My Reviews of Japanese Stuff, Part I

Well, that last post was sort of negative. I'm actually having a great time here, and to lighten the mood just the little, I'd like to unveil the first in what I'm hoping to be a series of installments which I call My Reviews of Japanese Stuff. Aren't I a clever title-maker? Well, let's start off with...

Coffee
So, I'm basically addicted to coffee. Since about sixth grade, actually. I've tried to kick the habit, several times, but always coffee comes back, like some coquettish old flame. Or like a chemical dependency. Take your pick.
Anyway, I was kind of hoping that going to Japan would be the one thing that finally allowed me to spurn my old love- A dramatic departure that once and for all banished my fiendish addiction, simply because coffee would not be available here. But it was not to be. Coffee was waiting for me here in Japan, albeit in a neverbeforedreamed location.
See, you can get most anything from Japanese vending machines.
At first, I was kind of dubious. Holding the small circular (and heated!) can before me, I steeled myself for something that I was sure would taste something almost, but not entirely, exactly unlike coffee. How wrong I was. It was actually damn tasty. Had it been presented to me by a barrista in cup form, I would have had no complaints.
Now, almost every day, I invest a paltry 120 yen into readily available vending machine coffee. Sure, it's not like the fresh brewed stuff that you'd drink during sunday brunch, but it's decently tasty, easy to find, and cheap. I'm hooked.
Oh yeah, and there are lots of Starbucks here. Imagine that.

Trains
Trains in Japan are almost always on time, easy to use, and reasonable cheap. Also, they go very fast. I like that.

Sushi
It's sushi. It's awesome. Duh.

Okonomiyaki
Okonomiyaki is like this kind of Japanese pancake thing made from chopped cabbage and other stuff, fried up right in front of you, and doused in sauce. You can get it with squid, pork, beef, whatever. It's crispy and sizzly, probably bad for you, and best of all there's a great place for it right by my apartment.

Schoolgirl Uniforms
So, I went to a Catholic school for elementary school. It was not pleasant, and I actually had to wear one of those stupid uniforms. Since then, I've been somewhat mystified by the whole "schoolgirl" fetish thing. I remember seeing girls in those uniforms. They were not sexy. At all. They were dumb looking and plaid. And the skirts? Way past the knees. There was not even the suggestion of thighs.
Short plaid and/or pleated skirts (thought me) were purely the province of things pornographic. Actual schoolgirls (thought me) wouldn't ever don such revealing attire. So, to review, my mental layout looked something like this-

Long pleated and/or plaid skirt: "I am the recipient of a parochial education."
Short pleated and/or plaid skirt: "I am so badly wanting 'it.'"

Hahahahaha! Silly me! Schoolgirls here prance around all the time those little sailor-esque uniforms, and all of them seem to don legwear that has heeded MAD Magazine's oft-repeated call of "Up with miniskirts." However, my mental signifiers haven't really adjusted yet. It's like they're some huge cast of a "barely legal" porno, I thought. Don'tlookattheirlegsdon'tlookattheirlegsdon'tlookattheirlegs, I continued to think. But I did. I'm now going to hell when I die. I swear, Charles Bukowski's ghost really is haunting me.
Ok, this wasn't really a review of anything, but it kind of fit here.

More unfounded opinions to come! Wheee!

Fun With Racism!

Ok, so I don't want prejudice, ethnic tensions, linguistic differences, or world politics to become the gimmick of this blog. I just want to have an outlet to talk about my travel experiences with people who care enough to read it while they drink coffee or something. So, between the mocking of various accents and the following post, I really don't want this to become a pattern. That said...
Last week I was chatting after class with a student that several other teachers have warned me about. "Don't ever get drunk with her," they said, "she gets really violent." Apparently I've yet experience this phenomenon (and I'm weirdly non-curious about ever doing so) but I'll refer to her as Drunk and Violent anyway.
So, Drunk and Violent has travelled quite a bit. She's been the United States, to Europe, to Australia, to Korea. You'd think that a person like that would have their eyes opened up, would be sort of liberalized by seeing lots of different peoples, cultures, languages, etc. Right? Those gallivanting world traveller types have to be pretty liberal, because they've seen how we're all one, big, happy world family, right? You know, like from some UNICEF promo material. Well, no.
We were looking at the map in my classroom, and she was telling me all about her travels in Europe. "Italy," she said, pointing to Italy, "France, Spain, Portugal. Latin countries, right"
"Yes," I said, smiling, "their languages all came from Latin." I thought, for a moment, that we were going to have a nice and interesting conversation about the evolution of the Romance languages or something to that effect.
"I HATE Latin countries!" she almost spat on me when she said it.
"What?"
"Latin countries! I hate them! ITALY," she pointed at Italy again, "Italy is the worst! All Italians are thieves!" Now, one likes to think that when confronted with prejudice or ignorant shit like this, one would whip out some sort of verbal judo that will expertly disarm and shame one's opponent. No. Instead I just sort of stood there for a moment with my mouth open.
"My mother's family was from Italy," I eventually said.
"Oh. Well, some Italians are nice people, but most are thieves."
So, even though I have to teach her, Drunk and Violent is not on my "cool person" list. I'd hate to meet her when she's actually liquored up.

Meanwhile...

I've seen and heard lots of trucks buzzing around Okayama carrying big, annoying loudspeakers blaring things at the general public. These trucks generally have lots of guys in either suits or pseudo uniform-things riding on them, and are often adorned with a few Japanese flags. This is actually kind of odd- in the U.S., the flag is on everything. Cars, t-shirts, dogs, everything. In Japan, the flag isn't really on anything, so the fact that these trucks have flags is unusual.
"What's with the really annoying trucks?" I asked Hip-Hop.
"Fucking assholes," he said.
"Nani?" said me.
"Some of them are politicians, but most of them are crazy right wing groups who want to kick out the Koreans."
"You're kidding."
"Nope. They're a bunch of ignorant shits who disturb the peace. I think they should be banned. Okayama's got a lot of them, unfortunately."
For a few moments, I thought it was kind of unbelievable that a bunch of people would get in trucks every day, put on uniforms, a spout xenophobic rhetoric to people while everyone was walking to work and getting coffee. But back in the good ol' U.S. of 'Merica, we've got a bunch of self-appointed guys with guns and trucks who hang out on the southern border and watch for immigrants.
It's weird to think of racism as contemporary, even when faced with it. I've always thought of it as something that "happened" as opposed to "happening." That opinion is quite wrong, I'm afraid.
Ok, I'm ever so slightly depressed after writing that. Here's a nice picture of some koi! Pretty koi! Koi like everyone- Latins, Koreans, whoever! Right, guys? Pretty koi.

Ninety Pounds of Pure Terror

You know what are scary? Not zombies. Zombies are all lumbering and beheadable.
No, cops are scary.
That distinctive blue woven fabric is more a banner of terror than any pustulating flesh will ever be... even if the cop wearing it is a tiny woman about a foot shorter and seventy pounds lighter than you. Prior to my departure, one of the trainers went out of his way to warn us about the Japanese police. I remember him cocking his head in question and saying that "They," and here he paused. It was a pause long enough to let us know that he wanted to say something rude, but was searching for a diplomatic alternative, "enjoy what they do," he finished.
Later, another trainer was not so circuitous. "Japanese cops are assholes," he told me, "have your papers on you. They can hold you for up to sixteen days without charging you of anything, and even after that apply for an extension. And, because your foreign, they'll get it. I've heard stories."
So, a few days ago, I was to meet one of my managers outside of the school. I was a few minutes early, and standing there with my bike, and this tiny woman with a badge on her hat walked up to me.
"Konichiwa," she said.
Oh shit, I thought, don'tfreakoutdon'tfreakoutdon'tfreakout, I continued to think.
"Konichiwa."
"(something in Japanese that I didn't understand)"
I gave her a blank look.
"Card please," she said en Anglais, now, the paperwork for my alien registration card had not all gone through yet, so I just handed her my passport.
"Your bike?" she said?
I realized suddenly what this was all about. Bikes in Japan have to be registered in the same fashion of cars. However, I acquired the bike in question simply by inhereting it from the teacher whose job I took over. (You remember this bike- the wimpy bike I took to the Inland Sea.)
The bike wasn't registered in my name. My passport (which she had taken hostage) was demonstrably different from the regsistry that she was presently contacting on her little cop-radio. I suddenly had images of myself hauled off to some sterile metal cell, where I'd languish alone under pale, green flourescent lights shouting "I demand to see the American Consul!" at the top of my lungs, only to be ignored and forgotten by a heartless Kafka-esque beauracracy.
"Choto matte kudasai," (one moment) I said and reached for a phrasebook that I hoped would have some magical ass-saving phrase buried within it's covers.
"So," she said, "you know Chris?"
"Huh?" I looked up. "Hai."
"This is Chris's bike."
"Hai. He gave it to me."
Then she just laughed at me. I was, after all, a six foot tall guy, fumbling with a phrasebook, visibly frightened of a tiny woman in a hat. "Ok, ok," she said.
"Ok?"
"Ok, ok." She was smiling, and laughing her ass off. Like, loudly. I'd heard all this stuff about the Japanese being all reserved and introverted, and here was a case-in-not-point. A few people were also looking at us, and seemed amused.
"Ok," she said again, and walked away.
I met up with my manager a few moments later and told him about. "Well," he said, "she was probably just bored, and thought you'd be fun to fuck with."

Iconic-licious!

So, here I am at a traditional Shinto shrine. Did I say "Shinto shrine?" I meant "Icon of mass consumerism and camp." Sorry.

Nonpronuncification

I think I'm a pretty liberal person. Very liberal. I'm all tolerant and progressive. I like NPR and vote Democratic, I enjoy tofu, eat healthy foods,and listen to moody indie rock. I want to save the Earth and be able to see gay people get married. You know, all that progressive stuff.
Anyway, nice, tofu-eating, indy-rock-enjoying, Democratic-voting people are a pretty tolerant lot, right? We're above doing dumb, culturally insensitive stuff, like, oh, I don't know, making fun of people who are different than us. You know, like the dirty, stinking, tea-swilling British.
One of my coworkers, the already mentioned British Girl, is, as you can probably figure out, is from that northern island. She's got those adorable little "Union Jacks" along with a "Map of the British Isles" hung in her classroom, where she teaches naive Japanese folks the mongrelized dialect that she laughingly refers to as "English." Ha-ha! Silly English! Don't they know they actually speak British?
Anyway we both had a lot of time on our hands at the end of the day on saturday, so we were just chatting outside our respective classrooms, and we got to discussing our various linguistic differences. I think it began when she attempted to correct my pronunciation of the word "leisure," which I pronounced (correctly, I might add) "lee-sure." She, though, insisted that the One True Way of intonating Mr. Suit Larry's first name was "le sure." Now, while "le sure" would be a great name for an ironic French music magazine, it is not how one pronounces leisure.
C'mon, Yanks. Are you with me?
Anyway, I decided to just sort of roll with it initially, and attempted to take her "corrections" in stride. "Le sure," I said, "but that just sounds like I'm mocking a British accent."
"No it doesn't," she said, "you just sound normal when you say it like that."
"Oh?" I asked, "So I sound all correct and British?"
"Mostly."
Now, I knew that at this moment I could have simply let things slide and changed topics. I didn't do that. I conjured up my best memories of Dick Van Dyke in Mary Poppins and...
"Pip, pip!"
"Stop that. No one actually says that."
"Pip, pip, Guvn'or! Bob's yer uncle?"
"British people don't actually talk like that, you know."
"What's all this, then?"
"Ok, that one was not funny!"
"Bugger me bobbins, Guvn'or! Right-O! Jolly good! Blimey!"
This was about the point where she started hitting me.
"Bloody 'ell! She's 'ittin me, she is! Pip, pip, gel!"
"Yeah, meaner British people would be hitting you in the face instead of the arm!"
"Lay off, old gel! Lay off!" Yeah, she was a bit amused, but she was pissed. And I thought it was hilarious in a sort of twisted, international sociopathic way.
"How would you like it if I made a fake Southern accent?" She asked.
"Well, ah reckon ah'd be right amused by that, ma'am. Shore would. Yee-haw!"
We actually ended up having a long, nerdy conversation about the evolution of English, the migration of various dialects, and such. She's not pissed at me, and I don't hate British people, but damn was it fun exploiting cultural stereotypes.

Meanwhile...

Ok, not meanwhile, but actually the day before that, another coworker (A Japanese guy who speaks flawless American English, and whom I will henceforth refer to as Hip-Hop, given his musical tastes) and I were sitting around Ye Olde Conversational English School, and he asked me if I wanted to do some prep work for interviewing prospective students. When a new student comes in, I've got a series of questions of progressive conversational difficulty that I ask them and see how good they are with it. It's like "Blade Runner," but without the robots and mood lighting.
Anyway, Hip Hop sat down and said, "Ok, I'm going to pretend to be a new student, and you try to guess my level of English."
"Ok," I said, and the role-play began.
"Hello," said me.
Hip Hop leaned forward, his hands folded and his eyes ever so slightly wider. "He-ROH!"
Do not laugh, I thought, don't be a dick. Do. Not. Laugh.
I laughed.
"What you laugh? What? My Engrish funny? Funny Engrish?" damn if he didn't milk the rs for all they were worth. He did it with a totally straight face. Now, I've hear plenty of Japanese people with not the best English, and it's fine. I'm not some chauvanistic dick who laughs whenever someone drops an article. Hell, they're bilingual and I'm not. I respect that. But, seeing a perfectly fluent guy deliberately fake the worst, bad, stereotypical Japanse accent was not something I could not laugh at, and I kind of hated myself for it even though Hip Hop was reveling in exploiting the stereotype. Japan will ruin me.

Meanwhile...

Last night in a bar with some other teachers, one of them, a Japanese woman, said "I just love it when Westerners try to speak Japanese! You guys have the most adorable bad accents. It's just so cute!"
"Oh?" said I.
"Yeah! You need to learn Japanese so I can make fun of you."
Aren't stereotypes fun? I think we all learned a lot today.

In Which an Old Lady Shows me the Sandals

So, some of the coworkers and I went out for Korean barbecue last night, and I've got say that the stuff is absolutely brilliant. Here's the setup: You and your friends sit around this metal-topped table with these holes in the middle of it. The holes are resceptacles for these mini-barbecue pit things that are inserted into your table. So, this guy who looked more like a welder than a chef in his leather apron and gloves came by and gave us two of these mini-firepits that sizzled away right in front of us.
The fun part is that you can order big plates of raw meat (and the occasional veggie) and roast them yourself right there. It's awesome! Seriously- you get to sit there, eating meat and drinking beer, and experience the ever-stimulating activity of setting things on fire. No matter how advanced our various forms of entertainment ever become, I don't think that anything will ever be able to truly replace watching something go *Foom!* as it's licked by flames. I'm sure there's some atavistic evolutionary principal at work here, some serious Clan of the Cave Bear thing going on. I have no complaints.
I also got the opportunity to try some new and different meat foods, which was cool. In addition to traditional (well, traditional by Western standards) cow body parts, we also had tongue and stomach, which were actually quite tasty, especially with this Korean hot sauce stuff. It was organ-liscious.
Anyway, at some point I got up to go to the bathroom. I even got to used a basic Japanese phrase: "Toire wa doko des ka?" I asked? The old lady who seemed to be the manager pointed me at the door, and I proceeded to open it. And, naturally, began to walk in.
Now, I'm not wearing shoes at this point. I've doffed them before sitting down as one does over here.
And out of nowhere, the old lady is suddenly grabbing my arm, saying something in Japanese, and gesturing at something on the ground. I have no idea what's going on. Why is this old lady trying to manhandle me? Am I going into the women's room by mistake?
Nope. I forgot the sandals. Apparently one puts on sandals before going to the bathroom. Makes sense, when you think about it. So, this old lady is still clutching my arm, talking in Japanese, and gesturing at the sandals. My coworkers are at our table, laughing uproariously. As are the guys in suits at the next table. As are the couple across the room. And the guy who looks like a welder.
"Sumi ma sen," (I think that means excuse me or sorry or something, haven't figured it out yet) I said as I put on the sandals, and went into the lavatory.
When I got back, my coworkers were still giggling, and British Girl (the one whom I went to Kurashki with) said "We were wondering if you'd do that."
"Everyone forgets the sandals," said Mr. Ecaudor, "she thought you might notice them, but I was all like, 'nah, he'll forget them like everyone does.'"
So, yeah- between my lack of drinking tolerance and my ignorance of local footwear customs, and who knows what else, I'm in store for all sorts of cultural snafus. It's like I'm Balki from Perfect Strangers. You know, the "Hi-larious Immigrant Character" type who says things like "I love America! Is wonderful for the living in!" That's me right now, except not as patriotic or Eastern European, but just as culturally deluded, overstimulated, and amusingly alien.

The Inland Sea by Night

It's twenty four hours later, and I still can't feel my legs all the way.
I inhereted this p.o.s. bike from the teacher I replaced, a complete aged clunker with all of three gears and no breaks. This thing isn't any sort of street bike or mountain bike, this is one of those big-tired things that are meant to be leisurely ridden around genteel urban areas on Sunday afternoon. Also, it's designed for someone who wears a dress. It's not at all like the sturdy and dependable hybrid I left behind in Eugene (which is on sale on Craigslist, hint, hint). This thing is what you would get if someone were to be able to metaphysically transform one of Cole Porter's less witty numbers into vehicle form.
Anyway...
Last night, a coworker (whom I will here on refer to as Mr. Ecaudor for reasons that will become apparent) asked me if I wanted to ride out to the Inland Sea (the stretch of water between Honshu and Shikoku) with him, and I said "sure." Now, my initial inclination was to go home after my first full day of teaching on my own, sit in front of a computer, write on this blog, eat a bento box, read, and fall asleep. I did none of those things. I figured that I'm here in Japan to do stuff, experience things, and get all edified, so I really ought to go out and see the picturesque oceanic marvel that I'm so near. So, I hopped on the wimpy bike, and we were off.
"It'll take about an hour," said Mr. Ecaudor. Ok, I thought, that didn't sound so bad. The wimpy bike, at least, is very agreeable. It goes forward in a genail and leisurely manner, and has this agreeable little light that's powered by the rider's own pedaling. I can do this for an hour.
I was technically correct. I was, obviously, able to make it there and back on this thing. However, it was quite the ordeal. After a while I realized that the bike was not actually big enough for me, so my legs did not extend all the way, and that it's three gears, though obliging and delightful, sadly lacked the grit and expertise necessary to get us where we were going in an optimally efficient way.
Note to self-get new bike. Riding this thing any serious distance over any real elevation gain is not a good idea.
But anyway, a lousy bike isn't that interesting.
What's more interesting is that we left Okayama and the surrounding cities behind. The landscape became sparser and darker around us, first docks and factories, closed for the night, and then country houses and rice paddies, all hugging the coast. The rice paddies had all been harvested at that point, and we stopped for a bit to look at the drained rows of cut crops, the bushels piled at regular intervals. The houses, also, were not the cramped affairs of the urban Japan that I've seen so far, but larger examples of traditional architechture, wood buildings with the sloping roofs of circular tiles.
All the while, Mr. Ecaudor was talking about his philosophy regarding martial arts and his time in the Peace Corps in Ecaudor. I actually like the guy quite a bit so far, he's been very friendly and helpful, but between the excruciating pain of pedaling the wimpy bike and the fascinating terrain, I wasn't really listening to him.
We got to the Inland Sea at perhaps 12:30 at night, and everything was still. We walked out to this stone dock type thing, a finger of rock extending into the water. Standing there, covered in sweat from the trip, I looked for waves and ripples in the water and found nothing other than the minor flurries lapping under my feet. Near the shore was a sort of glowing plankton, hard to see at first, but once I noticed their luminescence I couldn't stop seeing their small, glowing forms.
I know it sounds extremely trite to say this, but I was weirdly comforted by finding similar constellations in the sky. Yeah, cue up "Somewhere, Out There" from an American Tail and start going on about how "we're all just citizens of one big world" and crap like that, but I was seriously pleased to see Orion as bright as ever astride a foreign sky. I'm serious here! It was all Hallmark and shit. Had not some other guy been going on about his Latin American adventures (which, admittedly, did sound pretty neat) I would have gladly laid flat on my back and just picked out the stars that I know.
Now stop laughing. Not all of my posts will be able to have catgirls and drunkeness in them.
The whole thing, though, did sort of drive home to me that I've come a great deal of distance. Literally. I mean, when you sit in an airplane you just sort of sit on your ass and sleep and whatever until you're somewhere else. Physically and painfully taking myself out to the silent rural coast drove home the obvious point that I am very much somewhere else now. I still don't know what to think about that.