-16T01:02:00.000-08:00

After a three hour video call with the family back home Christmas morning, I jumped on a train to the airport and caught a flight to Fukuoka with my friend and fellow ALT, Danielle. We got in, jumped on another train, and headed to Kumamoto. We stayed in a minshuku, or what is essentially a bed and breakfast. This one came recommended from the Lonely Planet and was cheap at only 3,000 yen a night but it was pretty dirty. But the owner picked us at the station and took us back again in the morning so we were able to endure it for one night.

With our bags stowed in a train station locker, we headed on over to Kumamoto Castle, one of only three black castles in Japan. Inside, they had a recently renovated palace. Normally, when you visit a castle in Japan you only get to see the "defense" portions of the castle and while climbing crazy steep steps to see the view from the top of the donjon is fun, it was really nice to see some of the luxury that past rulers lived in. There was none of the rich furnishings that you see at places like Versailles, but instead just long empty rooms of tatami mats with gorgeous paintings on the screens. The best were the gold ones in what was the "throne" room.

Then we headed over to Suizenji Park. It was very nice. There was a pond, a temple, and an ode to Mt. Fuji. We had tea and manju and then we headed back to the station where I made us miss the train to Aso. With an hour and a half to kill before the next we settled in with drinks and a spicy mustard lotus root treat that is a specialty of Kumamoto.

Fake Fuji.

So delicious!

Next stop: Aso. With volcanos and more samurai.

Merry Christmas!

2009-12-24T17:57:00.001-08:00

I'll be home for Christmas...if only via webcam.

Merry Christmas from Japan!

Hair cut!

2009-12-23T00:15:00.001-08:00

Went and got my hair cut today. This after weeks of gathering the courage and looking up hair related vocabulary. I didn't have a spectacular experience last time at what is essentially the Japanese version of Great Clips so I decided to try for the place next to my house the Hair Stage. A little old lady who has gotten me wet on more than one occasion while she washes her front sidewalk in the morning worked on me. I asked for a "edage kitte" (cut off the dead ends or trim) but to put in some layers and I emphasized over and over that I wanted it long.

We had a little trouble communicating but I had explained at the beginning that I didn't really speak Japanese. This sets everyone's expectations very low so when I was able to chat with her, she was impressed. (So was I, frankly.) But my vocab search didn't extend quite far enough so when she was trying to ask me about how I wanted the layers done I had no idea what she was saying. She eventually just said, "eh, we'll try it." What we were trying I don't know! I'm still not sure exactly what I got because after she and another lady dried it, they put curlers in. I now have cascading curls down my back that look quite nice. No way it will ever look like this again anytime soon but I feel like I should go out tonight since my hair looks so good.

And it wouldn't be a trip to the salon unless the hairstylist commented at least once on how much hair I have. I couldn't explain in Japanese that I actually used to have more hair but this always shocks the stylists in the US. Quite a bit fell out when I lived in France and it's never come back in. It freaked me out at the time but it turned out to be a good thing. This lady added that I also had a small face, which I think is supposed to be a compliment. They also liked the little curls around my ears (I do too.)

The best part was that it was only 3500 yen or about $35! I kept telling myself while they were curling my hair that it was Christmas and it was okay to splurge, thinking it was going to be expensive. But 3500 yen? That's awesome. Now that I know that it's cheap and I can get by with my Japanese I won't be so nervous to go the next time. Add that to the list of "one more thing that should be easy but isn't because I live in a foreign country but I have finally managed on my own." Hurray!

Let it Snow

2009-12-22T00:38:00.000-08:00

On the first snow of the year my mom always calls up my grandma and before she can even say much more than hello, my mom launches into a rendition of the song "Let it snow." When I moved out I used to do the same thing to her. Except now I don't really get snow in Tahara. Sometimes a few flurries will swirl around but nothing ever sticks. And we never get snow like they are getting back home this week.

So the only way I was getting any snow was of the symbolic kind, so when we went to Maeda-sensei's house for a calligraphy lesson two weeks ago, I chose the word yuki to write. The top half written by itself means "rain." The bottom half changes it to "snow."

I liked writing this kanji. This one, like "mother" last time, is a beginner kanji so there weren't too many strokes. But Maeda-sensei for some reason also wanted me to write it in hirigana ゆき　but the first character ゆ　proved to be really difficult. I won't even post my results because it was really that bad. Afterwards, we had tea and cookies and chatted about the upcoming winter vacation. It was another relaxing Saturday afternoon calligraphy lesson.

Bonenkai!

2009-12-18T22:45:00.001-08:00

I went to two bonenkais (end of the year parties) this week. Thursday night was the Board of Education enkai which I was dreading. And last night was the choir enkai which I was only slightly dreading. I'm not really a party person and I'm really not one when I don't speak the language but both parties went better than I had expected.

The part that gives me the most stress is the seating. Unless it's a small group you aren't allowed to sit where you want. You have to draw a number and sit at that seat. I'm always afraid I'm going to be sitting next to someone who won't bother to try and speak English or at least speak slowly in Japanese. I got lucky both nights and had people who were both friendly and willing to slow down for me.

The good thing about the assigned seating is that after the opening speech and the kanpai (cheers) you can get up and move around. People crawl around on their knees and pour drinks for other people and chat. Actually you're really not supposed to pour your own drink. If you want some more to drink then you pick up the beer/sake/tea and pour for your neighbor and then they will hopefully return the favor.

I didn't really drink Thursday night because I had work the next morning and I didn't feel like a hangover. Besides, I'm not a big beer or sake drinker. I did drink a little though just because there is a lot of pressure to drink. I drank more last night not only because it was Friday but because one of the choir members makes his own red wine and brought some along. Wine is my drink of choice so I had to have some. Besides it's weird to get plastered in front of your boss, it's not weird to be tipsy in front of the choir members.

At the choir enkai we also played bingo and got to pick out presents. I got a basket with some candy. The woman sitting next to me also gave me a book of photography published by her husband. It has some beautiful pictures of the beaches in Tahara and it's so I can remember Tahara when I leave next summer. We had a nijikai (second party after the first one disperses) at the local karaoke place. Almost everyone at the first came to the second and we got down with some jpop, anime theme songs, enka, and my few additions of English songs. This is why I haven't quit yet. Because I really did have fun last night.

But I am glad that I am done with bonenkais for the season...possibly forever. I will miss having enkai style dinners. The tatami rooms are gorgeous and the food is usually delicious (I chowed down both nights!) But I won't miss all the drunkenness and awkwardness of not knowing enough Japanese to sustain conversation for three or four hours.

Merry Christmas!

2009-12-16T00:21:00.000-08:00

December is nice because not only do I get a two week break for the holidays but my lesson planning requires very little thought. I teach about the differences between Christmas in America and Japan and the students are very surprised to learn that we don't eat Christmas cake or KFC and everyone from children to grandparents get presents. Then we make Christmas cards or some other sort of craft and end with We Wish You A Merry Christmas. This has been successful for the last three years and this year was made even better by the addition of a 300 yen Santa suit I found at the 100 yen shop.

Christmas quiz!

Exchanging cards.

Merry Christmas from the 4th grade!

Shimoda

2009-12-10T05:02:00.000-08:00

Three weeks ago I met my friend C in Shimoda for the weekend. We chose it because it was close to Tokyo (where she lives) and is on the coast. It's not on any must see list of Japan but it notable in that it's the port where Commodore Perry arrived in 1855 with his eight black ships and "suggested" that it would be nice if Japan were to end its self enforced isolation and trade with the US. (A few cannonballs convinced the Japanese that it would be wise to comply.) And so Japan was opened.

What the Lonely Planet Guide does not tell you, however, is that there are TWO Shimodas in Japan. And the one where we were headed does not have a very easily identified train station name. I knew that I needed to go to Izukyu-Shimoda because I was the one who poked around on the internet and booked our hotel. C is a trainee lawyer in an international firm and frequently works until 10pm so she didn't really have the time to do any research. We found out though when she ended up north of Sendai, hours away from where she wanted to be. By the time she realized her mistake there were no more trains back to Tokyo, let alone Izukyu-Shimoda. So I spent the first night and morning alone.

But after that small hiccup, we had a lovely trip. We took a cable car ride up for some views of the bay and the Pacific. We rode on a poor imitation of a Black Ship. And we visited a local onsen (a first for C.) Sunday, we hiked along the beach and wandered around town before heading back. We talked so much on the train back that I left my bag on the overhead rack when we got off. I was almost on the shinkansen back to Nagoya when I realized I was sans suitcase. I had to sprint back to the other train, which luckily was a local and hadn't left again yet.

Our plan was to meet again before Christmas but it looks like the only way that is going to happen is if I steal up to Tokyo and hang out in the afternoon by myself while she works on yet another deadline. Makes me glad I'm not a lawyer!

Shimoda

Small island with a shrine and a few fishermen.

Perry Road - named in honor of Commodore Perry

Tourist gimmick that we totally bought into.

Temple where the US and Japan signed their first treaty.

How Japan "really" felt about the US. (Actually they held a sumo contest in honor of signing the treaty.)

2009-11-19T02:54:00.000-08:00

I don't care what language you speak, please don't ever tell me you don't need to study another one. Unless you want to start a fight. Then you've found one.

And if your teacher ever asks you whether you (as a Japanese student) should study English then you should answer yes. Always. Even if you disagree because if your teacher has decided to devote their life to teaching you that subject then they probably aren't going to like it if you tell them it's a waste of your time.

The foreigner and native English speaker who has to grade your papers also doesn't appreciate comments like "Japan better culture has than English." No one who wrote "I agree, I think we need not study English" got an A this week except the kid who thought that "English liking students should study English and Chinese liking students should study Chinese." He didn't like not having a choice, which I totally get.

Not valid reasons for not wanting to study a foreign language:

1. It's hard.
2. Other people should just learn English/Japanese/other (This is especially absurd when you think that Japan is the ONLY country that speaks Japanese and it's not an especially big country.)
3. I'm never going to leave the country anyway. (Way to think big!)
4. "If I speak with a foreigner I will use gesture." (Good luck with that! And I hope you don't have a yeast infection!)

This isn't to say that I don't think foreigners in Japan shouldn't learn Japanese, because it certainly does make your life easier. And foreigners in America should also learn English for the same reason. In fact learning English makes your life pretty easy no matter where you go because it is the international language thanks to British imperialism and American economic power after WWII, BUT just because touristy places will certainly have some English speakers doesn't mean your life won't be easier if you learn some basics.

Learn a language. Make a friend. Visit new and exciting places. The end.

/steps off soap box

JLPT

2009-11-13T05:02:00.001-08:00

Next month I am taking the Japanese Language Proficiency Test (JLPT). There are four levels, level 1 is ridiculously hard and I admire anyone who can pass it. You have to be able to read around 2,000 kanji and know some really obscure grammar. It takes around 900 hours of study to pass it. Most people equate level 1 with fluency. Level 4 is the easiest with only about 80 kanji and only the most basic grammar.

I am going for level 3. I know 300-400 kanji and have finished a beginner's course (both Genki textbooks.) I'm not really that interested in staying in Japan past next year but I think a level 3 certificate would look really great on my application to the Peace Boat. The test is December 6th and I lucked out and am scheduled to take it at the university near me. I don't even have to change trains!

I took my first practice test last night and was really worried I was going to fail it since I've had a hard time so far working through my test prep workbook. But I got a 75%. With a passing grade at 60% I might just pass this thing. Obviously I still need to study in order to get that up and guarantee a passing grade but I'm a lot more confident than I was last week.

So here are some more random thoughts about the JLPT -

- They are changing the test next year so level 3 will actually be harder, so it's important I pass this year. I'm not sure I will ever go for level 2. Studying Japanese is interesting but my first love is still Spanish.

- I really thought I was going to be better in grammar since the vocab lists in the Genki books are so random, but it turns out I suck at grammar. Really this shouldn't be a huge surprise since this was (and still is) my weakness in Spanish and French as well. My head does a good job of grasping the overall concepts of grammar but to ask me the nitty gritty details like which particle to use "ga" versus "no" for example then I blank out.

- I know more kanji than you actually get on a test and this sometimes confuses the heck out of me. I'm so used to reading the kanji that I sometimes blank out when I see only the hirigana. I tried looking up jusho (address) in the dictionary yesterday and felt like an idiot when the kanji popped up and I realized what an easy word I had messed up on.

- I studied pretty sporadically before I decided to buckle down and take this test. It's amazing how much progress I've made with both listening comprehension and speaking skills in my daily life here in Japan since I've made a concerted effort to study more regularly. Without Nathan at school to distract me I am going to try to keep up this trend until I go home in the summer. It's a good motivator to have instant results. That's something you don't get when you are studying in your own country versus being in the country where the target language is spoken.

2009-11-12T04:05:00.001-08:00

So last year I had Thanksgiving dinner in my apartment and although it was a lot of fun it was also stressful and really crowded, so this year I worked with the Tahara International Association (TIA) to host a Thanksgiving Party at the welfare center this past Sunday. What a difference it made! We had six ovens to cook in and they were big enough to fit a normal sized turkey. Like last year I ordered it over the internet from www.themeatguy.jp and had it shipped frozen to my apartment. It just barely fit in my refrigerator but it was definitely worth it.

We had about 12 people. They showed up starting around 10:00 on Sunday. Most of them were ladies from the TIA but we had one guy and two of my friends that I know from school and we had one mom and two kids (one of whom is in the second grade at one of my elementary schools.) I gave a quick run down of how and why we celebrate Thanksgiving in America and then we set about cooking. The original ideal was to have separate groups make different dishes but the timing of things didn't work out so that almost all of them were made separately, but that just meant that everyone could learn how each dish was made. It was a little disorganized but we had everything on the table in about three hours with no major mishaps. Although they did try to set the table with chopsticks instead of forks and knives but we fixed that. This was to be an American meal all the way around.

I think everyone had a good time. The ladies from TIA are especially sweet. I've worked with them before and several of them have come to my adult English classes. But most importantly, I ate until it hurt. And then I came home and took a nap in true Thanksgiving tradition. We sent everyone home with some leftovers, another tried and true tradition. Overall, it was a great party. Thanksgiving is one of my favorite holidays so I was very glad to be able to celebrate it with some real American food this year (although I will say that tako-yaki and turkey last year was fun.)

Making the green bean casserole. They were fascinated by the idea of a casserole. I had to explain that we have many different kinds.

Carving the turkey - this was my first time so I made a mess of it. But it still tasted great.

A traditional Thanksgiving dinner with green bean casserole, stuffing, turkey, cranberry sauce, and mashed potatoes with gravy.

And pumpkin pie of course! I didn't supervise this one closely so it came out a little dry because they didn't add all the cream the recipe called for. They were worried it looked too soupy.

Happy Thanksgiving from Tahara!

Futami

2009-11-08T01:20:00.000-08:00

Last month my friend Danielle and I headed over to Ise and Futami to visit the sites there. I had already been to Ise-jingu and the Mikimoto Pearl Island in Toba back in May (pictures here) but it had been rainy that trip and I had missed seeing Futami so I was excited to go again.

Futami is a small town with not much to see except the Meoto Iwa or 夫婦岩. It translates to the Husband and Wife Rocks. These two rocks tied together with a special rope that ways over a ton symbolizes the union of a man and a woman in marriage. The shrine next to it specializes in selling love fortunes, which tell you almost everything but your future mate's name (their blood type, sign, etc.) I didn't buy one because I don't believe in that sort of thing but Danielle did and she had a good time trying to translate it. We'll have to wait and see if it was correct or not! Either way, it was a beautiful shrine and the rocks are gorgeous too. Apparently the best time to go is in the summer at sunrise because the sun appears to rise between the rocks and if you are really lucky (not me!) you can see Mt. Fuji in the distance. I'll settle for this view since it's pretty awesome as it is.

Calligraphy and Happy Birthday Mom!

2009-11-03T01:36:00.000-08:00

Here are some pictures of my latest attempts at calligraphy with Maeda-sensei. I couldn't post them earlier because I framed this one and gave it to my mom for her birthday. I painted 母 or haha. It means mother in Japanese.

My initial plan was to paint 友人　or "friend" but I talked to my parents that morning and my mom suggested "mother" since "you know my birthday is coming up soon." That means next time I have to try "father" so she can have a matching set to hang in the living room. It's too bad that "family" isn't easier or I could have just given her one. ;-)

This one is a fairly easy one to write and I was really happy with the results. The smaller characters down the side are my name. I joked that I should have written it across the top with a "no" so it would say Jennifer's mother. And I got to use my stamp! I'm really pleased with this one and needless to say my mother loved it. Although she couldn't remember asking for it and had to call and ask what it meant. (That might have something to do with the fact that I mailed it two weeks after her birthday so almost a full month after that conversation...oops.)

I bought the frame at the bookstore where they sell frames especially sized for calligraphy boards. Before I go home I need to go back and buy at least one more for myself for my other attempts.

Tahara Festival

2009-10-22T03:30:00.000-07:00

I'm about a month behind on posting. The Tahara Festival took place at the end of September while Kristin was here visiting.

We woke up to fireworks going off at 6am. At Tahara Castle we were kidnapped and forced to drink beer with ten old men at 10:30 in the morning and then invited to sit in VIP seating for the Buddhist ceremony at the temple the next day (which sadly we could not make.) We watched floats go by on our way out to Long Beach and again when we returned. And again the next day when we headed to Takigashira to hike. Sunday night I dragged her along to a City Hall function where she got to see me introduce myself in shamefully bad Japanese to a room full of drunken bureaucrats and then we watched as fathers put their lives in the hands of their sons, draped over live fireworks. We ended the weekend with fireworks and what Kristin loves best - karaoke.

Keely and Jovan came to stay too and we occasionally crossed their paths at breakfast and bedtime while they tried to say their goodbyes to their Tahara friends since they go back to N. America this month. It was a really great weekend.

Check out the random white guy from Cincinnati pulling this float. It is really is a small world after all.

Everyone helps out young and old.

Two floats come together.

Some of my students carry flags.

My students were so excited to see me. Aren't they cute?

Taking a short break.

All three in front of Centfaire.

A smaller handmade float later in the afternoon with some dancing women.

I love these little girls with their hair and makeup all done up.

Regular fireworks.

Crazy fireworks. The father drapes himself over the pipe firework while the son waves a flaming stick around. Then once dad is out of the way they light it. Awesome!

Typhoon Update

2009-10-08T05:09:00.001-07:00

So the weather now is gorgeous - blue skies and sunny - but man it was pretty bad last night. I didn't sleep very well because the rain and wind was so loud. It's pretty windy here but this was worse than normal and then the power went out at around 4am. It stayed off until almost 1pm. Luckily I have a gas stove so I was able to cook breakfast but I still had to improvise a little. I made my toast in a frying pan since the toaster wasn't working and I used the hot water left over from boiling an egg to wash my dishes with because while my water heater is gas the controls to turn it on are electric.

Around 11 I went to the grocery store to pick up some things for lunch and discovered I wasn't the only one without power. The traffic lights were down so people were taking turns at the intersections and I shopped by candlelight at the grocery store. On the floor, lining the aisles, they had small candles sitting in cupcake tins. Although they must have had a generator because there was one room in the back that had lights on and their cash registers were working but most of the refrigerated items weren't out and you had to put your face to the shelf to see what you were looking for. The 7-11 across the street didn't even have that. They were packed to the gills with people looking for easy to cook things like Cup of Noodles while the poor cashiers had to add up all the totals by hand.

I read most of the morning, tidied up a bit, and played some sudoku, but I was ecstatic when the power buzzed on at around 1. You don't realize how much noise your refrigerator, computer, and other electrical devices make until they stop making them. The silence was starting to creep me out. I'm a product of the modern world I guess.

Typhoon!

2009-10-07T01:07:00.001-07:00

It's been raining since Monday afternoon although the typhoon isn't supposed to really hit until tomorrow. That didn't mean that my commute to school by bike wasn't absolutely sodding miserable though. The bus schedule changed a few months ago and I can no longer take the bus to this school so I was left with no choice but to climb on my chari and go. Despite the rain coat and rain pants I was wearing I still showed up soggy (although without them I would have been drenched.) It was horrible, but luckily one of the English teachers loaned me some dry clothes.

The day didn't get better really when I found out I had five classes, four of which consisted of grading speech tests. I listened to 150 horrible speeches about their summer vacations. Things finally looked up when they told me speech contest practice was canceled and because I only have one class tomorrow and school is likely to be canceled anyway, I should just not come tomorrow. One of the teachers drove me home and since I left my bike at school I will take the bus to school on Friday. It doesn't get there until 10:15 but she said since I didn't have a class until 3rd period that that was okay.

So in review...had a bad morning but I came home early, don't have to work tomorrow, and can come in late on Friday. Awesome!

I'm still deciding whether to go to the gym tonight or just hang out in my pajamas watching TV and eating Kit Kats.

Dragon Festival at Kiyomizy-dera

2009-10-05T04:24:00.000-07:00

I've now been to Kiyomizu-dera three times. It's not really that exciting but it really can't be left off any list of "Things to see while in Kyoto." So we went. This time I decided to spice it up by making sure that we were there for the Dragon Festival. This is my story and I'm sticking to it! (Although the truth might be that I had no idea when or what this was and just got lucky.) The dragon came by in a procession that also included guys dressed up as warriors, some monks, and musicians, two of whom were playing conch shells like trumpets to announce the dragon's approach- totally awesome. The dragon made its way to each of the smaller shrines within the temple and paid its respects (or at least that's what it looked like to me. Wikipedia failed me when it came to details.) It was a scary looking dragon but as far as I know it didn't eat anyone but we left early so it's hard to say. Enjoy the pictures!

The procession goes by.

The dragon.

It stopped at each shrine within the temple. Here it is at the shrine by the love rocks.

On its way to the next shrine.

Maiko

2009-10-01T04:05:00.000-07:00

There are two kinds of geisha sightings in Kyoto. You can see fake geisha and maiko (geisha apprentices) which are really tourists dressed up and then get their picture taken. And then there are real geisha sightings. If you see one in the middle of the afternoon wandering around a park or temple with a photographer...tourist. If you see one quickly walking down the Hanamachi in the teahouse district of Gion around 5 or 5:30 on the way to an appointment...real maiko. See one in a taxi in Gion...real geisha. Looks like it's not really her hair but possibly a wig...tourist.

Unless you are my dad and then every maiko you saw in Kyoto was very really real.

Kristin and I spotted some true maiko while in Kyoto. We showed up in the right neighborhood at about the right time but we weren't having much luck other than a few geisha in taxis until we noticed an American girl and her Japanese host-mom standing in the same spot that we had seen them in 20 minutes earlier. We hung around for another 5 minutes or so and spotted our first maiko on her way to a tea house. When the host-mom took her exchange student down the way to wait at a different spot, we followed. And were rewarded with seeing two more maiko.

Apparently, you have to walk as an apprentice maiko but once you graduate to geisha you can take a cab. That's one way to tell a geisha from a maiko. Another difference is the red in the maiko's hair and her collar. It signifies that she is still in training. The sleeves of her dress are a little longer, but with the geisha in the taxis it was hard to make out the difference.

Overall this was one of my favorite days of our trip. We hiked Fushimi Inari in the morning, stumbled across the Dragon Festival at Kiyomizu Dera in the afternoon (a separate post coming soon,) and spotted maiko in the evening, finishing the day with my favorite Japanese meal ever - sukiyaki.

Spotted in Gion along Hanamachi.

Look at her hand and how elegant she pats her hair.

Doesn't she look young?

Ryoanji (and some nuns)

2009-09-29T02:13:00.000-07:00

I've been to Kyoto twice before so I wasn't exactly thrilled when Kristin said she wanted to go there. Although really it was my fault because I did suggest it. But we did manage to see some things I hadn't seen before (and some things I had that I wanted to see again like Fushimi Inari.) One of them being a convent! That's right, because Kristin's mom works for the Sisters of St. Joseph we were able to stay with some sisters connected to them in Kyoto. I told them early on I wasn't Catholic so I didn't get the pressure to become a nun/missionary that Kristin did but they were all lovely and took good care of us.

The other great thing was that their retreat house was right across the street from Ryoanji Temple - one of the many hundreds of temples that hadn't really made it onto my radar, but I was very happy we went. Ryoanji is famous for its Zen rock garden. There are 15 large rocks floating in a sea of gravel that is raked every morning. 15 is a perfect number but from the viewing platform you can only see 14 at a time. If you move to see the last one, another rock slips from view. Only through attaining Enlightenment can you see all 15. (No luck so far! But I did fit through Buddha's nostril at Todaiji so there's hope yet.) It might have been a very peaceful experience if there hadn't been a crowd of junior high school students also visiting at the same time.

And if you take a picture you can only get five boulders.

Besides the rock garden there is a beautiful garden.

And a nice pond!

And Sister Jeannie and Kumiko and maybe a future Sister Kristin??? ;-)

Fushimi Inari

2009-09-26T06:39:00.000-07:00

When visiting Kyoto it is important to narrow down which temples you want to see because a)there is no way to see them all and b)you want to avoid temple overload. After awhile in Japan all the temples can start looking the same. But Fushimi Inari was one temple that I was very excited to go back and visit again.

The grounds are immense and extend up to the top of the mountain. Along the trails up there are thousands of orange torii gates, at times creating a tunnel of orange. On the way up there are smaller shrines and tea houses where you can stop for refreshment (or in my case some kinako ice cream.) The view from the top offers a panorama of Kyoto.

Prayer cards shaped as foxes.

Smaller shrines dot the trails on the way up the mountain.

The view on the way up.

And heading back down.

I think you can understand why this temple is one of my favorites in Japan. It is truly stunning.

Robot Ramen

2009-09-24T16:09:00.000-07:00

Last week I was in Nagoya with my friend Kristin, who was visiting all the way from Chicago, when we stopped at Fa-men, a restaurant where two robots make the ramen. If you think that Japan is a crazy exotic land where toilets talk to you and robots feed you ramen then you are absolutely right. And we got to experience that firsthand. It was pretty awesome. Or as the Japanese would say "SUGOI!"

And the ramen is pretty good too.

And on top of all that they are inspirational robots!

More from Kristin's visit later.

Unicycles

2009-09-08T02:14:00.000-07:00

My students asked me if I wanted to ride unicycles with them today. I declined. Because falling on my face in the dirt in front of a bunch of elementary school kids just isn't my thing. But they look cool don't they?

A Day in My Life

2009-09-03T02:46:00.001-07:00

I'm back in Japan and since this is my last year I've decided to make sure I document not just my travels around Japan and Asia but to really showcase what day to day life in the countryside of Japan is like. Because it is different. Sometimes really different.

A while back I took photos throughout my day at school. This is a day in my life at elementary school from start to finish.

Walking to the train station.

I stop to admire the nano-hana flowers. These are a big deal here in Tahara. There is even a special nano-hana decorated train.

I buy a ticket for 130 yen.

I don't get the nano-hana train this morning. Boo!

My friends and I play a game with our tickets. The first person who can make theirs add up to 10 wins. I usually lose, but today I get lucky. 9-8=1 and 3*3=9. 9+1=10. But no one is there for me to gloat.

I walk by fields of cabbage. I hate cabbage and because it's so abundant here I get to eat it almost every day. Woohoo!

It's a five minute walk from the train station to school. Here I am!

I change into my "inside" shoes. And am immediately approached by the 2nd grade teacher who apologizes for leaving me with her class of 38 students by myself yesterday. I was traumatized at the time, but I'm over it now.

My schedule for the day. Five classes! I am going to be busy.

I quickly finish up a one point lesson for the teachers even though I have missed the morning teacher's meeting. No worries because they have their monthly meeting this afternoon so I can give it then. My art skills leave much to be desired.

First class is 3rd grade. We learn animals, the noises they make, and "I have a cat/dog/chicken" and "I don't have a cat/dog/chicken" etc.

Karuta at the board with pica-pica hammers is a big hit with the kids.

My second group of third graders get the same lesson. Here they are showing me their fish faces.

Third period and the first grade really likes Duck, Duck, Goose. Except in this case we played Cat, Cat, Dog.

Fourth period, the special ed class makes a dice with the animals on it. We bounce them around and whenever they fall on the floor they have to call out the animal it lands on...or I call out the animal and try to get them to repeat it after me. It's mildly successful.

Lunchtime with the third graders. These kids are on lunch duty today, so they get all dressed up in their protective gear and dish it out to the rest of the class.

We get some perversion of spaghetti today. I put quite a lot of mine back in the pot. Itadakimasu!

After lunch the kids brush their teeth. The teacher has a timer and they have to brush until it beeps while I sit and watch. There's also a brushing your teeth song that plays over the intercom. Sometimes I dance to it and they laugh at me.

Time for cleaning. I sit in the teacher's room and talk with the kids who pretend to clean but spend most of their time wrestling.

Then I pretend to study Japanese for awhile, but really I'm spacing out and reminding myself I only have one more class to go.

Fifth period and the fourth graders are learning weather. I'm really tired at this point and they are in some sort of lunch induced coma so none of us are very genki, but we all get through it. They might have even learned something in the process.

After class, I'm too tired to try and study so I hit the computer and check my blogroll instead.

Usually I have to stick around until 4:00 but since there is a teacher's meeting in the afternoon, I give my one-point lesson and then get out of there at 3:30.

Waiting for the train. I'm in Toshima trying to get back to Tahara.

When the train comes I realize it's a nano-hana train. Yippee! Everything is decked out in yellow, including the fans, seats, and handholds.

Walking back to the apartment. I tried getting a shot of Mount Zao in the background with it's trademark windmill, but you can't really see it in this picture.

Finally at home. Outside shoes off...

And house shoes on. This work day is over!

Muggle Quidditch

2009-08-04T10:33:00.000-07:00

I'm still in America. Spent this past weekend in North Carolina visiting family. Finally met my new cousin, Jessie, (she married into the family) and discovered she's just as big a Harry Potter nerd as I am. We got in Friday afternoon just in time to head out for some Muggle Quidditch organized by her and her friends.

When we got there they were in the middle of setting up the field. Our goalposts weren't the best since this was only the second game they had organized but Jessie told us we would be rockin' it Weasley style. With some duct tape and a few bricks we were finally able to get them to stand up...sorta. Then we broke off into two teams. The first game I played Beater. Dad was a Chaser and my cousin Max was our Seeker and helped me out as a second Beater. His two friends were our other Chaser and Keeper. We were down 30-0 when Max caught the Snitch and we won the game.

The second game we switched up positions and I played Chaser. I managed to score 60 points before the other team's Seeker caught the Snitch and we lost 160-60. Then it was time for some cake. As we walked over, Jessie noticed I had a huge scratch on my face where I had caught myself with my broom. "You've got a battle scar," she said, "That's awesome!"

The rest of the weekend was spent mostly hanging out and geocaching and we made sure to check out Jessie's HP-themed geocache entitled "The Portkey." When you find the first box there is an old boot with the coordinates to the next box that takes you where else but to the Quidditch World Cup (aka some nearby soccer fields.) The whole weekend was great and I hope I can play some Quidditch again sometime soon.

Rockin it Weasley style.

I played for Cleansweep Thunder but I was totally jealous of the other team's name.

My dad (guy in black shirt) played great for someone who has never read the books.

After two shortish games we took a break.

And ate some cake.

Dramatically posed to show off my Quidditch injury.

Favorite Foods from Home

2009-07-29T08:32:00.000-07:00

I know this blog is about me in Japan, but at the moment I'm not in Japan. I'm in America enjoying all the foods I miss living in Tahara. These include...

Pretty much anything from Lulu's Asian Diner but especially Tom Yum soup, Pad Thai, and crab rangoon. The Chinese food in Japan is usually fantastic but nothing will ever beat Lulu's. I worked there two years in high school and never got tired of it. Ten years later I still can't get enough.

Wheat bread! Multi-grain bread! Anything but white bread.

Pizza that doesn't have corn, mayonnaise, or tuna on it but instead comes with pepperoni and a thick crust.

Orange freezes from UDF. The UDF might look like just a gas station convenience store but in Ohio they sell awesome ice cream, floats, and freezes.

Biscuits from Cracker Barrel. Or blueberry pancakes from Cracker Barrel or their fried chicken or anything really from Cracker Barrel.

Lemonade! Lots and lots of lemonade.

Root beer floats from the Sharonville Root Beer Stand. It's a total dive but they make their own root beer on site that is to die for.

All the many different varieties of CHEESE! Atsumi Foods actually has a pretty good sampling of cheese for a Japanese grocery store but it's still nothing to just a normal Kroger's and the Kroger's Marketplace down the road has a cheese I've been looking for for four years since I got back from France - Saint Agur - and I can't wait to spend crazy amounts of money on it.

BBQ ribs. I'm heading to North Carolina this weekend and I plan on getting messy.

Red wine that isn't served chilled. Seriously Japan what is up with the ice cubes in my red wine? I miss the selection, the cheaper prices, and wine tastings at Awakenings with my friend Judy.

Turkey sandwiches! I can't find turkey in Japan, not unless I want a whole one ordered off the internet and shipped freeze dried.

That's all I can think of for now, although there probably are more. Looking over this list though I can see why I gain weight when I visit home, not that it isn't totally worth it. :-)

In the news

2009-07-24T07:29:00.000-07:00

I'm in the Tahara City Magazine! This isn't the first time, but this is the first time it wasn't just introducing the year's ALTs, (to warn the citizens about the devil foreigners that will be wandering around town. Hahaha...just kidding! They love us in Tahara.) This time I'm in a piece about the new English program for 5th and 6th graders. They also talk about the exchange students visiting from Canada. At least that's what I think the article is about based solely on the pictures. I can't actually read it.

In the first two I'm teaching my fifth graders "Hello, how are you?" and "I'm hungry, good, tired, ok, etc." And the second from the bottom I'm doing a Show and Tell with the White House for my eight graders.

Sayonara Nate!

2009-07-16T02:10:00.000-07:00

The best part of my job is the amazing amount of vacation time I get. Unlike other ALTs who have to sit around the office even when class is not in session, I am given the boot. All I have to do is submit a report telling them my plans and then I'm out the door. In summer that means I head home to America for six weeks of friends, family, wheat bread, Cracker Barrel biscuits, and orange freezes from UDF. I got home yesterday after 24 full hours in transit (that's three trains, three planes, and one car ride.)

But before I left we had the first of what I'm sure will be several sayonara parties for Nate. The party was at a club in Toyohashi and Nate was clueless despite several people suspiciously showing up from Nagoya with little explanation as to why they were there until we got to the party. There was food, an open bar, a few speeches, and plenty of karaoke. It would have been the perfect party if only it hadn't been Sunday. Not that stopped most of us from having a good time.

Singing YMCA

I know he's not going to miss me or Japan but the job won't be the same without him. This last year I've argued over whose state is cooler (Ohio!) looked up lots of completely random things on Wikipedia (naval lint for one), recited SNL sketches in class (I've got a fever...and the only prescription is more cowbell), and cracked up over Nate's William Shatner impersonations (May...I...help...you?) But now, he's on his way back to Kentucky. I'm on my own from here on out.

In Mourning

2009-07-11T04:05:00.000-07:00

Since it was a rare sunny day during rainy season, Nathan, Miyuki, and I rode our bikes to the beach this afternoon. Once there we were met with a sad sight - a huge and very dead sea turtle had washed up on shore. It looked like he strangled himself on some rope, died, and then washed up. Further down the beach are dunes where turtles come ashore and lay their eggs. Nathan has plans to take his brother when he comes later this month there late at night to see if they can spot some. Today when we saw this poor thing, he said,"You were worried about not seeing a sea turtle, Jennifer. Now you have." In this case I really wish I hadn't.

Miyuki lays down next to it to show how big it is.

Love Hotels are recession proof

2009-07-04T10:10:00.001-07:00

A poem

2009-07-04T00:57:00.001-07:00

My third graders (US 9th grade) were writing English poems this week. We started with a Mad Libs sort of exercise where each student picked a phrase and wrote it on a sheet of paper, then they combined them with the other students in their row to create a poem. This one was my favorite.

Rainbow
My pet
Across the sky
I feed it everyday
Fun.

I want a pet rainbow that eats fun!

Update on Best Dancer in the Tahara Mixed Chorus

2009-07-02T06:13:00.000-07:00

Turns out that not just people who showed up to the concert in May got to see my amazing Ponyo dancing skills. Anyone who tuned into the local access channel could see me dancing like a loon as well, including two of my school principals and one Jr. High English teacher. Yeah, I'm awesome. And pretty embarrassed.

I'm bustin a move on the end in orange.

Eye Doctor

2009-07-01T02:20:00.000-07:00

I went to the eye doctor today. This is a big accomplishment coming from the girl who said she would never ever go to another eye doctor other than Dr. Parker ever again. I love Dr. Parker. We searched for years and years for an eye doctor I would be comfortable and when I finally found her I refused to go to anyone else. Even when we lost our health insurance for a short spell, I made my mom promise me she wouldn't make me go to someone new. I was in a panic about it, but she promised me I didn't have to see anyone other than Dr. Parker.

I've been going to her for over ten years now. We even laughed about it the last time I saw her. She told me that when my mom made that first appointment she told them I was a very nervous patient and to be please be gentle with me but after the exam I said, "gee, that wasn't bad at all!" It was love at first sight (harty har har.) This woman even bought an $800 set of knives off of me that horrible summer of Cutco. So you know she is pretty darn awesome.

I really considered coming home and having my eyes checked by her over my summer vacation and if America didn't have a completely screwed up health care system then that's exactly what I would have done. But the miser in me kept reminding the wimp in me that it would be very expensive to do it that way and rather silly since I have insurance here in Japan. The wimp in me reminded the miser that I don't speak Japanese well. The miser put her foot down. And since I had the afternoon off today, I visited the local clinic.

It wasn't that bad. But Japanese clinics are completely different than American ones. American doctors and medical staff are tied up by HIPAA regulations that go to sometimes silly measures to protect patient confidentiality. There is no such thing as patient confidentiality in Japan, except when the doctor decides not to tell the patient what is wrong with them, to protect them from bad news supposedly. There are no separate exam rooms. There was a waiting room, a testing room, and the doctor's office with a curtain for a door. Aides flitted around with their patients in tow, each of us at a different testing station right to each other.

My Japanese was just good enough to get my point across and there was only one test that I was slightly confused about, but I finally figured out what they wanted me to do. They did a lot more tests than Dr. Parker ever did and the doctor concluded that my glasses are actually stronger than I need. I don't feel like spending any money to replace them at the moment because they don't bother me, but I did order more contacts. Although they would only let me have a 3 months supply at a time. Not that this is a huge problem. I only wear my contacts on the weekends or special occasions so 3 months will likely last me through until next summer.

The doctor and my aide was super nice and made me feel very comfortable despite my lack of Japanese. The only real downside was that it took forever. You don't make appointments in Japan you just show up and join in the queue, so I had to wait a bit. Then there was about 45 minutes of eye tests. Then another wait to see the doctor and another wait after that while they figured out the financials, coming to a grand total of almost 2 hours. And it would have been longer if I had arrived any later than I did because it got real busy while I was there. But it's over with. I survived. And I saved money. Woohoo!

In Kanazawa with Keely

2009-06-30T04:17:00.000-07:00

At the beginning of this month I headed up to Kanazawa to see my friend Keely. Keely is awesome and one big reason why I am here in Japan. We met at Georgetown, where she was two years ahead of me. We had the same group of friends, were in the same sorority, and I was very sad to see her graduate but totally jealous when I found out she had moved to Japan to teach English in Tahara.

Yup, that's right, she had my job before I did. Since this sister city ALT program is not very well advertised at the college, she is the only reason I even knew it existed and thought to look into it when I started feeling stagnated at Cintas. After she left Tahara, she went around the world on Peace Boat (the same Peace Boat I want to try and work on) and then came home and married a Mexican guy she met in a hostel near Mt. Fuji. They now live in Kanazawa where she works for the university and studies environmental science while he finishes up his PHD in computer science (he's being recruited by Google at the moment.) Basically, I want to be just like her and if I get on Peace Boat the only thing left will be to snag a Mexican computer science genius for a husband.

She's been to visit me in Tahara twice now but this was my first visit to see her and Kanazawa. Her husband, Jovan, was away in Tokyo so it was a girl's weekend. It also happened to be Hyakumongoku Matsuri, Kanazawa's biggest festival of the year.

Friday night we headed down to the river to watch hundreds of floating lanterns drift by. Each lantern was hand painted and each one was sponsored by a family, local group, or school. They had large ones, small ones, and even one shaped like Doraemon. We climbed down the flood wall and sat on the ledge, watching them go by. We were in the chaya district and the faint strumming of shamisen music floated down to us as we watched the lanterns.

We got a late start Saturday morning after talking late into the night. Our first stop of the day was Kenrokuen Garden, considered one of the three most beautiful gardens in Japan. It was beautiful. For lunch Keely took me to the art museum, not to see any paintings, but to eat in the cafe, which boasts a world famous pastry chef. We had the most delicious quiche I have ever eaten. It was like a symphony in my mouth. We finished up with cakes and iced coffees.

Kenrokuen Garden

I couldn't resist getting a picture of this woman in her kimono sitting in the teahouse.

Kanazawa Castle. The wall and gate are all that's left. According to the Lonely Planet it burned down so many times that locals finally gave up on rebuilding it.

After lunch we wandered over to the castle and then down through town looking for the parade. We made a quick stop at the Museum of Modern Art to look at some of the free exhibits before finally finding the parade. We weren't interested in the brass bands, so we sat in a Starbucks until the acrobats showed up. They were totally worth the wait. Balancing on the tops of ladders, three men moved between death defying pose one after another.

At the Museum of Modern Art

A dragon goes by in the parade.

Tired of the parade, we wandered through the samurai district. Kanazawa was never bombed in WWII so there are still lots of these old neighborhoods around. We walked around, shopped a bit, and finally decided on some kaizen sushi for dinner. The sushi came around on a conveyor belt and we took what we wanted. Each plate is color coded with a price so at the end you call over a waiter and he tallies up how much you owe based on your stack of plates. I was really really hungry and the food was really really good.

After dinner we headed back to the center of things to see 10,000 people do some Japanese line dancing. I've seen this in Tahara, but believe me it is a much different thing to see thousands and thousands of people dancing in the street versus a few hundred people. In Tahara they were in a single file line. In Kanazawa they were 5 people deep for almost a mile. Then we headed back to Kenrokuen because it was open later and lit especially for the festival. They also had a classical music concert. It was a lovely way to end the day.

After another late night gabfest, Keely and I headed out a little earlier on Sunday to see the chaya district near where we had been on Friday night. Clustered in this area are lots of traditional tea houses, which means of course geisha. We didn't see any dressed up but we did stop to have a bath at the local sento and we're pretty sure we saw one of the okasans of one of the tea houses. She was older and had her hair immaculately coiffed. I had told Keely we could tell people we had bathed with a geisha because she probably was one at some point in her life. Too bad she was on her way out as we came in.

Our private room at lunch. Very traditional

The food was soooo good.

Me and Keely

Lunch was at a small restaurant in an upstairs room. We had the local fish dish recommended by the waiter. And it was sugoi oishii (very delicious!) After walking around and shopping some more, I said goodbye and caught the train (3 actually) back to Tahara. Who knows when and where I'll see Keely next. Maybe this summer in America!

And then it was just me

2009-06-25T02:41:00.001-07:00

So they won't be replacing Nathan. And what's worse is that when I asked if we will change schools in September they told me it was possible. I don't wannaaaaa switch schools. I love my schools! Even the school with the crazy "will you come and record a listening test at 5:30 or maybe on Saturday" English teacher. And I especially don't want to leave Tobu ES whose has the nicest, genkiest, sweetest school nurse and head teacher who force feed me medicine when I'm sick and give me back rubs and insist on me going home when I am done with classes. And I love my fifth graders who write things like "It's always fun when Jennifer-sensei comes" and think chicken is the funniest word they have ever heard.

And I would hate to leave Takatmatsu ES where Urara in the fourth grade gives me a sheet out of her memo pad after every English class, (I have tons of papers and little origami creations from students tucked in all of my files,) and the third graders call me Jenny-chan. I would hope they wouldn't move me from Tahara JHS and Tobu JHS but they might and then I'd never get to see Miyu dance Saturday Night Fever or hear Nanami ask "what's up?"

I shouldn't really whine. It's unprecedented that I have stayed at these schools as long as I have. Before I got here the ALTs moved around every 6-12 months. This was mostly because there was one idiot ALT that none of the schools wanted, so they juggled everyone around so no one school was stuck with him long-term and eventually he wasn't allowed to teach in elementary school at all because of a slight overreaction to a playground kancho (where students poke you in the butt with their two index fingers.) And by overreaction I mean apparently he grabbed a kid and shook him pretty hard.

But he's gone now! And I'm here and my schools love me and I love them and I really see no need to change them. Nathan has five schools like me but two of them we share, so really that's only 3 elementary schools or 4 days a month to cover between the remaining 4 ALTs. Surely the schedule can be manipulated to where none of us have to switch. Now I know what Japanese teachers feel like every year in March when they aren't sure if they will stay where they are at or be transferred to another school. And it sucks.

I'm praying that I get to stay where I'm at. If I have to deal with being by myself all day with no other Americans to talk to after work other than Vanessa (who is often not around) then I don't want to have to do it with brand new teachers and students as well. It takes time for me to work up a real rapport with people, even longer when it's in Japanese. I keep trying to tell myself that next year is going to be just fine, but I'm not very hopeful. Nathan will be gone. My friends are too busy to see me. And now my schools might change. Ugh, ugh, ugh.

Erin in Japan Pt. 2

2009-06-22T04:53:00.001-07:00

After three days in Tokyo, Erin and I escaped to the inaka of Tahara. By the time we arrived it was pouring buckets of rain and it wouldn't really let up until it was almost time for her to go home. But we didn't let that ruin our fun. Armed with umbrellas and smiles we headed to Irago where we caught a ferry over to Ise in Mie prefecture in order to see the most beautiful shrine in Japan according to my Lonely Planet guide.

We visited the Inner Shrine which is supposed to be prettier than the Outer Shrine. The rain added a mysterious aura to the place. I think I preferred it that way actually. It was very mystical. Of course, we couldn't see most of the shrine as it is off limits and surrounded by a huge wall. Apparently only the Japanese emperor and his contingent ever get the honor.

After the shrine we walked through the touristy area nearby and had lunch. I saw a man handing out free samples of dried squid, or squid jerky as I like to call it, and made Erin try some. She had liked the sashimi we had eaten for lunch so I wasn't 100% sure she would hate the squid. But still I was probably 99% sure she wouldn't like it, and really she should know better than to eat something just because I tell her. It's not like that's worked out for her in the past. (I am not the nicest big sister.) It did, however, make for an awesome photo op.

She didn't like it.

The Japanese people around her insisted that squid was delicious. "Oishii-yo!" one lady told her. She threw the rest in the gutter and we continued on our way, eventually finding something she did really like - taiko drummers.

These guys were amazing!

On our way back to the ferry station we noticed the Mikimoto Pearl Island. My mom has been joking with me about buying her pearls since she visited Tokyo and saw the Mikimoto Pearl store in Ginza. So we had to go. Although the whole time I felt really bad about not taking my mom there when she was in Tahara. I bought her some pearls to make it up to her, (the really small inexpensive seed pearls not the gorgeous and thus incredibly expensive pearls she was lusting after last year when she was here.) We learned about how pearls are cultivated (technique invented by Mikimoto) and harvested and then we tried on a very large and even more expensive pearl and diamond crown. Afterward, we headed outside to see the pearl diver demonstration from the luxury of the Foreign Visitor's Lounge.

Erin and I learn about harvesting pearls.

I'm trying not to move in case I break it. It's worth about $10,000!

Every hour they had a pearl diver exhibition.

The next day the rain increased from occasional shower to a never ending downpour. Erin came to school with me and listened to some pretty embarrassingly bad show and tell speeches from my eighth graders. After the speeches they interrogated her with questions like "how much money do you make?" and "who is cuter, Mr. Nathan or your husband?" (Answers: none of your business and her husband.) Then we attempted to see some sights in town, but because of the rain we didn't make it very far before we were soaked and we retreated back to the apartment.

"I'm singing in the rain!"

Erin vents about the weather on my fridge.

Despite the typhoon sitting off the coast and trying to ruin our fun, we braved the rain and headed over to local karaoke place with Nathan. I learned a lot about my sister on this trip. For one thing, she eats slower than a sloth. And second, she has a crazy love for 80's music that I never knew about. She learned a few things about me too. I'm pretty sure she had no idea that I could rap, something that amused her to no end.

Still in my school clothes and rappin it out.

The weather finally broke on Friday and we were able to rent some bikes and head down to Long Beach and then because we'd already biked 16km and what was a few more, we headed over to Takigashira Park too. Then it was back to the apartment for a nap before a party held in Erin's honor.

Biking along the beach.

Erin, Me, Clinton, Bob, Sue, and Miwa

I put her on the train back to Narita Airport the next day. I was really worried she would get lost, something she excels at, but a few hours later she called to let me know she had made it all right. We had a great week together. If you want to read her account of the same trip you can find it here

Erin in Japan Pt. 1

2009-06-21T02:34:00.000-07:00

This post is a little late but better late than never. My sister came to visit in early May during the Golden Week holidays here in Japan. I took her around Tokyo, Kamakura, Ise, and Tahara. While we had fun sightseeing the whole week was really about having fun and seeing just how many crazy pictures of ourselves we could take.

Kaminarimon

We started out in Tokyo since that's where she flew into. We stayed in a ryokan in Asakusa just off the main street by Kaminarimon so that's where we started our sightseeing. We headed out really early due to Erin's jet lag so we were able to see Asakusa, Tokyo Tower, Meiji Shrine, Harajuku, and Shibuya before we came back and fell into our futons from exhaustion around 8pm. I had originally planned for us to go out to sing karaoke that night but since it was all I could do to keep Erin from falling asleep before 9, we decided to nix that idea. We did find plenty of geocaches while we were out though so we declared the day a success despite the lack of karaoke.

Our awesome room at the ryokan or Japanese style inn.

Erin is excited by Tokyo Tower.

At a temple near Tokyo Tower.

At Meiji Shrine this old guy gave us cake and pictures and took a ton of pictures with us while his friend kept saying "hazukashii" which translates to "you're embarrassing me."

A traditional Japanese wedding procession at Meiji Shrine.

Random cuteness in Harajuku

Drinking coffees in Starbucks while watching people cross the street in Shibuya. This may sound boring but clearly you have never seen this intersection. It's insane!

Erin meets samurai!Col. Sanders.

Day two we got up early again (thanks again to jet lag) and headed to Kamakura to see the Daibutsu, or Big Buddha. We decided to get off the train at the Kita-Kamakura station and hike the Daibutsu trail. On our way we hiked over a mountain, saw a few shrines, including one where people wash their money for good luck, had lunch at a cute cafe on the side of a hill, and argued over whose dumb idea it was to walk so far.

Zeniarai Benten shrine is in a cave.

People wash their money in the spring inside the cave. They believe that when they spend the washed money it will come back to them several times over.

Hiking was all Erin's idea.

The guide said it took 90 minutes to walk the trail. We took 3 hours but we finally made it to the Buddha. After finally making it, we searched for a few more geocaches. Erin also got to try on a one piece kimono, which while it's true that it is easier than putting on a traditional kimono it still required quite a lot of maneuvering to get it on her. But she sure looked pretty in it.

Back in Tokyo we went to dinner near the hotel in a little streetside restaurant, where Erin wanted to play menu roulette by randomly pointing out some things on the menu. Luckily with the help of a kind woman sitting near us we were saved that ordeal and we ended up enjoying everything we ordered.

Our third day it started to rain but it didn't matter since our plan was to go to Oedo Onsen where after waiting in line for 45 minutes we enjoyed 17 different kinds of baths. Erin is a champion bath taker back home with music, candles, and cold cloths for her neck so she was in bath heaven. Even being naked in front of a hundred other women (it was Golden Week after all so the place was packed) didn't phase her for too long. After a relaxing few hours, we caught the shinkansen back to Tahara where our adventures continued, although unfortunately with a lot more rain than either of us wanted.

In our yukattas at Oedo Onsen.

TBC...

Kite Festival

2009-06-16T06:37:00.001-07:00

A few weeks ago around the end of May we had the Tahara Kite Festival here in town. I didn't get to go last year because of a choir concert and for the same reason I wasn't able to attend very long this year but luckily the concert ended early and the festival ended late so I was able to see some real kite fighting action, which mostly consisted of me trying to figure out who was trying to cut who while avoiding being hit by kite strings lined with sharp glass.

A team shows off their kites.

There is another larger and more famous kite festival in the nearby city of Hammatsu. The kites there are a lot bigger and a lot more colorful. Although the ones in Tahara aren't shrinking violets either. By the time I got there around 12, everyone had stopped for lunch. But when I came back after the concert they were having the final showdown. Even the mayor was in on the fun, fighting with a kite that had the city hall logo on it.

Here they are getting ready to launch the kites.

The way it works is that each team has a kite that is sponsored by different families or businesses. They try to cut the other kites strings with the ground glass on their own string. On this day all the kites were either blue or red and they worked together to take down kites of the opposite color.

The festival is held behind Jusco in the rice fields.

People hang out all day on their tarps and under tents, picnicking and watching the kites fly. They handed out small kites and free drinks at the library across the street from where the festival was held. We had to be very careful to not get caught in one of the kite lines that moved up and down the main street. It was bad for the kite and bad for us if we got in the way. One man in our group got hit with a line and he said it really really hurt.

If you look closely you can see the kite line in this man is managing.

They look so small up in the air.

It was a really good time. I don't have pictures of the group but a mix of Japanese people and foreigners showed up from Toyohashi and Nagoya to hang out with us locals and enjoy the kite festival. All of these pictures were taken by my friend Mako since I was busy traipsing off to choir to bother taking any. Now that I've seen the real deal, I'm very interested in going to Hammatsu's festival next year. And coming back to Tahara's again as well of course.

I'm a dinosaur

2009-06-12T17:25:00.001-07:00

I got confirmation this week that Tahara is not replacing Nathan with someone from Georgetown. I'll be the only Sister City ALT left and Vanessa will be the only JET left. There are two possibilities for next year. One, they don't replace Nathan with anyone but leave me alone at the two junior high schools and divide up his elementary schools among the rest of us. Or two, they replace him with yet another private from the nearby big(ger) city.

Option one is cheaper but leaves the schools with one less ALT, which they won't like. Option two lets them keep the same number of ALTs at a lower cost than hiring someone from Georgetown, but it carries some risk too. The dispatch company keeps sending ALTs who are not only not native English speakers but don't speak English well at all, and one guy who made the kids cry. They didn't renew that guy's contract but instead replaced him with a Nigerian who doesn't speak English OR Japanese well, making it all almost impossible to plan lessons with him. So option one might be looking attractive at the moment.

But it would make my job a lot lonelier. I'm already dreading September when I get back and realize that Nathan is gone for good. Even if they replace him , it won't be the same. And all of this makes me think that they won't replace me when I leave either and then the Sister City ALTs will gone forever. It makes sense when you think about it. I've known for awhile that Aichi is phasing out the JET program and since my contract is really just a photocopy of the JET contract then it makes sense that we would be phased out too. I'm a dinosaur, according to Nathan, the last of my kind. And that makes me sad.

Eigo Noto

2009-06-10T01:41:00.000-07:00

As of last year in Japan there was very little in the way of organized English instruction before junior high school. In my town, the ALT showed up once a month and organized a lesson that mostly included games. I actually had a principal tell me to please teach words only. Sentences were too hard. My students learned very little if any English from me. If they were good it was because their parents sent them to eikawa.

This year the Japanese government rolled out new textbooks for 5th and 6th grade called Eigo Noto (literally English notebook.) A lot of people think they suck. I definitely don't think they are great but the material they cover is much more advanced and it means the teachers can no longer shut me down because something is too hard. I can point to the book and they now have no argument.

I'm not sure how other cities are handling the new weekly requirement, but I think some are just having the homeroom teacher teach the lesson while others are increasing the ALT visits. In my city, they've actually hired what they call ATs, assistant teachers, who visit the schools each week. They are Japanese natives (most of them anyway) who speak English very well, (I know this because I interviewed them.) They plan the lessons, meet with the homeroom teachers to go over it, and then they team teach with the homeroom teacher once a week. I still only show up once a month. I jump in and follow the plan for the 5th and 6th grade but I still teach my regular "fun" lessons with the younger grades the rest of the day.

The two ATs I work with are very different. One hates the textbook and asked me to plan and teach a separate lesson last time. This time I haven't had an email from her so I'm not sure what to expect when I get to school tomorrow. I'll have a lesson waiting in case she didn't plan anything. I'm not a huge fan of hers. She's not very genki and she's a whiner. She actually wanted me to leave my flashcards with her last time and looked put out when I explained that I have three elementary schools and my cards travel with me. I've given her websites where she can get her own cards. And the board of education gave her a CD-rom that has materials on it as well; all she has to do is print them out. She's also lost her 5th grade textbook already and says that makes it hard to plan. Uh yeah...

The other girl is awesome and I want to hang out with her outside of school. Her lesson plans are a little schizophrenic though. I like to spend more time on activities but she flits around from thing to thing, often even changing from grammar point to grammar point. But she's always on top of things so I don't complain. Especially since she gets results. Today in my 6th grade class the students could answer questions like "Can you play baseball?" and "Do you like to swim?" with very little trouble distinguishing between "Yes, I can" and "Yes, I do." Some of my junior high school kids still can't do this. Eigo Noto isn't the best, but with some supplemental activities I think the students will benefit.

The other thing my schools are implementing is the "Let's Enjoy English" cheer at the beginning of each class. Four students come to the front and lead the group, going over what they need to remember during English time. They are: big voice, big smile, eye contact, and big actions. I love it and have started doing it with my 3rd and 4th graders too. If they start to slack off, I can just yell out BIG VOICE or BIG ACTIONS and they immediately perk back up. Not surprisingly most of the sixth graders hate it but at my really genki school all the students are excited to come to the front to lead the group. And the fifth graders at all my schools are pretty okay about it.

I was worried about this new year and how things would change, but overall, I am liking it. Although my legs are really sore today from dancing the Hokey Pokey with the older kids and to the Genki English "Hello, How Are You" song with the younger ones. Friday I am back at the junior high and even though I love my ES students I am looking forward to something more sedate. I don't think I could survive if I had to do elementary school all the time.

How do you say "wakarimasen" in English?

2009-06-02T03:25:00.001-07:00

Today the third grade teacher at Tobu JHS decided to teach some classroom English so that while the students wrote essays about their school trip they could ask me and Nathan for help. The first phrase she taught them was "How do you say _____ in English?" She didn't take into account though that Nathan and I both speak very little Japanese. So yeah, I spent 4 hours today saying "Uh....I don't know. Sorry." I am not a dictionary!

I am a spelling bee champion though. (Sharonville ES 1994 oh yeah!) And it's a good thing because the second question was "How do you spell ______?" So I wasn't completely useless today.

Pig Flu

2009-05-25T05:55:00.000-07:00

Japan has gone crazy over swine flu. I thought I was a hypochondriac but I don't even compare to the Japanese. My sister sat on the plane in Narita for almost an hour while health officials came through, kitted up in full body suits and masks, and took everyone's temperature. A red dot meant you had to stay for further testing. No dot meant you could leave the plane. Thankfully, she didn't end up in quarantine and our trip went smoothly.

But now that there are confirmed cases of the swine influenza in Japan there is a mask shortage. Schools are being shut down. Nathan's friends are here visiting and he had planned on bringing them to school two days this week so they could experience the craziness that is a Japanese junior high school. Already at two of our schools they have asked us about swine flu and if there are any cases in Kentucky. We assured them that they were healthy. They were still worried but maybe it's okay if they visit school. We should have known with the maybe. Maybe in Japanese is a pretty strong NO.

Nathan was already using nyenkyuu to spend time with his friends, but then the superintendent called as we were heading out to dinner to tell him that he could have those two days he had planned on working as "special" days off school to spend with his friends. In other words, keep your dirty flu-infected gaijin friends away from our students. Of course, I still have to go to school so now I have a whole week of being by myself. I've considered telling them I made out with one of them just to see if I get sent home too.

Although to be fair, one teacher did say today, "I don't know why they are so worried. It's not that bad." I knew there was a reason she was my favorite English teacher.

Special mask I made for my sister when she visited, back when you could still find masks.

In other news we had a small tremor tonight. I really really hate earthquakes.

How I became the best dancer in the Tahara Mixed Chorus

2009-05-17T01:15:00.001-07:00

Mostly by being a smart ass. I think one of the worst things a choir can do is dance but that's because the kind of choral music I like isn't exactly dancing material. Would you dance to Mozart's Requiem? Or to Shubert's Mass in A Flat? What about to some Morten Lauridson or John Rutter? I think not.

So there's the first problem. I could almost tolerate the music we were singing until they decided we should dance to it. When I found that out I realized I had two choices. I could sulk in the corner half-assing it or I could make fun of the whole affair by being completely over the top Broadway wanna be with it.

I went with choice two. Then my plan backfired, because even though I was standing in the back, I was still spotted and suddenly I was being dragged to the front of the room as an example of how to do the dance. I think maybe only the director and one guy in the bass section, Mr. Suzuki, (who was also dancing like a loon) understood that I was being a bit of a smartypants. Everyone else just thought I was AWESOME. Of course once I set the precedent of over-the-top silly dancing I had to keep dancing like I was trying out for Footloose right up until today's concert. I got big pats on the back afterward from the other choir members and even from a few random strangers in the audience.

So yeah, that's how I became the best dancer in the Tahara Mixed Chorus. Lesson learned: don't be a smart ass because Japanese people won't get the joke. Instead they'll try to make you do a dance solo in front of the whole freaking town and then the joke's on you.

Speaking of choir, I was actually thinking about quitting the choir recently because I found out it's going to cost me $120 every six months to stay in and the twice weekly rehearsals are really starting to get to me. But then randomly one of the little old ladies gave me a cake, just handed me a whole cake one night after practice. How can I tell them I want to quit when I'm holding a cake in my hand? I can't. And then today after I had declined to buy a bento lunch (because they are expensive and I'm never sure if I'll like what's in it,) one of the other ladies insisted and bought it for me. Apparently I'm a sucker for free food.

Although at a cost of $240 a year and countless hours of my life sucked away doing a horrible dance about a fish girl named Ponyo, I'm not sure it really counts as free. My plan is to wriggle free after summer break, using the JLPT as an excuse. I'll explain that I need the extra study time to pass the test. Unless of course they make me another cake in which case I'll never quit.

Clam Digging

2009-05-14T05:34:00.001-07:00

I'm from Ohio. For those of you geographically challenged that is nowhere near the sea. It's a good ten hours by car to get to an ocean. We have a dirty river and Lake Erie and that's about it. So living in Tahara where I'm a fifteen minute ride from the Pacific Ocean and the Mikawa Bay has been great.

A few weeks ago I found out just how great it really can be when I was invited to go clam digging. I love clams. Particularly in chowder. My family took an epic road trip through New England when I was in junior high and one of the things I remember is eating grilled cheese and clam chowder for lunch every single day and sometimes again for dinner. It was great. You could tell it was fresh when every once in awhile you would crunch down on a piece of sand. Really, really great. So I was really excited to go clam digging.

Shiroya Beach on the bay side.

Turns out I'm not so good at clam digging though. For starters we showed up in shorts and flip flops and then realized that all the locals were wearing raincoats and boots. That's because it was FREEZING. We were also missing some vital tools, shovels being the main item. Let me state that it is possible to dig for clams using only a very large rock but I wouldn't really recommend it. My hands ached for days after. Eventually, I gave up and went to sun myself on some nearby rocks, leaving the work to the experts like Miyuki's grandma. It took our group of six people to get the same amount of clams as that seventy-something year old woman.

My friend Miyuki and her grandma.

Nathan shows us what we're looking for.

Our catch for the day.

But while I may suck at digging for them, I excel at eating them. After soaking in salt water for several hours, Miyuki declared them ready to cook. A little steam, some sake, onions, and a clove of garlic and they were ready for consumption. And man oh man were they good. They were definitely worth the sore hands, back, and legs the next three days. Oishikatta!

Side note: I'm holding chopsticks in this picture but it's practically impossible to eat these little buggers with them.

Hiroshima and Miyajima

2009-05-10T01:57:00.000-07:00

So Vietnam wasn't the only place I traveled to this spring vacation. I also ended up taking a weekend trip to Hiroshima and Miyajima with my neighbor, Vanessa, and her friend visiting from the States, Sarah. I'd been to Miyajima before last year when my parents were in Japan but we had skipped the nearby Hiroshima and its Peace Park because we had limited time and Dad decided he would rather see Himeji Castle (thanks to a childhood spent watching samurai movies.)

Miyajima was just a beautiful as I had remembered and was well worth the second look and Hiroshima turned out to be both sad and vibrant at the same time.

Both the tori gate and the temple are in the water because the island was once considered too sacred for human feet to touch.

We got to Miyajima in the late afternoon, just in time to watch the sunset. We ate dinner at a small Italian restaurant on the mainland across from the island. It had a wall of windows with binoculars that you could use to peer across the water to find the famous orange tori gate. Then we caught the ferry over to take a look a closer look in the dark. Unfortunately none of those pictures came out very well. The next morning we headed back again and spent the first half of the day taking pictures, touring the temple, and meandering the streets browsing the many tourist trap shops. I ran off for a bit to find a geocache hidden under a 500 hundred year old tree. Then we caught the train to Hiroshima and spent the rest of the day exploring the Peace Park.

The A-bomb dome. One of the few buildings left standing after the bomb.

Thousands of paper cranes are hung at the Children's Memorial - honoring the children who died in the bomb or from after effects later.

The Peace Memorial. You can see the A-bomb dome in the background.

The park was beautiful, especially because the cherry blossoms were still in bloom. The museum was hard to process and I went through it quickly. I didn't know it but the mayor of Hiroshima writes a letter to every government who conducts nuclear testing, begging them to reconsider. Everyone from the US, Russia, France, India, China, and Iran and North Korea has received a letter asking them to keep history from repeating itself. I had to hold back tears after reading some of them.

I was surprised to notice that the museum acknowledged that the Japanese army had forced Chinese and Koreans into slave labor, some of them working in Hiroshima. But then I wondered after it kept getting mentioned if that wasn't just a way to emphasize just how many innocents had died in the attack, a "hey it wasn't just Japanese that died but people the Americans were trying to help!" I don't mind America being called to task on that point, I just wish the Japanese would more openly acknowledge their own atrocities, not just when it's convenient. I'm hyper-critical of museums due to my background in history, but overall I would say this one was pretty well done.

After the museum and the park (and a few more geocaches for me) the three of us headed back to the hotel where we ordered Pizza Hut. You don't know just how good a greasy piece American style pizza tastes until you live in the middle of nowhere and can't get it. And then of course stuffed full of pizza we went out to meet Vanessa's friend Shoko who took us to one of the hundreds of okonomiyaki restaurants, famous in Hiroshima. It was delicious but I didn't want to look at food for a very long time afterward.

This building was full of nothing but okinomiyaki restaurants!

Our food being prepared.

Okonomiyaki is a sort of pancake with lots of cabbage and then other things mixed in like egg and squid with a sweet sauce and fish flakes on top. It tastes really good, I promise.

The next morning I split from Vanessa and Sarah in order to do some more geocaching. They were leaving early to head onto Osaka so I wandered around, checking out the castle and doing some shopping before I caught the train back to Tahara. All in all it was a great trip and a nice end to an exciting spring break.

Sakura

2009-05-10T01:56:00.000-07:00

I'm back from a week in Tokyo, Kamakura, Ise, and Tahara with my little sister, trying to play catch-up with my posts. Here is some cherry blossom picspam from back at the end of March. Enjoy!

Vietnam - Part Four

2009-04-27T04:49:00.001-07:00

People ask me how I can travel by myself and I never understood what the big deal was. I've only recently realized that it's easy for me to travel alone because I almost always make friends while I'm out and about, (I get this from my mother.) While traveling in Normandy, I met two American guys and two Frenchmen in a restaurant. We talked for several hours and then headed out to a local bar. In Rome, I spent a memorable night with three guys from the hostel. We had dinner and then hit a wine bar in the Piazza Navone. In Venice, I spent a whole day sightseeing with a Canadian girl I had met at breakfast in the hostel. And in Vietnam I was never without someone to talk to.

The very first day, within two hours of striking out, a woman asked me if the big building next to us was the Reunification Palace. I told her it was. And within five minutes we had lunch plans. She was from the Philippines and her sister was going to be studying in America next year. I didn't end up meeting her and I felt really bad about standing her up but I ended up going back to my hotel for an early afternoon nap because I wasn't feeling well.

The next day I left on my bike tour and just when I was starting to feel a little lonely Alan and Wendy from the UK showed up at the home stay in the room next to mine. We ended up having dinner and then breakfast the next morning together. We kept seeing each other along the tour and chatted whenever our territorial guides let us. It was really nice to have someone to share stories with about the trip with and most of our conversation centered on travel. Where we had been. Where we were going. I was very jealous of their upcoming trip to the Sahara and I wished we could have spent a little more time together. We tried really hard to have dinner together again the last night but the guides wouldn't hear of it. Weird, right? My guide wanted to take me to a local place and their guide was too nervous to veer off the approved itinerary. We said goodbye the next morning when they headed off to Cambodia and I went back to Ho Chi Minh.

Back in Saigon my last day I booked a tour to see the Cao Dai temple and the Cu Chi Tunnels. By the time the day was over I had chatted extensively with a guy from Germany. (He even bought me a coke at one point.) And I ended the day having coffee and then dinner with two German girls, Jules and Nicky, who were also on the tour.

Dinner with my new German friends, Jules and Nicky.

Even on the way home, I managed to find a friend. An older Vietnamese man started talking to me in the check-in line. He was visiting his 93 year old mother. It was only his second visit to Vietnam since he left in the seventies. He told me all about how he had gone from a fighter pilot in the South Vietnamese Army to a janitor in America. He eventually got his masters in Engineering from Purdue and had only just recently retired from Lucent Technologies. We didn't sit near each other on the plane but he found me the next morning when we landed in Seoul and bought me breakfast and gave me some traditional Vietnamese sweets before we said goodbye and parted ways.

So there you go. That's how I can travel by myself. Because I never seem to end up by myself. I don't know how it happens. Sometimes I start the conversation. Sometimes it's the other person. Sometimes it's just a friendly chat but a lot of the time it turns into something more like a dinner or going to get coffee or a drink. I've never kept in touch with any of these people but it's still nice to share the experience of traveling with another traveler or two. Someone who understands exactly what it's like to be in a foreign country and what it is to see and do the things you are doing. How about you? Have you met anyone interesting while on vacation? I can't seem to help but to meet people on mine.

2009-04-22T03:52:00.000-07:00

First let me say, I am no where near being overweight. And yet, Japan isn't the best place for me mentally when it comes to my body image. I've never had a problem with my weight before. I was slender in high school, gained some weight in college, lost it and a little more in France after college, was starting to creep up again due to my office job, and promptly lost it again when I moved to Japan. Here I tend to hover around a set weight, a little more if I'm on holiday and eating/drinking to excess, a little less if I'm depressed or sick and eating less. I work out consistently, walk or bike most everywhere, and try to eat within reason. And I'm doing something right because I got a perfect score on my health report this year. Living abroad has been good for my pant size. It hasn't always been great for my body image however.

Just being a westerner in Japan is enough to make a person feel fat. I'm constantly surrounded by people who are shorter and about 20kg lighter than me. None of the clothes are designed to fit me. I'm too tall and too curvy for things to fit. Some shirts and jackets are okay, although they seem to be designed for people without waists. And pants are impossible. I'll try on the largest size they have in the store and it's still not large enough.

And if that isn't enough people here are not shy to make comments about your weight. When I first got here they were all complimentary, "Oh wow, you've lost weight!" Now I'm seeing that they also go the other way. The other night at dinner my shirt slipped up so my lower back was showing. My friend Sue walked by, tickled me there, and then told me that I needed to go to the gym.

I was aghast. "Are you calling me fat?" I asked her indignantly.

"It's okay," she said. "I need to go too."

So because of her comments I've cut out all sugary snacks and alcohol during the week. Eating healthier isn't a bad thing. I think course corrections here and there and making sure that a few holiday pounds don't become permanent is easier than trying to lose a lot of weight down the road, but it's my mindset about it that is starting to become worrisome. Her comments shouldn't have affected me, but it did.

I didn't realize how much until I got the opposite reaction from a friend in America. She told me she had showed my Vietnam pictures around to the ladies she works with and they all made comments about how skinny I was and how my collar bone was sticking out. I tried to tell her it's always done that, but she insisted that when she saw me at Christmas I was looking pretty svelte. Not skinny in a bad way, but just smaller. This after the "You need to go to the gym" comment. My mom has made similar comments about me getting too small but I've dismissed them since she worries too much. I'm getting mixed messages and my brain is having trouble sorting it out. Am I too big or too small? I feel a bit like Goldilocks. Of course, rationally I know I am just right. I checked at the gym tonight and I'm no bigger or smaller than I was at my health check. But still...body image doesn't seem to come from the rational part of the brain. I still look in the mirror and wish my stomach was flatter and then I berate myself for caring so much.

It's not just women either. Nathan (co-ALT, neighbor, and other half of our English comedy duo) had a teacher he hadn't seen in awhile tell him that his face looked fatter. If it does I haven't noticed. He was put out since he's been making a concerted effort to lose some weight before he goes home this summer. My friend Jovan was called out on his weight gain when he came back to Japan after spending the summer in North America. Just a casual, "well you've gained weight," like they were commenting on the color of his shirt. I know it's acceptable in Japanese culture but as an American it's one of those things that rankles no matter how long you've been here.

One thing is for sure, culture shock can be a bitch. And with that said, Nathan is coming over soon and we are eating cake - cake with strawberries and whipped cream and maybe even some wine or bourbon to wash it down. And we'll be two sexy beasts doing it too.

Vietnam - Part Three

2009-04-22T03:25:00.001-07:00

My final day in Vietnam was spent back in Ho Chi Minh. Before I left on the bike tour I had scheduled a day trip to a Cao Dai temple and the Cu Chi Tunnels that left at 8am so I was up early and out the door before 7:30. After some confusion on just where I supposed to be (resolved after I raised my voice explaining to the guy asking for my ticket that SOMEONE had ALREADY taken it and they WERE NOT leaving me behind) we were on our way.

We hit the Cao Dai temple first because they like for you to be there during prayer time. Cao Daism started in 1927 and is a mixture of Buddhism, Confucianism, and Taoism. The ceremony and prayer itself was very interesting but I felt it was ruined somewhat by the hordes of tourists snapping photos (me included.) I wonder if the participants are able to block us yahoos out while they meditate or if only the last half of their prayer time, after most of the tourists wander back to their buses, is peaceful.

One eye is the symbol for their religion.

The altar at the front of the temple

All but the monks wear white while they pray. Tourists gawk from the balcony.

Then it was onto the Cu Chi Tunnels. And just like the War Remnants Museum the history reflected was one-sided and biased to the point it was funny. The interesting part was that the tunnels were actually built during WWII to hide from the Japanese army. They were only expanded later when the Viet Cong moved in and used them to fight the US Army. One US Army base unknowingly was built right over one tunnel entrance making it very easy to steal weapons and information. The tunnels themselves are very small (they've widened sections so fat American and European tourists can have a look) and were heavily booby-trapped. Special markings on the wall told the Viet Cong which way they should go to avoid the traps. US servicemen oftentimes weren't so lucky.

They had all sorts of nasty traps including this one with bamboo spikes.

Me inside the tunnels. They weren't so bad after caving in KY.

They had a shooting range where for a small fee you could shoot an AK-47 (I declined.) When it started to rain, our guide hurried us through the last bits showing how the VC used the tunnels to live in and planned their attacks from and into a small area with a video to watch. The video was a propaganda video from 1967 lauding teenage girls who had won medals for being "American killer heroes." I kept waiting for a narrator to cut in and explain the historical significance of the tunnels or put them into some kind of context but no it really was just a propaganda movie from the sixties and nothing else.

Check out the flag and picture of Ho Chi Minh displayed over the TV.

Then we were rushed back into the van in the hopes that we would beat the looming thunderstorm back to Saigon. We didn't. But it worked out okay because I ended up in a cafe with some German girls from the trip while we waited for it to stop raining. We went to dinner together as well and then it was back to the airport for me!

And that was my vacation. I'll probably have one more post talking about all the people I met but this is most of the pictures and sights done. If you ever get a chance to go to Vietnam, I say jump at it. It's a great place and I loved (almost) every minute I was there.

Vietnam - Part Two

2009-04-15T06:08:00.001-07:00

After rushing through great cities like Rome in one day that it's best to take your time and savor a place rather than rushing around wildly to see all there is to see. So with this is mind, I booked a four day trip through the Mekong Delta. It turned out to be a great decision. It also helped that my guide knew that I wanted to try some authentic Vietnamese food and made sure to take me to local watering holes rather than the usual tourist stops. He told me I was the first guest he had taken to these places and the first guest he had drank with. I think by the end he might have had a bit of crush on me because when we got back to Saigon he offered to take me out again that night even though the tour was over. My stomach was screaming for a break by that time though or else I might have taken him up on it. Lots of pics and text...

Mekong Delta:

The first day started with a river cruise from My Tho. It started on a larger boat with a motor but we soon transferred to a smaller boat with a skinny old man in the back who paddled us into a increasingly narrowing canal. We got out on an island and followed a small dirt path through fruit tree gardens. We stopped at a cafe where we ate locally grown fruit and drank green tea sweetened with honey and lime. Then it was back on the boat, which took us to lunch, but not before a quick look at the temple of the Coconut Sect, a religious order started by a man who ate only coconuts and drank only coconut milk. After lunch we met up with the van and then we finally hit the bikes for a 17 km bike ride along the river for my first real look at the countryside I had signed up to see. Another boat took our bikes, our overnight bags, and us to the home stay where I would spend the night. It was like camping!

The second day we set off on our bikes around the island past beautiful houses with large open verandas. Vietnamese pop music drifted out while the inhabitants lounged around in hammocks. A father crouched around a bike, fixing it, while his two young sons sat nearby and watched with the radio on in the background reminded me of similar Saturday afternoons with my dad in the garage. We ran into two other tourists who were delighting the local children by taking their pictures. They laughed and hit each other when they saw the results. I smiled and said hello to school-aged children as they waved and shouted at me. This happened everywhere I went.

Then we took a ferry over to the mainland where we continued on through rice fields and past brick kilns. Large white funereal monuments rose up from the fields, family ancestors laid to rest in the same fields they had worked themselves. Cows lounged in the sun along the path, undisturbed by us or the auto bikes that whizzed by. The sun beat down as the temperature soared and my energy leaked away. When we finally stopped for a drink after 35km, I was done for the day. We rode the rest of the way to our lunch stop and then onto Can Tho.

Brick kilns

Cud-chewing cow who ignored us as we biked past.

My hotel that night was horrific with two gray mice snuggled up under my pillow in my first room. My second room was better but I stilled spied a gecko running around in the bathroom, but I was too tired at that point to care much. That night my tour guide, Le, didn't take me to the normal tourist venues but instead to a back alley stall for dinner. We sat on low plastic stools in an open air restaurant and ate Vietnamese hot pot - chicken in a beef broth mixed with Chinese herbs - with fried chicken feet to finish and several bottles of rice wine to wash it down.

We decided to go get coffee and when we got back to the main street, I suddenly found a helmet in my hand. I had avoided the auto bike taxis in Saigon, but Le was determined to show me the real Vietnam, and with my inhibition lowered, I climbed on and away we went. Where we ended up didn't actually have coffee so I ordered an Orangina and inexplicably ended up with a Bird's Nest drink instead. (And yes, it's really made from bird's nest. It was sweet and not so bad tasting if you can forget its origin, which I never really could.)

The next day we set off to see the floating market. There were almost as many tourist boats as vendors but it was still interesting. Then we hit the bikes, through tiny villages and over small bridges, some of which looked like they might fall apart and into the canals at the slightest provocation. Before lunch we visited a stork sanctuary. It was beautiful to see so many birds everywhere, but my guide said if they strayed too far the rice farmers would capture and fix them up for dinner.

The floating market

Lunch was another hot pot, this time my new favorite dish - sour soup. After lunch we left the small dirt tracks for the larger road towards Chau Doc. It was a little unnerving (okay a lot unnerving) to share the road with cars, auto bikes, and these humongous dump trucks but as the mountains slowly appeared in the background I learned to stay as close to the side as I could without falling in a ditch. I saw ox carts and young boys carrying bags of grain on the backs of their bikes. We stopped for a drink at a hammock cafe. Why don't we have these in Japan or America???

After another day of 35km or so on the bike we hiked another 1km up to the top of a mountain to see the view at sunset. Then Le dropped me off at my hotel (mouse-free this time!) with a promise to take me to another local restaurant for dinner. We had another hot pot, roasted beef, and more rice wine. The ride home was in a cyclo. About halfway back a pair of boys recognized our driver, and realizing that I was a foreigner, ran to catch us. They jumped in with us and rode the rest of the way. They asked my name in English but then grew frustrated that I couldn't speak Vietnamese. They asked Le why he hadn't taught me. I'm not sure what he told them, but I snapped their picture when we got back to the hotel.

My first cyclo ride.

The fourth and final day we set off on another boat cruise, stopping first to see a fishing village. It was crowded with tourists but it was interesting to see the houses up on their stilts with one pole marked to show how high the water got during rainy season. Back in the boat we cruised peacefully and snacked on fruit (they were always feeding me fruit wherever we went) before taking our bikes around another island. We biked through a small town where navigating the bike reminded me of a video game. I was constantly dodging people, bikes, animals, and veering right at the sound of horns so I didn't get run over by scooters from behind. It was crazy. It was awesome.

As we left the town the tracks became packed dirt and one point we had to detour because they were re-doing the road. Even after our small detour (down a ridiculously narrow path and over a small stone bridge that I actually fell off of) we had to ride through wet sand. An older woman on a scooter waited patiently while I hogged the one path that had been packed down some and when I passed she reached out and patted my shoulder and offered me a smile and an encouraging word. After 20km or so we caught another ferry back to the mainland and met up with our van driver who took me back to Saigon. And there the tour ended. I had a fabulous time and if I ever have the money for a private tour again like it, I will definitely jump at the opportunity.

Next up: A Cao Dai temple and the Cu Chi Tunnels.

Vietnam - Part One

2009-04-05T06:11:00.000-07:00

Vietnam - Part One

I had never really considered visiting Vietnam until my mom insisted that I should go there instead of Indonesia, which was my original idea for spring break. In her mind somehow Vietnam sounded safer than Bali. And being the respectful daughter that I am I decided to listen to her...somewhat. When I went to the library I checked out guides for both Bali and Vietnam and in the end Vietnam won out. I haven't been to Bali so I can't compare but I think I made the right decision. It was easily the best vacation I have been on in a long time. Vietnam and I got on rather well.

Saigon:

Ho Chi Minh City or Saigon as it used to be called (and still is by many residents) definitely shows its previous French influence in both the architecture and the coffee. But despite this, there's no way you can forget you are in southeast Asia. Woman in conical bamboo hats line every street, some of them carrying loads of fruits and vegetables over their shoulders. Hundreds of auto bikes and scooters whiz by, casually pulling up to street vendors to buy the day's food or a drink before whipping back into traffic again, sometimes driving on the wrong side until there is an opening to move back to the right side.

Men sit hunched over on plastic stools at impromptu sidewalk cafes, sipping tea or iced coffee while others lounge on parked bikes blocking the sidewalk and forcing pedestrians into the street with the traffic. Crossing the street is a nightmare preceded by a prayer. If you can find a local then follow them. One older lady saw me looking nervous my first evening, grabbed me by the elbow and dragged me across. She hardly waited for my relieved thank you on the other side. The trick, I was told, is to walk slowly so the bikes have time to swerve around you. They will but not without a lot honking first. The honking never stops actually, even late into the night, you can hear it. It's like the heat in that way.

If you are a tourist then you are constantly beset by men offering to drive you wherever you want in their taxi, cyclo, or on their auto bike. Women hawk different wares from food, toiletries, to cheap plastic toys. I learned quickly that an insistent "NO" along with avoiding eye contact kept them from harassing me too much, but not before I was stalked by a cyclo driver I had been too friendly with. An Australian couple near me at a cafe the first day was harassed into buying something from an elderly woman and her smug smile and laughter at the man's irritation made me lose any sympathy I might have had previously.

I didn't actually see many of the sights that the city had to offer. I refused rides by the cyclo drivers on principle and after observing the traffic there was no way I was getting on an auto bike taxi, which left me only my two feet to get around. I still managed two lovely parks, the Ben Thanh Market, walked by the Renification Palace (a horribly ugly concrete building from the 1960's) and over to the War Remnants Museum.

The museum was interesting though completely unreliable historically with its obvious bias. It did a good job of showing the horrors of the Vietnam War while managing to lump all the blame on the murdering henchmen of the American Army. Despite the harsh language though I was never made to feel uncomfortable being an American there. Maybe its because I'm young and female and they wanted my money, but I hope it was more than that.

I will say though that the pictures of Agent Orange victims combined with the heat made me sick to my stomach and I retreated back to the hotel for a few hours to rest before I ventured out again to do some more shopping although I didn't stay out long. I'm sad to say that the first day I went to bed early. The heat and pollution combined with an early start the next day to begin my bike tour had me showered and watching American Idol in the hotel well before 9pm. But since I rarely get to watch real TV I counted even that as a treat to be savored while on holiday.

Next up: Four days in the Mekong Delta

Stamps

2009-03-21T19:31:00.001-07:00

In Japan stamps are very important. Everyone has a stamp that they use for official documents. They are registered at city hall and you use them on bills, to open bank accounts, or even to sign up for a gym membership. My Japanese friends were astonished to know that we just sign our names in the States. "But anyone can sign your name, right?" Well, umm, yeah, but we don't have cool kanji to make up our stamps.

In fact my official stamp is just my initials - JK. It stays at the Board of Education with my boss because she "signs" documents for me on a regular basis so I only take it with her permission and a promise to return it safely soon after using it.

But luckily for me they use stamps for more than just official documents. The kids make stamps out of erasers at school and then use them to make bookmarks and the like. And calligraphers have their own stamps that they stamp their masterpieces with. I am recently the proud owner of 3 stamps featuring my name.

One was made for me by the fourth grade teacher at one of my schools. It's my name in hirgana carved into an eraser (the one at the bottom.) I was so excited and elated when she gave it to me. I've used it on cards and letters I've sent home and I have plans to stamp the geocache logbooks I find with it.

The other two are made from stone by my calligraphy sensei. He carved them himself and stamped our work for us yesterday before we left, one in romaji (on the top) and one in katakana (in the middle; this is how my name looks normally when written in Japanese.) I'm not sure I thanked him properly I was so excited. I'm going to have to go on a letter writing frenzy or practice my calligraphy some more so I can get the most use out of my shiny new stamps.

Traditionally this should be in red ink, but I only have a pink stamp pad at the moment.

My latest attempt at calligraphy - sakura or cherry blossom.

This kanji was harder than the last one I tried. I feel like I got the tree radical on the left alright but the woman radical on the right, while I can write it just fine with a pencil, is much harder with a brush. I'm also thinking too Western and write it with left to right in mind rather than right to left, which is how kanji is written. So my name should really be on the other side of the board. Oh well. I still like it. I imagine it looks like a woman sitting under a cherry tree while the pink petals shower down on her.

White Day

2009-03-13T19:06:00.000-07:00

In Japan, Valentine's Day works a little differently than in the West. For starters only girls give chocolates. They give it to their friends - tomochoco. They give it to their bosses - girichoco (literally obligation chocolate.) And they give it to their lovers/potential lovers. Or in my case they give it to their old men friends who sometimes pay for them at karaoke and asked that I give them chocolate on Valentine's Day. I did but with the caveat that I got something on White Day.

Say what? What the heck is White Day? you ask.

Japanese men get one month to decide if the chocolate offering in February was to their liking and return the gesture, although usually with cookies rather than chocolates. So at my English class on Wednesday night I came home with four boxes of chocolates and cookies from my lovely friends Toshio, Nagata-san, Clinton and Bob (yeah, those aren't their real names.) I don't have to buy cookies for...at least a week.

In which I am appreciated

2009-03-05T02:11:00.000-08:00

Last year due to some unfortunate scheduling I happened to be at one of my elementary schools for their graduation rehearsal and later at one of my junior highs for the actual ceremony. It was the kind of cultural experience I hoped I wouldn't have to ever repeat again because of the cold, uncomfortable chairs, and mind-numbing boredom. Somehow, this year I've managed to get out of all of them. I go to five schools and I'm not going to one graduation ceremony!

Instead this week, I managed to hit the "goodbye and thank you for being wonderful teachers" parties that the sixth graders in elementary school give before they graduate. On Tuesday they brought me cake in the teacher's room since I couldn't make it to the actual party and today during sixth period all the teachers were called down to the home economics room (very politely I might add) and then escorted there where we were fed crepes with tea and played games. They presented us with these plaques they had written messages on and a bookmark and then we had two very short speeches before we finished and the music teacher drove me home. Much much better than the graduation ceremony I must say.

I was especially happy to get a plaque since I didn't get one last year. You can see it below - that's my name in the middle in purple. It took me quite awhile to read all of it, but most of them say "Thanks for teaching us for two years. Your games and classes were fun. Please be nice to me in junior high." It's not really goodbye yet for these students and me since they will move up to one of the two junior highs I teach at. I made sure they knew that starting in April, however, that I was no longer Jennifer-sensei but Ms. Jennifer, which means no more stilted Japanese from me. It's all English from here on out!