Yesterday, Katie and I decided to transform our backyard into something that's not such an utter abomination. The first step in this epic struggle will be to get a decent vegetable garden going. We bought a few different varieties of tomatoes (roma and plum), red and yellow bell peppers, basil, and mint. We figured we'd get the most use out of those guys, even if others, such as zucchini or eggplant, might be easier to grow. We spent a few hours yesterday pulling up grass and weeds and turning up soil, and Katie's going to head to the home center today to buy bricks for making a raised garden so we can transfer the seedlings this afternoon. It's a grand experiment. I'll keep you posted on its progress.
Recently, I decided not to be such a shameless slacker and started taking actual Japanese lessons. I'm taking a couple, actually. Twice a week I do a program more focused on grammar, reading, and writing, and once a week I have conversation. Ok, technically the last one isn't exclusively a conversation class, but I'm going to call it one anyway because I'm talking to a living human being instead of working out of a workbook. In my spare time, I've also been making a more concerted effort to cram as many kanji into my head as possible. I'm not worrying so much right now about how to pronounce them, just learn what they mean. For example, I don't necessarily know that this character 起 can be read as "o" or "ki", but I do know that it means "get up". Once I learn the vocabulary "okiru" 起きる (to get up) or "kiritsu suru" 起立する (to stand up) I'll be able to remember the readings in context.
At the end of the month, Katie and I are going to Korea to visit our friend, Adam. We'll be taking the night bus to Fukuoka, and from there we'll take the high speed hydrofoil across the Sea of Japan and disembarking in Busan. I'm not exactly sure what the itinerary will be, but we'll head up to Seoul for at least a day or two, where we plan on taking part in the DMZ tour. Apparently, the USO runs a tour of the demilitarized zone, the strip of land that separates North and South Korea at the 38th parallel. It should be a hoot.
As for the summer, Australia is out of the question (we'll go sometime when prices aren't so ridiculous), so now we're looking at some more domestic tourism. And for that, we're looking north to the barren (by Japanese standards), snow-capped and wildflower-covered island of Hokkaido. It'll be nice to escape the oppressive heat and humidity that sits on the Kansai Region during mid-August. I'm especially interested in going to Hokkaido as it's one of the last vestiges of Ainu culture and civilization - the Ainu being the aboriginal people of the Japanese archipelago, sort of like the Native Americans back home. They're ethnically Caucasian, looking far more Siberian than East Asian, and are, among other things, the hairiest people in East Asia. Today, there are only a few hundred who can claim pure Ainu parentage, unmixed with the Yamato people we now know as the Japanese who drove them northward so long ago.
I've posted a backlog of pictures on the picasa web site. You can access them via this link: http://picasaweb.google.com/rmhollands . Please enjoy!
-Bob
Monday, April 14, 2008
Thursday, April 3, 2008
Katie's family's visit
Katie's family left for Itami Airport this morning at 6 AM in two taxis: one for them, and one for their luggage.
It was a sad farewell, not only because we enjoyed hosting them and were sad to see them go, but because of how quiet and empty our house seemed after they left.
Since I'm writing this account of their stay now, instead of as it happened, I can only remember the main details. But since I doubt you'd care to read all the nitty gritty details anyway, I think I can safely give them a pass.
-Katie's mom Roseann, her aunt Linda (her mom's sister), and Linda's friend Gwen arrived on Friday, the 21st of March.
-We spent Saturday and Sunday walking around Kyoto. Among the more notable things we did were staying at a Buddhist temple on Saturday night, visiting Kamigamo-jinja, Kurama Onsen, a machi-ya and the Higashiyama area which was all alight with lanterns on Sunday night.
-I had to work on Monday but Katie was off work, so she showed them around where we live. She took them to a 100 yen store, the grocery store, and various other places on the street in front of our house. On Monday night, Mr. and Mrs. Masaoka, my principal and his wife, came over for dinner. We served them chili, cornbread, and salad ("traditional" American food), and Katie made her famous guacamole. Mrs. Masaoka offered to show Katie's family around Nara on Wednesday and Thursday, since she went to university there and knows the area well.
-Tuesday, Katie and I were both at work, so our three guests went out on their own to visit Himeji Castle. Katie and I met them in Kobe for dinner, where we wanted to take them to an izakaya so they could try a variety of Japanese dishes. It was exceptionally crowded that night downtown (I later learned that it was because a lot of college students just graduated), and it was nigh impossible to secure a table anywhere. We ended up settling for a burger and sandwich place, which was hardly Japanese, but nevertheless tasty.
- Wednesday and Thursday, Mrs. Masaoka kept her word and led our guests around Nara. They saw all the usual sights such as Todai-ji, the Great Buddha, the deer at Nara Park, Horyu-ji, and Nara Women's University (where Mrs. M went to school). For a middle-aged Japanese woman, Mrs. Masaoka moves rather quickly, and our guests had quite the time keeping up with her. She took it easier on them on Thursday, moving at a slower pace and always trying to find escalators and stairs where available. Even so, she kept them out late, and on both days I arrived home from work before they came back.
-On Friday, while Katie and I were at work, our guests went shopping in Kobe (they had been enticed by all the big department stores they saw the last time they were in the city).
-Katie took off work on Saturday, and we all decided to go to Osaka. We stayed mainly around the northern Kita area of town, around Umeda station and its shops, but later that day we made it down to Osaka Castle and the surrounding park. We were originally going to eat dinner downtown in the lively southern district, but we decided that we'd rather eat some home-cooked lasagna which Linda graciously offered to make.
-Early Sunday morning, we hopped on the train to Kobe Airport and flew to Naha, Okinawa. Our first order of business was to see Shuri Castle, which was the seat of the Ryukyu Kingdom before the Islands were appropriated by Japan. We spent some time exploring the castle grounds.
-Monday was a day of bloody history. As a brief aside, let me say that it's nigh impossible to negotiate Naha by public transportation; the buses run irregularly and at outrageous intervals. We actually had to "hire" a large taxi that could fit five people and would wait for us while we explored the sites. First, we went to the secret, underground base the Japanese military used during the Battle of Okinawa in WWII. It was a rag-tag series of tunnels with several alcoves set aside to serve as meeting rooms, medical facilities, or quarters for certain ranks. The most macabre and, for me, the most interesting part was the section of tunnel still riddled with shrapnel holes from when the Japanese soldiers killed themselves by detonating their own hand-grenades. Afterwards, we took a taxi to the Memorial Park commemorating the lives lost during the Battle of Okinawa. The memorial itself was quite impressive: black marble slabs engraved with the names of both the Japanese and the Allied troops who were killed. If you climb up the hill above the memorial, there are separate monuments dedicated to Japan's 47 prefectures. Finally, before going back downtown to dinner and eventually, our hotel, we went to Cape Kyan to search for the "suicide cliffs". We found cliffs, but I'm not sure if they were the ones Roseann was looking for.
-Tuesday morning, Roseann, Katie and I tried to find the only beach in Naha only to find its ocean view annoyingly obstructed by cranes and shipping crates. It seems that if you want the white sand beaches and cobalt blue shores your mind conjures up when you think, "Okinawa," then you need to get the hell out of Naha. At the same time, Linda and Gwen headed down to Kokusai Street to do a little souvenir shopping.
-Wednesday morning we returned to Kobe. Katie, Roseann, and I went to Osaka while Linda and Gwen returned to Amagasaki to revisit the 100 yen store. The three of us tried very hard to find the perfect birthday present for Katie's younger sister, Jennie, but to no avail. We went back home, Katie made some more guacamole, our three guests finished their packing, we went out to eat at the Chinese restaurant next door, and it ended up being an early night for everyone.
That's about it. Later I'll ask Katie to fill in any missing details she thinks are important enough to include here. She's much better at remembering things than I am.
That's all for now,
-Bob
It was a sad farewell, not only because we enjoyed hosting them and were sad to see them go, but because of how quiet and empty our house seemed after they left.
Since I'm writing this account of their stay now, instead of as it happened, I can only remember the main details. But since I doubt you'd care to read all the nitty gritty details anyway, I think I can safely give them a pass.
-Katie's mom Roseann, her aunt Linda (her mom's sister), and Linda's friend Gwen arrived on Friday, the 21st of March.
-We spent Saturday and Sunday walking around Kyoto. Among the more notable things we did were staying at a Buddhist temple on Saturday night, visiting Kamigamo-jinja, Kurama Onsen, a machi-ya and the Higashiyama area which was all alight with lanterns on Sunday night.
-I had to work on Monday but Katie was off work, so she showed them around where we live. She took them to a 100 yen store, the grocery store, and various other places on the street in front of our house. On Monday night, Mr. and Mrs. Masaoka, my principal and his wife, came over for dinner. We served them chili, cornbread, and salad ("traditional" American food), and Katie made her famous guacamole. Mrs. Masaoka offered to show Katie's family around Nara on Wednesday and Thursday, since she went to university there and knows the area well.
-Tuesday, Katie and I were both at work, so our three guests went out on their own to visit Himeji Castle. Katie and I met them in Kobe for dinner, where we wanted to take them to an izakaya so they could try a variety of Japanese dishes. It was exceptionally crowded that night downtown (I later learned that it was because a lot of college students just graduated), and it was nigh impossible to secure a table anywhere. We ended up settling for a burger and sandwich place, which was hardly Japanese, but nevertheless tasty.
- Wednesday and Thursday, Mrs. Masaoka kept her word and led our guests around Nara. They saw all the usual sights such as Todai-ji, the Great Buddha, the deer at Nara Park, Horyu-ji, and Nara Women's University (where Mrs. M went to school). For a middle-aged Japanese woman, Mrs. Masaoka moves rather quickly, and our guests had quite the time keeping up with her. She took it easier on them on Thursday, moving at a slower pace and always trying to find escalators and stairs where available. Even so, she kept them out late, and on both days I arrived home from work before they came back.
-On Friday, while Katie and I were at work, our guests went shopping in Kobe (they had been enticed by all the big department stores they saw the last time they were in the city).
-Katie took off work on Saturday, and we all decided to go to Osaka. We stayed mainly around the northern Kita area of town, around Umeda station and its shops, but later that day we made it down to Osaka Castle and the surrounding park. We were originally going to eat dinner downtown in the lively southern district, but we decided that we'd rather eat some home-cooked lasagna which Linda graciously offered to make.
-Early Sunday morning, we hopped on the train to Kobe Airport and flew to Naha, Okinawa. Our first order of business was to see Shuri Castle, which was the seat of the Ryukyu Kingdom before the Islands were appropriated by Japan. We spent some time exploring the castle grounds.
-Monday was a day of bloody history. As a brief aside, let me say that it's nigh impossible to negotiate Naha by public transportation; the buses run irregularly and at outrageous intervals. We actually had to "hire" a large taxi that could fit five people and would wait for us while we explored the sites. First, we went to the secret, underground base the Japanese military used during the Battle of Okinawa in WWII. It was a rag-tag series of tunnels with several alcoves set aside to serve as meeting rooms, medical facilities, or quarters for certain ranks. The most macabre and, for me, the most interesting part was the section of tunnel still riddled with shrapnel holes from when the Japanese soldiers killed themselves by detonating their own hand-grenades. Afterwards, we took a taxi to the Memorial Park commemorating the lives lost during the Battle of Okinawa. The memorial itself was quite impressive: black marble slabs engraved with the names of both the Japanese and the Allied troops who were killed. If you climb up the hill above the memorial, there are separate monuments dedicated to Japan's 47 prefectures. Finally, before going back downtown to dinner and eventually, our hotel, we went to Cape Kyan to search for the "suicide cliffs". We found cliffs, but I'm not sure if they were the ones Roseann was looking for.
-Tuesday morning, Roseann, Katie and I tried to find the only beach in Naha only to find its ocean view annoyingly obstructed by cranes and shipping crates. It seems that if you want the white sand beaches and cobalt blue shores your mind conjures up when you think, "Okinawa," then you need to get the hell out of Naha. At the same time, Linda and Gwen headed down to Kokusai Street to do a little souvenir shopping.
-Wednesday morning we returned to Kobe. Katie, Roseann, and I went to Osaka while Linda and Gwen returned to Amagasaki to revisit the 100 yen store. The three of us tried very hard to find the perfect birthday present for Katie's younger sister, Jennie, but to no avail. We went back home, Katie made some more guacamole, our three guests finished their packing, we went out to eat at the Chinese restaurant next door, and it ended up being an early night for everyone.
That's about it. Later I'll ask Katie to fill in any missing details she thinks are important enough to include here. She's much better at remembering things than I am.
That's all for now,
-Bob
Tuesday, February 26, 2008
What would you say, you *do* here?
So what, exactly, do I do here?
I get up in the morning at around 7. If I was smart the night before, I'd have already showered and packed my lunch, which usually consists of whatever Katie and I cooked the previous night. I pack my laptop in its case, grab my lunch bag from the fridge, and try to be out the door no later than 7:40. If it's not raining, I'll bike to work. It's a 40 minute journey from my front door to the school's front gate. The terrain is flat enough, so the ride isn't too strenuous, which allows to let my mind wander while I'm riding. I ride like everyone else: on the sidewalk and without a helmet, both baskets filled with my personal effects. I take two main roads to get to my school: one is the north-south road, Ama Ho Sen, which runs from South Amagasaki to nearby Takarazuka and beyond. The other in Route 2, the main east-west road that connects Osaka and Kobe.
If I'm lucky, I'll arrive at school at 8:15 - 5 minutes before the office announcements begin. I enter the sliding door leading into the staffroom, offer up my daily rounds of "ohayo gozaimasu!" (good morning!), throw my stuff down on my desk, stamp my hanko in the attendance book, turn on my laptop, take out the yoghurt or whatever I threw in my lunchbag to eat for breakfast, and start my day.
First period begins at 8:40. Periods are 50 minutes long, with 10 minute breaks in between. If I have a class, I'll use that in-between-time to make photocopies of any handouts I've made for the class, or simply to discuss and finalize the lesson plan with my team teacher. I don't teach the classes by myself, you see. Notwithstanding the aneurism I'm sure my students would experience if exposed to English with no intermediary to translate it into safe, comfortable, and wholesome Japanese, foreign teachers are, by law, prohibited from teaching by themselves in a government school. I'm not exactly sure why this is so, and I can't be bothered to find out. Besides, I really wouldn't want to teach alone anyway. As I said, there's really no way for my students and I to communicate with each other, barring the rudimentary skills we both possess in each others' respective languages, which for them mostly consists of "What is your hobby?" or "What do you like Japanese food?" or "America is very crime."
Even taking into account my busiest day, Monday, I teach no more than four out of six class periods a day, and that's just one day a week. Most days I teach two or three. The rest of the time I honestly spend in front of my laptop surfing the internet. Rarely, very rarely, I'll practice writing some kanji, but I can never remember them the next day. I wish I could find the will to be more productive, as there are so many better things I could be doing with my time. To my credit, I've developed a keen interest in political science - religiously following the 2008 Presidential Campaign, reading anything and everything I can about who's a fascist, who is or is not a Muslim, and who's forgotten to wear his or her flag pin this week. To be certain, I am not impressed with the level of political discourse back home.
At work I'm more or less a ghost. If I talk to any other teachers it's almost always the English teachers, and that's only because I have to plan lessons with them. Everyone else leaves me alone. Sometimes, such as when we have an office party after work at some bar or restaurant, I'll get to socialize with teachers with whom I never interact on a daily basis. Most of them are really nice, and even if we can't understand each other perfectly, we still manage to have fairly pleasant conversations. They won't talk to me at work, but I know it's not because they don't want to, it's just that the language barrier is too great, and the conspicuous lack of alcohol (not a problem at office parties) only further inhibits them. My failure to overcome this is my own fault; I don't study Japanese enough or practice it enough, I'm not very outgoing with the other staff or the students, I spend most of the day sitting at my desk instead of visiting student clubs or activities - everything the stereotypical JET is supposed to do to get the most out of their "JET experience".
I have no right to complain because I knew what this job was going to be like before I even set foot in Japan. I had read others' accounts of their time here on this Program. I knew that the number one complaint JETs had was "too much free time." You wouldn't think it would be a problem, would you? Most people would kill for a little more free time during their day. So I don't necessarily find that to be an accurate assessment. I'd prefer the phrase "lack of purpose". That, my friends, is a killer.
Don't get my wrong, it's not all doom and gloom. A lot of my students are joys, and some pop periodically into the staffroom just to say "hello!" Actually, the conversation goes just like this, every time:
Student: Hello. (Louder) Hello.
Me: Oh! Hello. How's it going?
Student: ...
Me: Sorry. How are you?
Student: I'm fine, thank you. And you?
Me: I'm fine.
Student: See you.
Me: See you.
Anyway, I've gone off on a huge tangent here. I'm supposed to be telling you about my typical day.
After school (around 3:15) is cleaning time, when all the students clean different parts of the school. I'm sure you've heard about this wonderful utopia that is Japan where all the good little boys and girls help clean their schools while rainbow gumdrops fall like manna from the heavens. The reality, as is often the case, is quite different. First, students actually complain about having to clean, when "cleaning" in this case amounts to generally no more than pushing a swiffer around for five minutes and then calling it a day. Second, there is precious little cleaning involved. As I said, students gather together to push dust around for five to ten minutes. In the bathrooms, students take out a hose and spray down the urinals, toilets, and floor with water. That's it. No bleach, no soap, no nothing. Of course, the point probably isn't to clean anything, but to instill the students with a sense of ownership and responsibility for the school - the students will be less likely to deface that which they'll only have to clean up later on.
Even though I'm not technically a part-time teacher, I'm allowed to leave at 4:15 (the regular teachers can leave at 5 though many stay far later than that - this is Japan after all). Again, if it's not raining, I make the return journey towards home. Depending on what Katie and I've decided to eat for dinner, I'll pick up a few ingredients at the MaxValue near our house. Katie doesn't get home from work until 7:30, so I have a few hours to kill. I'll watch TV or movies I've downloaded, read, do dishes, snack, etc. until Katie walks in the door. If I'm the one making dinner for the night, I'll typically start prepping the ingredients around 6:30 or so, so that it's all ready to go on the fire when Katie walks through the front door.
We eat dinner anywhere from 8 to 9, then have dessert (usually pudding we picked up on sale at MaxValue) in front of the TV and, during this time of the year, under the kotatsu. After dinner we clean up, make our lunch boxes for the next day, and go upstairs where we read until we fall alseep, which is generally around midnight.
Now the weekends are totally different: I don't work on Saturdays, but Katie does, so I do laundry and clean up around the house a little bit. Saturdays are also when I call my parents. I'm almost always able to talk to Mom; Dad's a little harder to get a hold of. Mostly I spend the day milling around the house until Katie gets home at the usual time. On weekend nights we've taken to going out for dinner instead of cooking, and with the selection of restaurants available on our street alone, we're never out of delicious options.
Sundays are our exploring days. It's on Sundays when we hop on a train and go somewhere of cultural significance. Recently, we've been on somewhat of a Kyoto kick, even though it's twice as far as the closest big city - Osaka. As a result, we've become pretty familiar with the ancient capital, so if anyone has a hankerin' to come visit Kyoto, Katie and I are practically certified tour guides.
Well, that's about it. Lather, rinse, repeat. If my tone seems dismissive or even depressed, don't be fooled. It's just that I've come to realize that daily life in Japan, even though I'm thousands upon thousands of miles away from home, is almost identical to daily life back home. We have our routines which we follow with nary a second thought. Most people seem pretty content with this situation as it stands, but Katie and I are the restless sort. Any downtime we have is spent plotting and planning our next great adventure, patiently enduring our routines until the day comes to go somewhere new, to experience something else.
-Bob
I get up in the morning at around 7. If I was smart the night before, I'd have already showered and packed my lunch, which usually consists of whatever Katie and I cooked the previous night. I pack my laptop in its case, grab my lunch bag from the fridge, and try to be out the door no later than 7:40. If it's not raining, I'll bike to work. It's a 40 minute journey from my front door to the school's front gate. The terrain is flat enough, so the ride isn't too strenuous, which allows to let my mind wander while I'm riding. I ride like everyone else: on the sidewalk and without a helmet, both baskets filled with my personal effects. I take two main roads to get to my school: one is the north-south road, Ama Ho Sen, which runs from South Amagasaki to nearby Takarazuka and beyond. The other in Route 2, the main east-west road that connects Osaka and Kobe.
If I'm lucky, I'll arrive at school at 8:15 - 5 minutes before the office announcements begin. I enter the sliding door leading into the staffroom, offer up my daily rounds of "ohayo gozaimasu!" (good morning!), throw my stuff down on my desk, stamp my hanko in the attendance book, turn on my laptop, take out the yoghurt or whatever I threw in my lunchbag to eat for breakfast, and start my day.
First period begins at 8:40. Periods are 50 minutes long, with 10 minute breaks in between. If I have a class, I'll use that in-between-time to make photocopies of any handouts I've made for the class, or simply to discuss and finalize the lesson plan with my team teacher. I don't teach the classes by myself, you see. Notwithstanding the aneurism I'm sure my students would experience if exposed to English with no intermediary to translate it into safe, comfortable, and wholesome Japanese, foreign teachers are, by law, prohibited from teaching by themselves in a government school. I'm not exactly sure why this is so, and I can't be bothered to find out. Besides, I really wouldn't want to teach alone anyway. As I said, there's really no way for my students and I to communicate with each other, barring the rudimentary skills we both possess in each others' respective languages, which for them mostly consists of "What is your hobby?" or "What do you like Japanese food?" or "America is very crime."
Even taking into account my busiest day, Monday, I teach no more than four out of six class periods a day, and that's just one day a week. Most days I teach two or three. The rest of the time I honestly spend in front of my laptop surfing the internet. Rarely, very rarely, I'll practice writing some kanji, but I can never remember them the next day. I wish I could find the will to be more productive, as there are so many better things I could be doing with my time. To my credit, I've developed a keen interest in political science - religiously following the 2008 Presidential Campaign, reading anything and everything I can about who's a fascist, who is or is not a Muslim, and who's forgotten to wear his or her flag pin this week. To be certain, I am not impressed with the level of political discourse back home.
At work I'm more or less a ghost. If I talk to any other teachers it's almost always the English teachers, and that's only because I have to plan lessons with them. Everyone else leaves me alone. Sometimes, such as when we have an office party after work at some bar or restaurant, I'll get to socialize with teachers with whom I never interact on a daily basis. Most of them are really nice, and even if we can't understand each other perfectly, we still manage to have fairly pleasant conversations. They won't talk to me at work, but I know it's not because they don't want to, it's just that the language barrier is too great, and the conspicuous lack of alcohol (not a problem at office parties) only further inhibits them. My failure to overcome this is my own fault; I don't study Japanese enough or practice it enough, I'm not very outgoing with the other staff or the students, I spend most of the day sitting at my desk instead of visiting student clubs or activities - everything the stereotypical JET is supposed to do to get the most out of their "JET experience".
I have no right to complain because I knew what this job was going to be like before I even set foot in Japan. I had read others' accounts of their time here on this Program. I knew that the number one complaint JETs had was "too much free time." You wouldn't think it would be a problem, would you? Most people would kill for a little more free time during their day. So I don't necessarily find that to be an accurate assessment. I'd prefer the phrase "lack of purpose". That, my friends, is a killer.
Don't get my wrong, it's not all doom and gloom. A lot of my students are joys, and some pop periodically into the staffroom just to say "hello!" Actually, the conversation goes just like this, every time:
Student: Hello. (Louder) Hello.
Me: Oh! Hello. How's it going?
Student: ...
Me: Sorry. How are you?
Student: I'm fine, thank you. And you?
Me: I'm fine.
Student: See you.
Me: See you.
Anyway, I've gone off on a huge tangent here. I'm supposed to be telling you about my typical day.
After school (around 3:15) is cleaning time, when all the students clean different parts of the school. I'm sure you've heard about this wonderful utopia that is Japan where all the good little boys and girls help clean their schools while rainbow gumdrops fall like manna from the heavens. The reality, as is often the case, is quite different. First, students actually complain about having to clean, when "cleaning" in this case amounts to generally no more than pushing a swiffer around for five minutes and then calling it a day. Second, there is precious little cleaning involved. As I said, students gather together to push dust around for five to ten minutes. In the bathrooms, students take out a hose and spray down the urinals, toilets, and floor with water. That's it. No bleach, no soap, no nothing. Of course, the point probably isn't to clean anything, but to instill the students with a sense of ownership and responsibility for the school - the students will be less likely to deface that which they'll only have to clean up later on.
Even though I'm not technically a part-time teacher, I'm allowed to leave at 4:15 (the regular teachers can leave at 5 though many stay far later than that - this is Japan after all). Again, if it's not raining, I make the return journey towards home. Depending on what Katie and I've decided to eat for dinner, I'll pick up a few ingredients at the MaxValue near our house. Katie doesn't get home from work until 7:30, so I have a few hours to kill. I'll watch TV or movies I've downloaded, read, do dishes, snack, etc. until Katie walks in the door. If I'm the one making dinner for the night, I'll typically start prepping the ingredients around 6:30 or so, so that it's all ready to go on the fire when Katie walks through the front door.
We eat dinner anywhere from 8 to 9, then have dessert (usually pudding we picked up on sale at MaxValue) in front of the TV and, during this time of the year, under the kotatsu. After dinner we clean up, make our lunch boxes for the next day, and go upstairs where we read until we fall alseep, which is generally around midnight.
Now the weekends are totally different: I don't work on Saturdays, but Katie does, so I do laundry and clean up around the house a little bit. Saturdays are also when I call my parents. I'm almost always able to talk to Mom; Dad's a little harder to get a hold of. Mostly I spend the day milling around the house until Katie gets home at the usual time. On weekend nights we've taken to going out for dinner instead of cooking, and with the selection of restaurants available on our street alone, we're never out of delicious options.
Sundays are our exploring days. It's on Sundays when we hop on a train and go somewhere of cultural significance. Recently, we've been on somewhat of a Kyoto kick, even though it's twice as far as the closest big city - Osaka. As a result, we've become pretty familiar with the ancient capital, so if anyone has a hankerin' to come visit Kyoto, Katie and I are practically certified tour guides.
Well, that's about it. Lather, rinse, repeat. If my tone seems dismissive or even depressed, don't be fooled. It's just that I've come to realize that daily life in Japan, even though I'm thousands upon thousands of miles away from home, is almost identical to daily life back home. We have our routines which we follow with nary a second thought. Most people seem pretty content with this situation as it stands, but Katie and I are the restless sort. Any downtime we have is spent plotting and planning our next great adventure, patiently enduring our routines until the day comes to go somewhere new, to experience something else.
-Bob
Tuesday, February 12, 2008
Outrageously overdue
Ok, so I kind of let the blog get away from me for a month and a half, but to tell you the truth, not much has happened in that time. Some things of note:
My trip to Southeast Asia was great and I'd do it again in a heartbeat. I highly recommend Malaysia as a tourist destination because 1.) everyone speaks English, and 2.) even though you're almost guaranteed to get the runs, the food is awesome. The best parts were the cheap food and tropical weather. Also, I enjoyed meeting fellow travelers from all over the world. In fact, that was probably the most interesting part out of the whole trip. Based on my encounters, I feel nothing but love for Canadians, the British, Australians, Austrians, Germans, New Zealanders, the French, Koreans, Chinese, Bulgarians, Bengalis, Malays, Indians, Swedes, and of course, my fellow Americans (one of whom was in the process of bicycling across Asia). I learned that I should be eternally grateful that English is the most popular second language in the world, because were it not for that, I wouldn't be able to talk to a great majority of these fine people.
Katie and I met up in Tokyo and saw quite a bit of the city. We were especially impressed by the good eats in Roppongi (including a relatively inexpensive Thai place which boasted a commanding 13th-story view of the city) and by the plastic food in Kappabashi, between Asakusa and Ueno. If you ever asked yourself, "Where can I find quality refrigerator magnets that look like pieces of sushi?" then this is the place for you. Of course, Tokyo being as large as it is defies even the most determined tourist to see everything in a mere three or four days, so Katie and I will definitely be going back for more.
On the home front, the third years are done with classes, which means I have even more free time to screw around on the computer at work. I also read, and sometimes, if I'm especially motivated, I open my Japanese textbook. On a positive note, however, I've pretty much learned what works and what doesn't in my classes, and my students' eyes don't seem quite as glazed over as they used to. I learned that they love intonation practice. The Japanese language being fairly flat in terms of intonation (think how a robot sounds when it talks), my students cannot seem to shake themselves of this habit when speaking English. To correct this, I overemphasize the sentences I read to them to a cartoonish degree. Example: "HOW do I GET to the STORE?" taking extra care to force my voice through its full range. I then have the students repeat over and over again, refusing to stop until they've all made complete fools of themselves. Only then can the real learning begin.
In other news, our friend Adam, who now lives in Korea, visited us this past week. Unfortunately, Katie and I had to work, so he was forced to explore the local sights largely by himself. He seemed like he had a pretty good time, all in all, but I got the sense he was pretty disturbed by how cold it actually was in our house. He brought us delicious homemade kimchi (pickled vegetables, usually cabbage, in chili sauce), which we appreciated greatly.
For whatever reason, Katie and I keep getting sick. I got some kind of cold when I got back from Singapore, Katie got a horrible 24 hour stomach bug, which I got about two weeks later, and now we both have colds again. Ugh. It seems everyone's sick right now, though. Everywhere you look, the Japanese are sporting those surgical face masks all over the place. I can't imagine that they actually do anything for you other than signaling to other people, "Hey! I'm sick! Stay away!" But when you're riding trains and buses all over creation, and the little old grandpas and little old ladies haven't quite mastered the art of covering their damn mouths when they cough, it's pretty easy to contract all manner of nasties. I can only hope that this will improve as we move into spring and, hopefully, warmer weather.
Because of our frequent illness, Katie and I haven't been out gallivanting around Japan as we were wont to do, so you won't find too many new pictures or descriptions of all the new places we've been. We'll try to get on that as soon as we stop coughing...
-Bob
My trip to Southeast Asia was great and I'd do it again in a heartbeat. I highly recommend Malaysia as a tourist destination because 1.) everyone speaks English, and 2.) even though you're almost guaranteed to get the runs, the food is awesome. The best parts were the cheap food and tropical weather. Also, I enjoyed meeting fellow travelers from all over the world. In fact, that was probably the most interesting part out of the whole trip. Based on my encounters, I feel nothing but love for Canadians, the British, Australians, Austrians, Germans, New Zealanders, the French, Koreans, Chinese, Bulgarians, Bengalis, Malays, Indians, Swedes, and of course, my fellow Americans (one of whom was in the process of bicycling across Asia). I learned that I should be eternally grateful that English is the most popular second language in the world, because were it not for that, I wouldn't be able to talk to a great majority of these fine people.
Katie and I met up in Tokyo and saw quite a bit of the city. We were especially impressed by the good eats in Roppongi (including a relatively inexpensive Thai place which boasted a commanding 13th-story view of the city) and by the plastic food in Kappabashi, between Asakusa and Ueno. If you ever asked yourself, "Where can I find quality refrigerator magnets that look like pieces of sushi?" then this is the place for you. Of course, Tokyo being as large as it is defies even the most determined tourist to see everything in a mere three or four days, so Katie and I will definitely be going back for more.
On the home front, the third years are done with classes, which means I have even more free time to screw around on the computer at work. I also read, and sometimes, if I'm especially motivated, I open my Japanese textbook. On a positive note, however, I've pretty much learned what works and what doesn't in my classes, and my students' eyes don't seem quite as glazed over as they used to. I learned that they love intonation practice. The Japanese language being fairly flat in terms of intonation (think how a robot sounds when it talks), my students cannot seem to shake themselves of this habit when speaking English. To correct this, I overemphasize the sentences I read to them to a cartoonish degree. Example: "HOW do I GET to the STORE?" taking extra care to force my voice through its full range. I then have the students repeat over and over again, refusing to stop until they've all made complete fools of themselves. Only then can the real learning begin.
In other news, our friend Adam, who now lives in Korea, visited us this past week. Unfortunately, Katie and I had to work, so he was forced to explore the local sights largely by himself. He seemed like he had a pretty good time, all in all, but I got the sense he was pretty disturbed by how cold it actually was in our house. He brought us delicious homemade kimchi (pickled vegetables, usually cabbage, in chili sauce), which we appreciated greatly.
For whatever reason, Katie and I keep getting sick. I got some kind of cold when I got back from Singapore, Katie got a horrible 24 hour stomach bug, which I got about two weeks later, and now we both have colds again. Ugh. It seems everyone's sick right now, though. Everywhere you look, the Japanese are sporting those surgical face masks all over the place. I can't imagine that they actually do anything for you other than signaling to other people, "Hey! I'm sick! Stay away!" But when you're riding trains and buses all over creation, and the little old grandpas and little old ladies haven't quite mastered the art of covering their damn mouths when they cough, it's pretty easy to contract all manner of nasties. I can only hope that this will improve as we move into spring and, hopefully, warmer weather.
Because of our frequent illness, Katie and I haven't been out gallivanting around Japan as we were wont to do, so you won't find too many new pictures or descriptions of all the new places we've been. We'll try to get on that as soon as we stop coughing...
-Bob
Tuesday, December 4, 2007
Local haunts
First of all, my apologies for the inexcusable lack of posts for the last couple of weeks or so. It's impossible to write anything worthwhile if the creative juices just aren't flowing, and often it takes the right combination of factors to loosen the tap. I could merely offer up a brief accounting of our adventures here, but that would be a bland exercise in banality, and you deserve more than that. You deserve careful, measured commentary, and I intend to provide it for you. So here goes:
By now, I'm sure you've realized that life in Japan isn't just Hokkaido cream and peach blossoms; it's full of cultural walls to scale and linguistic obstacles to overcome. No seemingly simple, daily task is without its own devilish twist; going to the doctor for a checkup might as well be going to the moon. Nevertheless, there are moments that are so "Japanese" that I can't help but love my new home.
Case in point: two local businesses, each about two doors down from our house. One is a public bathhouse, and the other is a hole-in-the-wall sushi bar. I'll describe each in some detail.
Way back when, it used to be the case in Japan that every community had its own sento, or public bathhouse (this was before the days of private homes having their own tubs). The way it worked was like this: typically before or after your evening meal, you'd throw some soap and a towel into a little basket and you'd trot on down to the bath, where you'd get naked, take a long shower - in full view of the other bathers - and then soak in the hot, communal bath. "Skinship", as it is often called in English, was and continues to be an important aspect of Japanese society. At the baths, one can find both CEOs and street sweepers enjoying a hot soak, having divested themselves of the trappings of their respective stations.
I had previously been to an onsen, so when we finally decided to start frequenting the local sento, I was prepared. An onsen is like a sento, except an onsen uses mineral water pumped in from hot springs located all over Japan. Japan is an island rife with geothermic activity, and volcanoes, earthquakes, and hot springs all seem to go hand in hand. You take the good with the bad, I suppose. Depending on where you are, the hot spring water is said to have various healthful and restorative properties. The water from one town might help relieve arthritis, whereas the water from the town over might help cure migraines. You can never tell. As you can imagine, onsen are fantastically popular both with the locals and the tourists, both coming from far and wide to experience a few minutes in the tub. The sento, on the other hand, just heats up regular old tap water for its baths. In any event, the older lady who runs the sento next to our house had treated us very kindly in the past and had repeatedly asked us to visit her establishment, so we were more than happy to do so. That, and the fact that it's been getting pretty cold around here at night made taking a hot bath seem like a very agreeable way to spend the evening.
The entrance to the building is open, as are many storefronts in Japan, with only a half curtain hanging in the doorway. The sign outside displays the large, red, hiragana character ゆ, "yu". Yuu is the word for hot water. It has a corresponding kanji (Chinese character), but I've read that the kanji is used to represent hot water used for tea, whereas the hiragana is used to represent hot water used for people. Upon entering, you see that there are rows of foot lockers on either side, and that each side is divided by sex. You take off your shoes and hold them in your hand as you step up onto the actual floor (many establishments, including our own house, have an area exclusively for taking off ones shoes). You place your shoes in an empty locker and carry the wooden key with you as you enter the bath area - men entering through the doorway marked 男, and women through the doorway marked 女. Upon entering, the first thing you see are naked people walking around. As veterans of the stage, Katie and I are no strangers to seeing people in various states of undress (quick costume changes backstage quickly rob you of any sense of modesty), so seeing all this wasn't such a big deal, but I can easily imagine how the more repressed among us might have reacted to such a sight. Although really, anyone who goes to the gym and uses the locker rooms there with any regularity should already be quite desensitized. You pay several hundred yen (a few bucks) to the person supervising the bathhouse, and she gives you a little bottle of shampoo, soap, and a small towel. Most people prefer to bring their own supplies, though. You undress and throw your clothes into a small locker, taking only the towel (which is for washing - hopefully you remembered to bring something to dry yourself off with), shampoo, and soap with you, and proceed to yet another room which contains the actual bath.
In spite of their reputation for being polite and demure, there are a few sure-fire ways to piss Japanese people off, and one of the surest is failing to wash yourself properly before entering the bath. All along the walls are shower heads expressly for this purpose. You simply pull up a little plastic stool, have a seat (the shower heads are at waist level so you actually have to shower sitting down), and get to work with the shampoo and soap. Once you've scrubbed yourself completely, you take a well-earned seat in the bath. For a modicum of modesty, you can use the washing towel to cover your nether regions on your way from the shower to the bath, but be advised that the towel is not to go into the bathwater. Instead, many people put the towel on their heads. I'm not sure why it's customary to do this, but I've heard that in cases where the bathwater is extremely hot - as it sometimes is - putting a wet towel on your head actually prevents you from passing out. The most important thing to remember is to relax; once you're in the bath you can sit back and enjoy the mural of cranes flying in front of Mount Fuji painted on the tile wall in front of you, hazily obscured by steam.
The best part about visiting the bathhouse is how spectacularly relaxed you feel afterwards. Leaving the sento with your hair still wet and your insides still warm, stepping out into the late autumn chill, is a delicious feeling. Even better is the fact that it takes literally 30 seconds to walk back to our house which, although just as cold inside as it is outside, has certain indispensable amenities like space heaters and hot water heaters and a few seasons of Arrested Development on the computer for our viewing pleasure. C'est la vie!
I have less to say about the sushi bar a few doors down in the opposite direction, but please don't mistake my lack of prose for an indictment. Like the sento, it exudes old-school flavor; there might have been many such places that dotted our fair city in the not-too-distant past. Indeed, our whole street, complete with its fruit vendors and specialty boutiques, is somewhat of an anomaly when compared to the sprawling industrial landscape of Amagasaki. There are several sushi places on our street, and to be honest, this is the only one that we've tried. The other places, though no doubt delicious, loom large and commercial over our local dive which can only be described as elegant in its practicality. It seats maybe 8 people around a bar where a very nice man and (I presume) his wife toil busily away. It was here where Katie met some of our other neighbors for the first time; everyone seemed to be delighted to talk to us, even if it was in a broken mish-mash of Japanese and English. The most recent time we dined there, it was a Sunday night, and there were only a few laborers occupying the opposite end of the bar. They looked close to finishing their meal. We took a seat and the proprietor immediately asked us what we wanted. We ordered maguro (tuna) first, then sake (salmon). We were close enough to watch him take a block of fish and, using what looked to be extraordinarily expensive knives - I had seen such knives at a specialty cutlery store in Kyoto where some items went for as much as the equivalent of $500 - went to work.
"Sushi" is a word that refers to rice, not fish. One might translate it as "vinegared rice", which is exactly what it is: one first steams the rice and then folds in a mixture of vinegar, salt, and sugar. This addition makes the rice sticky and easy to manipulate into various shapes. "Sashimi" is the word that refers to raw fish by itself. If you order sashimi at a restaurant, what you'll get is a plate full of decoratively arranged raw fish, no rice to be seen. There are a couple of ways of combining fish and rice, however. The first way is the most common, called "nigiri". Nigiri is simply a piece of fish that has been pressed onto a little ball of rice. The next way is called "makizushi", or rolls. To make makizushi, one takes a sheet of nori (dried seaweed), lays it down, spreads out sushi rice over the nori, then places strips of fish and vegetables in the middle of the spread. Then, you roll it up (so that it's one long roll), cut it into smaller pieces, and serve. The last way is called "temakizushi", which are conical rolls constructed individually by hand.
I also have to issue a public service announcement: soy sauce is for fish, not rice. One of those aforementioned "things that piss Japanese people off" includes drenching rice in soy sauce. Seriously, the rice is often prepared with great care, so much so that a sushi chef in training might spend years just learning how to make the rice. It is prepared to be just the right consistency and flavor to perfectly complement the fish. The Western equivalent would be to drown your expertly cooked and seasoned steak in sauce before even trying a bite. Sure, you can do it, but say goodbye to earning any brownie points with the kitchen staff. So when you pick up that nigiri (yes, you can use your hands), dip it in the sauce fish side down.
Oh, and one more thing I wanted to clear up. For whatever reason, a lot of people in America think that Japanese people frown on mixing your wasabi into your soy sauce. Let it be hereafter known that I, Robert Hollands, have witnessed Japanese people doing this very thing - it's OK.
The chef went a little heavy on the wasabi this time - he takes his finger and spreads a little wet wasabi between the fish and the rice as a kind of cement to hold the two pieces together. We readily forgave him, though, because the fish was cool, fresh, and buttery in its texture. As we ate and drank, the little colored discs that indicated how much each item cost accumulated in front of us. Halfway through the meal, he thrust a bowl full of what looked like fish salad in front of us. "Fugu no kawa...karai," he told us. Pufferfish skin...spicy. As you might have heard, fugu is one of the deadliest fish known to man. Some of its internal organs contain a compound called tetrodotoxin; a powerful poison of which a minuscule amount can kill several people. Always ready to flirt with danger, the Japanese will pay top dollar for the thrill of eating this fish. It's a popular wintertime food, so here and there in our neighborhood one can see signs beginning to pop up, advertising fugu courses for somewhere in the range of $40 to $50. The danger is negligible however, because chefs who prepare this fish are well-trained and have to undergo a rigorous examination, which includes eating the fish themselves. Nevertheless, for a hypochondriac such as myself, eating any part of this animal might prove disastrous, poison or no. After returning home, so much as a sneeze might have sent me running for the nearest emergency room. As it turned out, though, I didn't sneeze or cough or anything which could otherwise be mistaken for impending death, so Katie was saved the hassle of filling out forms in triplicate at the local hospital while trying to remember the kanji for "overactive imagination".
So there you have it: an exclusive sneak peek into a couple of the quaint, local businesses that grace our neighborhood. If I had more energy, I'd tell you about the guy down the street who fixes bikes. He speaks decent English and has some friends from Vegas. He charged me 4000 yen for a new front tire, which was more than my bike cost (it's a crappy bike), but I'm not going to hold it against him.
Until next time,
-Bob
By now, I'm sure you've realized that life in Japan isn't just Hokkaido cream and peach blossoms; it's full of cultural walls to scale and linguistic obstacles to overcome. No seemingly simple, daily task is without its own devilish twist; going to the doctor for a checkup might as well be going to the moon. Nevertheless, there are moments that are so "Japanese" that I can't help but love my new home.
Case in point: two local businesses, each about two doors down from our house. One is a public bathhouse, and the other is a hole-in-the-wall sushi bar. I'll describe each in some detail.
Way back when, it used to be the case in Japan that every community had its own sento, or public bathhouse (this was before the days of private homes having their own tubs). The way it worked was like this: typically before or after your evening meal, you'd throw some soap and a towel into a little basket and you'd trot on down to the bath, where you'd get naked, take a long shower - in full view of the other bathers - and then soak in the hot, communal bath. "Skinship", as it is often called in English, was and continues to be an important aspect of Japanese society. At the baths, one can find both CEOs and street sweepers enjoying a hot soak, having divested themselves of the trappings of their respective stations.
I had previously been to an onsen, so when we finally decided to start frequenting the local sento, I was prepared. An onsen is like a sento, except an onsen uses mineral water pumped in from hot springs located all over Japan. Japan is an island rife with geothermic activity, and volcanoes, earthquakes, and hot springs all seem to go hand in hand. You take the good with the bad, I suppose. Depending on where you are, the hot spring water is said to have various healthful and restorative properties. The water from one town might help relieve arthritis, whereas the water from the town over might help cure migraines. You can never tell. As you can imagine, onsen are fantastically popular both with the locals and the tourists, both coming from far and wide to experience a few minutes in the tub. The sento, on the other hand, just heats up regular old tap water for its baths. In any event, the older lady who runs the sento next to our house had treated us very kindly in the past and had repeatedly asked us to visit her establishment, so we were more than happy to do so. That, and the fact that it's been getting pretty cold around here at night made taking a hot bath seem like a very agreeable way to spend the evening.
The entrance to the building is open, as are many storefronts in Japan, with only a half curtain hanging in the doorway. The sign outside displays the large, red, hiragana character ゆ, "yu". Yuu is the word for hot water. It has a corresponding kanji (Chinese character), but I've read that the kanji is used to represent hot water used for tea, whereas the hiragana is used to represent hot water used for people. Upon entering, you see that there are rows of foot lockers on either side, and that each side is divided by sex. You take off your shoes and hold them in your hand as you step up onto the actual floor (many establishments, including our own house, have an area exclusively for taking off ones shoes). You place your shoes in an empty locker and carry the wooden key with you as you enter the bath area - men entering through the doorway marked 男, and women through the doorway marked 女. Upon entering, the first thing you see are naked people walking around. As veterans of the stage, Katie and I are no strangers to seeing people in various states of undress (quick costume changes backstage quickly rob you of any sense of modesty), so seeing all this wasn't such a big deal, but I can easily imagine how the more repressed among us might have reacted to such a sight. Although really, anyone who goes to the gym and uses the locker rooms there with any regularity should already be quite desensitized. You pay several hundred yen (a few bucks) to the person supervising the bathhouse, and she gives you a little bottle of shampoo, soap, and a small towel. Most people prefer to bring their own supplies, though. You undress and throw your clothes into a small locker, taking only the towel (which is for washing - hopefully you remembered to bring something to dry yourself off with), shampoo, and soap with you, and proceed to yet another room which contains the actual bath.
In spite of their reputation for being polite and demure, there are a few sure-fire ways to piss Japanese people off, and one of the surest is failing to wash yourself properly before entering the bath. All along the walls are shower heads expressly for this purpose. You simply pull up a little plastic stool, have a seat (the shower heads are at waist level so you actually have to shower sitting down), and get to work with the shampoo and soap. Once you've scrubbed yourself completely, you take a well-earned seat in the bath. For a modicum of modesty, you can use the washing towel to cover your nether regions on your way from the shower to the bath, but be advised that the towel is not to go into the bathwater. Instead, many people put the towel on their heads. I'm not sure why it's customary to do this, but I've heard that in cases where the bathwater is extremely hot - as it sometimes is - putting a wet towel on your head actually prevents you from passing out. The most important thing to remember is to relax; once you're in the bath you can sit back and enjoy the mural of cranes flying in front of Mount Fuji painted on the tile wall in front of you, hazily obscured by steam.
The best part about visiting the bathhouse is how spectacularly relaxed you feel afterwards. Leaving the sento with your hair still wet and your insides still warm, stepping out into the late autumn chill, is a delicious feeling. Even better is the fact that it takes literally 30 seconds to walk back to our house which, although just as cold inside as it is outside, has certain indispensable amenities like space heaters and hot water heaters and a few seasons of Arrested Development on the computer for our viewing pleasure. C'est la vie!
I have less to say about the sushi bar a few doors down in the opposite direction, but please don't mistake my lack of prose for an indictment. Like the sento, it exudes old-school flavor; there might have been many such places that dotted our fair city in the not-too-distant past. Indeed, our whole street, complete with its fruit vendors and specialty boutiques, is somewhat of an anomaly when compared to the sprawling industrial landscape of Amagasaki. There are several sushi places on our street, and to be honest, this is the only one that we've tried. The other places, though no doubt delicious, loom large and commercial over our local dive which can only be described as elegant in its practicality. It seats maybe 8 people around a bar where a very nice man and (I presume) his wife toil busily away. It was here where Katie met some of our other neighbors for the first time; everyone seemed to be delighted to talk to us, even if it was in a broken mish-mash of Japanese and English. The most recent time we dined there, it was a Sunday night, and there were only a few laborers occupying the opposite end of the bar. They looked close to finishing their meal. We took a seat and the proprietor immediately asked us what we wanted. We ordered maguro (tuna) first, then sake (salmon). We were close enough to watch him take a block of fish and, using what looked to be extraordinarily expensive knives - I had seen such knives at a specialty cutlery store in Kyoto where some items went for as much as the equivalent of $500 - went to work.
"Sushi" is a word that refers to rice, not fish. One might translate it as "vinegared rice", which is exactly what it is: one first steams the rice and then folds in a mixture of vinegar, salt, and sugar. This addition makes the rice sticky and easy to manipulate into various shapes. "Sashimi" is the word that refers to raw fish by itself. If you order sashimi at a restaurant, what you'll get is a plate full of decoratively arranged raw fish, no rice to be seen. There are a couple of ways of combining fish and rice, however. The first way is the most common, called "nigiri". Nigiri is simply a piece of fish that has been pressed onto a little ball of rice. The next way is called "makizushi", or rolls. To make makizushi, one takes a sheet of nori (dried seaweed), lays it down, spreads out sushi rice over the nori, then places strips of fish and vegetables in the middle of the spread. Then, you roll it up (so that it's one long roll), cut it into smaller pieces, and serve. The last way is called "temakizushi", which are conical rolls constructed individually by hand.
I also have to issue a public service announcement: soy sauce is for fish, not rice. One of those aforementioned "things that piss Japanese people off" includes drenching rice in soy sauce. Seriously, the rice is often prepared with great care, so much so that a sushi chef in training might spend years just learning how to make the rice. It is prepared to be just the right consistency and flavor to perfectly complement the fish. The Western equivalent would be to drown your expertly cooked and seasoned steak in sauce before even trying a bite. Sure, you can do it, but say goodbye to earning any brownie points with the kitchen staff. So when you pick up that nigiri (yes, you can use your hands), dip it in the sauce fish side down.
Oh, and one more thing I wanted to clear up. For whatever reason, a lot of people in America think that Japanese people frown on mixing your wasabi into your soy sauce. Let it be hereafter known that I, Robert Hollands, have witnessed Japanese people doing this very thing - it's OK.
The chef went a little heavy on the wasabi this time - he takes his finger and spreads a little wet wasabi between the fish and the rice as a kind of cement to hold the two pieces together. We readily forgave him, though, because the fish was cool, fresh, and buttery in its texture. As we ate and drank, the little colored discs that indicated how much each item cost accumulated in front of us. Halfway through the meal, he thrust a bowl full of what looked like fish salad in front of us. "Fugu no kawa...karai," he told us. Pufferfish skin...spicy. As you might have heard, fugu is one of the deadliest fish known to man. Some of its internal organs contain a compound called tetrodotoxin; a powerful poison of which a minuscule amount can kill several people. Always ready to flirt with danger, the Japanese will pay top dollar for the thrill of eating this fish. It's a popular wintertime food, so here and there in our neighborhood one can see signs beginning to pop up, advertising fugu courses for somewhere in the range of $40 to $50. The danger is negligible however, because chefs who prepare this fish are well-trained and have to undergo a rigorous examination, which includes eating the fish themselves. Nevertheless, for a hypochondriac such as myself, eating any part of this animal might prove disastrous, poison or no. After returning home, so much as a sneeze might have sent me running for the nearest emergency room. As it turned out, though, I didn't sneeze or cough or anything which could otherwise be mistaken for impending death, so Katie was saved the hassle of filling out forms in triplicate at the local hospital while trying to remember the kanji for "overactive imagination".
So there you have it: an exclusive sneak peek into a couple of the quaint, local businesses that grace our neighborhood. If I had more energy, I'd tell you about the guy down the street who fixes bikes. He speaks decent English and has some friends from Vegas. He charged me 4000 yen for a new front tire, which was more than my bike cost (it's a crappy bike), but I'm not going to hold it against him.
Until next time,
-Bob
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