This may come as a bit of a surprise, but in Japan, people bow to show respect, thanks, apologize or simply to be polite. In fact, when in doubt, it’s best to bow. If someone has done something nice for you, you should probably bow. If you bump into someone accidentally, it’s a good idea to bow. If you’re alone, no one else is around, and nothing whatsoever is happening, you should probably ask yourself why you’re not bowing…and then bow.
So yeah, there’s a lot of bowing in Japan. What gets me, though, is people who bow in cars. You know how when you’re driving and someone purposefully lets you into their lane, or gives you their parking space, or unnecessarily gives you right of way, it’s usually enough to smile and wave, right? Well in Japan, people bow while seated! For example, when I get dropped off after work I usually bow and wave after I’ve exited the vehicle to thank them for driving me. At least I’m standing when I do that. To my surprise, the first time I did this, the guy who drove me bowed back, looking like he had just banged his head on the steering wheel.
While that definitely looks strange enough, my concern is that this usually happens while the vehicle is still in motion. I often see drivers bowing low, and thus completely eliminating their field of vision, while taking turns, or parking, or heading through intersections, when it seems as though a simple nod or wave would both satisfy politeness requirements and also prevent a dangerous couple of seconds during which the driver is paying maybe 5% of their attention on the car and 95% on bowing appropriately.
Also, the “dangerous” junior high school was thankfully nothing like what I expected. Yeah, the kids are kinda rough, but overall they seemed really into my English lesson and I was received really well. The first graders I taught were pretty awesome and the third graders were real awesome, using whatever English they knew to try and communicate with me inbetween classes and during lunchtime. Overall a kickass school, mostly cuz it has some actual attitude. Reminds me of my middle school a bit, actually.
Friday, October 24, 2008
Sunday, October 19, 2008
The school from hell...maybe.
Ok, so this Wednesday I'm going to go to my ninth and final school. This itself wouldn't warrant any major reaction, were it not for the fairly documented instances of ALT abuse. I mean, not having been there or so much as seen anything for myself I'm not in a great position to judge, but word on the street is the kids at this unnamed junior high school have a bit of a notorious rep.
One of my predecessors here at the Board of Education apparently had it pretty rough, including vandalism to her car and physical assault. So not quite sure how it'll go, but we'll soon see just how badass these kids can be. I teach at the elementary school that feeds this junior high school, and I'd say the kids there are awesome, so maybe it was just a bad year? More to follow.
One of my predecessors here at the Board of Education apparently had it pretty rough, including vandalism to her car and physical assault. So not quite sure how it'll go, but we'll soon see just how badass these kids can be. I teach at the elementary school that feeds this junior high school, and I'd say the kids there are awesome, so maybe it was just a bad year? More to follow.
Wednesday, October 15, 2008
Japanese Homecoming
Last Saturday I took a trip to Fukuoka, the land of ramen, the friendly rich, and of course, the loveable Softbank Hawks baseball team. Monday was a holiday, so I took Tuesday off as well to make it an even four days. And an excellent four days they were.
I took a 5-something AM train to Kaga Onsen station, hopped on the limited express to Osaka, and then switched to the Shinkansen. It was my first time riding the famed bullet train, but all said it wasn’t that much faster than a regular express train. The service and comfort, however, was second to none.
I arrived in Fukuoka at about noon, where I was met by my host parents from two years ago, when I spent 6 weeks studying at Kyushu University. They promptly took me to an American-style diner, with American-size portions, and I had what felt like the biggest burger of my life. The diner really did its best to remain true to the real deal. The food, the music, the drinks—even the magazines were American!
That night I met up with my friend Eiko who was at Queen’s for a year studying English and who ended up subletting my apartment in Kingston for a summer. It was kinda weird—we talked about my room and my house, and she confessed just how much cleaning she had had to do to get it looking the way it did when Josh, Geoff and I got back in the fall. She was joined by her friend, also a graduate of Queen’s U. School of English, and we all went out for ramen, oh sweet sweet ramen, at a yatai (licensed street vendor) near Canal City. Yatai stalls are some of Fukuoka’s more famous dining entities. They litter the streets throughout the summer and into fall and offer local food at good prices. I’m something of a ramen lover, so having street stall-style (say that ten times fast) Hakata ramen after a 2-something year dry spell was a real treat. I won’t lie—most of what follows is simply a description of the awesome food I ate, and I think it’s fair to say that’s what this trip was really about.
The following day my host sister Maki arrived from Tokyo and together with my other host sister, Sayuri, we went out and about in Tenjin, the major shopping/eating/hanging out/karaoke-ing/fun district. It was like old times…made me miss family life. That night we went out for yaki niku (fried meat) with the whole family, including grandma, and then out to karaoke afterwards, this time excluding dad, but…still including grandma. There’s nothing quite like belting out Ne-Yo or Backstreet Boys in front of an 85-year old who you just met.
Anyway, the next couple of days were slow and relaxing. I watched a lot of Full House, some American Idol (from 2 years ago, I discovered later…), went out to Ippudo—a very famous chain of ramen restaurants that boast perhaps the best of Hakata-men, and did a bit of shopping. I bought a winter jacket in Canal City that I better be wearing for at least the next 10 years to get my money’s worth. Ice cream, too, played a prominent role in any activities that were dessert or snack-related. I made two trips to Cold Stone ice cream, if for no other reason than to hear the all-Japanese staff sing a heavily-accented “Zipadeedoodah”. Most of the trip was about quality family time, though. I was treated to almost everything we ate/did, and my host mom took no shortcuts in making me feel at home.
On Tuesday, before leaving, my host sisters and I took a three-minute stroll down the block to a humble-looking ramen establishment that was recently rated as the second best ramen restaurant in all of Japan! As one can imagine, I was more than a little excited to try it out. To my dismay, however, it was closed when we got there! Turns out they’re closed for business every Tuesday. By some miracle, though, one of the employees snuck me and my host sisters in and whipped us up some delicious lunch in his own time and without his boss' knowledge. The guy even offered to let my sis off with no charge! This coming from a place that usually has a line around the block. Since in Japan you don’t tip, we expressed our gratitude by insisting that he let us take a photo with him instead of giving us change.
Shortly afterwards I left Fukuoka to come back to Kaga, but I’ll definitely be back as soon as I can. It’s a great place, with great people, awesome weather, and…amazing food!
I took a 5-something AM train to Kaga Onsen station, hopped on the limited express to Osaka, and then switched to the Shinkansen. It was my first time riding the famed bullet train, but all said it wasn’t that much faster than a regular express train. The service and comfort, however, was second to none.
I arrived in Fukuoka at about noon, where I was met by my host parents from two years ago, when I spent 6 weeks studying at Kyushu University. They promptly took me to an American-style diner, with American-size portions, and I had what felt like the biggest burger of my life. The diner really did its best to remain true to the real deal. The food, the music, the drinks—even the magazines were American!
That night I met up with my friend Eiko who was at Queen’s for a year studying English and who ended up subletting my apartment in Kingston for a summer. It was kinda weird—we talked about my room and my house, and she confessed just how much cleaning she had had to do to get it looking the way it did when Josh, Geoff and I got back in the fall. She was joined by her friend, also a graduate of Queen’s U. School of English, and we all went out for ramen, oh sweet sweet ramen, at a yatai (licensed street vendor) near Canal City. Yatai stalls are some of Fukuoka’s more famous dining entities. They litter the streets throughout the summer and into fall and offer local food at good prices. I’m something of a ramen lover, so having street stall-style (say that ten times fast) Hakata ramen after a 2-something year dry spell was a real treat. I won’t lie—most of what follows is simply a description of the awesome food I ate, and I think it’s fair to say that’s what this trip was really about.
The following day my host sister Maki arrived from Tokyo and together with my other host sister, Sayuri, we went out and about in Tenjin, the major shopping/eating/hanging out/karaoke-ing/fun district. It was like old times…made me miss family life. That night we went out for yaki niku (fried meat) with the whole family, including grandma, and then out to karaoke afterwards, this time excluding dad, but…still including grandma. There’s nothing quite like belting out Ne-Yo or Backstreet Boys in front of an 85-year old who you just met.
Anyway, the next couple of days were slow and relaxing. I watched a lot of Full House, some American Idol (from 2 years ago, I discovered later…), went out to Ippudo—a very famous chain of ramen restaurants that boast perhaps the best of Hakata-men, and did a bit of shopping. I bought a winter jacket in Canal City that I better be wearing for at least the next 10 years to get my money’s worth. Ice cream, too, played a prominent role in any activities that were dessert or snack-related. I made two trips to Cold Stone ice cream, if for no other reason than to hear the all-Japanese staff sing a heavily-accented “Zipadeedoodah”. Most of the trip was about quality family time, though. I was treated to almost everything we ate/did, and my host mom took no shortcuts in making me feel at home.
On Tuesday, before leaving, my host sisters and I took a three-minute stroll down the block to a humble-looking ramen establishment that was recently rated as the second best ramen restaurant in all of Japan! As one can imagine, I was more than a little excited to try it out. To my dismay, however, it was closed when we got there! Turns out they’re closed for business every Tuesday. By some miracle, though, one of the employees snuck me and my host sisters in and whipped us up some delicious lunch in his own time and without his boss' knowledge. The guy even offered to let my sis off with no charge! This coming from a place that usually has a line around the block. Since in Japan you don’t tip, we expressed our gratitude by insisting that he let us take a photo with him instead of giving us change.
Shortly afterwards I left Fukuoka to come back to Kaga, but I’ll definitely be back as soon as I can. It’s a great place, with great people, awesome weather, and…amazing food!
Wednesday, October 1, 2008
ゴキブリの戦争
As if life wasn't exciting enough, in recent days intelligence has revealed a noticeable step up in my domestic kitchen insurgency. Enemy activity has increased on multiple fronts including the cracks in and around the sink, fridge and burners, with a significant focus on night time raids.
That's right--I got 'roaches and I got 'em bad.
I mean, like almost every household in Japan, I knew I had some cockroaches living with me, but that can't really be helped. You just live with them knowing they're a fact of life. My kitchen, incidentally, is sealed up like Fort Knox. NOTHING gets left out for my scavenging housemates, which means closing and sealing any and all foods, putting it up out of reach, sticking it in the fridge, and cleaning the counters and sink anytime any food is prepared.
That said, I still kill a couple from time to time or see them scuttle around the vicinity of my living room, so last night I went out and bought a pack of roach traps. These ones are like little houses with some bait in the middle and a super sticky floor, so when the roach enters to try and get at the bait, it gets stuck to the floor. So I set up two of them, one on the kitchen floor near the crack between my stove and sink, and one behind the burners of the stove, where I've also discovered roach tracks.
That was last night.
This morning before heading out the door I figured I might as well check to see if I had successfully caught one in a trap. To my unprecedented horror, between the two traps that I set up more than TEN roaches had been caught, ranging in size from tiny to huge. Most of them were still alive and futilely attempting to free themselves. I instantly put the traps back and left the house in disgust.
Sealing up my house any more than it already is--with the intention of preventing entry for cockroaches--is impossible. To my knowledge they enter from and possibly live behind my sink, which is attached to the wall and inaccessible to me, the only other obvious entryway being through my toilet, which is a squat toilet and can't effectively be sealed. So tonight I'm going to set up about a dozen more traps and get some poison. I initially didn't want to use a roach hotel, because if they bring poison back to their nests, they'll die there and I'll have bug corpses in my house that I can't clean up, but given the escalation in troops on their part, picking and choosing my weapons of choice is a luxury I can no longer afford.
By the time this year is over, either me or the roaches will be dead. If it's the roaches, it'll be by traps and roach motels, and if it's me, it'll be from hepatitis or dysentery or something...
The war has begun.
Also, I've enabled anonymous posting, so even if you don't have an account but would like to articulate your disgust, you can comment.
That's right--I got 'roaches and I got 'em bad.
I mean, like almost every household in Japan, I knew I had some cockroaches living with me, but that can't really be helped. You just live with them knowing they're a fact of life. My kitchen, incidentally, is sealed up like Fort Knox. NOTHING gets left out for my scavenging housemates, which means closing and sealing any and all foods, putting it up out of reach, sticking it in the fridge, and cleaning the counters and sink anytime any food is prepared.
That said, I still kill a couple from time to time or see them scuttle around the vicinity of my living room, so last night I went out and bought a pack of roach traps. These ones are like little houses with some bait in the middle and a super sticky floor, so when the roach enters to try and get at the bait, it gets stuck to the floor. So I set up two of them, one on the kitchen floor near the crack between my stove and sink, and one behind the burners of the stove, where I've also discovered roach tracks.
That was last night.
This morning before heading out the door I figured I might as well check to see if I had successfully caught one in a trap. To my unprecedented horror, between the two traps that I set up more than TEN roaches had been caught, ranging in size from tiny to huge. Most of them were still alive and futilely attempting to free themselves. I instantly put the traps back and left the house in disgust.
Sealing up my house any more than it already is--with the intention of preventing entry for cockroaches--is impossible. To my knowledge they enter from and possibly live behind my sink, which is attached to the wall and inaccessible to me, the only other obvious entryway being through my toilet, which is a squat toilet and can't effectively be sealed. So tonight I'm going to set up about a dozen more traps and get some poison. I initially didn't want to use a roach hotel, because if they bring poison back to their nests, they'll die there and I'll have bug corpses in my house that I can't clean up, but given the escalation in troops on their part, picking and choosing my weapons of choice is a luxury I can no longer afford.
By the time this year is over, either me or the roaches will be dead. If it's the roaches, it'll be by traps and roach motels, and if it's me, it'll be from hepatitis or dysentery or something...
The war has begun.
Also, I've enabled anonymous posting, so even if you don't have an account but would like to articulate your disgust, you can comment.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
