Weekend in The Northern Land

Tags

Battle of Dannoura, Kokura Castle, Miyamoto Musashi, Moji, Sasaki Kojiro, Shimonoseki

If the northeastern part of Kyuushuu wasn’t called Kita Kyuushuu (“kita” meaning “north”) I probably wouldn’t think of it as The Northern Land considering it’s still much further south than southern Michigan. ^o^;

This past weekend I went to hang with some friends who live in that Northern Land.  First, we headed to Moji to take a boat to Ganryuujima, an island in the Kanmon Straits where famed swordsmen Miyamoto Musashi and Sasaki Kojirou had their last duel in 1612.

Susanoo, look at me, wooooh ♬

Musashi (at right) fighting Kojirou with a wooden sword he supposedly made from an oar of the boat he'd rowed out to the island in.

After taking many jump shots (that is, taking photos while jumping; unfortunately the ones I took didn’t come out very well) in front of the statue and getting Death Glared by an obaa-chan, we went to look for and skip rocks.  Once we started doing it, *everyone* did it.  >o<  But I can’t skip rocks.  I think I’ve achieved it once in my life, in Lake Huron.

Genji wasn't around to dance "Waves of the Blue Ocean." Sadness.

Then we took another boat to head to Shimonoseki, on Honshuu.  We got there around four o’clock so everything was already closing down.  We got some sea salt ice cream before going through the fish market on the wharf to see about getting some fugu, but since the stalls were closing for the day we’d have to go to a restaurant to get a meal with fugu rather than just buy a piece at the market.  There was another local specialty that I wanted to try so I opted not to risk getting the deadly part of the fish (because my life is plagued by Irony so I know I will die some really stupid way ^o^;;;).

There were helicopters flying about near the wharf.  If I had known in advance that you can go on helicopter rides, I would’ve done it.  It is expensive: the cheapest tour costs 3000 yen and lasts “3-4 minutes.”  A 12-14 minute tour costs over 10,000 yen.  But it’s a helicopter!  It’s not like I can ride a helicopter whenever I feel like it.  I’m not Tseng.  Oh well.

Hm…I wonder what’s more dangerous: eating fugu or flying in a helicopter? ^o^

Having looked around a bit, we decided to head back to Kyuushuu to eat yakikaree (fried curry).  Rather than take the boat back, we decided to walk back via the tunnel for pedestrians and cyclists. (O Reader, do you realize how AWESOME it would be if there were such a tunnel connecting Windsor and Detroit?! I’d go over to Windsor all the time for no reason!) On the way to the tunnel, we saw this cool building.  I forgot what it was called, but it was something for Sino-Japanese relations.  It has the Imperial Seal on it, so it’s a government building.

I'll try to dig around and see if I can figure out what this building is.

Close to the entrance of the tunnel, we saw another statue, this one commemorating the Battle of Dannoura in which Minamoto Yoshitsune and his clan defeated the Heike clan. The statue of the Heike warrior wasn’t very interesting, so I only took Yoshitsune’s picture. ^o^;

Catchin' waves.

Then we went to the tunnel.  It’s accessed via an elevator that takes you underground.  There’s a line in the tunnel showing the boundary between Fukuoka Prefecture on Kyuushuu and Yamaguchi Prefecture on Honshuu.

If one commits a crime while on the line, whose jurisdiction does it fall under?

About 10 minutes later we emerged back in Moji.  We walked by the track of the Shortest Train Line in Japan, home of the Slowest Train in Japan.  It’s a small, sight-seeing train. We were lucky enough to see it coming once we had already crossed the track.  One of my friends decided to race it. ^O^  He was wearing flip-flops, and it was drizzling, so while he kept pace with it, he didn’t outrun it.  I couldn’t see it myself, but apparently the conductor was very amused. XDD  I didn’t take any pictures, but here’s a post about it on another blog (Japanese only).

After that it started to pour.  My little umbrella only kept the rain off my head, but I was pretty wet otherwise and my friends were soaked.  Once we got to the first building with an awning we stood under it and tried to dry ourselves off with our little handkerchiefs.  The building housed an Indian food restaurant, and since we were standing there for a good while the proprietors were staring at us.  But it worked out, since we had planned on eating yakikaree anyway we decided to eat in that restaurant. I liked the yakikaree, but my favorite part was the naan since I love breads.

The area the restaurant was in is called Moji Retro.  It has many old, European style buildings that were renovated as tourist attractions some 20 years ago (so I read).  You can get rickshaw rides there, as well as take a picture with Banana Man, the Messenger of Love and Justice.

愛と正義の使者！

I think the rickshaw drivers leave their rickshaws on purpose so people can take pictures of them.

The white bridge in the background of the above photo connects Kyuushuu and Honshuu.  The tunnel is at about the same place.

After that, we headed downtown to Kokura. We took jump shots in front of Kokura Castle and discussed fire drills.  Why, I don’t remember. ^o^;

Because important cultural artifacts were meant to be jumped in front of. If you don't do it, the daimyou will cry and he won't be able to take over the whole country.

Oh dear, what ludicrous jokes I make.

Culture Festival 2010

At some point in the year, usually in June or September, schools across Japan have a 文化祭 (bunkasai) meaning “Culture Festival.” I think it’s the same thing as what I’ve seen written in English as “school festival.”

The festival was spread over two days, Friday and Saturday.  (EDIT: Some schools’ bunkasai only last one day.) Thursday evening, these wonderful boards were put up over the school’s gate:

Theme: "Creation. By the School, of the School, for the Ultimate." Or something like that.

Friday’s events weren’t open to the public.  There were many performances in the auditorium, such as the first round of the class song battle, brass band concert, a presentation by the students from the nearby Prefectural School for the Blind, and of course, English play.  Unfortunately I didn’t get to see the class song battle.  The brass band concert was pretty good.  Two of the members did a comedy routine while the band set up on stage, but I didn’t get the jokes.  The band played about five or six pieces.  I didn’t recognize most of them, but when the comedians/MCs went back up to the front and said “We’re now going to play music from the movie in which Johnny Depp was so cool, Pirates of the Caribbean,” I said “YES!” out loud. ^_^;;;  It turned out to be “Drink Up Me Hearties Yo Ho,” from the third PotC movie At World’s End. Well, since it was an arrangement for brass & percussion it was pretty different…not the soaring emotion that a full orchestra can achieve, but still great.  (The school apparently doesn’t have a full orchestra, but this year’s brass band is much bigger than last year’s so maybe there’s hope!) Their last piece sounded great and the crowd was really into it, but I didn’t know what it was. My co-ALT told me it was the theme song to Neon Genesis Evangelion, “A Cruel Angel’s Thesis.” Of course I’ve heard of NGE, but I’ve never seen an single bit of it.  I know, some of you think I’ve just blasphemed.  >o<

Next up was the big daddy…English play.  So, how did my students’ performance of High School Musical 2 go after 3 months’ preparation? It’s superstitious of me, but since their final rehearsal was 100% mistake-free, and even had decent acting, I worried that they’d mess up the actual performance. What someone thinks of the performance depends largely on how much English they know or how much accented English they can understand, as well as how familiar they are with the HSM franchise.  HSM isn’t well known in Japan, and given that this is a low level school, it was highly unlikely that the audience would be able to understand the English, even though I simplified it as much as possible when I rewrote the script. Most of the students in the audience fell asleep after 15 minutes.  It didn’t help that it was fiendishly hot in the auditorium.  Heat + dark room + language you don’t understand = Sleep.  The saddest part, however, was that the male lead choked.  Near the beginning, when the two leads come on stage, they’re holding hands, so the audience giggled, squirmed excitedly, and went “OooOoOOOooh!” in a way that in the States would only be seen in the lower grades of middle school.  Poor boy couldn’t handle it.  Well, he wasn’t the only one.  The pressure got to all of the kids; not only did the actors mess up their lines, but some of the kids handling the lights also messed up.  The audience of course couldn’t tell if the lines were bad, at least.  From my point of view, I give the opening day performance a “C.”  If only someone had filmed Thursday’s last rehearsal, the students would have a record of themselves doing a really good job.

That was it for Friday’s events.  Saturday morning had several things going on at once, and it was all open to the public (which, far as I know, meant parents of students and former students).  I think it was during this time that the homerooms had set up their special rooms.  For example, one homeroom set up a café where all the “servers” were dressed in their middle school uniforms.  Well, so those kids told me; I had to be a judge at the English speech contest that was going on at the same time so I didn’t see it.

Said contest is actually for middle schoolers.  For that speech contest, we had two ALTs from other schools come and be guest judges.  (Virtual shout out to them yo!)  There were 19 contestants, each reading one of three short speeches that we’d selected a few months in advance.  They were pretty good.  The only problem is that many of these kids are coached to use ridiculously over the top gestures.  I’ve heard Japanese people comment that they don’t use gestures much when they speak, so maybe that’s why apparently they have this exaggerated idea of what gestures should be like.  If you watched some of the kids, you’d think you were watching someone telling a story to preschoolers rather than giving a speech.  The group I judged in the preliminary round wasn’t too bad on this point, but apparently the group my co-ALT judged had one “actress” who got down on her knees and acted out the crying of the little girl in the speech. ^_^;;;

Once that was done, we had lunch, then went to see English play.  Saturday’s performance had fewer readily obvious mistakes, but I can’t say it was better.  The kids didn’t feel pressure to go all out in front of the 100 or so parents that made up most of the audience that day.  Oh well.

By the time that was over, there wasn’t much left, unfortunately.  I took the guest ALTs around to see the art exhibits in the central hall and art building.  Here’s one photo of the exhibit in the central hall:

You can see works from various disciplines in this photo: sculpture, graphic design, painting (oil and Japanese painting), drawing, and shodou (Japanese calligraphy).

After that, I went home, took a nap, and got up to go to the inevitable enkai.  At these events, especially if I’m sitting around teachers outside of the English or Art departments, I’ll get asked the question “What is the most surprising thing about Japan?” or some variation thereof.  Honestly, there’s so little that’s actually been surprising to me, and of that most of it was only surprising at first, that I usually struggle to answer this question.  Luckily this time the question was different enough to be easy to answer. The conversation went something like this:

Teacher: You don’t do enkai like this in America, do you?

Me: Not really.  My mother’s a school teacher, and at least at her school they only have enkai when a teacher’s retiring.

Teacher: What’s the one thing you can’t get used to about enkai?

Me: Pouring drinks for other people.  Every time I finally notice that someone’s glass needs refilling, someone else gets to it first!

^_^;

Anyway, that was easy to answer since it wasn’t really about being surprised.  It’s not surprising that you should be on the lookout to refill others’ drinks; when I first learned of this custom I really liked the consideration it shows.  I’m just not used to doing it, so I’ve yet to develop the Keep An Eye On Everyone’s Glass subroutine.

Thursday I happened to run into the principal as I was coming back from taking pictures of the gate, and he said to me, “Oh, this will be your first bunkasai.”  I just smiled and said yes, but I knew what that meant: the next time I see him, he’ll ask me what I was most surprised by.  While it’s true that there isn’t a complete equivalent of bunkasai in the States, I don’t think it’s all that different from the various events we do have in schools.  We have concerts and art exhibits in schools.  Well, at least we did until districts decided to lay off all their art teachers in the name of economizing to save the district while the big wigs shamelessly gave themselves raises and otherwise raided the district’s coffers. ARGH the hypocrisy hurts my brain! My middle school had an International Day; each homeroom would get turned into a particular country, then all the students were free to visit the other rooms, getting their “Passports” stamped and experiencing the culture of that country.  There’s all the dances as well, prom and such.  In other words, schools in both the States and Japan have fun events outside of the academic curriculum.  So what exactly should I be surprised by?  Maybe I should avoid the principal until several months have passed because nothing surprised me and he’ll be disappointed! ^o^

A Very Special Blog Post

I believe the boy who engaged me in the following conversation was just trying to waste time to avoid having to present in front of his classmates.  Or maybe this really was a pressing issue for him. Who knows.  Anyway, this was all in Japanese, so there’s a possibility I misunderstood something, but I’m 99% sure I got everything right.

Boy: Eri, Eri, what’s your real name?

Me: Eli—-.

Boy: How old are you?

Me: Twenty-seven.

Boy: Are you married?

Me: No.  Why?

Boy: Why aren’t you married? Are you so busy? You don’t have time.

Me: *WTH face* Wow, if you have the courage to ask me those questions, you should have the courage to present in front of the class!

(At this point my co-ALT walked by apparently wondering what was so funny, so I explained to him the hilarious conversation.  I thought that would be the end of it but…)

Boy: Today is nothing but English! Hey, hey, you don’t have time…

Me: *WTH face once more* My standards are too high, that’s why! Do your work!!!

^_^;;; Of course, it would’ve been inappropriate if I’d voiced the snarky answers I was thinking: “Why?  You got an older brother dying to get that hot American citizenship through a sham marriage?” LOL

In the moment, I interpreted his 「時間ない」(“you don’t have time”) as meaning “You don’t have much time left to find a husband [given your age],” but thinking back on it, since he asked if I was busy, I guess he could’ve also meant “Is it that you’re so busy you don’t have time to find a husband?”

Amusing as this is, I wouldn’t post about it if it didn’t really strike a chord.  It’s not that I’m particularly worried about being a “spinster,” but in general, even though I’ve wanted to do JET since I learned about it, because I AM older than the average participant, I feel perhaps even more than they do that I’m putting my life on hold by being here (since other JETs say that too).  Sure, I often use my free time to study Japanese, or read the news, or otherwise be productive.  And that’s great for my professional life, but my personal life? I’m sure there are people who’ve made lifelong friends on JET.  But for the most part, this is a job where people come and go and then they’re gone.  As for my student’s quip, especially if he did mean it as “you don’t have much time left to find a husband,”…well, my snarky inner answer was “That’s right, and it doesn’t help that I’m in a country whose population by and large wouldn’t dare to marry outside their own ‘race,’ especially not one of the ‘lesser’ foreigners i.e. non-white.”

Now, maybe I made some people cringe with that one.  I know many people don’t like to talk about race and racism.  They think, “Oh, let’s just ignore it, then it’s not an issue.” WRONG. Scientifically, race doesn’t exist.  But we made it exist.  So we have to talk about it.

Let me first clearly say that I’m not bashing Japan.  Racism exists in the States.  I’ve been discriminated against and made to feel uncomfortable, even in danger, in my own home state.  I don’t like going to suburbs like Livonia or Novi because I get the You-Don’t-Belong-Here Look.  But the fact that racism exists in the States doesn’t negate that racism exists in Japan.  I’ve yet to feel in danger because of this racism, but it’s there nonetheless, and it doesn’t feel any more nice than white people giving me and my family the Death Glare because we’re speaking in Spanish.

Anyway, it’s not too much of an exaggeration to say that white men have Japanese women throwing themselves at them the moment they step off the plane.  A guy that would be just a plain ol’ white dude in the States has an unspeakable appeal here.  Every straight white guy I know who wasn’t already in a relationship when he came here, is or at one point was in a serious relationship with a Japanese woman or an Asian woman who was also working in Japan (not necessarily on JET).  But female foreigners have it harder.  I’ve been told that Japanese men think foreign women are pushy.  Okay, that’s a challenge.  But if you’re a woman of color, well!  You better know how to run some major game.  Nothing illustrates the preference for white women better than something that happened to me back in November.

I wrote about the first time I visited the blind school in this post, but I left out the following incident.  As I wrote over there, one of the classes was with adult students.  One of them, obviously a young man into fashion and picking up women, commenced to hit on me.  Then he asked me if I was blonde.  Well, what he said was “Golden hair?” since he didn’t know the word “blonde.”  I simply answered no, but in my mind I was thinking, “You’re BLIND!!! What does it matter??!!?!?!”  If that wasn’t enough, his flirting decreased rather suddenly once he found out I wasn’t blessed with locks of gold.  What a disappointing foreigner I turned out to be! Granted, this is just one incident.  But if you compare the way white and non-white foreigners are portrayed in Japanese media, you clearly see that whites are treated favorably.

So yes, (getting back to what sparked this post in the first place), as more and more of my friends back home (and some on JET) tie the knot, or otherwise proclaim their commitment to someone, I can’t help but feel that I’m falling behind.  I planned from the beginning to do JET for two years, but I’ll probably be here for three.  I’ll be nearly 30 years old when I go back to the States (read: have a chance of finding Mr. Pretty Much Right). Pop culture tells me that it can be hard being The Single One once all of one’s friends are married, but at least in the States women don’t have this doom counter ticking over their heads (unless they’re Hispanic.  Whoops.) and they don’t have teenage Japanese boys telling them they need to get married ASAP.

Shout out to my Ma, who told me that one of her friends asked her, “y que si se trae un chinito?” (“What if she brings home a Chinese guy?”) *FACEPALM*