Monday, November 12, 2007
Month Three
It’s morning, and I’m running down a narrow little street near my house. I’d rather run on it than drive; the speed limit is 30 km/h. And even at that wretchedly slow crawl, driving is dangerous: the elementary school kids on foot and the junior high school kids on bikes seem to see no difference between the sidewalk and the road, and frequently some car or person materializes out of nowhere and appears two inches in front of my bumper.
The sun is rising on the hills in the distance; stripes of light coming through the clouds set the red and gold leaves glowing. The digital display at the bank says 6:20 a.m. and 0° C. It’s a little chilly. After my alarm rang, I lay under my thick comforter for awhile before getting up the courage to roll out into the unheated room, scramble into my fleece-lined running clothes, grab my iPod, and duck out the door.
I often feel warmer outside than inside. Usually when I’m outside I’m active and my blood is flowing, while inside I’m scrunched up as close to the kerosene heater as possible, burning my back while my toes are still cool, studying Japanese, writing e-mail, or reading.
My apartment is old, and the insulation—if there’s any—is quite poor. Heat comes from a kerosene stove in the living room and any space heaters that I want to use to supplement. I get slightly warm water out of one faucet in the kitchen attached to a gas water heater, and my shower, also gas-powered, still gets quite hot, though the previous resident warned me that in winter I shouldn’t expect as much. I talked to my supervisor about the uncomfortableness of being cold inside the house, but she just rubbed her hands on her folded arms and said, Wear lots of warm clothes. I’ll be an Eskimo toddling in circles around my living room, left foot, right foot, left, right, left.
The drums are beating outside the teachers’ room windows at school, and I want to write left right left right left right left right left right as fast as I possibly can, trying to keep time with their rapid beat. This could be a page filled entirely with left-rights, like the pages I used to cover with ‘Chinese writing’ as a child. But that might not be so interesting to read.
Oh, I was running. Sorry, I forgot. I run to the end of the street and over a canal on a pedestrian bridge. From there it’s up to the main road that runs by the sea. It’s like the Hokuto City version of U.S. 31 in Greenwood, Indiana—a four-lane road lined with grocery stores, banks, gas stations, restaurants, a few houses and office buildings, car dealerships, and other regular monstrosities of industrialization, constructed as unaesthetically as possible. This road even has a massive cement factory on one side and a cement pipeline stretching far out into the bay, where the ships come to load. It’s a scenic masterpiece.
I was listening to an NPR podcast about the environment yesterday on the way to school. The topic was Japan. Originally, Japan was likely one of the most beautiful countries in the world, the reporter explained. But now, she said, it might be considered one of the ugliest. Maybe that’s a little extreme—but I think I would say it has more human scars in more ridiculously gorgeous places than I’ve seen in awhile. Like the plastic retainers with yellow reflectors leading up a hilly path to a majestic panorama of forest, cliffs, sea, and distant islands. My neighbor Suzanne teases me about how ugly I find our town—I say that I would love it if I could wipe all construction from the last fifty years off of it and return to rugged coastline and sparsely populated farmland. The sheaves of golden rice standing in the fields a few weeks ago were magical; I could have sat and gazed at them for hours.
There are crumbled shells under my feet, and slippery little mounds of wet sand here and there threaten my gait. Not that there’s much at stake—in general, I’m a clutz and a perpetual tripper. I’m running past the beach now, if you can call it that, a strip of dirty sand surrounded by concrete. For the last two weeks now, every time I run in the morning I see the same man and his two shaggy chestnut-colored dogs there. One of these days maybe he’ll be coming up or going down just as I go past. I’m curious—the dogs are anything but the overgrown fuzzy rats that I saw people taking shopping with them last weekend. They don’t give off the slightest aura of domesticated animals bred for decorating tiny apartments and funkily stylish women’s shoulders. No, they bespeak wildness and freedom, space and dirt, energy and enthusiasm, running after Frisbees on cool fall days, slipping in piles of crunchy leaves, standing up mud-covered, panting and sweating. That would be so un-Japanese.
It’s time to turn around. I have to get back home, take a shower, and pretend to like my structured 8 a.m. – 4 p.m. life. Schedules, class periods, school uniforms, indoor and outdoor shoes, rules of apology, approach, attitude—and grammar. I see a slang lesson coming soon. And another run.
The sun is rising on the hills in the distance; stripes of light coming through the clouds set the red and gold leaves glowing. The digital display at the bank says 6:20 a.m. and 0° C. It’s a little chilly. After my alarm rang, I lay under my thick comforter for awhile before getting up the courage to roll out into the unheated room, scramble into my fleece-lined running clothes, grab my iPod, and duck out the door.
I often feel warmer outside than inside. Usually when I’m outside I’m active and my blood is flowing, while inside I’m scrunched up as close to the kerosene heater as possible, burning my back while my toes are still cool, studying Japanese, writing e-mail, or reading.
My apartment is old, and the insulation—if there’s any—is quite poor. Heat comes from a kerosene stove in the living room and any space heaters that I want to use to supplement. I get slightly warm water out of one faucet in the kitchen attached to a gas water heater, and my shower, also gas-powered, still gets quite hot, though the previous resident warned me that in winter I shouldn’t expect as much. I talked to my supervisor about the uncomfortableness of being cold inside the house, but she just rubbed her hands on her folded arms and said, Wear lots of warm clothes. I’ll be an Eskimo toddling in circles around my living room, left foot, right foot, left, right, left.
The drums are beating outside the teachers’ room windows at school, and I want to write left right left right left right left right left right as fast as I possibly can, trying to keep time with their rapid beat. This could be a page filled entirely with left-rights, like the pages I used to cover with ‘Chinese writing’ as a child. But that might not be so interesting to read.
Oh, I was running. Sorry, I forgot. I run to the end of the street and over a canal on a pedestrian bridge. From there it’s up to the main road that runs by the sea. It’s like the Hokuto City version of U.S. 31 in Greenwood, Indiana—a four-lane road lined with grocery stores, banks, gas stations, restaurants, a few houses and office buildings, car dealerships, and other regular monstrosities of industrialization, constructed as unaesthetically as possible. This road even has a massive cement factory on one side and a cement pipeline stretching far out into the bay, where the ships come to load. It’s a scenic masterpiece.
I was listening to an NPR podcast about the environment yesterday on the way to school. The topic was Japan. Originally, Japan was likely one of the most beautiful countries in the world, the reporter explained. But now, she said, it might be considered one of the ugliest. Maybe that’s a little extreme—but I think I would say it has more human scars in more ridiculously gorgeous places than I’ve seen in awhile. Like the plastic retainers with yellow reflectors leading up a hilly path to a majestic panorama of forest, cliffs, sea, and distant islands. My neighbor Suzanne teases me about how ugly I find our town—I say that I would love it if I could wipe all construction from the last fifty years off of it and return to rugged coastline and sparsely populated farmland. The sheaves of golden rice standing in the fields a few weeks ago were magical; I could have sat and gazed at them for hours.
There are crumbled shells under my feet, and slippery little mounds of wet sand here and there threaten my gait. Not that there’s much at stake—in general, I’m a clutz and a perpetual tripper. I’m running past the beach now, if you can call it that, a strip of dirty sand surrounded by concrete. For the last two weeks now, every time I run in the morning I see the same man and his two shaggy chestnut-colored dogs there. One of these days maybe he’ll be coming up or going down just as I go past. I’m curious—the dogs are anything but the overgrown fuzzy rats that I saw people taking shopping with them last weekend. They don’t give off the slightest aura of domesticated animals bred for decorating tiny apartments and funkily stylish women’s shoulders. No, they bespeak wildness and freedom, space and dirt, energy and enthusiasm, running after Frisbees on cool fall days, slipping in piles of crunchy leaves, standing up mud-covered, panting and sweating. That would be so un-Japanese.
It’s time to turn around. I have to get back home, take a shower, and pretend to like my structured 8 a.m. – 4 p.m. life. Schedules, class periods, school uniforms, indoor and outdoor shoes, rules of apology, approach, attitude—and grammar. I see a slang lesson coming soon. And another run.
Month Two
(written in early September)
→ Expert: This notebook is made of special neutral paper which can be written with a smooth touch.
First day.
I don’t speak Japanese.
I don’t understand Japanese.
Many Japanese people in my area do not speak much English.
Leaving home in the morning, I panic. Will I remember the way to school? Turn left after the AU cell phone store. What if I pass it and don’t realize it? What if it’s farther down the road than I thought? What if I get lost and show up late? [a mortal embarrassment—there’s a hole in my head where “never be late in Japan” has been drilled through, next to the “never ever (get caught) speed (ing) or have a car accident” hole] I watch the streets and stores vigilantly, watch my speedometer, watch the traffic around me; I am alert in every direction.
I pass the AU store, I slow down and turn left. A short distance up the road on the right I see the soccer fields and the bland walls-and-windows construction of Hamawake Junior High School. I pull forward into a parking space, not yet having mastered the almost universal practice here of backing in. I would rather stand out than scrape the paint off of one of my new co-workers’ shiny Mitsubishis.
Now I have to choose the correct entrance from the three sets of glass doors at the front of the building. Two are for students; one is for teachers. If I choose the wrong one, not only will I be committing an embarrassing error, I will also not be at my locker. And then I will mess up the prescribed shoe-changing ritual of which my locker is an integral part.
1. While standing on the floor for outside shoes, right next to the platform or
below the ledge of the floor for inside shoes, reach into your locker and take out
your inside shoes.
2. Place your inside shoes on the platform or floor, whichever is closer.
3. Take off your outside shoes and step into your inside shoes in one motion.
4. Reach down, pick up your outside shoes, and place them in the locker.
5. If you are on the platform, walk along the platform until you reach the ledge,
step up onto the floor for inside shoes, and continue on your merry way.
Somehow I manage to find my way through the right door; I complete the shoe-changing ritual, albeit sloppily, since my arms are full of posters, papers, lunch, computer bag, water bottle, coffee mug, etc.; I navigate the school halls from memory and successfully arrive in the teachers’ room on the second floor; I call out “good morning” from the doorway and nod-bow (I have not yet perfected the art of full bowing without falling over); I walk in and sit down at my desk.
Relief. Part one (of who knows how many—it seems like there are an infinite number of firsts) accomplished.
As I lay out my things on my desk, Mr. M. comes up to greet me.
“Good morning, Catherine. Here is your schedule for today. Before classes begin, you will introduce yourself to all the teachers at the morning meeting and then to an assembly of all the students. In Japanese—is that okay?”
[Refer to the beginning:
I don’t speak Japanese.]
“Sure, of course it’s okay.”
“Good. The teachers’ meeting is in five minutes.”
I can’t remember the introduction speech that I wrote two weeks ago. And anyway, I found out after I had given it multiple times that some of my grammar was wrong. Even though I had asked a native speaker before giving it if it was correct. I don’t like to say things incorrectly in front of big groups of people, especially big groups of junior high school students.
More small panic. Oh well, I guess I’ll make a ten-second speech. Better than nothing.
Open with a nod-bow.
“
Ohayoo gozaimasu.
Watashi wa Catherine desu.
America no Indiana kara kimashita.
Nihon wa hajimete desu.
Doozo yoroshiku. Onegai shimasu.
”
[
Good morning.
I’m Catherine.
I’m from Indiana in America.
I’m in Japan for the first time.
I’m very pleased to meet you.
]
Close with a nod-bow.
Or something like that. I still don’t know if the Japanese is right. But nobody snickered or giggled, at least that I could hear.
After I gave my speech in front of the students, the class president came forward and spoke on behalf of the students. Before he began, he bowed deeply. Nervous and terrified of falling face forward and cracking my head open on the podium, I didn’t bow in response. When he finished, he bowed deeply again. Still nervous and terrified, I stood there stiffly.
In Japan, you should always bow. Whenever. Wherever. To whomever.
My life is replete with mistakes. Any time I’m not making a full-on mistake, I’m making a mini-mistake or an almost-mistake. Or I’m feeling like I’m making a mistake.
It’s okay. That’s how it goes at the start.
Shitsuree shimashita.
[Excuse me].
I say this often. I need to say it more. And bow a lot. Maybe bow a little deeper.
(And pray that I don’t fall forward. I have a tendency to crack my head open).
→ Expert: This notebook is made of special neutral paper which can be written with a smooth touch.
First day.
I don’t speak Japanese.
I don’t understand Japanese.
Many Japanese people in my area do not speak much English.
Leaving home in the morning, I panic. Will I remember the way to school? Turn left after the AU cell phone store. What if I pass it and don’t realize it? What if it’s farther down the road than I thought? What if I get lost and show up late? [a mortal embarrassment—there’s a hole in my head where “never be late in Japan” has been drilled through, next to the “never ever (get caught) speed (ing) or have a car accident” hole] I watch the streets and stores vigilantly, watch my speedometer, watch the traffic around me; I am alert in every direction.
I pass the AU store, I slow down and turn left. A short distance up the road on the right I see the soccer fields and the bland walls-and-windows construction of Hamawake Junior High School. I pull forward into a parking space, not yet having mastered the almost universal practice here of backing in. I would rather stand out than scrape the paint off of one of my new co-workers’ shiny Mitsubishis.
Now I have to choose the correct entrance from the three sets of glass doors at the front of the building. Two are for students; one is for teachers. If I choose the wrong one, not only will I be committing an embarrassing error, I will also not be at my locker. And then I will mess up the prescribed shoe-changing ritual of which my locker is an integral part.
1. While standing on the floor for outside shoes, right next to the platform or
below the ledge of the floor for inside shoes, reach into your locker and take out
your inside shoes.
2. Place your inside shoes on the platform or floor, whichever is closer.
3. Take off your outside shoes and step into your inside shoes in one motion.
4. Reach down, pick up your outside shoes, and place them in the locker.
5. If you are on the platform, walk along the platform until you reach the ledge,
step up onto the floor for inside shoes, and continue on your merry way.
Somehow I manage to find my way through the right door; I complete the shoe-changing ritual, albeit sloppily, since my arms are full of posters, papers, lunch, computer bag, water bottle, coffee mug, etc.; I navigate the school halls from memory and successfully arrive in the teachers’ room on the second floor; I call out “good morning” from the doorway and nod-bow (I have not yet perfected the art of full bowing without falling over); I walk in and sit down at my desk.
Relief. Part one (of who knows how many—it seems like there are an infinite number of firsts) accomplished.
As I lay out my things on my desk, Mr. M. comes up to greet me.
“Good morning, Catherine. Here is your schedule for today. Before classes begin, you will introduce yourself to all the teachers at the morning meeting and then to an assembly of all the students. In Japanese—is that okay?”
[Refer to the beginning:
I don’t speak Japanese.]
“Sure, of course it’s okay.”
“Good. The teachers’ meeting is in five minutes.”
I can’t remember the introduction speech that I wrote two weeks ago. And anyway, I found out after I had given it multiple times that some of my grammar was wrong. Even though I had asked a native speaker before giving it if it was correct. I don’t like to say things incorrectly in front of big groups of people, especially big groups of junior high school students.
More small panic. Oh well, I guess I’ll make a ten-second speech. Better than nothing.
Open with a nod-bow.
“
Ohayoo gozaimasu.
Watashi wa Catherine desu.
America no Indiana kara kimashita.
Nihon wa hajimete desu.
Doozo yoroshiku. Onegai shimasu.
”
[
Good morning.
I’m Catherine.
I’m from Indiana in America.
I’m in Japan for the first time.
I’m very pleased to meet you.
]
Close with a nod-bow.
Or something like that. I still don’t know if the Japanese is right. But nobody snickered or giggled, at least that I could hear.
After I gave my speech in front of the students, the class president came forward and spoke on behalf of the students. Before he began, he bowed deeply. Nervous and terrified of falling face forward and cracking my head open on the podium, I didn’t bow in response. When he finished, he bowed deeply again. Still nervous and terrified, I stood there stiffly.
In Japan, you should always bow. Whenever. Wherever. To whomever.
My life is replete with mistakes. Any time I’m not making a full-on mistake, I’m making a mini-mistake or an almost-mistake. Or I’m feeling like I’m making a mistake.
It’s okay. That’s how it goes at the start.
Shitsuree shimashita.
[Excuse me].
I say this often. I need to say it more. And bow a lot. Maybe bow a little deeper.
(And pray that I don’t fall forward. I have a tendency to crack my head open).
Wednesday, September 26, 2007
(written August 6)
Three weeks ago I was walking down the streets of Houston, Texas, a plastic to-go cup of iced coffee in my hand. Waiting for the little white man to flash at a crosswalk, I sipped from the long green straw. Droplets of sweat strung across my forehead; I brushed them aside periodically with my free hand. The slightly overcast sky hung thick and heavy, condensing the air below into a stagnant mass of invisible liquid.
“Mushiatsui!” I would have exclaimed under my breath if I had known the word. I stumbled across it today in the index of my Japanese textbook—“sultry.” An apt word, perhaps, to describe much of the summer weather in this country.
For most of the last two weeks, gray masses have been hovering over the mountains around Hokuto City, occasionally descending and dumping their contents on the town. When they recede, mists ooze up from the puddles in the streets and the soaked black soil in the fields, and with one step in any direction, my skin is dampened and my clothes stick to my body. Then I reach again for my iced coffee, bring the clay cup to my lips and thank the Dutch (who knew?) for scattering those little brown (when they're roasted) beans across the oceans as far as the land of tea.
Month One
On the southern coast of the northernmost large island of Japan, a little town of concrete and fields sits by the sea. Waves occasionally splash over the coastal road, and in winter the hills behind the town hover like guardian ghosts. This is Hokuto-shi, the merged “city” (more like a town) of two former towns (more like villages), Kamiiso and Ohno. Kamiiso is the concrete, Ohno the fields. This is my new home.
Though I’d known since April that I would be moving to Japan at the end of July, and had had the possibility on my mind since last November, when I applied to work as an Assistant Language Teacher with the Japan Exchange and Teaching Program, I was too preoccupied with scrambling up faux rock walls in Nashville and jetting around the U.S. to reestablish lost-but-not-forgotten friendships to give much thought to this transition before it actually happened.
And then one day I found myself boarding a 747 in Chicago and disembarking in Tokyo.
Hmm.
Eight months in the U.S. since the end of my previous adventure (two years and eight months in West Africa) temporarily reacclimatized me to comfort and convenience, having everything I could want and more at my fingertips, and to the joy of clear and simple communication. For eight months I could talk to whomever I wanted with great ease; I could read and understand every sign, notification, description, newspaper, magazine, form to fill out—anything and everything written; I could, more or less, take care of life on my own; I had not only enough food to eat every day, it was delicious and nutritious as well; I took hot showers when it was cold outside and slept in air-conditioning when it was hot; and I felt like I had a good deal of control over the shape of my existence. Thanks to a number of kind souls who extended amazing generosity and kindness to me, and to many wonderful people who shared their friendship with me, and thanks to America and all that it offers, I lived in relative bliss.
Too bad I couldn’t just leave it that way.
Tragically, from the perspective of some, I seem to be addicted to adventures abroad. Perhaps it’s the simple delight that I take in noticeable accomplishments, one day being surrounded by what seems to be meaningless gibberish, the next day being able to separate it into words and phrases, and the next to spit out some of that gibberish (which is suddenly meaningful and not so gibberishy) myself. Perhaps it’s the feeling of excitement and discovery I get when I go for a walk down a street I’ve never been on before, with shops selling things I’ve never seen before, and restaurants offering food I’ve never eaten before. Perhaps it’s the opportunity to hop around the globe, always to be based in a new location with a whole new set of countries to explore. Perhaps it’s the deeper fascination I have with examining different ways of living and thinking, observing how and asking why people do things the way they do. Or perhaps it’s a little bit of all of the above.
Whatever it is, it’s taken me from Austria in 2001, to Switzerland, France, Spain and beyond in 2003, to West Africa in 2004, and now to Japan in 2007. I won’t be surprised if it takes me farther.
There’s more than just a personal dimension to this vague “it”, though—it’s not only all about me. As I was reminded regularly in Peace Corps, it is my responsibility (and naturally also my desire) to share these unique experiences and what I learn from them with others. Looking forward to the coming year in Japan, and reflecting on what my first month here has already brought to me, I am eager for you, my friends and family around the world, to participate in this adventure.
Though I’d known since April that I would be moving to Japan at the end of July, and had had the possibility on my mind since last November, when I applied to work as an Assistant Language Teacher with the Japan Exchange and Teaching Program, I was too preoccupied with scrambling up faux rock walls in Nashville and jetting around the U.S. to reestablish lost-but-not-forgotten friendships to give much thought to this transition before it actually happened.
And then one day I found myself boarding a 747 in Chicago and disembarking in Tokyo.
Hmm.
Eight months in the U.S. since the end of my previous adventure (two years and eight months in West Africa) temporarily reacclimatized me to comfort and convenience, having everything I could want and more at my fingertips, and to the joy of clear and simple communication. For eight months I could talk to whomever I wanted with great ease; I could read and understand every sign, notification, description, newspaper, magazine, form to fill out—anything and everything written; I could, more or less, take care of life on my own; I had not only enough food to eat every day, it was delicious and nutritious as well; I took hot showers when it was cold outside and slept in air-conditioning when it was hot; and I felt like I had a good deal of control over the shape of my existence. Thanks to a number of kind souls who extended amazing generosity and kindness to me, and to many wonderful people who shared their friendship with me, and thanks to America and all that it offers, I lived in relative bliss.
Too bad I couldn’t just leave it that way.
Tragically, from the perspective of some, I seem to be addicted to adventures abroad. Perhaps it’s the simple delight that I take in noticeable accomplishments, one day being surrounded by what seems to be meaningless gibberish, the next day being able to separate it into words and phrases, and the next to spit out some of that gibberish (which is suddenly meaningful and not so gibberishy) myself. Perhaps it’s the feeling of excitement and discovery I get when I go for a walk down a street I’ve never been on before, with shops selling things I’ve never seen before, and restaurants offering food I’ve never eaten before. Perhaps it’s the opportunity to hop around the globe, always to be based in a new location with a whole new set of countries to explore. Perhaps it’s the deeper fascination I have with examining different ways of living and thinking, observing how and asking why people do things the way they do. Or perhaps it’s a little bit of all of the above.
Whatever it is, it’s taken me from Austria in 2001, to Switzerland, France, Spain and beyond in 2003, to West Africa in 2004, and now to Japan in 2007. I won’t be surprised if it takes me farther.
There’s more than just a personal dimension to this vague “it”, though—it’s not only all about me. As I was reminded regularly in Peace Corps, it is my responsibility (and naturally also my desire) to share these unique experiences and what I learn from them with others. Looking forward to the coming year in Japan, and reflecting on what my first month here has already brought to me, I am eager for you, my friends and family around the world, to participate in this adventure.
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