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August 25th, 2009

10:26 am - Two Lovely New Pieces In My Artfire Shop Current Mood: creative

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July 3rd, 2009

01:29 pm - Goddess Joy Designs I wanted to introduce you guys to the jewelry of a friend of mine, Goddess Joy Designs. Joy makes beautiful, earthy pieces. Her work has been a serious influence on me lately... For example: That's a tiny bottle of mouse bones, from an owl pellet! Her work is vibrant, powerful, and really gorgeous. Every week, she and I get together and spend a day playing with pretty shiny things together, and every week I have some new awesome idea that germinates from our time together. So, I wanted to take the time to share her work with you guys. Hope you enjoy poking around in her shop. She also has tons more beautiful pictures of her work on her Flickr page. Current Mood: fond

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April 3rd, 2008

12:18 pm - Public Speaking Blog An old friend of mine has started a blog about public speaking, and how to become more comfortable with it. I thought some of you might be interested. He's trying to get it known, so if you know anyone who would enjoy it, please do pass it along -- I'm trying to help him get it some visibility. Speak Week Current Mood: cheerful

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September 9th, 2005

04:41 pm - This is not a drill. I've been in the process of making my journal friends-only for a while now. I'm working my way back to my entries from Japan, and I'm still debating whether to lock those as well. For now, those are staying public, and I'll decide what to do about them later. From here on out, all entries will be minimally friends-only. I have also pared my friends list down to mostly people I know both intimately and in 'real life,' so if you were removed from the list, it's not a slight on you in any way, I'm just taking this journal to a new level of intimacy and decided that you were probably unlikely to be interested. If you're upset about it, feel free to email me at the address on my user info page. I'm happy to consider opening myself up to people on a case-by-case basis, but on a large scale I'm not yet willing to have the levels of vulnerability and authenticity that I plan on instilling in my journal from now on be open to the public at large. Perhaps I never will be, perhaps next week I'll decide to remove the friends locks. I can't say anything for sure. This is where I stand right now. Now I'm going to go eat the rest of my calzone and watch a stupid movie. It's Friday night. Current Mood: thoughtful Tags: reflection, relationships, revelation, self-image

August 2nd, 2004

03:12 pm - Oh, California... Joni's version came at me one week before I left Johen as I was driving along a winding Ehime highway, and I began to sob as I dove through the tunnels and spilled out into the summer sunlight reflecting off the fishing boats. Here's mine, and it says everything so far. Reading the news and it sure looks bad They won’t give peace a chance That was just a dream some of us had Still a lot of lands to see, But I wouldn’t want to stay here It’s too old and cold and settled in its ways here Oh, but California... California I’m coming home... I’m going to see the folks I dig I’ll even kiss a sunset pig California I’m coming home I met a fisherman on a Japanese isle Who taught me slang and stayed up late He gave me back my smile But he kept my book to translate Oh the sea, the blue green slides They cooked good chawan and nabe And I might have stayed on with them there But my heart cried out for you, California Oh California, I’m coming home Oh, make me feel good, TMBG band I’m your biggest fan California, I’m coming home It gets so lonely When you’re walking And the streets are full of strangers All the news of home you read Just gives you the blues And it gets so lonely When you’re walking And the streets are full of strangers All the news of home you read More about the war And the bloody changes Oh will you take me as l am? Will you take me as l am? Will you? Current Mood: natsukashii

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July 16th, 2004

04:35 pm - Last Day at Sozu My goodness... I just had my last day at Sozu Jr. High and Elementary. Ayaka, Kakeru and Erina (the Jr. High kids in their entirety - huzzah for small schools!) and I made okonomiyaki together, and had a lovely little going away party in the science room over good food and singing, and they made me beautiful going away cards. The elementary kids all gathered in the gym after lunch, and they all drew my portrait and gave me letters they had written, then we took pictures. I got 2 pictures with each student individually, and then two of the whole elementary school all together. I will try to find some way to post them, because they are priceless. The letters they wrote for me are heart-explodingly cute. (Oh, speaking of heart explodie, I watched Kill Bill 2 last night, and was very pleased. Just a little side-note. I want to talk about that more later, but right now it's all Sozu.) The portraits ranged from surprisingly detail-oriented to fabulously impressionistic. Rensui, the new 1st grader I wish I had more time to get to know, drew me in an orange sweater (I am wearing a black tank and blue button-down shirt, but he said he liked me better in orange. I do not own an orange sweater. I adore this child.) and made my silver necklace red because he thought it made more sense that way. I am also pleased to note that many child portrait-drawing techniques are the same between America and rural Japan, including making arms and legs long, thin rectangles and adding an appropriate number of little bubbles to the end for fingers. I am immensely fond of how that looks. I gave everyone Dum Dums, said my goodbyes, played final games of English-version Rock Paper Scissors with the younger kids, got tons of hugs and handshakes, and finally trundled back over here to wait for the bus. Which comes in about 10 minutes, so I should go pack my stuff up and head out to the stop, for the last time. *whimper* Tonight I have my farewell party with all the teachers from Johen Jr. High. And I haven't even had time to tell you about the party last night yet! I took some good pictures. Later. Current Mood: natsukashii

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July 15th, 2004

04:20 pm - Purty Flowers Don't Get Put On Hold Ok, I think I have a ticket home reserved. E-mail with specifics forthcoming to those what needs ta know (i.e. The Boy&Co... if you think you are deserving of the itinerary and don't hear from me soon, do let me know) but the barebones basics are that I'll be coming back through Vancouver much as I did over x.mus, but with only about 3 hours of layover as opposed to last trip's 11. Cheer with me, will you? As I was sitting on hold, I made a lovely doodle of purty flowers, and cherubim carrying a flowing ribbon banner that read in lovely curly script, 'purty flowers don't get put ON HOLD'. It cheered me immensely. Now I have to go home and clean up the apartment a bit, so that my supervisor can come see it and we can talk about cleaning it before Cassandra arrives. And then off to the second good-bye party this week. Here's to chuu-hais and karaoke. Current Mood: excited

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02:05 pm - Kurosawa Returns! My old supervisor, Mr. Kurosawa, came to school today to say goodbye... Everyone is saying goodbye to me now, although I don't leave for a good 15+ days... It's very sad. What with the goodbye party with the Sozu teachers night before last, my goodbye party with the town officials and principals of my schools tonight, and the Johen Jr. High goodbye party tomorrow night, I feel like I'm just going to be hanging out for the next 2 weeks, stuck in that awkward "we've already said our farewells, exchanged gifts and addresses, and now we're just kind of shifting our weight from foot to foot and waiting for my bus to leave" limbo... Although how much I'll actually see people next week is debatable, as school will be out for summer and I will be cleaning, packing, cancelling up a storm and stressing my little head off. (Don't you wish you were me? Doesn't my life sound fun! Oooh, do I whine and whimper!) So Mr. Kurosawa just showed up, and I heard the familiar but long-missed call of "Emi-chan! Emi-chan!" and leapt from my chair to go find him. He looks really happy, I think retirement must be agreeing with him. He's in khakis and a polo shirt, and he's stopped dying his hair, so he looks all relaxed and groovy now. He gave me a beautiful Japanese fan (to use now, and put on my wall in America, he informed me), and a small gift to bring back to rubicantoto as well. The sweetheart! I do so adore my Kurosawa. He and I are going to go out for zarusoba sometime next week, as we never did get to do that last time. I'm very excited. I was a little worried I might not get to spend much time with him again before I left, so I'm glad we're arranging a lunch date. Sidenote- even though we have splendid, arctic-quality AC in the teacher's room, Dolly Parton keeps opening the window right behind me, and letting the hot, moist, icky-humid muggy air come billowing in over my desk. She also smells inexplicably like beef jerky today. Huh? So I keep closing it and trying to let this room be the oasis of chilly in a desert of hot steam. Current Mood: ecstatic

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July 1st, 2004

11:15 am - The LJ People Come Through For any other paid users on my friends list who might have missed it, LiveJournal is doing their damnedest to make it up to us that the site has been so flickery the last month or so, and so anyone who had a paid account during the month of June are eligible for an instant 2 weeks of extended paid membership, even if your paid account has since expired. Alternatively, if you have plans to purchase 6 or 12 months of service during the next week, you're eligible to receive 2 additional months of service for free. Both offers can be found for the next 7 days on the Paid Time Reimbursement page, and they apply to any eligible account you manage (communities, etc). Yay, extra paid account time! This is why I love the LJ techies so much. They play fair, they fight like gentlemen*, and their spiffiness seems to know no bounds. *re 'fight like a gentleman.' Yes, this applies also to the ladies. I, for instance, always do my best to fight like a gentleman. It's about style, class, and not being a coward or a cad, it has absolutely nothing to do with gender in any direction. So there. Current Mood: gratified

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June 30th, 2004

03:45 pm - Blather, Rinse, Repeat. The subject-line is my new favorite invented phrase. Through a random, curiosity-impelled Google search just after it popped into my braincase, I found that (q'uelle surprise) I am not the first person to stumble upon its loveliness, but nonetheless I still came up with it independently and so, like my brilliant revelation of roller skates (or more illustratively, the epiphany of "imagine if we didn't have to walk... imagine... shoes with WHEELS!") at age 4, I still consider it mine. I just have to share it with the other geniuses of my caliber who also invented it. If only the patent office were as diplomatic and beneficent as I. And, incidentally, to detail how my roller skates would have far surpassed conventional models, particularly those within the "invented by the under-5" sector, the wheels on MY rollerskates were more like steam-roller wheels rather than car wheels. It was also coupled with the idea of one or two walking sticks that one could use to propel forward, either gondola- or cross-country-skiing-style. I drew up some rough drafts of my plan before I was reminded that something similar already existed, and sadly I gave up before my duowheel personal gondola system was perfected. Anyway. I was just thinking about the phrase "a word to the wise." I used it in a comment to skipperdee, and it occurred to me that while in that case it was absolutely apropos, as I do consider her quite a sage little turtle, it seems on the whole to be kind of a strange thing to say when giving advice. Wouldn't it be more fitting to say "a word from the wise"? The best I can find is references to an (often labeled as 'British') idiom "a word to the wise is sufficient," meaning all a wise person needs hear is one word and they can glean the entire meaning. And now that I think on it a little more, it occurs to me that whenever I heard my parents use it, it was always followed by a one-word admonition or advisory. "A word to the wise: Don't" etc. Hmmmm. In a similar but slightly off-topic vein, I have just recently discovered that my electronic dictionary, for which I am ever-grateful in vocab-intensive situations like drinking parties and English conversation class, has an entire database of Japanese idioms, or 'kotowaza' as they call them. There are books about Japanese culture. There are books that translate and then explain Japanese idioms and sayings. But to my knowledge, there is no book that gives Japanese idioms or sayings and then provides the cultural context in which they become more easily understood. Right after I tackle the other five novels I want to write, this possibly Sisyphusian task is next on my list. I really, really like words. I think it surprises people sometimes when they give me a tidbit of etymology, some fabulous local dialectic regularity, or an unexpected kanji compound or radical useage (sorry I know I'm drifting into the linguaphiliacally esoteric now, but if you don't know what I'm talking about, you can substitute "spiffy linguistics stuff that Emi goes nuts for" in place of all the ridiculous terminology in this paragraph) that they find passingly interesting, and then watch me go into spasms of unabashed glee as I ponder on it. I learned the local slang-word for 'cool, awesome, amazing' the other day from Shigeto, and he was baffled that I wanted to know it because, as he put it, "nobody outside of Minamiuwa County will understand you when you say it..." GAINA! (that was the word, by the way, as well as the reaction.) I tested it out at dinner later that night, and everyone was floored. One of them even told Shigeto to stop teaching me "bad Japanese." Oh, the horror! I told him later that if he stopped, I wouldn't teach him any more English slang either. We agreed to continue corrupting each other linguistically, because it is just too good not to. I have chicken curry waiting at home, and I can go in 15 minutes. It's hotter than Hell's hinges in Johen now, we have fully entered into the nasty mugginess of summer, and yet for some reason, they keep turning the AC off. My poor little cardboard fan finally gave in at the crease where it bends as I flap it, and I had to cello-tape two paperclips perpendicular to the fold to provide stability. But now it makes a tape-creaky noise when I use it. Nobody else seems to notice, but man is it bugging me. I am bringing my beautiful hand-fan that Karlee gave me for my birthday with me tomorrow. It is designed for long-term use that this little disposable gas station hand-out one really wasn't ready for. I also just came across this song that rubicantoto put onto my computer when I was home (your guess how it slipped under the radar until now is as good as mine) and I can't stop listening to it. I'm hopelessly addicted to this song. Yesterday it was in my headphones as I walked home from work, and I laid down stripped to my skivvies in my cool bedroom on my cool bedsheets with my fan blasting full arctic mode across my skin while I listened to it on repeat and sang to myself blissfully. It was one of those "one with the universe" moments, where I could feel energy coursing up into my feet from the ground, and it propelled me forward, and I could feel a smile coursing out across my face from my lips to the tips of my ears, like a paper towel takes spilled water, the capillary action of intense happiness. It was forefront in my mind that my time here is coming quickly to a close, but it manifested that afternoon as an increased openness- I absorbed all my impressions as I walked. The creaking metal panel on the old house, the rushing water under the small concrete bridge, the smell of warm laundry drying outside the apartments, the golden glow of afternoon sunlight on the weeds growing between the logs in the woodworking shop yard, the contrast of the amber traffic light against the sky, the beating wings of the birds from their nest as I felt the bolt slide back in my door as I twisted the key... Heightened isn't the word, but perhaps enriched is. It's comforting that there is at least one other person who understands that sometimes, you can love something with all your heart, and still want to leave it behind. A new favorite smell is Japanese calligraphy ink. One of the teachers next to me is making a hand-brushed sign for an event at the school this weekend. I am glad to be in Johen. I will be glad to be in America. I am looking forward to looking back on all of this and missing it immensely. I am plugging in my iPod, queuing up my Frou Frou, packing Marlene away in her laptop bag, and wandering back to my apartment for some air conditioning, dancing alone in my kitchen, re-warmed chicken curry with yuzu-pon, knitting, and silly movies. Current Mood: grounded Current Music: 'Maddening Shroud', Frou Frou

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June 29th, 2004

02:55 pm - The Weekend That Wasn't, and Last Day at Midori So on Saturday, Karlee and I went out to Uchiumi to help Joe with an International Party. We each prepared an ingredient list for a food from our country, and a game to play with the kids. At the Uchiumi party we got to cook with the kids, then have a lovely lunch of our foods supplemented with a generous supply of curry and rice. There was also an amazing (and possibly not work-safe, depending on the level of anti-nudity subscribed to) statue at the community center where we held it. The kids left not only knowing what American banana splits were all about, but also Australian fairy bread (bread with butter and sprinkles! Sprinkles!!) and British pancakes (very much like crepes. In fact, I would hazard to say almost exactly like crepes, only slightly heavier) tasted like. They also knew how to sing 'Old MacDonald' for at least 30 minutes, learned how to play musical chairs, and became proficient at the finer points of Simon Says. It was a grand party. We went back to Joe's apartment and hung out for a while, and watched some episodes of 'The Young Ones' he had on tape, journeying outside for a moment to try to take a walk but ended up getting caught in one of the many sudden rainstorms and being drenched to the skin. Frolicsome! Then, Joe's supervisor took us out for dinner to thank us, and as I had driven, I was the only sober one at the table after the rest of them finished off a bottle of gold flake shochu (Japanese grain alcohol) between the four of them - Karlee was sticking with ume sours, and I had my oolong tea. One of the teachers had really long and well-kept pinkie nails, while the rest were trimmed down. After he was a little toasty, I asked him about them and he told me it was an old Japanese tradition - he demonstrated in pantomime how helpful it can be if you have something in your ear, or if the inside of your nose itches. How utilitarian. It's a portable q-tip. He presented the three of us (Joe, Karlee and myself) with pink freshwater pearl cellphone straps, telling us that the pearls of Uchiumi were the best in Shikoku (and therefore, obviously, the best in Japan, was the reasoning) and that the pink were the most prized of all. It was really touching. He also invited Karlee and me back for Joe's goodbye party and told me I had to take a taxi so we could get drunk, as he'd heard rumors that I could hold my liquor. I accepted the challenge, but we'll see what happens. Joe's supervisor is a hoot. He has given himself the appellation of Joe's "Japanese father" and is visibly sad whenever Joe's return home is mentioned. On Sunday, I came over to Johen Jr. High to help Tetsu give a vocabulary and sentence memorization test to the 1st years. I was a little more lenient than I think he wanted me to be, but it is just too hard to give a kid a zero when you can tell he's got most of the words and only slightly the wrong order, so I gave everyone at least the first question's points, and nobody left my test room without a Dum Dum in their pocket to take home and eat. Hey, I have to get rid of these. I need all the room in my suitcase I can get. Yesterday was my last day at Midori Elementary. The kids were precious and sweet, and we had a fabulous last day together. During last period, they threw a goodbye ceremony for me in the gym, where they serenaded me when I came in, presented me with message cards with pictures of me with each class in the middle and messages from all the kids written around the sides (all up on my wall now, naturally) as well as doing a whole-school choreographed song and dance about a very genki baby kangaroo, and playing an amazing game of double-elimination rock-paper-scissors. At the end, I gave a speech and thanked all of them for their hard work in my class and especially for being so enthusiastic and fun to teach. A first-year called out "don't forget us!" and so I assured them all there was no way I could ever forget this year with them. Then, they paraded me back out of the gym through a promenade of the kids lined up on either side. If you have never been escorted by trumpet fanfare through a walkway of Japanese elementary schoolchildren all cheering your name, waving happily with shimmering jazz-hands, you haven't truly lived. It is an experience worth seeking out. I left them my email address and told them to please keep in touch and to feel free to ask me any questions about American culture or English that they had. They looked apprehensive until I added that the emails could of course be in Japanese, then everyone's faces melted into gratitude and excitement. (And that was the teachers.) Soo cute. Today, Tetsu is in Matsuyama taking his driving test to get his license, so it has been very quiet for me. WoWoW has gone into "all soccer, all the time" mode for the Euro 2004 tournaments, and so my source of good night-time movie viewing has unexpectedly crapped out on me. So, I went and rented some movies from the local place. Watched 'The Gift' last night. Hmm. That was a bit of a let-down, even if I did get plenty of Cate Blanchett prettiness to look at. Tonight? Either 'X-Files,' 'The Lone Gunmen' spin-off, or 'Scary Movie.' I get downright hedonistic in my self-indulgence when I am renting movies only for myself. I'd better get it out of my system before I get back home, I will have to get back into the swing of rental compromise with rubicantoto. Oh, and if the links didn't give it away - there are new pictures up in the June Album. Possibly the last batch, as I don't think anything exciting is happening tomorrow that will be worth photographing. Heading into the last Gallery Album of Japan... *sniffle* Current Mood: jittery

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June 25th, 2004

04:24 pm - Fraidy Cats I just wrote this as a comment in another friend's journal. She is going to be joining the JET program as one of the newbies in about a month. Her entry was talking about the thing that makes the largest number of JETs cancel at the last minute. Not a sudden superior job offer. Not a family emergency. Not a physical injury. Fear. They convince themselves they can't do it, and so after over a year of working and competing for one of the coveted positions, they cancel. They just walk away. It's too frightening. Here is what I said to her, and I liked it so much I decided I wanted to hold onto it, because it is, I believe, one of the most important things I have learned in this last year. --- I am going to give you a statistic that the JET representative at the San Francisco Embassy gave me: More than 75% of JET cancelations come in between three and two weeks before departure. Suddenly when it isn't "next year," "six months from now," or even "one month from now," when it enters into weeks and weeks translate into days, people become terrified. They get cold feet. They lose their nerve. They convince themselves they can't do it, it's too real now, too big. And so they bail. Now, far be it for me to speak too ill of the people who cancel - Heck, I wouldn't even be here if it weren't for some girl in New York state getting cold feet, but on the other hand... There is a lot to be said for facing your fears head on and blazing into something despite being afraid. It's that first run down a ski slope. The first jump off a diving board. The first day at a new school. It is terrifying, and up until the very last moment, up until that point of no return, there is part of you that wants to run back to safety. But then who would know how to ski, or dive? Who would ever graduate? It sounds oh so cheesy. But it's what kept me from cancelling one week before I left. I realized that I was SUPPOSED to be afraid. That was what was going to make it so incredible. And it SO has. It has been emboldening, strengthening, amazing, awe-inspiring, and just generally splendid, and I would stand there at the international terminal and physically push the hesitant JETs onto those planes myself, if they would let me. Go you for being so determined and so strong. And ESPECIALLY go you for being so honestly, unabashedly afraid. Revel in the fear of it. Enjoy that sensation, it's your gauge for how awesome you are about to be. You are going to be the person who walks head-on into it. Booyah. Come on in! It's so, so cool in here. --- Current Mood: jubilant

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09:36 am - All Right, People... It's Official. I now know exactly when I am coming back to the states. And it isn't when we thought it would be. This was originally going to be a bit of a surprise, but rubicantoto and I talked last night and decided to announce it publically and let the cat out of the bag. (Eugh. Cat. I can't talk about cats right now. I had a truly wicked dream last night. Maybe more on that later.) I will be flying home at the end of July. July 31st has been approved as my departure date, and my new supervisor is reserving plane tickets sometime soon, if he hasn't already done so. (Yeah, I finally went and met my new supervisor, did I mention that? I think perhaps I did.) This means I will be hitting American soil in 36 days. Have your hugs, snuggles, un-subtitled DVDs, questions, and 2-liters of DP handy. We're re-integrating the gaijin back into American culture. This does also mean I only have 36 days to say goodbye to everyone, pack, clean the apartment, sell my car, and to cancel my WoWoW channel, cell phone, and bank account. Mrrrrr... Just so everyone knows, I am fully expecting a welcome home party. It really shouldn't be immediately upon my arrival, as I expect I will be intensely jet-lagged, culture-shocked, tired, sad to have just left Johen, confused by all the foreigners and English suddenly surrounding me, and just generally blinking my eyes in overstimulated confusion... But after the dust has settled, there needs to be large-scale felicitation. rubicantoto, doctor_samuel, hanashibeta, rhosyn_du, karmakanic, and ex_nihilo (and kion, I hear you too are gifted in this arena), I fully authorize all of you to theme-ify this fete to your heart's content. I will help arrange a date and time, and I will help provide some goodies, but know that some of the most important aspects lie in your lovely, capable hands. This post is going up about one month before I come back, so you all have plenty of warning. Those of you who saw me over X.mus break got a little taste of the re-entry shock that I think is awaiting me in far greater dosage when I come back permanently, and so please understand if I put myself in a bit of a social quarantine when I first get home - it's for your own safety. I love you all, and I know you are all very forgiving people, but honestly - none of my friends (much less my sweetest and closest) deserve to get accusatorially sobbed at in Ikea. That's just silly. So, that is my big announcement. Are you bouncing yet? I am! Current Mood: Bouncing, duh!

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June 22nd, 2004

02:42 pm - Track and Field! In a Pool! So not so much of the track. And not so much field, neither. So today was the county's track and field competition, and I decided to attend the swimming competitions because not only do I find it far more interesting to watch than the track races, but there is a lovely shaded area where the teachers and judges sit, and my pale, pale skin prefers shade to blazing sunlight on bleachers. Which for me are far from nominally appropriate - more like... broilers. So I chose not to go sit on the broilers for four hours. (Always a good move, I feel.) The Misho swim team is far more powerful than ours, and they took almost all of the awards and whatnot, but we did get one nice trophy, and I was happy to sit and cheer for the kids. I was feeling trepidatious (trepid-what-ous? -acious? -itious? trepidacious? Is that a word? That is, is it a word I didn't just invent? HALT!) *one ridiculously long and convoluted google and online dictionary search later* Ok, so it would appear that the overwhelming vote is that neither trepidatious nor the alternative trepidacious are considered acceptable words. One of the spellings has in fact been added to the list of "worst non-words in English," although the various implications of that list are more than slightly abhorrent to me, as it all smacks rather harshly of linguistic imperialism... As a fan of the anthimeriage* (not to mention other tropes in general, but that's another discussion) and other language and word-play that I am, I tend to get irritated when people make big wet-blanket lists of "words someone made up and are therefore BAD and UNUSABLE and not at all funny." Wow, I got way off-track. What was I talking about? Ahhh yes. My trepidation. So, as I was saying, I was feeling trepidatious (TAKE THAT! I don't think 'trepid' even sounds like a word, anyway, never mind that it's less fun) about going to the swim meet, but couldn't quite put my finger on my issue until I got there and remembered the last one, which was about a year ago. And I remembered that I hadn't been introduced to the students yet at that point, and so they had all been staring at me with this confused "Who the heck is that, and why is she watching us swim?" look on their faces, I still didn't know my way around Johen yet, I hadn't met the other ALTs, and I'd only barely met the teachers. But this time, I was the awesome Emily sensei with her awesome sunglasses and her awesome fan, and all of them wanted to borrow my fan, wear my glasses, chat in English and sit by me, and it was all in all a far improved experience. If I needed more things to show me just how much has happened in the last blink-of-an-eye year, this morning was fabulously illustrative. And tonight to celebrate Johen Jr. High's athletic prowess, the teachers are all going out to a... Yeah, you guessed it - Drinking Party! I'll give juicy details on that tomorrow. *eruthros rocks my world. Current Mood: Less foreign

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June 21st, 2004

01:51 pm - Houseguests, Typhoons, Adrenaline-induced Heart Attacks... So frozenbears is now off on the next leg of his journey. It was a kick having him here, and I feel like we are much closer now than we were before he came, which is fantastic. Nothing like letting someone live in your rural Japanese apartment to help really cement a friendship. (Eh, nyquest? Eh, doctor_samuelFromTheFuture?) And he left just before all this typhoon craziness started up, lucky boy. This morning at school was vaguely unpleasant. There is a teacher here at school who is known for being fairly... forceful... in her verbal expression of dissatisfaction in anyone up to and including the highest authorities, and all the way down to the students. She regularly gives these little tirades at people in pretty harsh tones. She's come up in my journal before, under various guises. You might remember the Dolly Parton reference. I don't really have a pseudonym for her yet, but due to her demeanor and resemblance, I'm leaning towards something like Demon Doll. (Devil Doll she most certainly does not deserve - she is far too cool, and that's already my nickname for a high school friend I hold in very high esteem.) Anyway. Demon Doll leapt on me the moment I arrived at my desk, sternly lecturing me to clean my desk. Apparently some flyers and other random pieces of paper had been dropped at my desk on Friday when I wasn't here. So she was lecturing me to clean up things that had appeared since the last time I was at my desk. And she was doing so by shaking a finger in my face first thing in the morning, literally before I'd even put my bag down or pulled out my chair. Interestingly, my desk is never messy, I just have one stack of my teaching textbooks in a far corner as far from her things as possible, and my tiny little desk calendar. And there was nothing to indicate that I wouldn't have collected and recycled these myself in the next 3 minutes or so, had she not detained me to bark at me about my desk. The worst part is she assumes I don't understand her Japanese, and so frequently resorts to one-word English commands like "Clean! Clean!" while pointing pantomimically at the papers and making gigantic 'cleaning' gestures, which surely must increase my desire to do her bidding. Having just trudged to school in the driving typhoon rain (more on that in a moment), I didn't really have a spare ray of sunshine to beam back at her and so I resorted to something I really try not to do here - I responded to her in regularly-speeded vernacular English, with a quickfire "I will clean it off in a minute as soon as I get my stuff set down and sort through it to see what I want to keep." It wasn't the best handling of the situation, but it certainly made it stop. In retrospect, a polite Japanese response would have been the more diplomatic choice, but I feel that it's best not to set a precedent I don't want to continue - this is the first time she's lectured me, and I sincerely hope it's the last, because I am incredibly impatient with people who feel a need to tell me what to do. I used to put up with a large amount of that sort of bossiness, but some point around the beginning of college, I must have hit critical saturation, because I just hit a breaking point and have zero tolerance these days. Anyway. About that typhoon... Today, the kids didn't even come to school until after lunch, and they are talking about sending them home early, because the biggest typhoon yet this year is headed straight for our fair village. The winds they are a-howling, the trees they are a-whipping around like mad, and the rain it is a-pelting. Umbrellas will not help you- the wind is too strong, and besides, what good is an umbrella when rain is smacking onto you from all sides horizontally? A raincoat will not help you unless it extends down to (and for maximal puddle-protection, underneath) your feet, and is also a magically humidity-free zone. That's the weird part. You get soaked just by the ambient humidity, you don't even need to be in the rain. The teacher's room is the one grace-given area of dehumidifying AC, and so fortunately although all classes have been suspended today, I am still able to sit in comfort at my beautiful PowerBook and tak-tak-tak away to my heart's content, basking in her radiant, titanium-clad glory. Except when she gets ornery. A moment ago, I opened her back up after running to the post office to pay off a postal order for the litho print I bought on Thursday (yeah I want to take pictures of it and post them -- it is magneeeeeeeeeeficent! and also hanging over my couch! Real artwork in my apartment! And just one month before I leave. Snuck in under the wire on that one.), and the screen turned into a scrambled, vibrating wall of what gibberish would look like if it were written in color instead of words. I panicked. I stroked her gently, trying to soothe out whatever demons had possessed my precious G4. When that didn't work, I closed the lid again and sat here for a moment trying to think how I was going to survive my last month with no laptop. Visions of being forced into the Realm of Grace The Frumpily Surly any time I wanted internet access, and not to be overly dramatic but I swear my eyes teared up. When I re-opened my G4 to try a restart, however, she had returned to her happy little normal screen as if nothing had happened. I think she was angry at me because I muttered something vaguely unlady-like at her last night when something went a little awry. (It was entirely my fault, and I have now apologized to her and made some offerings to appease her.) I'm hoping we can work through this little bump in our relationship and move forward with a greater understanding of the other's needs. On a total sidenote, rubicantoto woke me up this morning with a "no news, I just love you and hadn't talked to you in a while" phone call. It put me in a fantastic mood that even the desk lecture was unable to really dent. Current Mood: frustrated Current Music: a vague post-adrenaline rush ringing in my ears

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June 17th, 2004

12:38 pm - Lions and Tigers and frozenbears, Oh My! So as I mentioned in my last post, frozenbears has arriven in my fair town of Johen. (It's not a typo. I just like irregular verbs, and am doing my part to foment a little bit of anarchy in this stagnant tongue of ours. And 'stagnant tongue' sounds really icky. And first syntax student to mention 'foment' gets a chopstick in the eye.) We have been having a great time, arranged as it is around my work schedule, but that has worked out pretty well so far - he has been encouraging a very low-key visit, without too much running around, which is great for me, as I can just show him what everyday life is like here by bringing him along for the ride. Yesterday, Tetsu and I gave a demo lesson to about 35 other English teachers from around the county. Our lesson was with the 3rd year advanced students on the grammar point "have been to ~". So we played one of my favorite games, 2 Truths And A Lie. The students wrote three sentences of the form "I have been to ___." Two were true, one wasn't. Then they broke into teams and tried to guess each other's lies, got points, and then the leaders of the teams came to the front and the teams all competed against each other for the final round. And at the end, the winning team got Dum Dum lollipops. I am finally getting rid of some of the 200-count bag of Dum Dums I brought from Costco with me when I came, as originally I'd been told we weren't allowed to give food in class. But I asked for clarification finally, and they said as long as I made it clear these were to be taken home and then eaten, it was OK to give them as prizes for games and such. So I have become quite generous with the lollipopping. After school, there was to be a drinking party (NOMIKAI!!) and Tetsu told me I was welcome to invite frozenbears along with us for it, which made me super happy as it was a chance to share that decidedly non-tourist view of Japan with another foreigner friend of mine, so off we trundled to a new restaurant for what turned out to be the farewell party for Shaun, Joe, and myself, as the departing JETs of this year, with Aaron and Karlee there as the staying expatriot senders off. So it was even more flash than usual, with truly spectacular food including a half-shrimp-half-lobster looking creature that according to the people at the party wasn't anywhere else in the world really except for here. We joked that southern Ehime is so removed from the rest of the world, even the sea creatures haven't gotten the memo that they're extinct. So we had some tasty prehistoric sea monsters along with the normal bill of fare, and frozenbears was delightfully welcomed in, as the party was entirely JETs and their English teachers from the schools, so there was no language barrier for him. Afterwards, Sunao (Shaun's English teacher, and chairman of the English Teaching Board of Whatever) suggested that we had to give our guest the proper introduction to Japanese drinking parties, namely taking him to karaoke afterwards. I was amenable, naturally. So off we trundled to Star Rich, and proceeded to have a fabulous time crooning like crazies for two hours and having a fabulous time. Aaron, Joe and Karlee came along with Sunao, Tetsu, Yasuoka sensei (the English teacher from a different school) and the two of us, and we sang such memorable hits as 'Bohemian Rhapsody' (complete with headbanging), 'Video Killed The Radio Star', and I even threw in the two Japanese songs of the night, 'Sakura' and 'Shima no Uta' as our self-proclaimed theme for the evening was 'Memories,' and those are two songs that will forever mean 'Johen' to me, and that have fabulous sappy nostalgia value at karaoke. We even got frozenbears himself behind the mic once in a while. He said when we got home that he thought the alcohol probably helped with that. I can't argue with that assessment, it is a proven fact that alcohol applied liberally beforehand does ease the transition into karaoke significantly, and has been known to even create in the test subject an actual and intense desire for that cozy little room with the microphones and uncomfortable booth seats. We got home around midnight (having gone to the first party at 5pm - that's the best part is the longevity of these affairs,) and stayed up chatting until about 1am when it occurred to me that I had work the next day. So I am good and drowsy today, and kept yawning in class, but fortunately Tetsu understood why and didn't poke me too much. I did manage to stay vertical. The kids made me lunch during 4th period today (and gave me this fabulous kitty face invitation out of construction paper with a fabulous food collage on the inside depicting the onigiri, fruit salad and toast pizza we ate, with the invitation written in colored pencil! It's going on my wall!) and so we had a fabulous chat about simple but interesting things, like favorite foods, hobbies (one of the girls knits, it turns out, so that sent us off on a fabulously confusing conversation as I tried to explain cables and intarsia in Japanese - to her credit, she totally got it) and whatnot. Now I am just waiting until they are able to come to my desk to grab a couple of lollipops (my thank you gift to them for the lovely lunch they made for us) and then I will be heading off to grab frozenbears and zip over to Sankus (also known as the greatest convenience store in the world, and he will back me up on this now) for his lunch. And tonight, we're having dinner at Joyfull with Mioko! Things just keep getting better. Current Mood: chipper

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June 13th, 2004

06:32 pm - Sunday In Matsuyama-phone post I came up to Matsuyama around one today after a long phone call with rubicantoto- he called precisely eight hours after I went to sleep, after talking until four this morning. He is prodigial in placing well-timed and perfect phone calls. Hung out with Adam and his new girlfriend who couldn't be cuter or nicer, and am now awaiting Marc's arri--oh there he is. Later.

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June 9th, 2004

12:36 pm - More Pictures So, I finally got a June album made, and I've put some pictures from my birthday and the katsuo cooking class in it. I also realized I forgot to mention that about a week ago, I drove up to Oomoriyama Park to see the hydrangeas and to run through them in blissful abandon. It was a rollicking success. I have never seen so many hydrangeas in all my life. I took approximately a bazillion pictures of them, and uploaded only the best of them, and there are still more than 2 pages of hydrangea pictures alone. I have a bit of a passion for hydrangea, can you tell? So going up to Oomoriyama and hanging out in their resplendence with my iPod and my camera for about an hour was one of my birthday gifts to myself. The other one was this door curtain that I fell in love with on the day of my birthday when I went to go buy my apron. Oh, I forgot to take a picture of my apron - I will do that later. So yeah. The 2 mugs of me were taken in my hallway on my way out the door to the drinking party the night before my birthday, because the teacher who was walking with me was so impressed with how good I looked and asked me to let him take a picture. The first one was serious, but he wanted one with flash, and I couldn't help pulling a face. I am extremely talented at making myself look awful. Y'all should see my kabuki face sometime, if you haven't had the pleasure yet. It's even worse than that fish face there. Karlee has taunted me with her mysterious "bunny face," but says that she must be incredibly drunk to be talked into doing it, and that nobody looks at her the same way after they've seen it. I figure I have to throw a good-bye party and see if I can get her sauced to find out what the fuss is about. How can I resist that build-up? In other news, I bought a bottle of Violet liqueur the other day at the drink store, more or less on a whim. I was there for mugi-cha (always with the mugi-cha!) and I wandered into the H and H aisle - Housewares and Hard liquor. It's the aisle with all the vodka, gin, etc. on one side, and toothbrushes, paper towels and napkin rings on the other. The organization of some of these little stores is astonishing to me. But about this violet liqueur - I can't find a single reference to it online, although it is made by Suntory, a major Japanese alcohol distributor. The label was what attracted me to it - it has a 1920's perfume-bottle look to it, with a cream-colored background scattered with small violet blossoms and leaves, with 'Violet' written across it in a rippled, purple Victorian font. I am all for things that are flavored like violets - I used to adore sugar-covered violets when I was little. The flavor is distinctive and very unique, and I wasn't sure how well it would transmute into an alcoholic form, but it was worth a try. On the bottle it recommended it with soda water, so I got a bottle of that, too. Also a bottle of tonic, not because I like tonic particularly - in fact, I loathe it - but because the bottle was really lovely, and small enough to be able to empty and put up somewhere easily. (I'm a bottle collector, have I mentioned that before? Also boxes. You can ask rubicantoto about all the thrills of living with a bottle and box collector.) It took me a couple of days to be in the mood for a possibly unpleasant after-dinner fizzy drink, and last night I finally tried out my new purchase. I poured out just a tiny drop at first, to taste it and see how it was. It poured thickly, and spread in the bottom of the glass like syrup. It was also a deep, royal purple, which gave me instant hope for it. Even if the flavor was a little off, it was purple! It smelled light and sweet, and when it hit my tongue, I instantly remembered exactly what sugared violets tasted like - they tasted like this! It is perfect. I poured more into my glass and topped it off with soda water, and happily curled up on my couch to watch some movie with Audrey Hepburn and Fred Astaire set in Paris, sip my violet fizz, and continue knitting my violetish variegated sweater. Such bliss. I felt spectacularly cultured. So I am thrilled with my find, and plan to bring a few bottles of it home with me when I come, as its pointed absence from Google searches has left me nervous about the possibility of finding it in America. Does anyone know of a good online imported liquor resource? Current Mood: erudite

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June 8th, 2004

12:28 pm - Last Day at Tokai Elementary Yesterday was my last day at Tokai Elementary before I come back to America. It was much harder than I expected it was going to be, and I knew it was going to be rough. Tokai, you may remember, is home of the inimitable Tsubasa, and also my favorite 5th grade class. Tsubasa was, true to form, the one to remember all of the English we had done before, and the first and most enthusiastic volunteer for every single question. He remembered not only "How's the weather?" but also all of its responses, and would blurt them out even if I hadn't tossed him the koosh, prompting the teacher to kneel down next to him and keep pressing his finger over Tsubasa's lips, telling him to let the other kids think about it first. Tsubasa was clearly amused. When I finished class with them, Tsubasa scooted over to me and pulled me down to him and thanked me for teaching him so much English, and insisted that we had to shake hands. He gave me a fabulous handshake and a huge grin, and I felt my eyes start to well up with tears. (I am starting to tear up a bit just writing about it, now.) The class then presented me with various little origami and notes they had written for me, including some hilarious bitey-fish. You pull on their ears (yes, these fish have ears. Or maybe they're fins. Anyway.) and their mouths kind of open up. The other classes were pretty much as normal, and then my last class of the day were my 5th years. These kids have gotten into English that the 1st years at the junior high have a hard time with, like "Which do you like, ___ or ___?" Quite impressive. We had a great time working on the numbers 1 to 100, and playing a game called "Boom!" which involves stacking hands in turn with my counting out the numbers with them repeating them, until I would unexpectedly yell "Boom!" and the next person had to try to slap the pile before everyone else pulled their hands out. A great energy game. At the end of class, everyone stood and pulled out a piece of paper from their desk, and they read to me a message in English that thanked me for teaching them English and for having so much fun with them. They wished me well, told me to have fun in America and to come back soon. They told me they would never forget me, and hoped I would never forget them. Tears were pouring down my face, even as I tried to keep myself together and smile. Several of the girls started crying as well, and we had a last game of koosh catch, and as I was about to leave, one of the boys asked me to sign his notebook with his brush pen. You can imagine what happened next, if you have ever been in an elementary classroom. I almost instantaneously had a queue of kids with notebooks stretching back from my table, and the teacher tried to tell them I didn't have time to sign everyone's. I waved that off and told them I would stay until everyone had one. You can't do one and then leave. That's just wrong. I gave them a super scripty curly-q signature, the upturned end of my signature's "y" curling back inside itself multiple times to create a whirlpool under my name that they loved, and wanted bigger and ever swirlier... "Naruto! Naruto!" (namely 'whirlpool,' but also the name of the white and pink fishcake that is sliced and put in Japanese soup that has the swirl through it that looks like a whirlpool, also the name of a popular cartoon about a ninja school, that I have joked with them about before.) They all were fascinated with the fluidity of the pen moving through my name's letters and how easily I wrote it. It cracked me up, and at the same time reminded me of my own elementary school when a Japanese woman came to visit us and wrote out the hiragana syllabary for me and I marvelled at her ease in writing these elegant and completely foreign characters. I took that sheet home and practiced it over and over, having no idea what the symbols were or even how to read them, it was just because they were beautiful and I loved writing them. I wonder if that gave me the upper hand in my beginning Japanese classes many years later, although I don't know if I had a conscious memory of the characters...? I said my goodbyes to the teachers and kept dry eyes, but after driving away from the school and nearing my apartment, I realized I couldn't go home yet - I wasn't ready to say that the day was over. Instead, I did something that I don't think I have ever been motivated to do before - I just drove around Johen and Misho for the sake of driving. I had no destination, I was just driving and listening to my music, and pondering what I sensed has begun to happen - my inevitable permanent separation from this place. I can come back and visit, and have been invited to, but it will never be like this. I will never live here again. (...to my knowledge, at least.) So, I drove. Eventually I felt ready to go home, and so I did. When I got home, I was invited to go to Joyfull with Shaun, Eiko, Chiyomi and Rika. Rika picked me up, and we dropped by Fuji first for her to use the ATM. They were having a towel sale, and I managed to pick up 6 or 7 different Miyazaki towels for under 2,000 yen, which is unthinkable. (All of you fellow Miyazaki lovers will know what I mean by 'unthinkable' - normally you won't walk away with ONE Miyazaki towel without dropping about 3,000 yen or so.) Rika thought it was adorable how I fell all to pieces at the sight of these towels, but I will take some pictures of them and I think you will see from those that I was fully justified in all my giddiness and bounce-hoppery. Joyfull was fabulous, as usual... It is my Johen equivalent of nights at Denny's or Abo's (or mukashi mukashi*, Round The Corner) in Boulder, Saturn or Jeffrey's in Santa Cruz. Rika taught me a new word the other day - 溜まり場 "tamariba". It means 'a favorite place to go; a haunt.' I in turn taught all of them how to use the phrase 'my old haunts,' and while they seemed put off that it had a word they recognized from the title "Haunted Mansion," they caught on quickly and liked it a lot. I have noticed that my English and Japanese are mingling to the point where I don't realize I am speaking a hybrid anymore. Small things, like "soshita" or "ken" (Johen slang versions of "and so," and "because of", respectively) have crept insidiously into my speech patterns... This is not a problem here, where everyone understands what I'm saying, and it actually helps me communicate more efficiently when the English might be difficult. (I think that's how it started, I would throw in Japanese particles or nouns amongst my English as sort of training wheels or guide lines to help keep them up with the story while still helping them practice listening to English - I only do this with my friends, the students have to fend for themselves in a sea of un-hybridized English.) But it has, like any spoken pattern used with enough frequency and regularity, become unconscious. My mother and I were chatting, and she asked me some yes or no question, and I reflexively responded with "Nn, soo yo." To her great linguistic sponge-like abilities' credit, she understood me flawlessly though she has never studied Japanese and only picked stuff up from asking me and listening very closely, and she kept right on talking, only pausing a few minutes later to comment on it in retrospect. But not everyone has the same ridiculous language genes that flood my mother's and my veins... And not all of my friends have studied Japanese, either. With one circle of friends, I can rest assured that the occasional lapse will be comprehensible, but I wonder how long they will persist in an environment that doesn't nourish their existence. I have been worrying more and more about the re-entry shock. It's strange how even being aware of it and thinking about it clearly does nothing to lessen its effect. Even only coming back for a short visit at Christmas was a jarring and deeply distressing experience on some level. It had a lot to do with things not being as I remembered them because now differences were visible and obvious, where before, my cultural expectations had rendered them transparent. It is deeply troubling to have that rug pulled from beneath you, to have the sense of 'normal' completely debunked by having it revealed as just a different set of variables that are nonetheless defined and existent and separate from all the others. I don't know if there is any way to explain it except to experience it. 2 weeks was a difficult phase, and I found myself looking forward to going back to Japan where things were at least as I expected them to be. Japan had become more comfortable than 'home' because it turned out that "the way things are" is a soap bubble that creates an illusion of uniformity, and that when you realize that your own culture isn't the baseline but just a different set of variables as arbitrary as any other, that bubble collapses and at least for me, I felt that I had lost the one thing - the idea of "home," with all its safety and comfort in the expected and intuitive processes it followed, that I could attribute as somehow 'fundamental' - that had given me some needed sense of security in myself even as I was living the day to day life of an outsider, someone that even the government marked as a card-carrying "resident alien." I could write an entire book on the effects of knowing that even the highest level of authority to which you can appeal calls you a little green man. *Mukashi mukashi, adjectival phrase; "long, long ago"; "once upon a time." Current Mood: uncomfortable

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11:44 am - Summer Markers Now it's officially summer - the school fridge has been once again stocked with mugicha (roasted barley tea) for all to enjoy. My 8 glasses of water a day just got a lot more sumptuous. Current Mood: Sippin' Mugi-cha

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