Sunset Over Lake Kasumigaura

I think we've mentioned before, but in case we haven't, we live next to the second largest lake in Japan. Unfortunately, it's dirty and polluted and you can't swim in it, but it does make for some nice scenery. I remember one time in class, the Japanese teacher asked a student (in English) "Do you want to swim in Lake Kasumigaura?" The purpose being to teach the grammar point of "Do you want to ~ ?" The student gave him a look that seemed to say "I'm not swimming there, you're crazy!" I know a lot of people go fishing there, so I asked the teacher if people ate the fish from there, and he said "Uhh, it is...possible...but uh...I don't want to. It would depend on how hungry you are." So there you go. Anyways, now that Tessa and I are on winter vacation (fuyu yasumi) we need excuses to get out of the apartment (at least before our big trip to Tokyo) for some fresh air, and the lake is a nice enough area to walk, especially right before sunset. See below:

That is a small Shinto (I believe) shrine. You see small shrines like this by the road all over the place.

The Rainbow Tower, Namegata's only claim to fame. It's also pretty boring inside.

This was spray painted on a wall under a bridge. I have no idea why.




Nice shot of the light reflecting off the bridge. It's the best I can do with the crappy 5.0 mega pixel no zoom digital camera we have. That's all for now, we leave for Tokyo on the morning of the 3rd.

Kurisumasu in Japan

In case you didn't know, the Japanese love them some Christmas. It's not a religious holiday over here of course, but a secular one. One of my teachers explained to me how they celebrate Christmas and New Years as the opposite to how they are celebrated in America. For Christmas day they go out and party, and for New Year's, they stay inside and celebrate with family. New Year's is much more spiritual. All the super markets and department stores have Christmas decorations everywhere, and playing Christmas music. Some of the music are the old classics in English, but some are in Japanese. One store has a Japanese version of Santa Claus is Coming to Town playing on a continuous loop. It's all in Japanese, except for the chorus of "Santa Claus is coming to town" and for some reason they throw in a random "merry Christmas" here and there. I have also heard a Japanese Jingle Bells that was similar.

Last week sometime, a friend of ours invited us to a Japanese Christmas party in Kashima put on by the Rotary Club. Yes they have Rotary Clubs. We were pretty nervous, as we didn't know what to expect, and we are both naturally shy when it comes to the unknown, but part of the reason for this whole trip was to do something out of my comfort zone, so we decided to do it. We went to the hotel where it was being held (pretty big for the area) and pushed open the large double doors into the large banquet room. We knew we were a little late, so what would await us on the inside? A lot of Japanese people silently eating, then looking up to see why three foreigners (including our friend) had interrupted them? Naw, not exactly. It was much like I imagine something like that would be in America. A buffet of Japanese and Western foods, and many tables scattered around filled by Japanese people having a grand time, and someone playing Disney favorites on the piano. We got some food and sat down to eat with friends of our friend, and had a good time. At some point, they started having kids play musical chairs for prizes. First, really young kids, then older elementary school aged, then Junior and High school. After that they asked for parents to come up. I laughed and remarked to Tessa that we would (thankfully) not be playing since we didn't qualify. But I was wrong. The slightly tipsy Japanese emcee dragged me up there anyway much to Tessa's delight and my chagrin. Out of like 15 adults, I got second place somehow (with Tessa giggling all the way), and won a box of snack things. Afterward, a random old Japanese man vigorously shook my hand and thanked me for playing. Thankfully, there is justice in this world, as they had another round of musical chairs for adults and dragged Tessa up there. She got FIRST PLACE and won a larger box of snacks. Later in the night they had some kind of raffle and ended up with some nice flowers, and a giant bag of rice (about 30 pounds) that the winner didn't want. It was a really fun night.

We're getting close to Christmas and our winter holiday here. We have to work Monday and Tuesday, then have Wednesday off (national holiday for the Emperor's birthday), then back to school on Christmas eve (what's the point?). We have Dec. 25th through Jan. 11th off, though Tessa has to go back for one day on Jan. 8th for some reason. We love and miss you all. Happy holidays!!!

"Oh the weather outside is frightful..."

Well, just cold, really. We just bought de-icer for our cars, but Chris has only used it once. We have another 2 weeks of school, and then we'll be able to sleep in past the time of day when you need de-icer ;) I've been listening to Christmas music for a little while now, and while it cheers me up, it also makes me pretty homesick. I love this time of year, but it's hard without family and friends. Luckily Chris and I have each other, and we have a lot of fun. I just made him a christmas mix CD for his junior high kids, and I'm already laughing imagining them singing We Wish You a Merry Christmas and Santa Claus Is Coming to Town. (By the way, they call him Santa-san)

I'm sure we'll have more to post about Christmas in Japan, and pictures too! Our town recently put up a great show of lights at the community center, so we'll try getting some snaps. It's not what we're used to, but it'll do for now.

107 days left over here!

Thanksgiving in Japan

Hi patient blog-readers!

Chris and I cooked our own Thanksgiving Dinner yesterday. Obviously the Japanese do not celebrate Thanksgiving (although they do have a national holiday on Nov 23rd called Labour Thanksgiving, but it's not a big deal) so we both had to work on the actual holiday.

Dinner posed a bit of a quandary for us, as we are pretty limited in cooking equipment/resources. The Japanese don't really eat turkey (never seen it once, in 8 months) so that was out of the question. Not that we had an oven to cook one in anyway. We wanted to find something at least a little special to base the dinner around, so Chris cooked up some pepper steaks. I took a step into the unknown and made Beer Cheese Soup for the first time, and cobbled together something that was based in part on an online recipe, as well as what was available in the store. It ended up being pretty tasty, but you wouldn't want a very big helping ;) Good for roll dipping, though. I love yams, so we got the closest thing to them: Imo . I mashed them with some butter and milk, then sprinkled brown sugar over the top - delicious!

We found some kind of odd little cake for dessert, and I also made some no-bake chocolate peanut butter corn flake treats.

All in all, a pretty good mini-feast. We missed our family and friends, but we managed to create some of the normal holiday spirit, and ended the evening by watching Miracle on 34th Street - the movie does start on Thanksgiving, so technically it was all within November traditions. Plus, if you know me you know I start getting pumped for Christmas pretty early, so I was dying to see a holiday classic.

Check out the pics from our little dinner:

"Climbing" Tskuba-san

Last weekend on Sunday (Nov. 8th) Tessa and I climbed Mt. Tsukuba. They call it "Tsukuba-san" (kinda like "scuba-sahn"), the "san" suffix being the same they apply to people to denote honor or reverence. Basically they call it Mr. Tsukuba. Anyways, while it's not the world famous Mt. Fuji, it is locally quite famous, and we have been trying to get a chance to get out there to climb it for a while now. It is 2,877 feet high (for some really interesting historical info go here). It's almost a two hour drive from the trail head, so we left home at about 9:30 am to make a day of it. I have to admit that when we got to the base of the mountain, we were a little intimidated. Both of us have gotten a bit out of shape recently, not having much to do but hole ourselves up in our apartment, so the looming mountain looked quite daunting. We decided that this time we would forgo the actual hiking up the mountain trail in favor of the cable car that takes you up to the middle of the two peaks. Mt. Tsukuba has two peaks, a male and a female side. The cable car is angled like the steep side of the mountain and took us straight up the steep (35% grade at some points) mountainside in ten minutes. Once the cable car got us to the middle of the two peaks, we picked the male side and began the hike up. It was strenuous, but not too far. At the top there was a small Shinto shrine, and we witnessed some people praying at it. Unfortunately, it was a bit foggy at the top, so our view was a bit obscured. Usually one can have a panoramic view of the whole Kanto plane, but alas. Maybe next time. On our way down the peak, we randomly ran into our coordinator from our company. She and her group had hiked all the way up the mountain (next time, I vowed) and poked fun at us for taking the cable car up. We then decided to hike down the mountain, which we did. It took about an hour and a half with rests, and it really wasn't easy. The trail was quite rocky and rooty from all of the trees, but we made it. So yeah, we may not have climbed *up* the mountain, but we climbed *down* it; that has to count for something, right? I'll answer that question, yes, yes it does. The following three days, Tessa's and my legs were INCREDIBLY sore (did I mention we were out of shape?). Walking up stairs was tough, but walking down them was torturous. I also heard later from seasoned Tsukuba-san scalers that going down was more difficult, so there you go. Anyways, we got some great pictures, this area of Japan is really beautiful in the fall, and not too cold yet too. The first picture is from my iPhone of a sunset over Lake Kasumigaura, and you can see Mt. Tsukuba in the distance. I took it about a month ago, but I added it here to give a bit of perspective. Enjoy!

Beautiful sunset. Mt. Tsukuba is left of center in this shot.



The beautiful fall mountainside.

I am conquering Mt. Tsukuba!

Scaling the rocks.

The shrine at the top of the male peak.


Beautiful fall colors at the top of the male peak.


The view of the cable car tracks down the mountainside.

Action shot of the cable car moving down the mountain.

Pros and Cons of Living in a Rural Area

Sorry again for the lack of updates. So as anyone who has read this blog or talked to us since we've been here knows, we live in Japanese farm country. Not just rice mind you, but sweet potatoes ("imo"), corn, pumpkins, persimmons, watermelons, wheat, etc. Most people in this area live the "simple life" of rustic farm folk. Then you have us citified foreigners ("gaijin"). We stick out pretty well here, sometimes getting double takes from people or stares from children. This actually is part of the reason why our jobs exist, to help acclimate Japanese children into seeing a non-Japanese person. It is important in a country where 99% are Japanese and 99.9% are Asian, and especially important in rural area where the numbers are further skewed. Living in this rural area has pros and cons.

Cons: Boring, Isolated, Expensive to Travel
Not much to do here. No nightlife to speak of, and very few people who speak English around us. It's a good thing Tessa and I have each other here, or else I don't think we would be able to do this. There is a feeling of isolation when you know of only one other native English speaker within a 30 minute drive from where we live (and he doesn't really have anything in common with us). There are a few other people we've met around the area, but they live further away, and it's difficult to get together sometimes. Also, if we want to visit a bigger city, like say, Tokyo, it takes a long time and can be pretty expensive. We were thinking of going to Hokkaido for winter break, but couldn't afford the travel, so we are going to spend three nights in Tokyo in January.

Pro: Quiet, Nice Scenery, Inexpensive, Cultural Experience
Hey, what the heck are those things in the sky? Stars? Huh? Being away from a major city center is a nice and quiet life free of bright lights and noise. It is kind of nice. There is also some beautiful scenery and sunsets. It's not nearly as expensive as living in the city, for rent or for buying everyday items. There also is a nice extra cultural experience. Now I know what you're saying, isn't just living in Japan itself a cultural experience? Well yeah, I suppose it is, but living in the sticks gives us a chance to experience a life that few foreigners get to see. It's that kind of experience that I will be able to take with me for the rest of my life.

A couple of weeks ago I heard some drumming coming from outside our apartment, so I went to investigate. Around the corner, I saw a large cart on large wooden wheels sitting in the parking lot of the city hall. It was topped by a large statue of what looked like a Japanese Samurai. Down the street, I saw many Japanese men and children dressed in traditional clothing pulling ropes attached to another one, pulling it down the street. It was also topped by a statue, and a bunch of Japanese men playing traditional flutes and drums. I watched another one get pulled in too. After they were pulled in, the adults kicked back and started drinking beer and Chu-Hi (sorta like a Japanese Mike's Hard drink). At 9:45 am. That's just how they roll here though, I suppose. This was all part of some sort of local town festival. Anyways, I bring this up because I just think that we're pretty fortunate to see this kind of thing. How many Americans have seen these festivities specific to the tiny town of Aso in the small city of Namegata in the rural Prefecture of Ibaraki? Not many. But Tessa and I have, and so will you (in pictures below):











Night shot!

Extra Eigo (English) Lessons

Hi All,

As you are all busy with your own lovely lives, so are Chris and I. Getting settled into life in Japan has meant that posting updates hasn't felt quite as urgent or essential as it once did. We talk to family members and a few friends over Skype fairly regularly, and they get the mundane, every day stories. All the rest of you get is the Big News, which doesn't happen much these days.

Anyway, I thought that I would share a bit about my non-regular lessons. As you know, I teach 5th and 6th graders pre-planned and pre-provided English curriculum. But nearly every day I also teach an extra lesson for one of the 1st-4th grade classes, and these I get to plan myself. The smaller schools combine the 1st and 2nd grades (ichi and ni nensei), or the 3rd and 4th grades (san and yon nensei), and rotate the lessons so I see each grade a few times a month. Because of the length of time between these special classes it's not really feasible to create a progressive English curriculum that we keep building on; the kids usually forget at least 50% of what they learned between classes anyway. As a result, I just plan good stand-alone lessons: Colors, Animals, Food, etc. My goal is for my students to have a good time and to develop a positive association with English (and foreigners).

They generally love me; this is not actually a result of any of my personal qualities. The kids are naturally curious about foreigners and find me a total novelty. I may be the first English-speaking person some of them have ever seen in the flesh, let alone spoken to. They like my blue eyes and light-colored hair. Nearly anything I teach is a) new to them, b)reminds them of the "cool" English TV shows and movies they watch, and c) not real schoolwork, and therefore way more fun.

Many times a day I hear "Hello!" or, "Tessa Sensei, Tessa Sensei!" along with a hodgepodge of English they have learned from me or their older siblings. They love when I eat lunch in their classrooms because it gives them a chance to show off. For example: I'm sitting, eating my rice, and feel a tap tap and one of the kids has leaned over to me to say, "Tessa Sensei, Yes We Can!" (giggle giggle giggle). Or "nice to meechu", or my favorite, "Hello, mayonnaise Yuka!" (they sometimes hear "my name is" as "mayonnaise"). I'm grateful the kids are having fun with me and my lessons, because by the time they're the age of Chris' Junior High students, English class involves actual homework and tests and loses a bit of its cool factor.

These last two weeks I've taught my favorite 1st-4th grade lesson yet: Body Parts & Monsters. Isn't the correlation obvious? ;) First I teach the kids the names of the more basic body parts, we sing Head, Shoulders, Knees and Toes several times (getting faster and faster each time of course), and then I call out Monster body parts for them to draw. For example, 2 green heads or 6 yellow eyes, or 10 short rainbow legs. They have to pass their drawings down the row after adding each body part, so they end up with really funny pictures. Then I have the kids walk around and share their pictures, wishing each other Happy Halloween.

In Japan it seems like personal expression and creativity isn't always encouraged, and valued much less than fitting in with the group. For example, whenever my 5th and 6th graders have to draw pictures of their favorite foods, sports, animals, etc, they all draw things the same way. And if there's a picture in the textbook of what they want to draw, they make sure to copy it exactly. Literally, if kids are drawing grapes, the grapes all look exactly alike. And they get frustrated if they can't make something look "perfect". It's a bit unnerving for me, actually. Anyway, with the Monster Body Parts lesson they kind of had permission to exaggerate and just do whatever they wanted. It was really neat to see so many completely unique monsters ;)

By the way, today marks the 210th day we've been in Japan - we have about 5 months left in this adventure. Coming up, we're going to another Kashima Antlers soccer game on Saturday, a Halloween party with other ALT's on the 31st (still not sure about costumes - no Value Villages over here to find costume pieces at), and looking forward to 3 different Japanese holidays (read - days off!) in November.

Hope Fall where you are is as beautiful as it is in Japan!

-Tessa

Happy Accidents

Yay for happy accidents! Tessa and I were driving through Itako (a town near where we live) looking for an Italian restaurant to got to for Tessa's birthday. We did find the restaurant (though it's unclear whether or not it is currently open for business, I guess we'll find out later) but we somehow also found an amazingly beautiful field of flowers. We didn't even know it existed, but apparently it is free for people to walk through, enjoy, and pick! The weather was nice, and we had a very pleasant stroll among the flowers (that we don't know the name of). Pictures below:







Guarded by Japanese scarecrows!






The flowers that we brought home. And yep, that classy vase was a $3 bottle of wine.

Japanese JHS Student Pop Culture

Aaaaaaand, we're back. Sorry about the lack of updates lately. Tessa and I are done with the summer vacation and back in the rigors of the school year, and we've been too tired/lazy to update. We really, really appreciate you reading though!

So anyway, Japanese Junior High School students, like American JHS students, have their own niche in the realm of pop culture. They are taken in by the various fads of fashion, music, memorabilia, and entertainment that are rife in any capitalist society. I would like to share with you some of the current ones I have witnessed.

First, memorabilia. Almost everything the students bring with them to class has some type of slogan or character imprinted on it. The most popular character (by far) is the character of Stitch from the Disney movie Lilo and Stitch. Disney has a HUGE draw in Japan. I'd say they control almost all of the non-anime cartoon/comics in Japan. Which is not too surprising, given what we know about the Disney company. Tokyo Disney Land is a very popular destination for Japanese vacation goers. The surprising thing is how Japanese culture has latched onto the character of "Stitch", especially given the fact that it was released 6 years ago (in Japan). Though Lilo and Stitch was made by Disney, it was certainly not one of their high budget/high grossing movies. I always thought it was an underrated Disney movie that never got the play it deserved, but in Japan it is EVERYWHERE. Stitch's likeness is by far the most popular cartoon likeness I see on an everyday basis, and I see him on everything from folders to pen cases to random sketches the students draw. I think the allure might have something to do with the Japanese's fascination with Hawai'i, another popular vacation destination. Of course the Pixar movies are well represented, as well as the Japanese anime/manga industry.

Second, music. Ah, to be 13 again. remember the crap music you used to listen to? Well, Japan has the same stuff, just (mostly) sung in Japanese. The J-Pop the kids listen to is mostly terrible, and I sometimes have to listen to it during lunch at the schools. The current faves are: Glay, Greeeen, Hey! Say! JUMP (the "JUMP" stands for Johnny's Ultra Music Power), and many others. They sing pop music in Japanese and sometimes English (hilarity ensues!) but usually the English is confined to a few lines like "Because I love you", etc.

My students also love Japanese comedians. I don't know much about them, but they always want me to say "Toose!" like the Japanese comedian in this youtube video (see it at about 20 seconds in). Whenever I do it, they crack up, but I don't really know why.

That's it for now ja, ne!

P.S. "ja ne" is sorta like Japanese for "see you!"

Undo Kai - Sports Festival!

Since the first day of the 2nd Term (Sept 1st), schools across Japan have been practicing hard for their sports festival. Chris and I have had few lessons to teach (in C's case, none last week) as the students are all extremely busy working on the individual events of the festival, as well as all the transitions between activities, order of events, etc. Families attend the festivals, and if they are involved in the PTA, they may even participate in certain events. Typical of the Japanese culture, order and perfection in the presentation of the school's festivals are almost more important than how the competitions turn out.

Last Saturday, we went to the festival of one of Chris' schools, Sakuragawa Junior High. It took place on the track field, and families basically camped out all around it, sitting on tarps and putting up huge umbrellas. No one wears sunglasses here (too reminiscent of the Japanese mafia, the Yakuza, or so I've heard...) so umbrellas and sun visors are everywhere. Anyway, we got to sit under the teachers' tent with a great view of the action. After what seemed like endless speeches from the Principal, team captains, and random old men (we think they were PTA....?) and a solemn salute to the Japanese flag, things got underway.

The festival lasted all day, and featured such events as sprinting, tug of war with huge rope and bamboo poles, relay races with inflated waist-high colored balls, beanbag toss into baskets on high poles, and the Samurai game. This was one of the most-anticipated events, involving one boy (the "Samurai") sitting on another boy's shoulders with his legs held up by two others. These boys represented the Samurai's horse. Then all the units ran into the middle of the track and the Samurai tried to knock each other off their "horses". No punching or kicking was allowed, but it was still pretty barbaric!! Seeing puny 7th grade boys being wrestled down by huge 9th graders was hard to watch - still, American football's no better. The day also involved the 3 teams (named Galaxy, A Fixed Star, and Comet) doing a cheer routine before each event they competed in.

The elementary school festivals are happening in the next few weeks, and they have some different events. Instead of waist high ball relays, two teams form semi-circle lanes around the track, and try to get huge, 5 foot tall inflated balls pushed down their lane, around a cone, and back up the lane again. There are also dance routines (some humorous, some more traditional), marching bands, and special obstacle relay races where the runners have to grab a card along the way, which tells them which obstacle they have to face: running under a long net, jumping several times through a hula hoop, or running around a standing baseball bat 5 times with their forehead on the handle.

These festivals are all oriented towards building school spirit and team efforts. It's been really fun getting to see these public school traditions!

End of the Summer

Tomorrow is our first day back to school after 6 weeks off. Truth be told, it got boring at times (there ain't much to do where we are if you don't want to spend much money), but we had a lot of fun and relaxed a lot. A few days ago we went to the Ueno Zoo near Tokyo. It was really great, had a variety of animals, though unfortunately no Giant Panda (their famous one Ling Ling died a little over a year ago). Working the last two summers at the Woodland Park Zoo, I couldn't help but compare the two, and while you probably have a little better view of some of the animals, their living areas often seemed a little too small and sparse. WPZ in Seattle has some really amazing natural-looking enclosures. Pictures of the zoo trip at the bottom.

We also had a really fun BBQ on Saturday in Kashima on the beach with some other English-speaking ALT friends. Good people + good food = good times. We had wagyu beef burgers (!!) and fresh scallops cooked over the grill on their own shells (!!) along with chicken, veggies, chip and salsa, etc. A nice Western-style BBQ this time. Afterwards we went lakeside and viewed perhaps the best fireworks show we've ever seen.

I'm going to let this go now, with woah there's a typhoon going on outside (see Tessa's post below about it) and today I've had my worst allergy attack in months. Yecchh! Anyways, bye for now!