Saturday September 27, 2003
3:26 am
Tonight I was originally planning on going to a dance club...But I forgot about an obligatory girl scout meeting I promised some little girls I'd go to. Damn conscience. So it was a "Moon watching" event, actually like a fall holiday. Every September in Japan, people make mochi, which are these slightly squishy rice and flour balls (which are supposed to resemble the moon) and sit around the table together stuffing themselves and telling a few stories. (If only I could understand Japanese!)
It was interesting to see what Japanese girl scouts are like, being that I did girl scouts when I was little. Much is the same, they use the English words "Girl Scout", "Brownie" (pronounced Bu-lou-nee), and "Junior", and go camping and such. But other things, like their uniforms, are very different. They all wear little blue jumpers with red striped handkerchiefs around their necks, and don't mess with that sash and merit badge business - maybe because that has the potential to create different ranks among the girls, and here you always try your best not to stand out from the group. Group unity is everything.
Anyway, by the time that was over, all my potential rides had left for the club which was an hour away and no where near a train station - it's not easy being car-less...So I hopped on the train and went to another city called Kurayoshi. After listening to some street performers for a bit, I went to one of my favorite places, the Art Bar - and unexpectedly ran into 4 Brittish JETS there. So we hung out for a bit - The Art Bar has the best atmosphere (low lights, lots of ethnic hanging tapestries and strange abstract objects here and there) and I adore the 2 chicks that run the place. One of them pulled up a chair for me, reached under a bench, and dropped a tiny kitten in my lap!!! Bar Kitty (as she affectionately became referred to as) chilled with us the whole night - or at least until we made our next stop at the "No Side" club) It was a good night.
Monday September 22, 2003
7:23pm
Today I introduced ten little girls and one little boy to their very first taste of Mexican food. There is not one Mexican restaurant in the whole prefecture of Tottori (prefecture=like a state).
So I�m in charge of the international club at school (for obvious reasons) and today we made tacos. My mom had mailed me some taco shells and good ol' Kroger brand taco seasoning. You should have seen these kids trying to eat them. They seemed scared that it was going to bite back or something. I couldn�t help but laugh a bit. But afterwards they were all saying it was �oiishi"(delicious). Since the shells had come through the mail, there were a lot of broken ones. I had enough for everyone to have one taco, and then we had all these taco fixings and meat leftover. So I took a broken taco shell, scooped some meat out of the pan, put some lettuce and cheese on top and said, �This is a nacho" The kids really seemed to like this. They knew by this point that the food wouldn�t kill them and we all stood over the stove scarfing the stuff down and making a big mess with no type of Japanese ettiquite whatsoever. It was great.
Saturday September 19, 2003
(morning)
The following are small bits of conversations from last night at izakaya (which is a bar, the one place in Japan where people will get really bold and say anything and everything that is on their mind and the only place where some people seem comfortable enough to talk to me at all.)
-En means fate, destiny.. It�s en that you�re in Tohaku, in this Izakaya with these people. En brought us all here. Why are you here? En? Why are you teaching? En. Do you love someone?
-.maybe...
-That�s en.
-My great grandmother doesn�t like Americans. She can remember the war, and her sons were killed by Americans. In elementary school we had to ask our grandparents about the war for homework. She remembers bombs. Her son was 19 when he was killed. But I think it�s getting better now. That�s why you�re here.
-Do you wear a bra?
- uh, yeah.
- He thought American women didn�t wear bras.
- Well, we do. Not every person, all the time, every day you know. But, for the most part, yeah.
- Oh.. Do tennis players wear bras?
- Yeah, as far as I know.
- But their�s are different? What�s that??
- Um, a sports bra?
- Yeah, what�s that? Not really a bra?
- No it is. I have some. They do the job.
- Really??? Do the Venus sisters wear a bra?
- That I can�t tell you?
- So what�s the difference between a temple and a shrine?
- A temple is for Buddhism and a shrine is for Shinto. All temples are for the one God, Buddha. And shrines are all for different Shinto gods. But they put both of them together. (shrines and temples are set very close to each other) I don�t know why..
- I like blonde hair. Is that za word? Blonde? Can I touch it? Oh it�s like Barbie hair - soft - I like that
- oh can I too?? (and the bartender puts the palms of his hands together, nods, and says �gomenasai" which means �I�m sorry" but people seem to use it like an �excuse me" or �pardon my intrusion" - though it never is an intrusion.)
(now picture 2 people on either side of me picking through my hair like it�s not really something attached to my head.)
Tuesday September 15, 2003
(writen on the back of a reciept while on a train)
The boy sitting across from me has a black t-shirt on - it pictures the U.S. flag, only the blue square is a blood red color and the stripes are missile trails, with a fat white missile at the end of each. It says "Live in fear of bombardment" and in big letters below that, "AGAINST WAR". How do I feel about this? It makes me sad that my country has this association to this boy. I want to talk to him and say, "I'm an American and I'm against war too". But all I know how to say in Japanese is "me too". I don't think that would get the right message across.
In the states, I was always cynical - I went to protests and became annoyed by all the patriotism after 9-11. Now I'm holding up U.S. flags for school kids and acting as their one and only representative of American culture. The flag is the symbol of me. I try to catch this boy's eye, but he's obviously avoiding looking at me.
The train stops and he gets up to leave. The back of his shirt says, "Love is Peace". Can he even read that or understand the message he broadcasts. Most Japanese people can't read the English on their own trendy clothes. He probably only understands the image of the bloody U.S. flag - MY bloody flag - and it's tainted with Japanese blood. I live 3 hours from Hiroshima.
Friday September 12, 2003
(Looping �Cast No Shadow)
I miss my dryer. Clothes dryers don't seem to exist in Japan. Or at least no one in my town has one. Everyone just hangs their clothes outside to dry. This was fine at first, kind of cool, but now it's causing a few small problems. I have to put off doing laundry quite often due to various rainstorms and typhoons (when they say rainy season, they mean it - wait, the rainy season is supposed to be over now...) Tonight the weather seemed stable so I decided to finally tackle my mountain of clothes. However, soon afterwards, when I turned down my speakers (my neighbors love me I'm sure) I realized the wind was really freakin loud, and my balcony door was rattling (this time NOT due to the train passing outside. Every time it goes by and I�m in the shower, the floor shakes and I think I�m in an earthquake. If one actually struck while I was in there, I�d never know the difference.) Anyway, I pulled open the curtain and the balcony was empty- My blue running shorts and purple underwear were lying on my neighbor�s balcony. As I was leaning over the edge to retrieve them, I saw the rest of my wardrobe (undies and all) lying in the parking lot five stories below me. So I walked down the five flights through several spider webs and over giant dead cicadas to pick up my pitiful wet, re-dirtied clothes. Welcome to Japan.
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