Golden Week: Part 1

(This post is rather long. Also early, because I won't be able to write a post tomorrow. I do it because I love you. <3)

It's now halfway through Golden Week and I feel like I'm just getting going. Hard to believe, really, when I consider just how much has happened since last Friday.

Fridays are one of two days in the week when I am sent on a half-hour bike ride to an Elementary school. The other day is Monday, which bookends my weeks nicely. This Friday, however, I was more concerned with whether or not I'd be able to make my train in time.

Luckily, it happened to be a week of home-visits. Every day last week, school would end after lunch and the students would head home. Shortly after, the teachers would stream out of the teacher room clad in identical black suits, carrying identical black briefcases, heading to their students' homes for a heart-to-heart with their students' parents. What that meant for me specifically, as a mere assistant teacher, was that I could finish up early and head to the Board of Education. From there, it's only 5 minutes by bicycle and I'm home.

I took full advantage of this fact. As soon as the clock hit 4:15, I ran down to my bike and turned a five minute ride into two minutes. At home, I rammed a long weekend's worth of clothes and toiletries into my backpack, and hopped back on my bike to head to the train station.

All in all, the entire procedure - BOE to home, packing, and home to train station - took about half an hour. And all I forgot was a tooth brush, which I soon found a ￥50 (~$0.60 USD) replacement for. Not too shabby.

Once in the great city of Okayama, the merriment began.

Our merry band

The plan was this: First, we would find a place to consume foods. Second, we would acquire the liquid beverages necessary to make the night perfectly forgettable. Finally, we would mosey on down to the club where our common friend was to execute his DJ skillz. At some point, presumably, we would have to emerge into the night/dawn and find something to do with ourselves. But we would cross that bridge when we got to it. And in the mean time, we could always book a capsule hotel.

As it so happened, we were bogged down from the first step. Our initial hopes of chowing down on a rooftop patio were beaten into nothing by the fact that Japan wasn't yet in "rooftop patio season." Instead, we ended up at a ridiculously over priced buffet restaurant that would later prove to be our downfall. You see, not only was it overpriced, it was also pretty much disgusting. In general, I'm not that picky when it comes to food quality. I have some picky habits (no bananas, thank you very much, and keep those raw tomatoes away from me), but if it's cooked, I'm usually okay with it. Still, I was admittedly daunted by what lay before me.

The fare was simple enough: fried rice and sushi, fried chicken and sausages, that sort of thing. But even the pasta was stale and seemed like it was, in fact, yesterday's dinner microwaved and presented today. Which made me suspicious of the sushi. Others, braver than me, tried the sushi and paid the price.

But that wouldn't come into play until later. In the mean time, we finished up our meal and headed out for the bar. It was time to take things to the next level. On the way we stopped into a konbini and bought ourselves a few chu-hais and canned beers. I know, real classy.

At the bar, we enlargened our group by about double. Possibly more, I'm not totally sure. We also consumed several more, slightly classier, drinks. Well, at least they weren't in cans. And I did have a glass of wine, which is definitely in a classier category than chu-hai.

Anyway, to cut a long list of drinks and drunken acts short, we got out of the bar after about an hour and a half, then headed to the club. As it turns out, the "club" was more like a private party for us. Not intended to be, I'm sure, but as we constituted about half the patrons, the club pretty much belonged to us.

Well, that's okay. I had expected it to be a small place.

Here, check out this video. It captures, in complete detail, the experience.

Seriously, I don't recommend watching the whole thing.

Sometime around 4 AM myself and a small remaining group stumbled out of the club. That small group then split into two and one group (mine) went to the capsule hotel while the other group went God knows where. Probably somewhere with more booze, if I were to guess.

As you might imagine, the following morning was something awful. I woke up after a fitful four hours of sleep and crammed some food into my mouth. An hour later, I was joined by two of my fellows and we plotted when to catch the train to Ise. One more person was supposed to join us, but the buffet food and booze had laid waste to his stomach and, quite frankly, he wasn't going to make it. He would try, he said, to catch a later train, but I wasn't holding my breath.

That day, not a whole lot was accomplished. Partly because our train didn't get into Ise until 2 PM. Mostly because actually doing things was not compatible with our current condition. To point: the first thing we did upon arriving in Ise was take a nap.

Us upon arrival.

Eventually we roused ourselves enough to make our way to a late lunch. We asked the hostelier for a recommendation and he pointed us in the way of Cafe Jamise. (You can see a picture of us here.) It turned out to be a truly awesome, chill spot. We seemed to be the only paying customers there, but we weren't alone. There was also some guy, apparently quite famous, playing a box-drum thing.

You know what, that description really doesn't do him justice. Let me try again.

There was also some guy, apparently quite famous, who introduced himself as Poutine. The entire time whilst we were talking, a constant drumming could be heard erupting from Mr. Poutine's direction - I quickly learned that this was a nearly unconscious act of his. The man's fingers drummed. It was their essence, their raison d'etre. A little bit later, he brought a Cajón out from his car and treated us all to a half hour of drum beats and finger rhythms that I could barely even follow with my eyes.

Suffice to say, he was pretty awesome.

We rounded out the rest of the day with some snacks by the river, an hour long game of 20 questions (highlights included "Under my bed" and "Air"), and shabu shabu. Just after sunset, we were joined by our final companion, who had finally ridden his stomach of all the vileness of the night before.

The next day could be an entire blog post in its own right. But as this post is already getting long, I'll sum it up in point form, chronological style.

• 10:00 AM - Awaken to our host playing super chill ambient music on his electric guitar.
• 10:30 AM - Wander into a konbini for breakfast, rush to the train station and barely make it onto the train for Futami and the Wedded Rocks.
• 10:45 AM - Arrive at the Wedded Rocks and wander about. Enjoy the ocean. Discover a several awesome frog statues. Collect sea shells and sea glass. Be happy.
• 11:45 AM - Catch train back to Ise.
• 12:00 noon - Arrive in Ise. Be disappointed at the fact that all the bikes have been rented. Decide instead to taxi it to the Inner Shrine of Ise Jingu.
• 12:20 PM - Arrive at Inner Shrine, wallet feeling somewhat lighter. Eat lunch. Wander the grounds. Get told off by security guards twice for failed attempts at Gaijin Smashing. Be rather impressed by the whole thing.
• 2:30 PM - Take a taxi back to the hostel. Check out, inspect bags, be cool. Drop off one of our number who is feeling rather exhausted. Walk to Outer Shrine of Ise Jingu. Encounter Power Rangers.
• 3:00 PM - Arrive at Outer Shrine. Walk around, realize that many of its buildings are exactly the same as the Inner Shrine, except that the whole thing is rather smaller and less pretentious. Be pleased.
• 3:45 PM - Walk back to hostel, pick up exhausted companion, walk to the train station and catch a train to Osaka.
• 5:45 PM - Arrive in Osaka. Drop things off at capsule hotel. Visit a record shop and be blown away by the cheap and awesome selections. Make our way to El Pancho. Be full of food and joy.
• 9:30 PM - Go to L&L, a tiny shisha bar in Shinsaibashi. Apparently it is also a favorite hangout of Boys2Men and "The Green Jedi". We decided the guy meant Liam Neeson. Be impressed. Also amused.
• 11:00 PM - Finally decide on a club to go to.
• 11:30 PM - Arrive at said club, only to be told we have to wait another fifteen minutes. We go to get another chu-hai from the nearby konbini.
• 11:45 PM - Enter the club, only to discover that, including the three of us, there are a total of 12 patrons. But it's okay, because it's so full of fake fog that we can barely even see each other. Proceed to dance. Witness the Great Circle Dancer. Drink. Be happy and exhausted.
• 3:00 AM - Finally exit the club and head back to the capsule hotel to get some sleep. Be amused at the porn playing on tv in the hallway, climb into capsule, fall asleep.

The next and final day of the first half of Golden Week (Monday, if you've managed to follow thus far) was a much slower day. We ended up just perusing some shops, catching a showing of Dirty Harry in northern Osaka, and finally taking the bus back home.

Since then, I've been in my inaka little town. Yesterday and today I had classes to teach. But now, that's all over. This evening, Golden Week resumes.

I'm comin' for ya, Fukuoka.

~Jeffles

Golden Weeking

Today, as you probably know, it is April 26th. That may not mean much to you, but it certainly means something to me. And what it means is this:

Golden Week is coming.

Very soon, in fact. It will arrive in TWO DAYS. That's right, you heard me. Two. Days. If today is Thursday, then Golden Week will be here on what day? Come on now, say it with me. Saturday.

Good job.

You get a Gold Star!

What is Golden Week, you ask? Golden Week is a short period of time in which there are several national holidays. Essentially, this results in a week during which the entire country goes on vacation. This year, Golden week consists of two successive long weekends, one being a 3 day long weekend and the other being a 4 day long weekend.

But this is not necessarily the fantastic, wonderful gift that you might expect it to be. Plane, train, bus, and hotel prices sky rocket. A trip that might only cost you $300 at any other time of year will now cost you at least twice that amount. And you may not even be able to make the trip in the first place. Why? Because hotels at popular destinations may have already been entirely booked up for six months to a year in advance.

Yes, really. In fact, this happened to me. A few friends and I were planning to go to Yakushima for the second part of golden week. It's an incredibly gorgeous island that is famed for its nature, its obscenely old trees, its incredible hikes, and its mind-bending beauty. It is so beautiful, in fact, that Hayao Miyazaki based the forest setting of his famous movie, Princess Mononoke, on the island.

Unfortunately, despite looking a full two months in advance, my friends and I could not find a single place to lodge ourselves. Sadness. :(

Yeah, that sucked. But we all ended up making new plans, so it's okay. And now, Golden week is just around the corner. In fact, it begins tomorrow for me. When school gets out I will head down to the city to see my friend put on what will certainly be a super awesome DJ set. From there, it's Ise, Osaka, and later Fukuoka. Should be a good time.

What about you? If you live in Japan, what are your plans for Golden Week? If you don't live in Japan, what WOULD you do given a free week to travel?

~Jeffles

What's in a Name?

So, the last post was kind of a non-post and I feel like I should make up for it. So here you go, have a Japan story.

One of the by-products of teaching English in a small community in Japan is that you tend to be around kids a lot. And when you're around kids a lot, it is inevitable that you are also going to be around their parents at some point. Because kids and parents go together like... like two things that go really well together.

Yesterday, one of my elementary schools held an open house day. What this amounted to was a horde of parents descending upon the school to watch their children in class. I'm unsure if they were there to support their kids or if they were there to see what kind of teachers their kids have. Possibly both reasons.

At any rate, I was not given any classes to demonstrate. Fine by me. The less responsibility foisted upon my shoulders, the better. Instead, I wandered about from class to class, showing my smiley face to all the little kidlets and saying hello to the parents.

At one classroom, I was approached by a particularly happy looking woman.

"Are you the English teacher?" she asked.

I replied in the affirmative.

"Oh great!" Her smile opened up wide enough to show her pearly whites. "You see my son over there? He has a younger brother now! Well, he already is the younger brother - he has an older sister, you know - but now there's another younger brother in the family."

Thinking she was just excited to talk to a foreigner who knew her son, I congratulated her. Given how fit she looked, I guessed the birth was not an immediately recent event. Still, it must be recent enough that it was noteworthy. I decided it has happened in the last few months.

"Well," she continued, "I told my son that he could name the new baby. He thought about it for a little bit, then said 'Canada'."

She laughed.

"Canada?" I replied, dumbfounded. Would a Japanese person actually use a name like that?

"That name is a little strange, of course," she said, "so we went with Kanata."

I told her I thought that was an excellent choice for a name. At that point her son barreled out of the classroom and into his mother. I grinned while she explained to the boy what she had just told me. He glanced at me shyly, then ran back into the classroom, presumably to escape my piercing gaijin eyes.

And there you have it. Your Jeffles has inspired the names of children in Japan. If that isn't internationalization, nothing is.

~Jeffles

Awwwwww

I have nothing to say today.* So have a picture of a baby seal.

Aww, how adorable.

~Jeffles

*In fact, I ran out of time. But I've been relearning HTML and CSS and this post makes use of that fact. And yes, I used a table. Deal with it. That's what I actually have to say today. Yay.

Japan in Bloom

It's days like today that remind me how lucky I am. Let me explain:

Japan, today.

I live in freaking Japan!

My house is literally right next to a scene like this. If I wanted, I could spend all day, every day, sitting under those trees. As it is, I am aware of the necessity of going to work, though, so I only spend my mornings, lunch breaks, afternoons, and evenings reveling in the beauty that is Japan.

It's okay, you have my permission to be jealous. I probably would be, too, if I were you and not me.

The only sad part about this is that the cherry blossoms don't last. They finally opened up about a week ago and already the blossoms are beginning to fall. In fact, if you look closely you can see some of them scattered on the ground in the picture above.

In a way, however, the short-lived nature of cherry blossoms adds to their beauty. There is so much anticipation of them and then, when they finally open up, their beauty can only be experienced for a short time. They begin to fall only a week after so much glory, leaving bare limbed trees to stand alone for the next eleven and a half months.

This also is very revealing about Japanese views of beauty. That which highlights the fragile things, the things that you only get to experience for a short time, is the beautiful thing. This is reflected all over the place in Japanese culture. Next time you go to see a Noh performance, or participate in a tea ceremony, or do any thing that is considered beautiful by the Japanese, remember the short-lived cherry blossoms. You may find a surprising parallel.

~Jeffles

10 Things I've Learned From Japan

This is a bit early, but I was compiling this here list and I thought "You know what? I should post this." So here you go. And it's nice and short, too. So no worries there, ya know?

Also, I will post again, as regularly scheduled, on Thursday.

Further, I could probably make a list much, much longer than just 10 points, but 10 is a good number. I like 10. Got some other suggestions? Post a comment!

Finally, if you are interested in hearing the story behind any one of these points (they all have at least one, probably several), let me know... Post a comment!

And without further ado...

---

10 Things I've Learned From Japan

1. Toilet seats. They can be heated. And you don't have to be a millionaire to experience this!

2. English is an obscenely hard language created by and for demons and is almost certainly not worth the effort.

My students every day.

3. Everything tastes better raw.

4. There are, in fact, only six continents.

5. Africa is a country. (And a continent. Much like Australia.)

6. I am practically a god at using chopsticks and all shall worship at the alter of my rice bowl.

No, Mr. Miyagi, it is not beginner's luck.

7. If you can say this phrase, you are probably amazing at Japanese: “go hyaku en desu.” Good luck.

8. I look exactly like Tom Cruise.

Me, yesterday.

9. It is possible to commute from Canada to Japan every day for work.

10. Poop is goddamn adorable.

Awwwwww

The Shigyoushiki

Please pardon the lateness of this post. I fully intended to write yesterday, but somehow it just never happened. But it's for the best, really, because now I can write about the "shigyoushiki," or Opening Ceremony.

This story really begins a couple weeks ago. School had just ended for the year and I was mentally preparing myself to spend all day, every day, sitting at a desk with nothing productive to do. I would study Spanish, I decided. And because I am incapable of actually focusing on just one goal, I also decided to relearn how to do some basic programming. And to read some of those books that keep staring at me every time I go home.

Then my laptop exploded.

Jeffles Two Weeks Ago

Okay, I exaggerate. But the power cord had melted and the side of the computer started smoking. At first I smelled something burning, so I looked around. Had I lit incense and forgotten? It has been known to occur, but no, I hadn't done so this time. That's when I realized something was wrong and saw the stream of smoke rising from my laptop. Wasting no time, I reached for the power cord, hoping to yank it out and shut down the computer as quickly as possible. My first attempt was driven back, though, by a flurry of sparks erupting into my hand.

The true effect of the sparks, though, was to steel my determination. Lappy needed to be put down.

Heedless of the flying specks of fire, I grabbed the cord and yanked it out.

And I breathed. The sparks stopped, as did the smoke.

It's possible that all I needed was a new power cord, but between this event, my laptop's truly horrible speakers, its penchant for literally dying for no apparent reason, the common refusal to start up, the visual hues that keep changing and dead pixels that keep popping up, and the pure slowness and lack of power of the machine in spite of its annoyingly large size, I needed a new laptop. The next day I found PCTokyo and ordered myself a brand new machine. A week and a half later, it arrived.

With it also arrived a certain desire. This was a desire to play a new(ish) game. The newest game I've been able to play on my previous (exploded) laptop was a full five years old. So you see, I haven't exactly been enjoying top-of-the-line products. Thus it was, with a heart full of anticipation, I logged onto amazon.co.jp and ordered myself Skyrim.

What does this have to do with the Opening Ceremony? Well, you see, Skyrim arrived yesterday. And the Opening Ceremony was today. This morning, in fact.

Yes, I admit it. I did stay up until nearly 4:30 in the morning playing Skyrim, only to awaken three hours later to rush to work. Is Skyrim the reason I was late to the Opening Ceremony, the reason I wore an unwashed shirt covered in lint from an old sweater, but not a tie or a suit jacket, the reason I nearly fell asleep in the middle of the ceremony? Maybe not. But the chain of cause and effect has to start somewhere and that's as good a place as any.

I tried to waste no time, tried to get out the door as early as I could manage. But alas, fate was working against me.

I logged off my chat messenger and shut down my computer a full five minutes earlier than normal. Not thinking of anything beyond getting out the door, I grabbed the nearest button-up shirt, which ended up being the aforementioned lint-covered shirt. I grabbed my bag, affirming that all the necessary materials were present, and stepped toward the door.

Then I remembered, Friday is bottles and plastic garbage day. I checked I my watch. Crap. Fast as I thought I'd been moving, somehow five minutes had passed by in my preparations. Well, if I didn't take my trash out now, I'd have to wait two more weeks and plastic seriously knows how to pile up in Japan.

So I got my bags of plastics and bottles together, put on my coat and my bag, walked over to the garbage drop-off point, and then made my way back to my bike. Another five minutes elapsed. I was now officially late.

Well, I can just bike fast, I reasoned. Perhaps that might have saved five minutes, but at that moment I remembered something else I had to do: buy a bento lunch.

Normally, elementary school teachers (which is what I am on Fridays) eat the same school lunch as the students do. In fact, I have my very own personal schedule for which group of students I am supposed to eat with on which day. But today was a special day. Today there would be no kyuushoku. And late as I already was, there was no chance in hell that I'd be making my own lunch.

So I biked to a grocery store that is thankfully open 24 hours and somewhat on my way to school, picked up something tasty-ish looking, paid for it, and hopped back onto my bike. I was now a full ten minutes late.

If I bike really fast, I might be able to do it, I thought.

And maybe I would have been able to. Except that today I was biking directly into very strong winds for the entire ride. I'm talking the kind of wind that blows your umbrella inside out and threatens to pick up your grandma and deposit her in the next county over. Any dreams I had of making up the time I had lost were thereby shattered.

Grandma This Morning

Half an hour later, I arrived at a suspiciously quiet school. Suspiciously quiet in that it was as quiet as a school would be if all the students had been gathered into a single room and told to be quiet.

But here's the worst part. It hadn't even occurred to me that there might be an Opening Ceremony today until half way through my bike ride. On my schedule, all it says is that my day is full of meetings. No mention of the Opening Ceremony. (This would be why I was not wearing a suit and tie.)

So I arrived at the Opening Ceremony entirely unprepared, under-dressed, and late. What a way to start the school year and make a good first impression on the new teachers, eh?

The ceremony itself was quite boring, actually, and not very different from the sort of assemblies we have in Canada and the US.

All the students sat down in lines according to what grade and class they were in. Then the principle stood up and introduced the new teachers to the students. All the main players then gave speeches. Topics were standard fare ("Study hard and do your best!", "Don't forget your manners!", "Don't forget to have fun!"). We sang the school song (I mostly just pretended as I have no idea what the words are), then the students were introduced to their teachers.

This was one point that was slightly different. From what I remember, my schools when I was a kid always posted lists of who was in what class with what teacher. In Japan, though, the class stays the same. Only the teacher changes and even then, sometimes the teacher stays the same across several years. And again, slightly different, the teacher assignments were announced at the Opening Ceremony rather than posted somewhere as a list to be read.

Of course, there was also copious bowing, all the students wore uniforms (which they always wear, not just during ceremonies) and everything was conducted in Japanese. In these ways, the Opening Ceremony here in Japan is different from what we might experience in Canada or the US. That is, for schools in Canada and the US that actually have assemblies at the opening of the school year (and I know some do).

When the ceremony finally finished, I slunk out of the gym and went to the teacher's room to write this post. And so here I am.

~Jeffles