Disclaimer: This blog is opinion and observation based solely on my own experiences.
As with most Americans of my generation, I've never really been too concerned about getting married just quite yet. In fact, I feel as if the general consensus among Americans my age is that marriage doesn't need to be (and quite honestly shouldn't be) a concern when one is in their early to mid 20's. That is of course if one even intends to get married at all.
In Japan, at least in the rural areas, this doesn't really seem to be the case. I can't speak too much for the young men of Japan, but I've noticed that a large part of the women in the 18-25ish age range are either already married or actively seeking to get married and have a child. To me, this active pursuit and interest in marriage is a very strange departure from what I perceive to be an overwhelming disinterest in marriage on the part of most young Americans.
But I've found myself slowly getting sucked into this mindset that one should be trying to get married at this age. For me personally, there are a number of factors which contribute to this. The biggest, and most obvious factor for me (I think) is that I work with young kids. And let me tell you, they are SOOO freakin' cute. While teaching at Elementary School isn't exactly my favorite, when I get the chance to go play with the kids outside or just hang out and talk with them, I sometimes think to myself "You are so cute! Why aren't you my kid?!"
I think the other factor which plays into my changing mindset is the fact that "Do you have a girlfriend?" is probably the most common question I get asked, aside from "Where are you from?" and "What is your name?" And don't just think that its women in my age-range that ask this question... My students ask me this. Old ladies ask me this. Middle-aged men ask me this. Complete strangers ask me this. Basically, everyone asks me this. But why?
To be honest, I don't quite have an answer. All I can say, is that (at least from my perspective) there seems to be a much greater concern about whether or not someone is single, dating, or married in Japan. In America, the question "Do you have a girlfriend/boyfriend?" is quite heavy and carries with it the implication of "I'm interested in dating you" or "I know someone who is interested in dating you." In Japan, the question seems to carry no such weight and really isn't all that different from asking "Do you like apples?"
But despite the question not seeming to carry any significance whatsoever, I do feel that it contributes to the desire (pressure?) to marry at a young age. It's almost as if being asked this question is a constant reminder of either A) the fact that you are single, have no bf/gf; therefore cannot get married, or B) the fact that you have a bf/gf combined with the implication, "Then why aren't you married yet?" It's a vicious cycle. Basically, my opinion is that this light-hearted, no-ill-intended question actually plays a lot more mind games on the young Japanese people than they think.
So yeah, its all quite a different change from America. And while I say that I've been swept into this mindset (and I can just see the looks on the faces of my family and friends back home), let me assure you that I recognize the fact that I am still young, foolish, am in no way ready to make any big life decisions (this a large part of why I'm in Japan in the first place), and that most importantly I want to stay this way for as long as possible.
Now... trying to find a Japanese girl to date? That's an entirely different, complicated, and confusing story. lol
But yeah, that's it for this blog. I hope it was interesting? Oh... and I've gone back and added the answers to the blog about Japanese emoji or smiley faces.
In Japan, there are two types of cars. There are white plates and yellow plates. Yellow plates are referred to as "Kei" cars, and are basically advanced go-karts. They have really small engines, and they are much lighter (and less safe) than their white plate brothers. Kei cars are much cheaper to own and operate, as the reason for their very existence is to take advantage of certain loopholes in car laws/regulations in Japan.
Fortunately, I got a white plate. It's got more kick, has airbags, and feels a lot more sturdy than a Kei car does. And here's the kicker: I pretty much got the car for free. I paid ¥120,000 for it (which is about $1,500 at todays exchange rate), but this cost isn't for the actual car itself. Because I know the daughter of the man who owns the car shop who "sold" me the car, they gave it to me for free. The ¥120,000 breaks down as follows: ~¥100,000 for mandatory taxes, inspection, etc. and ~¥20,000 to file the necessary documents, change ownership, etc.
So, yeah! Awesome!
I took it out for my first drive in over 8 months yesterday. It was also my first time ever operating a vehicle with the handle on the right side, and also my first time driving on the left side of the road. Overall though it wasn't nearly as hard as I thought it would be. In fact, it seemed somewhat natural.
I'm definitely looking forward to the increased freedom that owning a car will bring. No longer will I have to wait around for 2 hours to catch the next train if I want to go somewhere. Best of all, living in one of the rainiest regions in all of Japan, this baby will REALLY come in handy on days when the sky is practically falling and I HAVE to go to the grocery store because I am out of food.
Finally, I hope to go and visit friends in northern Mie much more frequently, and I definitely want to plan some road trips as well.
It's an angry (or frustrated) person flipping over a table. It's only one of countless hundreds of "emoji" (the Japanese word for emoticons). It's also one of my favorites!
In the west we seem to have developed a system of emoticons which pretty much all require the reader to read the emoticon horizontally - think along the lines of: :D &=P &:*(
In Japan, emoji utilize a whole host of characters and symbols that most of us westerners don't even know exist. These emoji are much more interesting, pleasing, and descriptive than their western counterparts. However, many of them are downright confusing, and a lot of the time I cannot even figure out what they are trying to convey.
As you can see from the title of the blog, Japanese emoji are read vertically (i.e. you don't have to tilt your head to read them). There are a whole range of emotions/actions that can be conveyed including: happiness, anger, sadness, kissing, dancing, singing, confusion, shock, evil/plotting, apologizing, drinking, and writing.
That said, I thought it might be fun/interesting for me to list some Japanese emoji and see if you can figure them out! And I thought it would be interesting if I didn't provide you with the answers until my next blog post!
So... without further ado, here are a handful of Japanese emoji! Can you figure out what they are trying to convey??
Fair Warning: This blog might be a little negative or depressing to read. Also, spelling errors. ごめんね。
Let's start with a little backstory. In Japan, the school year starts on April 1st. Each year, near the middle of March, certain teachers are informed that they will be changing to a new school. As far as I can tell, there is very little rhyme or reason to who gets transferred... but on the whole, the younger a given teacher is or the longer a given teacher has been at the school, the greater the chance that he/she will be transferred.
I can sort of understand the reasoning behind it, but a lot of what I see makes no sense at all. Sometimes I feel like someone somewhere picks a name from one hat, a school from another, and "PRESTO!" those are the changes to be made.
That out of the way, I have two very different stories to tell.
As I have said many times before, I teach at 7 schools. Five of them are Elementary Schools (ES) and two are Junior High Schools (JHS). I enjoy my time at ES, but in all honesty, it is not where my heart is. I much prefer my days at JHS over my days at ES. The kids are more mature, they tend to take English more seriously than their ES counterparts, and I get to work with teachers who have studied and speak English.
Yesterday and today were the farewell dinners for both my JHS. This type of dinner starts out really formal, with the Principal and Vice-Principal each making a speech. Then, each teacher that is leaving makes his or her speech. Then the eating and drinking commences. Through the course of the night, more speeches are made, presents given, and one-on-one chats take place. I'm not going to go into too much detail, but let's just say I've had wildly different experiences at my two JHS.
At one of the schools, the teachers are incredibly nice, friendly, and I feel like they actually want to get to know me as a person. At this school, 5 teachers are being transferred. Two of the teachers were part-time, so I didn't really get to know them that much (as we were rarely at the school at the same time). But the other three I'm really sad to see go.
One is a PE teacher who is almost like a motherly figure to me. It's really difficult for me to put into words, but something about her really reminds me of my mom. I wont lie - I got a little choked up when we said goodbye. The second is the Vice-Principal. The only word I can think of to describe this man is "jolly". He would often come to my desk to chat with me, or ask me about this and that, or tell me jokes. He's just a really good, well-rounded man. Finally, the music teacher. I think I'm most sad that she is leaving, because I really only started talking with her a month or two ago. This is mostly my fault that we didn't speak as I was too shy and my Japanese is still really bad. I'm really starting to regret it now, as she can sing well, play piano beautifully, is interested in English, is younger than 30 years old (this is RARE in my town), and is unbelievably pretty. Lesson learned: don't wait around.
Now, let's switch to the other school. At this school, the teachers barely even acknowledge my existence. I don't think its that they dont like me, I think it may just be that they are really busy. Still, there are days at this school where I quite literally talk to NO ONE, except to announce my arrival to and departure from school and a couple sentences here and there with the English teacher about the days classes.
With that in mind, let's jump to the farewell dinner of this school. Seven teachers are leaving, most of whom I have never even shared a word with. Two of the younger teachers came over to talk with me, but other than them (and the English teacher), I pretty much spoke to no one. I know part of it is my own fault, as I probably need to be more outspoken in Japan than I currently am. But a lot of the time, I think I get lost in the madness of the school day, and as a result I end up at my desk bored to tears. Sometimes I just wish a teacher, any teacher, would come to my desk and say "Let's go clean!" or "Come play tennis with us!" At least that way I would feel more included than I currently do. Yesterday at this school, I kind of just thought "Screw it!", and I basically followed my English teacher throughout the whole day and just did whatever she did. It definitely beat sitting at my desk, so I will probably be using this method next year as well. Still, it would make me BEYOND happy just to be asked, even if it was just once or for some menial task.
So yeah: two schools, two experiences. And that doesn't even include the FIVE elementary schools I go to every week. It may sound kind of weird when you consider that my schedule is the same every week, but I feel like there is very little consistency in what I do. That is to say, when I visit my Wednesday school, the time between this Wednesday's visit and the next Wednesday's visit encompasses 6 other schools, some 16-odd classes, with about 700 students ranging from 6 years old to 15 years old, with class sizes ranging from 2 students to 35 students, and all this with teachers who have wildly varying levels of English and drastically different teaching styles. Granted each week is practically over in a flash, but each week also takes me from the start to the end and makes sure nothing, and I mean NOTHING, gets lost in between. While it is rewarding, it is insanely exhausting. I've never been so tired before in my life than I am currently feeling. Some nights, even with 10 hours of sleep, I wake up and feel like I didn't even sleep at all.
So yeah... this wasn't really a rant or anything, just a way for me to put things into perspective, and hopefully others can find it interesting. If it came off depressing as I thought it might, I'm fairly confident it's because of the things happening around me. Teachers leaving, students graduating, the return of the unrelenting winter cold, RAIN, etc. etc.
While I will miss many of the teachers and students, I pretty much have to force myself to move on for my own sake.
In that sense, I am ready for spring, the new year, the new teachers, and new chances.
Today I present to you an assortment of videos which I have been sitting on for quite some time. None of them have any particular relevance to anything, and most of them border on being tedious and boring... but we can't be picky now, can we?!?!
I will present them to you in the order in which they were filmed. The oldest one goes back to October 2011, and I just filmed the newest video today. So without further ado, step right up and grab a video!
Video 1: Random Concert in Akihabara
This was filmed on October 9th, 2011. Not sure who is performing... but you can see fan dedication at its finest (aka creepiest) in this video. It is not uncommon to see grown men in their 30s and 40s cheering for, dancing with, and singing along to concerts performed by 16 year old girls.
Video 2: Riding the Bullet Train
This is what it looks like to travel ~200mph on the ground. This was taken aboard the Nozomi Shinkansen (fastest Bullet Train in Japan)... and as you can see, the ride is smooth as silk. It's also very expensive.
Video 3: A-Fishing We Will Go
I went fishing out in the bay of my town and Owase. You can see Owase as marked by the giant tower near the end of the video. Shortly thereafter, I pan the camera to the right, and you can just barely make out the presence of my tiny little town.
Video 4: New Apartment Tour
I took this the day I moved in. We basically moved everything from my old place to my new place in one day (from 8am to about 6pm). This video was taken in the aftermath... so things were still all over the place. On moving day, I was pretty much the luckiest guy ever - an army of older ladies came over and cleaned the entire place floor to ceiling. Since taking this video, a lot has changed (namely, I got the bed and couch I spoke of). I plan to take another video soon to show all the changes.
Video 5: Riding the Local Train
These are the gorgeous views as you venture away from the civilization of northern Mie deep into the untamed wilds of where I live. Welcome to rural living!
Video 6: A Finnish Choir... in Japan?
Uhm... yeah.... this is easily one of the most unusual things I've seen so far in Japan. Who would have ever thought that I would spend an evening with a Finnish Choir group (let alone in Japan)?!?! I guess it's just another item I can check off of my "things I didn't expect to experience in Japan" checklist. And yes, they are singing in Finnish.
Video 7: I'm Not Really Sure...
I took this video today at a local carnival type thing that was held today in Kii-Nagashima (the town about 20 minutes north of me). I think everyone in this video is a man... but some are dressed like woman, others like clowns, one like a green leopard, and one as a fireman of sorts??? It was interesting... and it was also raining quite heavily.
That's all for this time around. Hope you enjoyed!
This is going to be a mish-mash of various topics, each beginning with the contraction "let's" which is ubiquitous in Japanese English learning, speaking, and writing. So without further ado, let's begin. Oh dang, see what I did there?
Let's Talking About Love!
February 14th was Valentine's day in Japan, and believe it or not, it's actually quite a common practice adopted in Japan. There are some MAJOR differences, however, to what you think Valentine's day means, and what a Japanese person thinks Valentine's day means. For starters, in Japan, Valentine's day is all about women showing their affection (or rather obligation) to men. What do I mean?
Well, in Japan, on Valentine's day, the expectation is that a woman will give chocolate to men. The types of chocolate is broken into two kinds. The first, called "Giri-choco" basically means obligation chocolate. This is given to coworkers and other male acquaintances to whom the girl has no love interest in. It is usually cheap, ordinary chocolate which simply means "I acknowledge our friendship or working relationship." The other kind (the kind that every man wants to get), is called "Honmei choco" and that basically means love chocolate. Lot's of girls go through meticulous hours of baking and decorating their own sweets, candies, chocolates, and cakes for their love interest(s). If they don't decide to make something, they usually buy a really nice gift box costing an absurd amount of money. While I don't know for sure, I would guess that most girls only give this kind of chocolate to one or two guys at most.
On the guys end of things, you pretty just have to sit back and watch the chocolate come at you. There is no expectation or obligation that you will give anything on Valentine's day. Moreover, gifts, dates, and other related things that you would normally associate to Valentine's day are not widely popular here. It's all about giving chocolate to men if you're a woman, and getting chocolate from women if you're a man.
(Unless you're me. I was hoping to at least get some giri-choco from select teachers and students, and deep down, of course I was hoping for some Honmei-choco from a certain someone or two... but alas, I received not even a single piece of chocolate.)
Next, we jump forward to a date which means nothing to the Western world: March 14th. This day is called "White Day" and it is the day on which men are to return the favor to the women that they received chocolate from. If he received Giri-choco, a simple offering of basic chocolate is a sufficient return gift. However, when receiving Honmei-choco, the man is (according to the general consensus) supposed to return a gift which he estimates to be around 3 times the value of the gift that he originally received. His return gift can be chocolate, but depending on the level of the relationship, it can also be other things such as: jewelry, a date, and even lingerie.
(And, on the grass-is-always-greener side of life, because I didn't receive any chocolates in the the first place, I have none to return! Yippie! Although, there is a small chance that I might give something to someone anyway, as I honestly have nothing to lose.)
Before we go on to the next "Let's" topic... I should mention that I think Japan's view towards Valentine's day is slowing approaching to what we think Valentine's day is in America. It's still rare, but not totally out of the picture, for men to give chocolate to women, singles to ask another out on a date, etc.
Finally, I will leave you with 2 videos. The first is the most popular singing group in Japan performing the most popular Valentine's day song in Japan (they are called AKB 48, and the song is called "Valentine Kiss"), and the second is a commercial for my local grocery store (it's advertising a cooking show for women on making Valentine's goodies - with who is quite arguably the hottest mom in town):
Let's Eating School Lunch!
Because I'm a municipal JET (meaning I'm hired directly by my Board of Education), I get the joys of a little thing called School Lunch. Other JETs (who are hired by the Prefecture [or state]) generally don't get such a luxury.
You may be thinking, "Ew! School lunch! That stuff is nasty!" Not so in Japan my friend, not so. In fact, school lunch in Japan is everything you want it to be: amazingly delicious, incredibly nutritious, satisfyingly filling, and fantastically inexpensive. Each meal consists of 4 dishes and some sort of milk or yogurt to compliment. The four dishes, quite generally, are:
Rice (replaced by bread on Wednesdays)
Some sort of meat or pasta dish (For the meats: fish and chicken are common - pork and beef on occasion; for the pasta: think ramen, udon, or western spaghetti type foods)
A vegetable or fruit dish
A soup dish (usually a variant on the traditional miso soup)
All this, for under ~$3... amazing! I truely look forward to it everyday, and it's one thing that I already know that I'm going to sorely miss when I leave my job here.
Well, that's enough TALKING about school lunch, so now, let me show you the magic that is Japanese school lunch:
Let's Taking a Bus Ride!
Out of the five workdays, on three of them I stay at one school the entire day. This happens at my big Elementary School and both my Junior Highs. In total, I teach at 7 schools (2 JHS and 5 ES), and because I go to every school every week, this leaves 4 schools for the remaning two days. What ends up happening on these days is: I go to one school in the morning and teach the 5th and 6th graders, then I eat my sacred school lunch, and then I hop on a bus to get to the next school (at which I also teach the 5th and 6th grade).
This is annoying at times, but it's really not that bad. What it ends up doing is giving me free time to kind of do whatever I want, because all that really matters is that I make it to the next school by the start of the next period. Nobody really cares what I do in between, so long as I'm where I'm supposed to be when class starts and as long as I have a lesson planned. Anyway, I digress.
This transfer happens every Tuesday and Friday. On Fridays (today), the bus ride is gorgeous. The bus drives through an EXTREMELY set of narrow streets in a town that is locked between the ocean and a mountain (unfortunately, I didn't capture this harrowing part in the video below). When it emerges from the town (about where this video starts), it ends up on a road which is basically at ocean level, with the ocean on one side of the road and a giant mountain on the other. There is very little else (save for a few houses and shops sprinkled here and there) along this road which is sometimes barely big enough for two cars to pass on. In fact, in this video, there are occasions when the bus stops or slows dramatically in order to allow oncoming traffic to pass. There are even one or two times when the bus honks once to thank the other driver.
Also, it is not uncommon for the driver of a moving vehicle to BOW in the car WHILE DRIVING.
Here is a map of the route the bus takes in the video:
Point A on the map is where the bus starts (at an ES called Hikimoto) and the destination is Point B (an ES called Yaguchi). Hikimoto has about 50 students, and Yaguchi has about 30; at Yaguchi, my 5th grade class has a whopping 2 students - 1 boy and 1 girl.
Also, around the area with all the stars and the train station called Aiga is my town. The Pacific Ocean pretty much starts right below point A, so as you can see, my town is right on the water (although we are surrounded almost exclusively by mountains).
Okay, here's the bus ride video:
(CHALLENGE: See if you can hear the bus announce that the next stop is Yaguchi a short bit before I push the button to stop!)
Let's Learning the Tea Ceremony!
I recently went to a Tea Ceremony event held by my local international society. The tea ceremony leader also happens to be an English tutor in the town about 25 minutes north of me, so she switched back and forth throughout the entire presentation.
I had no idea the press would be there, but as it turns out I ended up being in the newspaper and on the local TV station again. In the interview, I talking about something called Seiza (pronounced say-za), which is basically sitting on top of both your legs with your feet being pushed in underneath your rear end (like you see everyone doing in the video). Any more than 5 minutes of it is torture. We did it for about 30 minutes during the Tea Ceremony presentation, and by the time I had to stand up.... well, I couldn't. It was unlike any other sensation I've experience before - I was paralyzed from the waste down. After hitting my legs really hard (so hard, that it normally would have hurt) for about a minute, I attempted to stand, only to immediately collapse and fall on my side. It was quite comical.
Anyway, you get the idea. Here is the video:
Let's Finishing!
Okay, I'm getting tired of typing. Soooo, that'll wrap up this blog! I hope you enjoyed, and I hope to write another one soon! Have a great day in your corner of the world!
JJ
PS: Please forgive what I'm sure are numerous spelling/grammar mistakes. I will go back and correct them later... (and using the structure "Let's ~____ing" as each section's header was not a mistake...)
To think I've been here 6 months! Absurd! Unbelievable! Crazy!
There are times when I really have to stop myself and say "Dang dude, you live in Japan!" I've been surrounded with such nice people and (mostly) good kids that I really feel like this is a home away from home. Lately it has started to seem so much like home that the natural beauty which used to leave me breathless on a daily basis has lost a lot of its appeal. In fact, a large part of the honeymoon period that most people experience upon arrival in Japan has slowly worn off. I am thankful though that I never truly experienced any culture shock or homesickness (save for a very brief period shortly after arriving).
However, on my walk to work this morning, for one reason or another, I was once again taken aback by my surroundings and decided to take this short video:
Granted it's been really ugly here all day (and raining almost non-stop), but it was still quite beautiful.
Changing gears - I've been just as busy as ever. This weekend I'm going north to Iga (famous for being the birth place of the Ninja and a well-known castle). Next weekend I'm going to Nagoya to see a pretty spectacular light display. The following weekend there will be a big festival in Owase (the big-ish city just south of me) in which the town splits into 2 teams and have a friendly "brawl". Then the next weekend I'm probably going to head South to the Shingu area of Wakayama to hang out with other JETs and celebrate their birthdays. Haha - so yeah, that makes my next free weekend somewhere in mid to late February... I guess I can't really complain though. It is pretty nice to always have something to do and people to see/hang out with.
My school schedule is also pretty busy. I teach anywhere from 19 to 22 classes a week (with only about 7 or 8 of these being at Junior High). The rest are all at my 5 Elementary schools, meaning I'm usually running the show for the full 45 minutes of class. These classes are all pretty well-behaved (save for 1 or 2 "bad" classes), but everything is done at full volume and with high energy. This of course results in some very fun, rewarding, and ultimately exhausting days.
Sometimes I find myself wishing I taught at fewer schools... but my situation is really not that bad. Five out of seven of my schools all have less than 60 students, so it's not that hard to learn the names of the kids at those schools. And I'm VERY fortunate that my furthest schools are only a 10 minute bus ride away. Other JETs that I know have schools that take 40 minutes to get to! Some even have to take a taxi to get to their schools because there are no buses.
*****
In other news, I have long since signed my recontracting papers - meaning I will be here at least until July 2013. But I'm kind of already planning to be here 3-4 years. At this point, when I return to America I want to attend graduate school but (as is life) these plans are subject to change.
Staying in Japan will give me the opportunity to save a lot of money, but at the same time it has me worried about a few things:
Driving... I have not driven a car in 6 months. If I don't end up getting a car during my stay here, I worry about having to "learn" to drive all over again.
My English... It's getting worse. Constantly having to dumb down your English so that others around you can *hopefully* understand does not bode well for becoming a graduate student.
Time... It's not on my side. If I stay four years that means I will come back to America as a 27 year-old. Add to that 3-4 years for graduate school and... BAM! I'll already be in my 30s. Where does a wife and kid(s) fit into that???
Maybe these are things that I really shouldn't be worried about as a soon-to-be 24 year-old... but they do creep into my thoughts every now and again.
Anyway, I haven't got much else to share for this post. So, here are some pictures!
Enjoy! And ttyl!
A gathering of (almost) all the JETs that live near me.
I bought a couch! It doubles as a bed and has all sorts of cool features.
View out my hotel room in Tsu (the capital of my prefecture [state])
