Yosenkai

Ere long it is seen
Where in the snow an ox's
Path comes to its end.

---

Fast fact, Nick: did you know that the days after snow falls are actually colder than the day of snowfall? You see, while incidental factors (like heat-reflecting cloud cover and storm-related winds) may seem to suggest otherwise, the process of melting requires snow to absorb ambient heat-energy out of the atmosphere.

But that's nonsense. Of course you already knew that!


Also nonsense was that it’s already been one week since the first snowfall of the year... well, for Tokyo, at least, and, as everyone knows, it only counts if it happens in Tokyo. Ken and I celebrated

¹because Japanese people always celebrate the firsts of everything: 初詣 (The First Visit to the Temple), 初日の出 (The First Sunrise), and 初夢 (The First Dream). Heck, they even have a thing for the "First Strong Breeze of Summer."

¹ by meeting up with his Sig.Oth for a Fleet Foxes' concert at Studio Coast in Shin-Kiba, Tokyo. And because I am loathe to not celebrate absolutely anything ad infinitum, we went out again on Monday for some impromptu yakiniku, only mildly perturbed by the nipping cold and slight, though constant, rain. Ken was close to begging out, but I would not be put off Discount-Steak-Monday (certainly an event worthy of its own celebration).

Anyway, so Ken was right, in that by the time we were walking home, the cold, heavy rain had turned to cold, heavy snow. But I've always been of the mind that snow is much better than rain. At least snowfall is better than rainfall

²In as much as snow has a "Magicalness" half-life best counted in minutes rather than days

². Anyway, after being reassured that it never "really" snows all that much in Kashiwa, Mother Nature went on to say "oh yeah?" and dumped around three inches.

Three inches may not sound like a lot both to people who have and have no sense of how much snow "three inches” is, but all we need to know is that “three inches” is enough to blow everyones' minds. I mean, they went crazy. It was such a big deal that, not only did the Tokyo Fire Department report 53 instances of snow-related injury by 10 a.m. the next morning, but it literally blew thoughts of Friday's "first" snow storm out of the social consciousness.

Nonplussed, both Ken and Karl were ripe to mention that we should try to catch the earlier bus to accommodate the more sensible Chiba-ians who'd decide to take the bus rather than venture cars and bikes on the narrow, unsalted roads of Japan.


We adjusted accordingly and planned to be at the bus stop by 7:10 for the "7:21" bus. Verily

³I do not lie.

³, I gave away what very well was the "last spot" on the "early" bus to some old woman. Did it make me feel good about myself? A little. But not as much as I regretted not Heisman-ing her out of the way up the steps. But that is, as they say, neither here nor there. Certainly two more busses passed by the stop within the hour (no more than 20 or 30 minutes late), with neither stopping for passengers. At around 8:15, Ken suggested we skip the whole "bus" thing, catch a couple of trains that would find us slightly more north of our present location, and then proceed to walk the rest of the way.

And that is what we did.

It was a little past 10 by the time we walked into the office, which, to our surprise, was full for the postponed teachers' morning meeting.

It has been a couple days since the Great Snowfall of 2012, and our schedule has just gotten over reeling from the White Menace

⁴Snow, not Sperry

⁴, especially as this week was supposed to be Finals Week for the 三年生, who, inexplicably, get two months off to "prepare" for college entrance exams.

Anyway, what blew my mind was not the paltry amount of snow that danced across the streets in wisps like children, or how it put a stranglehold on normalcy in the Kanto region for days on end, but rather the hour I spent standing at the bus stop at 北柏駅.

Our stop is on a modest hill, one much steeper than I would like to walk on a daily basis, but no more steep than any random hill you could force any cross-country team to run in West or South Torrance. Then again, any hill of any size is steep enough for cars to lose traction when icy.

People do strange things when things don't go the way they expect them to. I could not tell you the number of cars that would slow to an eventual stall at the very foot of the hill thinking that gunning the accelerator would resolve the whole lack-of-traction problem

⁵"Constant thrust = constant speed!"

⁵. Granted, this would occasionally work and they would lurch ahead at a painstaking rate of inefficiency, only to return from their crawl to immobility inches later. I, literally, watched a delivery truck do this for an hour, deciding halfway up the hill to pull over to the curb and wait it out. What exactly he was waiting for is still unclear, but he waited.

Also astounding were the number of idle pedestrians who went out of their way to help push these cars stuck in ice patches. If I were a better man, I would have stepped out of the bus line to help. After all, a car in the way is one more car blocking my bus. But, then again, if I were an even better man, I would have fired up the ol' Google Translate and translated me up some "Please stop. Please put your car in reverse and turn around. Go a different way. This is not the only road through Kitakashiwa. Thank you"

⁶Incidentally, GT suggests "中止してください。逆に車を置いて、向きを変えてください。別の道を行く。これは、北柏で唯一の道ではない。あなたに感謝。" Not coincidentally, this is not correct.

⁶.

Whether it was obstinate pride or panic induced un-thought, both being double-plus un-good by the way, pretty much everyone would spend at least 10 minutes trying to gun it up the hill. And while that provided us all with an excellent visual demonstration of independent-wheel, anti-slip traction technology, people would try, try, try again, only to put their car in park and quit where they stood. I would like to think that it just didn't occur to them that turning around and going back down the hill was a perfectly viable option.

Certainly, this isn't unique to Japan: I've survived far too many rainy days on the 405 to know that Californians, too, can lose their minds when things don't go the way they're supposed to.


So, if I consider that most people responded the way they did because they had not considered that going back was an option (even to most of the helpful pedestrians, "forward" was the only way), I need to ask myself how long it would have taken me to finally get around to considering turning around as the best course of action.

I'd like to say that it would have come to me in a timely manner, but I can make no presumptions to think that I would have at all, were I ever to find myself in a similar situation. And I should not necessarily be ashamed of that. What I should be ashamed of would be, having watched this pattern of events for almost 90 minutes, not reassessing my own emergency-response methods to be sure that it includes a "backwards" option.

Actually, now that I think about it…

A few weeks ago I was in a classroom, as teachers are wont to do. I'm not quite sure when it was, except that I know that I was done with my instruction and was sitting down after doing a preliminary walk-through to make sure that everyone had understood and gotten started on the assignment.

So, anyway, I was sitting at my tiny teacher's desk, which is this tiny white-laminate TV tray of a table, when the whole building started to shake. Now having grown up in California and, thusly, a party to my fair share

⁷That's an American share, not a Japanese share.

⁷ of earthquakes, I quickly ascertained that we were in the midst of a mild 'shaker, which was fine. You know, besides the normal thoughts of "whoa" and "whoa-whoa," I realized that the students were looking to me and that I had no idea what I was supposed to do

⁸Our earthquake preparedness drill was cancelled due to rain in October, to which the students were instead treated to an instructional video that the ALTs weren't privy to.

⁸.

My initial play was to cool-hand it. After all, if I couldn't offer practical advice, I should at least provide emotional stability. The rumbling continued for a good 60 seconds and we rode it out in good spirits. Mid-way in one of them asked me if they should open the door and the window, to which I affected knowing and nodded my assent.

Before long, class was over, assignments were handed in and I was walking back into the office, off-handedly commenting how it was a real shame that the earthquake drill had been cancelled because I had no clue what I was supposed to do.

Come to think of it, I still don't. Well, at the very least I know that if there's an earthquake I should open the doors and windows.

That being said, after 90 minutes and still no bus, Ken suggested that we, ourselves, backtrack a little and take the train to 柏田中駅. So we did. And along the way found a French bakery.

So that was delicious.

Shin Nen Kai

Though often late, or
Rarely on-time, a bus should
Never be early.

---

Nick,

There is no doubt that you know that Japan's two most important holidays are 1) 正月, and 2) 大晦日, which happen to be "New Years Day" and "New Years Eve," respectively.

But one of the most exciting part about New Years in Japan is that television receives a much overdue production bump: a paint job for "Sweeps" season, if you will. This is when every game show and variety program gets a two hour special and every big televised anime debuts (or re-runs) a new "movie."

For a month, producers and writers pull out all the stops to catch the vacationing eye. Regardless of how vapid or interchangeable their preceding (and following) seasons have been (or will be), this is their opportunity to win over viewers and set their programming marks.


For all the chatter about how bad Japanese TV is--and it can be--the six-week period around New Years makes it all worth it. After all, this is the where we get amazing shows like the bunraku extravaganza 全日本仮大賞, or the reality show to top all reality shows, はじめてのおつかい

¹ Which is pretty much my new favorite TV show of all time.

¹. Pretty much any of those clips of Japanese shows venerated on YouTube comes from one "冬スペシャル" or another.

Yesterday, however, I came across a two-hour special that left me feeling slightly perturbed. The angle of this particular variety show special was more or less an "Extreme Makeover," where they would tell the woe-begotten tale of a person in need and reward their tenacity with a much needed makeover. Usually there is some medical impairment or requirement that renders the "makeover" justifiable and, therefore, palatable. At the very least, not quite as vapid.

This show, in particular, was the exploitation of a story of a rising Korean pop-artist who, early into her career, contracted a disease that attacked her face with some form of elephantiasis that was surgically reduced but left her severely disfigured.

I have been struggling to define what about this show bothered

² And, perhaps, "bother" is too strong of a word: maybe something more demure like "disquieted," or "unsettled."

² me. Now I have no problem with television "exploitation." I mean, I had publicly declared that my new favorite TV show of all time was はじめてのおつかい, which is basically a show that exploits four year old children by sending them out into the streets "alone" on their first errand. Ah the sweet, life-giving tears of innocent children!


In contemplating this the entire day, I think that what I had a problem with was that they picked a South Korean woman, focused on the depth of her despair and squalor (and near abject rejection) in Korea, and contrasted this with the open arms of Japan and its copious medical resources. From dank and gray with it's minor-chord soundtrack overlay, to bright and clean, endearing and hopeful.

Now, I don't mean to speak out of turn, in as much as I have no clue about this particular show's geopolitical perspective or its historiography. I don't know if they regularly travel throughout Japan offering medically necessary surgery to domestic economically underprivileged residents (unlikely) and happened upon a "great find" that--whoops!--just happened to be from Korea. What struck me as peculiar was that 1) there wasn't a viable Japanese candidate for this exploitation, and 2) the obvious deep seated tensions between Japan and Korea

³ This includes the lengthy and brutal occupation of Korea in the late 19th and early parts of the 20th century during the "日本統治時代の朝鮮" colonial period, which includes current conflicts over issues such as "comfort women" (forced prostitution) and political visits to the Yasukuni Shrine to honor/celebrate the soldiers who fought in WWII: both issues that remain hotly contested in contemporary Japan-Korea relations today and are especially relevant to the Zainichi (diasporic) Koreans who continue to live in Japan without political rights or representation. All the while there persists a grass-roots resentment over the growing prevalence of Korean presence in Japan, with minor "protests" as recent as August 2011 over the amount of Korean programming that was being broadcasted on Japanese television.

³.

Even still, I want to be very aware of my 外国人 sensibilities. That is, in addition to needing to take into account standard melodramatic TV tropes, I need to recognize my own geopolitical assumptions and avoid reading into what I think are inter-cultural necessities, especially as an "outsider," but even more so as an ignorant observer.

I find myself having to ask what my intercultural expectations are. What do I assume are normative and normal interactions between Japan and Korea on a macro- and micro- level? Then what sort of legitimate privileges do I have as an "outsider" to see these conflicts, condescensions and concessions, and then what are the inherent limitations that come with my American-level of sensitivity and sensibility? Am I, as a sensitized outsider, privileged to read of a situation cultural bias, or am I, as an over-sensitized outsider, privileged to read into a situation cultural bias based on my expectations of subtext? Granted, it's hard to think otherwise, with Japan's historically less-than-apologetic regard to normalizing relations, and persistence in believing everyone should just move past diversity issues

⁴ One only has to look either north or south to the way that Japan has dealt with either the Ryukyuan people of Okinawa or the Ainu people of Hokkaido. You know it's bad when there's a whole Wikipedia page dedicated to the Ethnic Minority issues of Japan. Most relevant, however, are the Burakumin, who are ethnically identical to other "Japanese" people, but are discriminated against as a "social" minority group. Particularly telling is that the title "Buraku" was created because the government, in attempts to lessen the prejudice and stigma surrounding these so called "untouchable peoples," banned the use of the terms "Eta" and "Hinin." Generally, the approach is to discourage discourse and encourage the problem to disappear with time. Which, apparently, if you live outside of Kansai, is the case with the "Buraku problem" [especially as the problem is more or less left unaddressed by Japanese discrimination laws since the Burakumin are not a "specific race" (Degawa, Racism Without Race)]. Then again, apparently the Burakumin make up 70% of Japan's largest Yakuza syndicate, so "effectiveness" is up for debate.

⁴.

I suppose it's the general lack of social and societal institutions that exist to create dialog about the way Japan's history--based out of a strong sense of ethno-/national-centrism--lends itself to a persistent "othering" (or exo-grouping) which, in turn, affects the way the world responds to it. More often than not, when it comes to the topic of diversity (or the lack of integrative diversity), it's safer just not to talk about it, almost as if putting those words to air breathes life into the embers of crisis.

But I just don't know, Nick. I mean, on the one hand, the obviousness of the Korea-Japan contrast bothers me, which is a no-brainer. But that I lack the resources (culturally and linguistic) to even begin to ask the right questions confounds me. I mean, one of the things I loved most about Critical Theory was that "interpretation" was the belief that by figuring out the "right" questions to ask we could impose an organizing framework onto complex ideas.

In most cases the first step is "locating yourself in the ongoing dialog." Basically this means whipping open a text book or firing up Wikipedia, retracing what work has already been done over the last 50 or 50,000 years in the field, and then settling into a philosophical niche that works best for your mood. But this just seems to not be the case here: there's as little discussion about race and diversity in Japan as there possibly could be, so there's no real ideological springboard to work off or tap into. Even casual conversation about race and race relations is met with hesitance and embarrassment. Despite the historical presence of Japan internationally and the rapid growth of a foreign presence within Japan itself, there is very little discussion about the way the Japanese interact with exo-groups (even indigenous exo-groups), rather just a myriad of disparate questions floating around: is it possible to redefine "Japanese-ness" around it's core principles of homogeny and submissive/self-sacrificial unity without resorting to exclusion, or is it necessarily exclusive? Is "awareness" the first appropriate step? Should dialog be conducted at a grass-roots level or can questions be asked by "outsiders" through the educational system?


I realize that Japanese history is one of the more important subjects at Ichikashi and, seemingly, most high schools in Japan. The amount of historical facts our kids are required to learn--re: regurgitate--is staggering. Emperors, shogunates, wars, you name it. But it's all of a particular history. As late as 2007, the central government (which is in charge of pedagogical decisions) was found to be instructing high school textbooks to "downplay the military's role in ordering mass civilian suicides" of Okinawans during WWII. Julian Dierkes' 2010 expose on post-war history education in Japan pinpoints bureaucratic foot dragging as the key to maintaining this status-quo, preventing modern historical analysis and critiques, stunting critical thinking regarding Japan's jingoistic past.

However, this should not be surprising from a country that, in 2005, erected a monument to Justice Radha Binod Pal for his dissenting view

⁵ And yet even this issue is not rife with complexities. Pal, a purported Japanophile who considered the Japanese defendants proponents of Asian liberation from Western influence (Bix, 2001), seemingly agreed to sit on the tribunal with the intent to decry the legitimacy of the trial, never once engaging with the reality of the war crimes charged. However, Pal was right to point out the hypocrisy of "victor's justice" in play, as the firebombing and nuclear attacks of Hiroshima and Nagasaki upon civilians would never be tried in court, arguing that the Japanese on trial should be declared innocent based on the injustice of the indictment. Though, on first blush, and in persistent cursory interpretation of his dissent, Pal will continue to be lionized as purporting complete Japanese innocence, Ushimura Kei (2007) argues that a finer reading of Pal's judgment is one of procedure not of morality.

⁵ in the International Military Tribunal for the Far East, arguing that all military personnel should be cleared of all responsibility for Japanese war crimes committed during World War II (such as those committed at Nanking), dismissing the legitimacy of the IMTFE's claims to justice.

So, maybe, then asking these sorts of questions in public spaces is the place to start, especially at a progressive school like Ichikashi. As a 外国人, I am in a ironically privileged place, afforded copious amounts of grace for not being Japanese enough to know/understand the morays of polite Japanese customs of silence. Just as we use "外国人-ness" to intentionally "get away" with eating while walking and sneaking the last chocolate out of the お土産 box, I am in a unique position to ask those difficult questions because I just don't know enough to know not to ask those kinds of questions.

If only I knew the right questions to ask.

Seijin no Hi

Hey Nick, long time no see!

You may not know this but today is 成人の日 ("Seijin no Hi," or Coming of Age Day), which is meant to “congratulate and encourage” those who have reached the “age of majority” (which is 20 years old in Japan)

¹ http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coming_of_age_day

¹. 20 seems really “late” for a C-O-A celebration that dates back to the 8th century, but having seen the way high school kids—emphasis on “kids”—are treated it shouldn’t come as any real surprise.

In honor of this auspicious holiday, I have committed myself to a new day planner

² It’s a very adult thing, I assure you.

². Though, really, I had a very nice calendar that I bought when I first moved to Japan, that was inauspiciously thrown out with the gift-wrapping while I was in Torrance for Christmas last week.

Regardless, I found myself back at Tokyu Hands slogging through the mounds of day planner options: full spread monthlies, vertical weekles, horizontal dailies, calendars with hourly listings or to-do lists. The options were seemingly endless

³ And frivolous.

³.

Step #1 in picking the perfect personal calendar, according to About.com, was to "Pick the Right Planner." This would obviously be a crucial step.

For my purposes and sanity, I wanted a simple weekly layout, one that maximized efficiency by limiting memo space. I went back and forth about a vertical weekly and a horizontal weekly, between hourly or lined.

This time I settled for a Takahashi Shoten "Link Up Schedule." A quick scan of their webpage reveals that they have 171 distinct calendar designs. I think it took only 43 tries before they got it right, but I give them credit for trying: each page is broken up into four rows, one for every day of the week with the eighth row on the right hand page given over to extra notes and a monthly view. However, the daily rows are divided into two columns, the right half for memos while the other, a four-panel table.


There was an insert that explained a variety of ways that I could use this table (maybe one pane for AM, one for PM and one for expenses and details), but it was all in kanji. Regardless, it was the versatility of the vague space that captivated me. I am also not one to let the irony of finding blank space marred by two thin lines more versatile than actual "free" blank space, but that’s the way of things: it is the imposition of boundaries that make sports challenging and therefore more interesting.

Granted, I find it annoying that I am not quite sure how I want to use the table: it’s ambiguity laughs in the face of the feeble sense of control that a day-planner pretends to propose. But I love the idea that any unused days can become a CSI-Miami 4-pannel comic

⁴

⁴.

Step 2 of maintaining a successful day planner, again according to About.com, was to name my calendar. I’ll have to commit some thought to that. Though, really, I would have made Step 2 (shortly after the all important first step of actually acquiring a calendar) "be consistent" in application and methodology. Or maybe just "make up reasons to use your brand new archaic calendar to justify the cost."

メリークリスマス!

Nick,

So there are fewer than 10 days to my personal Californian advent calendar, but I’m trying not to get too excited. If I let myself think about it too much I’ll start packing, and if I start packing I’ll be living out of my luggage next week. Then again, it couldn’t hurt to start packing as 80% of what I’ll be bringing back is omiyage and Christmas presents. With everything I’m bringing I may just have to check my luggage at this point.


Well, as you pretty much guessed, in between the space of these two paragraphs was all the time it took me to break down and start packing. As of today, I pretty much fit all of my omiyage into one carry-on-able bag, though I cannot yet tell you where I will store my clothes… Maybe I’ll just wear them all onto the plane

¹ They tell me that, when in Japan, I should “layer”…

¹.

But all of this is fine. I’ll have plenty of time to think about it.

Since finals were last week, we’re all pretty much in a holding pattern. The schedule is generous to the teachers as they have two whole weeks to turn in grade reports. Being the pseudo-repressive Type-A that I am, I had my grade sheets tabulated and my formulas ready to go last Thursday so I could dump the digits in on Friday and have nice little cut-outs for the teachers ready by Monday.

Suffice it to say that the last couple of days have been pretty chill in the office

² Since I’m already done with my grading I’ve done more wristwatch shopping (A, B) than actual teaching or grading over the last two days… which isn’t to say that I’ve been completely unproductive…

², so Ken and I are trying to be proactive in getting out of the office and engaging students.

Oh, yeah: speaking of “chill”… though high temperatures this year had lingered late into October, it has already sharply downshifted into winter; this weekend we’re told to expect our first sub-0 temps. Just in time for Christmas.

For the most part, autumn was all about posturing myself for the winter: the kerosene heaters, term finals for course placement, prepping for the first round of university exams, and the big pre-Christmas sales on winter jackets, thermals and home insulation. Fortunately for me, though, I have a tendency to plan ahead. By mid-November my rugs were laid out, my windows sealed and sheeted, and my thermals unpacked. Looking ahead has never really been my problem. Even now as I start to prepare for my flight out to Torrance, it’s remembering to not forget about today that’s the harder part.

And perhaps that’s the trick of living any place, let alone in a place like Japan: to remember to look around as I continue to look ahead. To remember to taste of the bright seasonal fruits and flavors before they pass into a starker hue. To remember to drink in the luxurious fall colors, bask in the lingering warmth of the autumn sun before it drifts away into the high, winter sky. To remember to share a smile at the bus stop before those too disappear behind masks and scarves.

Though the threat of 0° weather is a tad… prohibitive.

Roppongi (六本木)

We had been looking at the forecast for the weekend every day at work and, despite the bleak report, I had promised myself that I wouldn’t spend the entire weekend locked up in my heat-hovel. And after waking up at the casual hour of 10am--and only after a furious amount of Googling and japan-guide.com--I had decided to take a half-day trip into Tokyo to cross off a few more sites on my “Tourist” Bingo card by going to Roppongi and seeing

³ ”See,” not “go up,” as I was advised (repeatedly).

³ the Tokyo Tower.

Ultimately, my plan was to walk around the base of the tower and its surrounding parks and shrine and leave with enough time to make it to the Roppongi Hills Mori Tower observation deck for sunset, which was scheduled for about 4:29¥pm. I got there at around 3:00 and paid my ¥$15 to ride the elevator up the 52-stories to the observation rotunda. It was quite an amazing view and I was glad that I brought my widest lens

⁴11-16mm Tokina.

⁴, but was instantly met with a huge problem: as the sun sets only once per day, do I park myself at the east-facing window, towards Tokyo Tower and Odaiba, or do I settle in on one of the benches on the west-side of the tower, to watch the sun set behind (literally behind, today) Mt. Fuji.


I walked around the tower twice before coming to the realization that the photographic opportunities favored heavily the east-facing side as shooting into the sun is not as amazing as it would sound, at least not until the sun passes behind the mountain. Also, preliminary shots revealed that my lens was too wide, and Fuji-san too far to obtain dramatic Fuji-themed images.


So the limitations of my equipment

⁵Re: “skill.”

⁵ dictated the terms of my shooting. At a little after 3:20, I carved out a little spot right by the window and set up for some short-term sequential shooting. Then, from about 3:58 to just shy of 5:15, I snapped up 146 shots at just-about-30-second intervals. For a first-try at time-lapse, stop-motion photography, it’s not bad. But even now I can see a half-dozen things I would do differently: there are glare-artifacts due to inadequate sealing against super-thick double-pane windows; there are exposure shifts (amateur!); and I’m not using a professional-grade compiler, so there’s considerable dithering most notable after dusk.


Even after all that I still like it. It really helps add a whole level of “texture” that mere stills fail to convey.

As always, the rest of my Roppongi images can be found on my flickr.

Kinro Kansha no Hi

Happy December, Nick!

Today is a special day: last week may have been Thanksgiving in America

¹ And since Matthew asked, I'll just note that Japan does have its own Thanksgiving on November 23rd ("Labor Thanksgiving Day," which appears to be a clever conflagration of Thanksgiving and Labor Day into one nationalistic "give thanks that for your government sponsored labor" day).

¹, but December 1st signals the return of the kerosene heaters in the classrooms.

This may seem oddly specific but Japanese high school life is often dictated by such scheduled, seasonal directives: heck, on October 1st everyone was required to break out their Fall Blazers, even though it was still 24°C through Halloween.


Well, as you could probably guess, it's no longer 24. It's been averaging around 15 or so

² That's 59¥F°.

², and I swear that whatever it is outside, for some reason--perhaps because all schools everywhere are soulless voids--the halls are bound to be 5¥F°s colder.

So it's quickly turning winter despite that it still feels, mentally, a little too early to be layering knowing that it will only get colder in January. But I've been taking advantage of the winter sales, buying up inexpensive thermal sets and wool socks at Uniqlo, while rounding out my Christmas/omiyage shopping

³ I feel that there's an expectation that all of the gifts I buy be "Japanes-y." Grape Mentos and Seasonal Kit-Kats for everybody!

³.

Anyway, last week was my birthday, too. Not much fanfare, but I did get a bit of alone time to explore more of Abiko (我孫子市) and watch some movies. Actually, ever since I came back from Hakone, I've had a hankering to watch me some Princess Mononoke. Unfortunately, I didn't bring any of my Ghibli DVDs with me, so I took advantage of locale and circumstance to fill out my Ghibli backlog. I was recommended to watch "The Cat Returns" ( 猫の恩返し), which was pretty good despite Ghibli's tendency for lackadaisical plot-pointing, inclusion of minute "hyper-realistic" detail, and frustratingly abrupt, unsatisfyingly-simplistic conclusions

⁴ Which is why I feel that Mononoke, which is a much tighter, more fluid piece, is a superior work.

⁴.

For no apparent reason, other than not really wanting to get out of the house, I ended up randomly deciding to watch 耳をすませば, or "Whisper of the Heart." I was shocked: characters from “The Cat's Return” pop up here and there with varying significance throughout "Whisper of the Heart" in the most cavalier of fashion. Was that the Baron I just saw? And an off the cuff reference to the cat named Moon? I believe it was! It appeared to be a Christopher Nolan style stroke of genius of the most J.J. Abrams order. Until I realized that “The Cat's Return” was released seven years after “The Whisper of the Heart” as a "spin-off."

Anyway, after I get around to watching a few more of those hard-to-get-in-America movies under my belt I'll start compiling a tiered ranking (the likes of my Pixar tree). But, until then, enjoy my Christmas Wish List (in no particular order):

• Chipotle (guacamole!)
• Pizza Machine (bacon bits pizza, buffalo wings)
• The Habit (BBQ bacon cheese burger, onion rings)
• Gengis Khan (everything in a bowl)
• Shinsengumi Yakitori (pork belly)
• G-Bowl (Portuguese sausage, eggs, rice, short stack
  ⁵ The "Kevin Special."
  ⁵)
• Guliano's (crumbled meatball with cheese, Chinese chicken salad, Maui luau BBQ chips)

All this to note that the last couple weeks have been pretty chill. While the 三年生s were prepping for their university entrance exams (a test, a Japanese interview, then an English review), the 二年生 students were off on their school trips

⁶ 2A had left and returned from Torrance while the 2B-S were well on their way to Okinawa.

⁶ and, thusly, we were all on an abbreviated schedule for a whole week, not including the "Sports Tournament Day."

Things get back to normal this week and next. At least until Thursday, which is the start of finals for the second trimester… and Friday, which is 忘年会 ("bounenkain," literally meaning "Forget the Year Meeting"). Ken says after the winter block both our 三年生 writing protocol and our OC1 Elective session is completed (a final which we proctored yesterday), leaving us with just the 2A conversation classes twice a week for the spring trimester.

Actually, yesterday, the 1A instructor (Iwata-sensei) asked if I would start doing morning homeroom announcements with him, so I can probably count on adding the 1AΔ2A transition to my spring schedule. Which is fine: the 1A kids are nice enough. Combine that with this year's 2As revitalized interest in English

⁷ Traveling abroad and being capable of only limited communication has that affect on people

⁷ and the next few months seem to be stacking up well. I'll just have to remember to take up a hobby or two: I'll try to remember to bring my uke with me on my return flight, maybe make a move to learn something Japanese-y… like 漢字.

A [noun] By Any Other [noun]...

Nick,

One of the many things that I love about the Japanese language is the interesting (and often sophomorically hilarious) ways that its intricate orthographic system confounds consistent meaning. I'm told that a lot of this has to do with kanji, so let's start there.

Kanji

¹ As Wikipedia tells me.

¹ is a "logographic" writing system adopted from Chinese hanzi characters imported through cultural trade during the Han Dynasty around 57AD. Later, this complicated system of emblematic pictographs was simplified. Around the 9th century, industrious women poets--though banned from formal education, including instruction on the complex hanzi writing system--recognized how stupid it was to have one symbol for every single word in your language and so settled into the 46-character syllabary system that we know as hiragana.

Anyway, just as the logographs of kanji were inherited from it's Chinese hanzi parent, so too were the Chinese hanzi pronunciation. Today, this category of kanji-pronunciation is commonly known as "on'yomi" (音読み), or "on" pronunciation.

Problem Number 1:

As there are nearly twice as many sounds in the Chinese linguistic syllabary, many of the possible Chinese pronunciations were lost or conflagrated into the Japanese speaking system

² Mary Noguchi writes, "When Japan imported kanji wholesale from China, the Chinese pronunciations of kanji words were transliterated into the narrower range of the Japanese phonetic system; the result was a great number of compound words with the same pronunciation." "Kanji Clinic #24: Is there any relief from Japanese homophone headaches?" The Japan Times, 9 Aug. 2002, <http://www.kanjiclinic.com/kc24final.htm>. Pinyin.info suggests that Chinese has 410 distinct syllable sounds, while Japanese has only 349, and cites a study that reports that Japanese has three-times more homophones than those found in Chinese.

².

Not satisfied with these proliferating approximate (and overlapping) pronunciations--and probably just as disenchanted the notion of maintaining cultural dependencies upon China--Japan, doing what Japan does best, created a "Japanese" style of reading kanji: the "kun'yomi" (訓読み) method. No longer would the Japanese writing system be tied directly to the Chinese language. Instead, all conscripted kanji would be given over to the Japanese lexicon. Let me explain…

[I will use the "for instance" that Wikipedia uses because it's a good one.]

Take, for instance, the kanji for "east," as represented by 東. The on-yomi (Chinese) pronunciation of this logograph is "tou" (とう). Lo and behold, may it be said, that long before Japan adopted the "tou" logograph (東), Japan already had a word for "east" (that being "higashi": ひがし

³ Let it actually be said that Japan had TWO words for "east," higashi and azuma (あずま), so frustration over why they needed a third is quite understandable.

³). Thusly, these additional "kun" readings were later appended to the range of any kanji's readings, not ever fully replacing the original “on” reading.

This means, though most kanji have one specific locus of meaning, there is a nexus of pronunciations tied to each logographic pole, often only known through contextual expression: when by itself, 東, as an “ideogram” (指事文字: しじもじ: Shiji-moji), is almost always pronounced using the kun expression "higashi,” but will often be seen tied to a secondary figure that activates a secondary reading. One such example is when 東 is bound to the “kyou” (京) kanji, forming the compound "東京", which, of course, is the kanji for Tokyo, thusly requiring us to read 東 using the original on-yomi pronunciation.

This polyphony of sign:signified readings, however, is where we get the interesting system of Japanese "abbreviation."

Let's take 柏市立柏高等学校 (Kahiwashiritsu Kashiwa Koukou), which is roughly translated as "Kashiwa-City Municipal Kashiwa High School

⁴ This would be akin to "Torrance Unified School District Torrance High School.”

⁴." Now, much like how Westerners love giving beautiful, ornate names to institutions and buildings only to subsequently hate pronouncing all of those fancy syllables, Japanese people also do this. While we would normally crop words like "Torrance High School" into something more manageable by pressing words into acronyms based on initials--like "T.H.S."--kanji compounds would be pared down to their more essential pieces. In this case to 市 (designating the type of school: Municipal or "city funded"--versus private or prefectural--from "柏市立") and its location, 柏 (Kashiwa), omitting the values of "高等学校" (high school) as assumed. This leaves us with "市柏". Now that these characters are freed from their original contextual confines, we can talk about reinterpreting the logographs.

No longer appended to the locative “city” kanji (柏市 - Kashiwa-shi, or "Kashiwa city"), 市 is no longer bound to its dependent

⁵ Re: serving as a modifier.

⁵ "on" reading ("shi") but is given over to its "kun" (native) reading as an independent logograph, which is "ichi," giving us "Ichi-Kashi(wa)" instead of "Shi-Kashi." Sometimes 立 (りつ: ”ritsu”) is included in this “abbreviation” (市立柏), but it is not as common.

This happens all over Japan. Even "Nikon" is a cropped compound derived from their founding name, 日本古学 (Japanese Optical): 日(本)古(学) [+ (Zeiss) Ikon].

As a side note, I think this is where we get "Nichigobu" at G.V.B.C.

I know we've spent many years trying to figure out where this comes from (of course, never once asking a Japanese person to spell it out for us). I figure that the original name was "Japanese Language Service," or "日本語部(門) (部門 being a guess meaning "department,” “branch," or "section", though Kotoba! suggests that there are 5 additional common kanji with either on or kun pronunciations of "bu"). This, following the above logic, 日本 can then easily be surmised as 日 (now read with the kun reading "nichi", for "day") as "日語部”, or "にちごぶ" (Nichigobu).

Currently, there are 6,355 accepted Kanji in existence (while only 2,136 are considered "standard"

⁶ 常用漢字 (Jouyou Kanji) - the "regular use" kanji characters modified from the 東洋医学 (Touyou Kanji) list established post World War II, restricting the number of kanji that can be used in newspapers.

⁶) with a countless number of available readings. Logically, multiple available pronunciations eventually lead to divergent uses meaning that each character is quite flexible in its use.

For example, 行 can be used as the verb meaning "to go" (いき), a verb meaning "bound for" [ゆき], a verb meaning "to perform" (おこなう), or even act as a noun to represent "lines of writing" (ぎょう). This problem of homographs, one character with multiple possible readings, which we’ll call “Problem Number 1.2,” is the sort of linguistic charm that I would normally find fascinating, were it not emblematic of the problem of Japanese homophones in general.

Problem Number 2:

Jack Halpern, CEO of the CJK Dictionary Institute, notes that one can say that "Japanese orthography is so highly irregular that it can be considered, without the slightest fear of being accused of hyperbole, to be a couple of orders of magnitude more complex and more irregular than any other major language, Chinese included

⁷ Halpern, Jack. "The Complexities of Japanese Homophones." cjk.org, 23 Jun. 2001, <http://www.cjk.org/cjk/reference/japhom.htm>.

⁷.” His argument that Japanese (writing in particular, but the language in general) suffers from an extremely over-prevalent use of homophones. That while Japanese words, often distinguishable by sight on text, are often ambiguous and usage evident based only on context.

This is an inverse of the problem above: while one kanji character can have a seemingly infinite number of pronunciations linked to the logograph. As is the case with all homophones (such as “there,” “their,” and “they’re”) for the most part, the words sound the same: in Japanese, pronunciations overlap, differing only slightly from others by degrees of emphasis or aspiration or even by bounds

⁸ Such as 硬い, 堅い, and 固い, all are pronounced “katai” (かたい), meaning "hard," while “seikou” (せいこう) has more than twelve disparate meanings, among them being "success" 成功, "steel manufacture" 製鋼, "western suburbs" 西郊 and "sexual intercourse" 性交.

⁸. Jack Halpern offers an interesting example in his introduction, using the phrase "ひのささないやしき" ("A Mansion with no Sunshine"), where he offers 12 different though equally acceptable translations, compounded by the fact that none of six "professional translators and writers" matched the "standard" form suggested by dictionaries.

So, as a new-speaker, how are you to know whether your friend is talking about a flower or a nose, both pronounced "hana" (はな: 花, 鼻)? Or whether it is a bridge, the edge, or chopsticks that are the topic of conversation (“hashi,” はし: 橋, 端, 箸)? Save for context, you can't, really. Every context has an appropriate interpretation and though, maybe contradictory on its surface, is really a truer expression of the concept signified.

In Japan, the balancing of ambiguity (and shades of contradiction) within contextual appropriateness is key to maintaining the function of society: it is the belief that one has a face appropriate for every situation. These are often distilled into two categories: a public/explicit face (the おもて: “omote”) and a private/implicit face (うら: “ura”). While in America, we would posit that two separate and divergent personas is inconsistent and insincere--where who we are is a sum of our disparate parts in unity that must agree and align like concentric circles of revelation around a singular ideological pole--in Japan, a "public" and "private" face that are nothing alike is hardly contradictory and can be quite admirable.

The belief is that by effecting a construct in public, you are not "pretending to be who you are not" for duplicitous personal gain, but, rather, serving a societal/political function. You are agreeing to submit parts of yourself for the purpose of cohabitation and success. We would call that "etiquette," or even “civility.”

The interesting aspect of the omote/ura dichotomy is that these faces are contextually driven: that your ura can be whatever you want it to be as long as your omote is in place when it is expected.

So you can be whoever you want to be when you're at the bar or in the red light district, as long as you are in your chair when the bell rings, wearing a dress shirt and tie. However, this also creates a fascinating dichotomy in which a person's "public life" is not at all impacted by his "private doings." That a businessman can be publicly inebriated after a "business party" is completely acceptable (and often times expected), and does not negatively impact his reputation amongst his colleagues as long as he does not appear at work inebriated.

While in America, it would be assumed that a remarkable business man who gets so drunk on a Tuesday after work that he is literally stumbling out of a hamburger restaurant has personal issues that will inevitably interfere with his ability to function at work (as well as reflect negatively upon the company that hires him), in Japan, the two faces are assumedly both true (that he is both a capable worker AND a lush), and should be seen as a fuller expression of who he is, rather than a contradiction.

Omote extends to virtually all public forms of society: almost as important as being "competent" is looking as if you are competent, and much of the system is based upon one’s ability to “appear” competent more than actual competence. Not, so much, that one is judged by his appearance, but by his ability to appropriate the correct signs for the context (a tie and dress shirt, riding leathers and matching helmet, etc.).

Though it is easy to see how and why the omote has it’s value, alas, it is difficult to see when the ura is allowed to find expression, or if it even has a place in the public space. But even within the two months I’ve spent in Japan has revealed that, though it may rub my Western sensibilities the wrong way and will always be difficult as an outsider to read and understand, the subtleties of personal expression are there; especially at a high school, where the students have not yet fully bought in to the value of the omote.

And, even then this is not to say that the teachers in the room are not merely a collection of suits, ties and indoor shoes. Sometimes it can appear that the amount of personal submission required to function in the public space is a tad overblown, and, really, the omote provides a framework for social stability that leaves just enough space for personal expression. That within the rigid structures there is enough ambiguity and subtlety in aspiration that provides for polyphony of expressions, if you’re attuned to the aspiration and the context. Which is refreshing to me because, even though from the outside much of it looks exactly the same, eventually--even to me--there will become a perceptible difference between 紙, 髪, and 神 (かみ: “kami” - paper, hair, and spirit).

Bunka no Hi

While in Shinjuku on some business last Thursday, I happened into a cozy little bar a stone's throw away from Shinjuku Station

¹ 新宿駅, which happens to be the busiest train station in the world (Guinness approved: the recored people, not the beer).

¹. The warm patter of laughter drifted across the otherwise empty streets as pedestrians and bikers alike criss-crossed down the street like an indifferent autumn breeze. Tempted by the warm glow of the wall-mounted plasma screen and the affable bar tender's constant stream of conversation, I demurely ambled across the street and was beckoned to a seat at the bar and gladly settled in, even though I was only able to understand about 25% of the conversation on hand (50% if you counted "inference" as "understanding" and maybe just 10% if questions were addressed directly to me, it would seem). I had almost forgotten what it was like to sit in front of the warm glow of the TV, make idle small talk, and genuinely hang out with the guys.

Suffice it to say that, when Ken asked if I wanted to snag a dinner in Kashiwa before he headed out to Tokyo a few days later, I figured it would be a great opportunity to check out Hub Pub, a favorite local sports bar. Though, as far as timing went, the scene was a little dead: not that it was empty, no; maybe 1/4 to 1/2 full, and there was some J-League playoff game dominating all 8 screens (in curiously non-HD quality), but there were mostly private parties or TV gawkers. Now, I wasn't expecting anything on the level of Cheers, but after a short mug of Bass, I more than had my fill and wound my way back home to finish season 3 of Breaking Bad.

Anyway, as I was saying, I was in Tokyo to commemorate Bunka no Hi (文化の日), or Culture Day

² Celebrated every November 3rd in honor of the signing of the Post-War Japanese Constitution (signed on November 3, 1946) to promote Japanese culture, art and academic endeavour.

². With a whole day off and no plans, I did what any sensible foreigner would do: hit up Google. In no time I had a schedule of possible activities, from parades and performances in Asakusa (浅草) to upscale kabuki performances in Tokyo (東京), I had a veritable cultural potpourri to pick from. I decided on hitting up the annual "Martial Arts Performances to Honour the Deities" at Meiji Shrine (明治神宮). I mean, what's cooler than Aikido performances, Kobudo ("old-style martial arts and fire-arms") exhibits and the "All Japan archery tournament"? Well, 流鏑馬

³ Yabusame, or 13th C. (Kamakura) "horseback archery".

³, for one.




Archers--regaled in traditional silks, skins and crests--ride at a gallop pace down a 100 yard channel, draw his bow, fire at one target 40 yards from the start, reload, draw, and then fire, again, at a second target maybe some 60 yards from the first

⁴ Think "Ashitaka" in Princess Mononoke (もののけ姫)… Can you believe that movies was made in 1997?

⁴. Despite waking up late and arriving in Harajuku (原宿) at a little before 12, I found myself a snug little corner at the front edge of the SRO groupings mid-way between the two targets. But at 50 yards in, this meant that I was a touch too far to get good shots of the rider barreling down towards the first target, and too early for good shots of the archer drawing up for the second shot, but, even then, it was amazing to see. (Again, all of my pictures from Bunka no Hi can be found on my flickr.)

Okay, okay: so I'll admit that Yabusame was only a part of the reason why I wanted to head down to Harajuku. Yes, it was a BIG part of it, but so was this deal I saw at MapCamera.com, a large used-camera reseller in Shinjuku. And, in keeping with my tradition of respecting each and every Japanese Holiday (…with as little rest and as much travel as possible and…) by spending a ton of cash frivolously, I inevitably came home with this:


A lovingly used Nikkor 28mm AF f/2.8: a more appropriate "portrait" lens for my D7000 (though it is probably more technically correct to call it a "wide angle" lens, with the cropped sensor, I think the 28-35mm is the a representative portrait equivalent to the film standard 50mm).

Wish me "bon voyage" with the new glass! I'm sure you'll see plenty of it.