Silver Week

This weekend, I met up with my friends, Greg and Kyle, whom I had met on the plane to Hokkaido. We had hung out a couple of times since then, and decided to hang out again for Japans 5 day long weekend which they have called Silver Week. Friday evening, I took a train to Kushiro, the 4th largest city in Hokkaido, and about 2 hours away by express train to meet the both of them; this being a good meeting place for all three of us, since we all live in different directions from one another. We all ended up meeting each other at the train station at the same time, and headed out into the city. I have come to the conclusion that I don’t want to live in a city if I can help it. I enjoy visiting cities and exploring them, but even more I really love being out doors and away from the noise and confusion; I find that I’m the happiest when I’m in the country. Greg is the opposite. He loves city life. While walking around Kushiro, he couldn’t decide which street to go down first. We ended up eating in some hole-in-the-wall restaurant. The counter, being the only place to sit at, must have only had enough chairs for a total of 6 people. These are my favourite kinds of places to eat.
After a light meal of fish and skewered pork, we headed off to the Karaoke club. You really do have to go with other people who don’t know how to sing when your not confident about your own singing capabilities. The evening was good except the part where my friend Kyle and I had to go running into the streets to find Greg, who ended up having way too much saki at the Karaoke club. Kyle and I eventually peeled Greg off the streets and taxied our way back to the hotel. The hotel room was only meant for one person, yet Kyle and I stayed there anyways. This had to be one of the smallest rooms, and awkwardest sleeps I’ve had in a while.
The next day Kyle left us to go back to his home town of Nemuro. By then, Greg had sobered up enough to drive us back to his hometown of Tsubetsu. On the way there, we were rerouted off the road and stopped by the police to be given the largest and whitest radish I have ever seen. It was a Japanese daikon. I’m not even going to try to understand this one. Before reaching Tsubetsu, we passed through some mountains, one of which was almost completely barren of trees on the top. Usually its me who looks for trouble and adventure, but this time Greg was the first to act. We ended up turning around and finding a hidden trail that led up to the bald part of the mountain. The trail we took was like walking through Narnia or something. Lush green flora surrounding us on all sides with cool little streams that cut through the soil with ease. A beautiful waterfall at the end of the stream ended the walk, and began the ascent. We’ve been told that Hokkadio has bears, so every twitch of the bushes made us jump. More often then not, it would be a deer, which would scramble up the mountain after seeing us. We eventually made it close to the top, but were restricted by the high plants, which substituted the absence of trees. Walking up there with no people around, no buildings, no bugs, and no noise made it feel as if we were on another planet which was only populated by a thick knee deep leafy weed.
We eventually made it to Gregs house, but not before missing a pack of wild dear, which hogged half the road. The next day we drove to Kitami, the nearest city to Tsubetsu, where we attended a Catholic Church Service. I’ve been to a couple of Catholic Church Services before, but this one was exceptionally long. After the service, I was asked to give a speech (The Japanese love their speeches!!!) about where I’m from, and what I thought of my students in Shimizu (???).

The next day, our friend Eri joined our group. Greg and I had been planning to hike one of the mountains in Daisetzuan National park, and Eri voiced that she would like to come along. Her English is really good, she has a great sense of humour, and she’s really pretty, so we couldn’t say no. It was nice to have a girl presence in the car. All three of us really got along and seemed to really enjoy one another’s company. We ended up climbing the mountain that afternoon, and were the last ones to the top, but the view was amazing!!! It has already snowed a bit on some of the other mountaintops, which really added to the scene. It actually reminded me of the arctic, being up there. Later that evening, we drove to the nicest camping site that I’ve ever seen. People were paying 4000 yen (around 40ish dollars) a night, yet we ended up sneaking into the cheaper site (did I mention that we are all really cheap?). The next morning, we drove to Asahikawa, the second largest city in Hokkaido, where we met up with Eri’s identical twin sister for dinner, before going home the next day. All in all, this Silver Week has been the best Silver Week I’ve ever had.

Week Six Many Faces

Many faces, yet all true

What I really find interesting is the levels of politeness that exist within Japan. There are entirely different ways to say virtually the same thing, but a lot more politer, depending on the situation you’re in. The Japanese will use the more polite Japanese at work or in formal situations. Using apologies to express gratitude for example, as I had mentioned in an earlier journal. When you are with your friends though, you would refrain from talking like this. My friend from Minnesota and I were talking about this and he mentioned a book he read which mentioned that the Japanese people have five ‘masks’: One for formal occasions, one for work, one for family, one for friends, and one for oneself. These different ‘masks’ call for different codes of behaviour including different levels of polite language. I might be completely wrong in saying this, but in North America, it seems that many of us look for the sincerity in people and try to see what’s behind the mask. In Japan, there is no looking behind the mask because all there is, is the mask. The idea of looking for the genuine person I think is very much a Western idea, yet again, I could be completely wrong about this. What’s really confirmed this idea of certain attitudes in certain places within Japan is not only in the language, but also the lifestyle. In Japan, you never wear your outdoor shoes inside your house. At the front of every house in Japan is a lower level than the rest of the house for leaving your shoes. You can then put on your indoor shoes after taking your outdoor shoes off. Most of us take off our shoes when we go inside a house anyways, and is just plain sensible if you think about it, yet I had heard that the reasoning for this in Japan is that you live a life outside of your house, and you live a life inside of your house. A lot of dirt and attitudes come home with you, but should not be let inside your house, and therefore left at the door.
Another element of Japanese lifestyle, one which I think everyone should try, are the onsens, or natural hot springs. Japan is of course along the Pacific ring of fire and is no exception to the large amount of thermal energy which exists in this part of the world, and therefore creating some of the best hot springs. These hot springs aren’t used in the same way that we use hot tubs back home, where you just plop into a hot pool of water with your bathing suit on. Instead, onsens are used as a bath. And just like bathing at home, you would not wear a bathing suit. Yes, that’s right! Nude! Family, friends, co-workers and total strangers bath together in the same hot spring, and no one thinks anything of it. What I really love about this is that any sort of hierarchy system that exists in Japan is broken down when you are sitting and relaxing in an onsen. It’s difficult to tell who’s the president of a major company when they’re not wearing any cloths.

Week Six

What should I say…?

Last week was a week of self-introductions. I think I’ve now introduced myself to at least 700 students. “Hello, my name is Joey. I am from Canada. My city’s name is Winnipeg…” Part of my self-introduction involves talking about animals, and I had mentioned that I have a cat back home. To go along with this, I made a cat sound, “Meow” I got a lot of blank stares after making the sound. Wondering if they had understood or not, I looked to the Japanese-English teacher for translation. She quickly sputtered off a bunch of Japanese ending with the sound “Niao”. I looked at her again with a confused look on my face. “In Japanese, the sound for cat is Niao” she told me. I was fairly surprised at this fact as I had always thought that this animal sound was universal. After class, I began to ask her and my other Japanese-English teacher other Onomatopoeias. For those of you unfamiliar with this unnecessarily long word, Onomatopoeias are words which sounds are imitative of the sound of the noise or action designated (This definition was totally plagiarized by the way). Some of these sounds are very similar to the English sounds, yet some are just bizarre. For example the sound for cat, as mentioned, is Niao. Ok, pretty similar. The sound for dog: won won. Sound for horse: hinhin-hinhin. The sound for pig: boo-boo. Duck: gaga. Crying baby: en-en. Gurging water: gara-gara. Mouse: chu-chu. Train sound: shushu-poopoo. Dropping large rock in water: Bo-cha! (You can almost hear this one).Dropping a small rock in water: po-cha. Ripping paper: biri-biri (I don’t get this one…) Unlocking a door: cacha-cacha. Touching something hot: achi (In North America, I believe the sound is a sharp Tsss). Stomach rumbling: gogo. And finally a buzzing bee: buuuuuuuuu.
I hope to teach a class on these in the near future. Part of my role here is not only to assist the Japanese English teachers with teaching English, but also to be a cultural ambassador for the students. Onomatopoeias are just one example of the many interesting cultural differences that exist. I hadn’t realized that saying ‘bless you’ after you sneeze is pretty North American. I was walking with a New Zealander, where at one point he let out a large sneeze. I dropped the ‘bless you’ remark and he began to laugh explaining that in New Zealand, they don’t say anything, and that he usually tries to stand beside someone from North America when he needs to sneeze so he can hear our absurd remark to a natural phenomenon. The Japanese don’t have a remark for it either which I find interesting since Japan usually has a polite phrase or action that goes along with almost everything. I got scolded the other day by one of my Japanese English teachers for not putting the word san after one of the secretary’s names when talking about them. The word san will always follow a person’s family name (last name) to show respect, but for me, because I’m considered a teacher in Japan, I get the honorary title of sensei. I don’t think I deserve this title given the role of what a teacher in Japan has to do (I’ll have to talk more about this in a later journal). I was also scolded for asking, “How are you?” to the principle. There is very much a hierarchy system in Japan, and a principle, as you might expect, is above the teachers. Asking “How are you” is just too casual, and is perhaps rude for a teacher to ask this question. He just looks so friendly though!!!

Garbage

So I’ve been in the town of Shimizu for about 2 weeks and feel pretty settled in for the most part. One factor of my day-to-day living in Japan, which I am still trying to understand, is the complexities around garbage. Japan has what must be the most complex garbage system known to mankind. To start off, Japan requires that you divide your garbage according to the make of it. I guess we should be used to that: paper, plastic etc. But Japan takes it one step further, paper and plastic is taken every Thursday, then you have your plastic bottles, which are put into one bag with the label and cap in two separate bags. Milk and juice cartons must be washed, cut so all 6 sides are laying flat and dried, before being tied up in a bundle and thrown away every other Wednesday. Then you have your food scraps, which are thrown away on Tuesday and Friday, yet must be thrown away in the designated red bags, not the blue bags; blue is for broken appliances, which can be bought at your nearest 7-elevin in two different sizes. Don’t mix the two colours up! That’s the easy part. Now if you have oversized garbage such as a broken air-conditioner, TV, refrigerator, or washing machine, you’re screwed!!! For the oversized garbage, there are set days when you can do this. In some towns, you have to pay a set price to buy a designated ticket to put on the oversized garbage. Some of these larger items have to be taken back to the retail store you bought it from and they will take it, but you have to pay them a recycling and handling fee. Wow, if that doesn’t sound overwhelming for someone who doesn’t speak very much Japanese, a language of 3 alphabets totalling over 30,000 different characters, I don’t know what is. So the next time you throw something out, think about how fortunate you are for not having to think about it… (did that make sense?)

Week One

This week has been awesome so far. After staying in one of the nicest hotels that I’ve ever been to right in the heart of Shinjuku, Tokyo, I, along with a group of around 40 people, flew up to Hokkaido to start our new lives.

This week has been awesome so far. Me along with 2 other Winnipegers flew to Calgary to join a group of other JETS from Montreal, Saskatchewan, Edmonton, and Calgary. All of us were invited to the Japanese Consulate Generals house for a really nice sushi dinner. The next day, all of us flew together to Tokyo to join a larger group of around 900 JETS from Australia, New Zealand, Jamaica, Ireland, the UK, the US, and South Africa. We all ended up staying at the beautiful Keio Hotel in downtown Tokyo in the Shinjuku district. After 2 days of orientation and workshops provided, everyone split into different groups, which corresponded to the district that they would be going to. The group of people from this orientation that will be living in Hokkaido is around 40, with a total of around 210 JETS from around the world living in Hokkaido alone. I believe that there’s around 4600 JETS living and working throughout Japan; just to give you an idea as to how large this program is. On the 29th, me along with the 40 other JETS flew off to Hokkaido to meet our supervisors who will be taking us to our own designated communities and assisting us in getting set up to live in Japan.

When arriving at the Chitose airport near Sapporo, I was greeted by my supervisor, Abe Sensei, one of the English teachers that I will be working with. He was nice enough to buy me an ice-cream before we headed off to Shimizu-Cho, the town that I will be living in. The 2 ½ hour train ride was one of the nicest train rides I’ve had before. Hokkaido is so beautifully lush and not like the rest of what I’ve seen of Japan. It’s so open with lots of little farming communities and small mountains, yet still maintains the Japanese essence. What I really like about it, especially after being in Tokyo, is it’s cool weather. The rest of Japan gets extremely humid during the summer months, where as Hokkaido is much cooler and more comfortable. The disadvantage is that it will get quite cold during the winter months, and will limit my cycling. Which reminds my. I brought my bike to Japan. I’m so excited! I thought it was going to be a lot more difficult than it actually was. I just put it together, but haven’t had any time to ride it yet.

When Abe Sensei brought me to my house, I was really surprised to find out that I have three bedrooms, all lined with tatami mats! I also have a really disgusting yet comfortable couch in my living room, so if anyone wants to visit… J. I also have a shed to store my bike in and any other junk that I will collect over the year. I’m going to have to get used to ducking under my doorways all the time though. These Japanese houses are net made for “giants” like me.

I’ve now been in the town of Shimizu for one whole week, and so far I love it. This town is, for lack of a better word, cute. Everything seems miniature size, even my house. I always have to duck underneath all the doorways. Japan was not designed for people over 6 feet.
I have about 2 weeks before I start teaching. The students are on there summer break, yet all us sensei’s are stuck at school with a variety of tasks. Lately I’ve been doing a lot of reading, and trying to brush up on my Japanese. Wow, I’ve forgotten how complex this language can be. I’ve memorized 2 out of 3 alphabets, and have almost no trouble understanding one of them, yet the third alphebet will take anyone a lifetime to learn. I think I’ve memorized around 50 or so characters out of 30,000+. You thought I was joking, didn’t you. Lately I’ve been working on my survival Japanese, which mostly entails being really really polite, and apologizing a lot. Japanese people often express gratitude through apology. Half of what I hear in the staff room is, excuse me, thank you, sorry, I apologise that I’m leaving earlier than you, excuse me as I enter the room, excuse me as I exit the room, etc. I feel like everyone must think I’m the rudest person ever for not knowing all the different time of when to say which one! There is also a lot of bowing. There’s three bows that I know; there’s the 30 degree bow, the 45 degree bow, and the 90 degree bow. The lower you bow is in accordance with how important the person your greeting is. For men, there hands have to be at there sides while they bow, and for women, its infront. Japanese people are amazing at it too. I said good afternoon to an oldman working in his garden, and he was still able to do an amazing bow while crouching in the dirt. I don’t think I’ve shaken one Japanese persons hand since I’ve gotten here.

Since I’ve gotten to Japan, I’ve constantly, yet inadvertently, been comparing this experience with my teaching experience in Indonesia. About 4 years ago, I went to Indonesia for one year to teach English to Elementary school students. I have been reflecting a lot on my Indonesian experience and am so impressed with the way that I had survived at 19 years old, with no teaching experience, and not having lived abroad by myself before. At the time, I was living with two girls, both from Winnipeg. I now realize what a blessing this truly was. I don’t know how I would have survived that year without having someone else to speak English to, and the fact that they were both from my city was a plus. Looking back, I also can begin to appreciate the things that I have here in Japan. My main school is only 2 minutes walking distance from me, which is awesome. In Indonesia, I would sometimes take an hour in a half to get to school in the morning. I would also have to wait for my housemates to finish their classes, at different schools, so I would wait in the hot car with my driver until they were finished, which was sometimes 2 hours, and then it would be another hour in a half to get home.
I will be teaching at 2 other schools in the next towns once a week, yet I think that I will be taking a train there. I am hoping that this won’t be too much of a problem in the winter. Hokkaido apparently receives a lot of snow in the winter months, and can get pretty cold, yet compared to Winnipeg, it’ll feel like spring!
I have also taken by bike with me to Japan. This has been awesome for getting around, buying the things I need for my house, and just seeing and experiencing the amazing landscape here. In Indonesia, I bought a brand new bike for around 50 Canadian dollars, which was also great for getting around on, yet it just wasn’t the same. I think that’s what really compelled me to bring my own bike this time. No regrets!
As far as housing goes, I’m really content. Its quite a bit bigger than I expected, and actually pretty big for a Japanese house (for one person anyways). I have a living room, shower room, toilet room, kitchen connecting to the living room, and three bedrooms, all lined with tatami mats. They are traditional Japanese (washitsu) rooms, with the exception that there are no traditional paper windows (Shōji). To make the room complete, I bought a Japanese style futon. This isn’t like the futons that we’re used to at home where the couch folds down into a bed. Instead it’s just a foldable mattress that lays on the tatami mat floor. Tatami is amazing by the way. If you ever want to cover a floor in anything, tatami is the way to go.
The staff at my school have been very friendly and helpful. So far I’ve met the music teacher, two of the English teachers that I will be teaching with, the agriculture teacher (I didn’t know you could take agriculture in high school…) the Japanese teacher, the calligraphy teacher, the home economics teacher, she’s hot! (did I just say that?), and the science teacher, who sits beside me and loves trying to have conversations with me, despite our lack of comprehension in each others respective languages. Tomorrow I will be going to the town hall to introduce myself and tell everyone how great I am… We’ll, maybe not the latter, cus I’m not that good at Japanese yet…