Christmas Card!

I got a Christmas card today! I was so excited to get some mail! I don't think she told me that she was sending one so it was a nice surprise. I sort of tore it open and took it out of the envelope too quickly... Because, ah, the front of the card was covered in glitter. So when I took it out the way that I did... I got glitter all over me. Especially my hands. And instead of washing them I just left the glitter on my hands and started doing natural things like itching and scratching and face touching so then I was just a big glitter mess. I didn't realize this until my niece came to me and was like "Why are you so sparkly today?" Ahaha... oops.

So, thank you for the card! And this just reminds me that I have a ton of things I need to mail out. Like... at least ... more than ten. .___.

Singing Karaoke!

Today, or rather yesterday since it's been not-Friday for almost two hours, I had my weekly English class. These guys are my advanced students. They're a lot of fun. Afterwards though I have a lot of free time. As mentioned before, the bus comes once every hour. BUT SOMETIMES it decides that it wants to come once every two hours. And this happens to land right on the time that my class finishes. So my class ends at 3pm and the bus comes at 3:22 which isn't feasible at all. I take a train first and that's 7 minutes, and from the building to the train station is about fifteen minutes walk or about five to ten minutes depending on traffic. But if I get a ride it is from one of the students and we tend to do some small talk after. So when is the next bus? 5:06.

One of the students, upon hearing this, excitedly asked "Do you want to go sing karaoke???" to which my immediate response was "Uhh" (Yes, clearly the best person to be an English teacher) my more articulate, second response was "Well, I'm not very good. In fact I'm probably really horrible" But that didn't sway him. Instead he gathered two more students who were chatting before heading for home and we all went to a karaoke box.

The major difference between karaoke in Canada/USA and Japan is that in Canada it's a stage you sing on, in front of tons of strangers. And in Japan it's in a room and no one is watching you (except your friends if you are with them)

I sung some Disney songs as well as a few others but I... can't sing in front of people. Or at all... I mean I'd like to, but I've never practised or anything. Plus I'm just too shy to do it. So my voice ended up being small and wavering with every word.

I think I'd get better if I did it more, but dragging my husband with me ... I mean it's just no fun when they are forced into it.

So... expensive...

For my birthday (which was in October) I had wanted to go to the movie theatre. I know it's expensive (It's pretty much expensive everywhere in the world, I'd imagine) and that the food is over priced, but I really wanted to go.

I guess it's the overall experience that I pay for. Plus in Japan you have designated seats so you know ahead of time if there's enough for everyone in the space. I like the surround sound, the dark room, the big screen and I can convince myself that eating popcorn and drinking soda just this once is not going to turn me into the next contender in the heaviest person in the world contest. (Although I use that just this once excuse way, way, way too many times........)

I wasn't alone, of course. I like sharing experiences like that so I brought along my husband even though he was reluctant. (He usually is for any sort of social thing. I think sometimes that if it weren't for me he might have turned into a hermit. A vampire hermit...) At the end of the movie he admitted that it was "Ehh" which translates to "I like that enough to see it again one day". Who needs to learn English when you can communicate using just sounds, right?

Now I used to work for a movie theatre company, and when I worked there the price for one adult was $9.90 (Marketing tricks, eh? It's not $10, it's only $9.90) Although that might have changed by now. But when we went to the counter to pay for our tickets the number that appeared on the register was 4680 (Yen) which roughly ends up being $50.... That's $30 per person. That's like a whole dinner and not just a regular dinner but one of those fancy ones with the four course meal or whatever.

After snacks and popcorn and whatever else he wanted (Being a guy he had to have some sort of meat thing. This ended up being a hot dog - this time.) the total now was at 7450 (About $80).

Eighty dollars to see one movie!

I'd say that I'd pass on doing that again but I probably won't.

Cause I like it...

.___.

Dear Stranger...

Yes, you who came up to me in your truck. You who didn't leave me alone. Even after I said I couldn't understand you, that I was not interested in getting in your truck, no matter how big (or possibly fake) your smile may have been, and that I had no time to talk to you. You who followed me in your truck as I kept walking (Seriously, did you not get the hint??) and continued to ask me to come inside your vehicle.

I've got a question for you.

What the heck?? I wasn't born yesterday.

Sincerely,

(sadly) the only westerner around this area of Japan

It's too close.

Have you ever been on a balance beam? The type you see on TV that gymnasts do all sorts of craziness on? You know how they are only a foot wide? That is the exact amount of space I get between where I need to walk in order to get to the bus stop and the road. Beyond that is someone else's properly or a drop into a rice field.

So now that you know that I've got that much room, can you imagine how much fun it is to walk in the POURING RAIN? Yeah, not.

And how about if that road is riddled with large puddles?

Oh yes, I'm sure you can imagine. I was drenched.

I literally had a wave of dirty rain water almost come down on me. (Luckily? I dodged it enough to only have the bottom part of my body soaked in dirty rain water)

Fortunately there is a road right by the bus stop so I hide a few feet down that road (Not too far down or I won't be able to see the bus and it will pass right by. It only comes once an hour so I really don't have the time to wait for the next one) and you'd think that staying about six/seven feet away from the main road with the puddles that you'd be far enough to avoid getting splashed.

Ha. Haha, you'd be wrong. I was splashed a total of nine (nine!) times while waiting for the bus. How long was I waiting? Approximately 10 minutes. That's one splash per minute.

I've really got to work on my avoid-the-dirty-rain-waves dance.

'Tatemae' and 'Honne' in Japanese Society

Two people, meeting.

Person One - Hi, how are you?
Person Two - I'm fine, thanks. And you?
Person One - Great.
Does the first really want to know how the other is doing? And if the second was doing not-so-fine, would they have said so?

The Little White Lie

There are many situations in everyday life where social interaction is an insincere ritual we go through, even though the ritual itself suggests otherwise. This is because the social circumstances around us, the codes and contracts that determine where we stand and how we are looked at and how we look at others, the cultural impulses or the sensitivity of a situation, ask us to suppress our natural impulses and replace them with a more formal, socially complacent conduct. We learn to do this early in life. It can be the aunt whose ever-wet kisses you hated, but to keep repelling her was not done. To simply tell her that you were not amused with her continuous slobbering is right out of the question. Maybe you would laugh about her among your siblings, but never to her face.

It continues to haunt us. It seems that as a group we prefer these stability-preserving rituals over the real emotional responses of a person, though we can curse these same rituals as being hypocritical and unnecessary when we are alone. It is found most frequently and most severely in places where people must interact closely though they have not really chosen to be with their company themselves. Parties, the office and family gatherings are all prime examples.

In this, we can ask: what is the social reality of a given situation?

Is it the fact that you dislike the aforementioned wet-kiss aunt?
Or is it the fact that you allow her to kiss you again and again?
or...

Is it the fact that we all know his wife is having an affair?
Or is it the fact that they have shown up at the party together?
The Japanese Solution

In the Japanese language, an explicit acknowledgement of this double social reality is made by way of two words which are diametrically opposed to each other.

Tatemae (pronounced 'Ta-teh-MAE'): official, public, socially required reality

Honne (pronounced 'HON-neh'): informal, personal reality in disregard of social parameters

The fact that these two words exist in Japanese is a fascinating thing. Here is a society that can be seen by outsiders as, by way of vocabulary, being honest about casual dishonesty. To themselves, however, it is more the acknowledgement of there being more than one mode of honesty entirely.

For people with a more Western social upbringing this is a strange thing, since when asked which of the two 'modes of honesty' is more 'real', they are inclined to say the honne side of things should prevail for it is morally right. But morals are sometimes for forming social proceedings. Furthermore, since the dawn of Western science and the disenchantment brought on by rationalism, the Western mindset does not allow for two realities to exist on an equal level. In Oriental philosophy there is far more room for multiple explanations of reality, be it in science, religion, or, as in this case, in everyday social life. For the Japanese, honne is not more real, only perhaps more true to the thoughts of a person. Yet because tatemae is what appears at the discernible surface of everyday life, it should be considered just as relevant to reality as honne. What one thinks is not what one does, and sometimes what one does is more important.

Isn't that a Lie?

Is the tatemae/honne dichotomy different from the innocuous white lie?

Yes and no. Little white lies are probably the best we can come up with when we think about social harmony prevailing over personal reality. Our moral puritanism allows for such lies only to be white if they stay little. But tatemae is not small, nor is it seen as a veritable lie. It is an entire way of being in certain situations, cancelling out the areas of interaction that are personal, sticky and altogether unwanted in the relation, in favour of peace and harmony. People can interact with each other their entire lives and have a silent mutual agreement to limit themselves to tatemae.

The usage of the two words is not limited to reflections on social interaction. In discussions about the news, in international relations, in scientific research reports, policy making, there is room for tatemae and honne running parallel to each other, providing a safe way to contemplate sensitive issues.

The fact that the difference between the two realities in society has been made explicit in Japanese can be seen as an indication that the Japanese are 'honestly dishonest' a lot, maybe even more than people in Western society. Yet it can also be seen as an indication of a people that values true sincerity so much, it makes its insincere moments explicit, thereby implicitly apologising for them.

Consider a bank employee from France, who works at a bank in Japan for 15 years. Every morning he is greeted by his Japanese co-workers with the same enthusiasm and warmth as he bestows on them. He grows to like this job very much, comforted by the belief that he is thought highly of by his fellows.

Yet, somewhere in his 13th year on the job, during a private moment with a co-worker, during a quasi-philosophical talk about heaven and how to get there, this Japanese colleague says: 'Well at least I don't think you will ever get to heaven. You don't seem to be a nice person at all.'

This undistorted display of how the co-worker really thinks about him arrives after 13 years of working closely together. For Japanese, this is not strange. The fact that honne is spoken out is a sign that one feels the other can be trusted with this personal truth. It may be the start of an entirely different mode of relating, but something the Japanese value enormously. Instead of being honoured because he is finally entrusted with this personal reality though, the Frenchman is deeply offended. After all, he says, he has been lied to for so long!

News and Updates

I'm going to keep this brief and then expand on the topics at a later date.

- I went to USJ - Pictures to come later

- I went to the movie theatre

- I implemented a "Punishment Cup" in my advanced English class to stop them from speaking Japanese words in class (When I'm sure that they can speak the English equivalent)

- I have a new computer but the Wireless USB thinger doesn't seem to work very well.

- I keep meeting Japanese people who want me to go somewhere with them together.

- The stupid bus stop is too close to the road

- I have successfully created a "new" recipe. ("New" because I'm sure I'm not the only one to have made it) For cookies. Can't go wrong with cookies!

- I found out that America wants to control the internet.

- Also that they can say officially that pizza is a vegetable.

- I went to the Canadian Thanksgiving dinner and signed up with them to do future events

This just in: Asphalt is hot!

Honestly, why is this news? I turned on the television and found them discussing how grass is 10 degrees cooler than the sidewalks and roads and being thoroughly impressed by the results. Is this some breaking news in Japan? Cause I'm pretty sure I knew about it since when I was a child and decided playing in the fields was a lot cooler than on the concrete.

In other news...

Last week when I was at the train station and getting past the ticket gate I suddenly heard someone loudly say "Hey!" in a surprised, yet friendly manner so I looked around and saw a black guy looking back at me, and in return I said "Hello". We had a small conversation while riding the escalator to the platforms and boarded separate trains. It was odd to be called out of the blue like that, but at the same time it was nice to have a conversation with someone who (I'm assuming here) is a native English speaker again.

Japanese Commercials

I'm sure that you've all heard about how Japanese people have crazy things. From crazy ideas, to crazy people to crazy television shows and movies. The Japanese culture is just strange to a Westerner's eye. And maybe to a Japanese person's eye as well (as so claimed by my husband - although I'd argue that he's more Western like than Japanese)

BUT

If you haven't...

I'm about to introduce you.

What does Coca cola have to do with vampires? Why did he stop from drinking the blood from the lady's neck? Are we to assume that it tastes like blood? Or that it's a drink that will satisfy your thirst for blood? Or is there some message about desire in there?

I'm probably thinking too hard. Let's see...

Coca Cola Zero Free tastes so good that... you want to drink it more than anything else in the world. Even the liquid that you need in order to survive.

There. That wasn't too hard. But in terms of Japanese craziness, I'd rate that as pretty tame, so let's check out another one.

So this one start out interesting. Aliens spying on a guy shirtless at the beach who is playing the piano. Normal for Japanese crazy standards so far. Bikini lady is introduced, and then some weird stuff goes on with the aliens and we cut back to the beach people who are now making out and then back to the aliens... and then the beach people with a final cut to the sand on the beach where it shows us the name of the company.

I don't exactly know what 7/11 had to do with any of that, because I've never seen any beaches or aliens inside of it. But, uh, yeah... continuing on. I'd still rate that as pretty tame.

Now we're getting up there in the weirdness. Living inside of Japan for a while now I can tell you that these baby things are in fact a mascot for a pasta sauce. What they are doing on a beach, scaring little girls, though, is beyond me.

Oh look, Arnold S...ch... yeah I have no idea how to spell his last name. To Google! Google says... Schwarzenegger. Thanks Google!

So this is an energy drink, and... I don't know. What happens when you drink it, I guess. You begin to see Arnold popping out of peoples heads.

He was really popular a while back for commercials, but I have never seen him on television.

Oh! Are you interested in a Mc Donalds commercial? No? Haha, Oh well! Here's one anyway!

I'll let that one and the next, final one, speak for themselves.......

I will warn you though, that this next one is the strangest of them all, and could be considered offensive. However it was shown on Japanese television.

English Class

So usually (This class is pretty advanced) I just let my Friday class talk if I feel the conversation is engaging or that everyone (Or most everyone) is interested in the topic. They enjoy just chatting about daily things and such, but because of this one of the previous lessons that I have done is unfinished. And one of the students is unhappy about that. He asked two weeks ago if we could get back to the unfinished lesson and I said (since it was the end of class when he asked) that we'd get to it next week. This week rolls around and he also didn't mention it until the end of class again.

These people, mind you, are not young students. The youngest is probably 35-40 and the oldest is maybe 60-75. And they all understand that they are free to speak their mind and voice any questions/concerns that they have.

So while I did say that we'd get to finish the lesson this week, the conversation took off and so I didn't want to stop it in order to get back to the lesson. (Which was just reading and discussing a short story written by and for native English speakers) And, like I mentioned above, the student didn't ask about the lesson until the end, which really is just bad timing on his part. It's not like I can say "Oh yeah sure. Everyone has an extra hour or two to discuss the lesson?"

When I answered him he did a silent fit. It reminded me of when any muppet would get angry and the lips/mouth area would curl inward. It made me feel a little bit bad, but in the end he was the only one who was concerned with the lesson while everyone else enjoyed what we had been discussing.

Actually the week before he also participated in the discussion. (He likes talking about political and educational things, not every day things like we had been discussing this week) And he enjoyed himself and seemingly only asked the question out of curiosity while this time it was out of growing concern or possibly anger.

After class I was invited out to a coffee shop with some of the other students. We talked about many things but one of them was the student above. Everyone believes that he seems more concerned about the grammar of English and the side of it that is more academic based. (Writing, much dictionary use, the correct way to use x and the many meanings of x) Which is fine, however I would say that when learning a language nothing should be put above another. No area should be given more attention because when you build it up and turn around to look at the other areas you'll fall into one or both of these categories:

The annoying one, where you'll be constantly asking why everything is what it is and refuse the answer of You'll just have to remember it like this for now.

The deaf ears, where even though we have studied or talked about it, you'll refuse to acknowledge it until much later and by that time we will have moved onto a new topic and having to go back and discuss it again causes everyone to become bored as they all understand and have learned the subject matter.

I stressed my concern about this to the other students and they agreed that it was a problem. So my solution was to give everyone a weekly email. A preview of what will be going on in the class and a review of what happened for those who did not show that week.

That was my best, and to be honest only, idea I had. Hopefully it'll work out.

Big, Failed Plans

So I had some plans for today. I figured they were relatively big, you know big "for me", I'm sure your version of big is different than my version. But... as the title of this post has pointed out, they failed. 3/4 of them, anyway.

So plan number 1) Go see the niece sing at her school performance.

2) BUY A COMPUTER

3) Watch a movie at the movie theater

4) Eat birthday cake (This is the one that was sort of not a fail. My husband did go to a cake shop and buy me an average single serving cake at our local cake shop - which I love - but technically it was mousse. I'm still not complaining though. It was delicious.) (EDIT: I love how I mentioned the cake shop twice. I'm going to blame being sick and light headed....)

And why did they fail? Well... apparently I'm sick. Again. For, like, the third or fourth time this year. That's a lot right? I need to bulk up my immune system or something. Cause this feeling? The fuzzy-light headed feeling? Yeah it got really annoying about three minutes in. Plus there's the blowing of the nose and the sneezing and it's just in general not a boatload of fun.

Ha. I say it like no one in the world has ever gotten sick.

I didn't think that I was sick, I mean the signs weren't there. Usually I get a tickle at the back of my throat but this time it was just this... odd feeling that I couldn't quite describe. And, of course, me being somewhat paranoid me, goes to look up all sorts of odd sensations in the back of the throat and trust that the internet knows what it's talking about. (And also trust that I know how to properly describe said sensation)

This is usually why the doctor stuff is left to the doctors. Since -usually- they know what they are talking about.

If I had gone to a doctor and been like:

My throat feels funny.

They'd probably shove some swabs and lights down my throat and then diagnose me as sick. Instead of my trusting my limited throat knowledge plus the internet and believe that I had acid reflux.

I didn't have any of the symptoms (Maybe one) and yet with the strange feeling that I couldn't quite place, I had decided that I had acid reflux.

Good thing I'm not a doctor.

"Human Damage Accident"

Today the train was delayed. I'm not really the kind of person to question delays unless it's really necessary. Things happen. Things break down. That's life. So when I saw that the train was delayed I didn't give it much thought, and then the words "HUMAN DAMAGE ACCIDENT" Appeared below "xxx Train is Delayed". That kinda bummed me out. I don't know exactly what happened but my guess is either someone jumped in front of a train or was pushed in front of one. There is really no other reason why a train would be delayed from "Human Damage".

Just thought I'd share my bummed out feelings with the rest of you. I know you all love me for it.

36 Pots

In case anyone was wondering - that is how many pots (Big pots) of water it takes to fill the tub. With the occasional kettle of water and splash of cold water from the tap. It sounds like a big number, and it feels like a big number when you've been hauling giant pots of water from the kitchen to the bathtub, but in reality it's just a deep tub. It's not really big. It is about half the size of me so I can't even stretch out and relax. I can have my legs dangling outside of it if I want to warm up my body and vice versa.

Pool Shower Time

The hot water or gas ... or something in this house is broken. And it seems that it will cost a lot of money to fix it. That means no hot showers. But for the Japanese people, who have grown up in Japan where bathing in hot springs (With a bunch of other naked people -same gender of course) is normal and accepted, the problem is not too severe.

Except I have not grown up that way. In fact I don't remember ever having a problem not getting hot water. So this is new to me, and as I have a huge problem with my self confidence and standing naked in front of strangers my options are limited as to where I can take a hot shower until the problem is fixed.

That is where the Pool comes in. In this town we have a public pool/gym building for exercise and recreational purposes. And, like Canada, there are shower rooms with showers on timers. In my case we have to pull down a sort of lever and hot/warm water will come out of the shower head. You can control the temperature of the water but you cannot control how long the water will last. Since yesterday was the first time that I had to go to the pool for other reasons than to swim I could tell you that the max amount of time that the water came out of the shower head was 10 seconds. Now I am not complaining because I am thankful that I can still shower but it was annoying flailing around with shampoo all over me trying to blindly find that lever so I could rinse it off.

Walking into a change room with topless old ladies, no matter where I am in the world, will still make me feel awkward.

Ramen Truck

I may have pointed this out before but I wanted to do it again seeing as there is one outside of my house as I type. A ramen truck is the same as an ice cream truck... but without the ice cream, haha. They go around in this semi large truck playing a jingle and you go up to them and order a noodle dish. I am assuming that it is a hot noodle dish but in Japan they also have cold noodle dishes for the summer so I am not too sure which one would be inside. My guess is both and that it depends on the season/weather.

I have never done it before and have only gone up to an ice cream truck once before (That I can remember anyway) but my husband says that the food is mediocre at best, burnt and tasteless at worst. I suppose getting raman at a restaurant dedicated for it would be the best bet for tasty noodle dishes, but I'd like to try it. Just once. :)

Fish Tank

I have a virtual fish tank that I thought I'd point out if anyone is curious. It is at the bottom of my blog. Feel free to click on it and give them food. They will swim around your cursor if you keep it still long enough.

So in case you thought it was a dangerous Ad and did not want to get near it, fear not. It is something I put there purely for fun and entertainment.

English Class

I have an English class that I teach every Friday and one that I teach every Saturday. To be honest, I really have no idea what I am doing. Although everyone seems to enjoy it, sometimes I panic when I do not know the answer to a question. (Is this an Adverb? An Adjective? Why is it "does" and not "Is"? Etc) My class on Friday is of a much higher level than the class on Saturday. I thought that maybe if I went really slow and explained all the sentences and the structure as best that I could that I could start them off on something easy (Like a small news article) but relatively intermediate in terms of level.

I was wrong.

It is difficult because the range of levels in Saturday's class is so great that if I did something at the beginner level, some of the students would find it too easy. But as I explained above, if I did something of a higher level it will end up being too difficult.

The class has 18 students. There are 4 men and of those four I would peg three of them as intermediate. The rest of the class is in early beginner. Also female.

The old English teacher (Who I have never met and do not know anything about besides that his name was Joshua) gave them crossword puzzles and word searches as homework. But I have been told by a few that they disliked having to do that very much. ... But 1/4 of them really enjoyed it.

It would be nice to work with a company that had a book with set lessons and such. As it is, finding and making my own is proving to be difficult and moreso as time goes on.

So what I have been thinking and researching is if I couldn't buy some English teaching books online that have set lessons in them. That would make things easier for me but now the question is... which books would be the best to buy?

New Website!

Not for me, haha. I have created enough half-done blogs for a while. But for a family member, and I am proud of it (Even though it did not take that much effort to create). Check it out here: [Link]

As of this moment it is not completed. And so it still has some stock photos for a space filler until all of the photos that are wanted can be put up. Mostly you can find the stock photos in any of the photo gallery pages of the website.

Check out the old website here: [Link]

The image used of the puppy in both homepages is the same image - one was updated in the last year. I believe that puppy is no longer a puppy now. The image is probably 3-4 years old.

I remember that I was requested to make a photo gallery that was easy to scroll through, and how they wanted the images to pop out. However I was not very good at Flash programs and could not create the website that had those things.

The host of the new website is dedicated to Flash. And they made everything as simple as dragging and dropping. Although it did crash my browser several times. I remember trying to create my own website from the same host about a year and a half back but they seemed to be having problems then as my browser crashed every five minutes and I needed to restart everything. Now it seems that my browser crashes only if I ask it to do too many things at once. I lay part of the blame on the computer that I am borrowing. It is a few years old and has many things stored on it that makes it slow already. But it is a definite improvement. Which is why I decided to share it with you :)

What does "Omnomnom" mean?

The word Om nom nom (Or three words, haha) is a sound made by eating something delicious. The sound was coined by Cookie Monster from Sesame Street, but in the past 3 or so years it has become a very popular word used on the internet. Especially in places like chat room or forums where many people can get together and talk.

I thought I would clear that up for anyone who is not internet savvy :)

I decided to use the words for my blog because I enjoy Japanese food. A lot. It is delicious. I invite everyone to try or make some. And, no, that does not mean go out and buy sushi. ;)

Repost- Ponyo

Dumbledore VS Dumbledore

I have honestly been searching for this one image on dA for a good half hour. I was amused because I also was not pleased with how the actor decided to portray Dumbledore in Goblet of Fire. Eventually I gave up the search on dA (Although I knew for a fact that I had seen it on dA!) and went to Google. A quick image search of "Dumbledore, movie vs book" brought up this image several times! Thanks Google I don't know why I ever doubted---

Ah yes. Thank you for reminding me.

Some light Google searching tells me that KellyWormtongue from DeviantArt is the artist of the book/movie Dumbledore (although dA seems to think that she/he does not exist)

To be fair, I do not think I liked the second actor who portrayed Dumbledore from the beginning since he had said that he never read the HP books and did not plan to. Giving us the resulting Dumbledore.

He kinda reminded me of a hippie. With the hat and beard tie.

Butterbeer

Keeping with the Harry Potter theme today, I had been thinking about concocting my own Butterbeer. I had seen several recipes online that looked ... less than amazing in my opinion (Con on guys, the best you can do is cream soda, butterscotch topping and whipped creaｍ？) One recipe even called for two tablespoons of actual butter. Unmelted. It just asked you to stir it into the drink. (Note to the creator: No one wants to drink butter) Like, I know it has butter in the name, but that's probably not what Rowling was aiming for.

I gave up the search for a premade recipe and began thinking of making my own

So far I had thoughts about Pumpkin, Apple juice, sugar, cinnamon, nutmeg, clove, ginger ale and vanilla.

What did you imagine the drink to taste like when you read the books?

Harry Potter as an Anime

I like how Snape is on a bed of lilies. Sneaky, there.

101 Dalmations

Thanksgiving!

Which sucked last year in Japan because there was none. I suppose that is to be expected because of the whole Thanksgiving is Christian and most of Japan is Buddhist...

so this year I found this awesome thing right here which promises a full on Thanksgiving dinner. (Okay, I don't see the part where they say "and all the fixin's" but there will be turkey and good times) But the thing is.... my husband does not like being social. At all. He will do anything to avoid going to events. Even faking being sick (Sometimes I wonder about his maturity). So even though I poked and pleaded, he wasn't going to budge.

Fine. I thought. He can sleep the day away while I go have fun. (Expensive $45 dinner fun) I went and asked around the few contacts that I know and it looks like my Japanese teacher is interested, as well as her International Associate friend plus the other Canadian in this town. (Did I mention that he and I are the total Canadian population in the town? I'ma 50% number here! That's the biggest number I have been and yet the lowest I have seen the Canada population. Granted I had lived in Canada before now...)

So hopefully I will have lots of fun and meet new people while my husband sleeps his Sunday away (He does that ever Sunday. I don't know how someone can sleep as long as he does)

Cute Bento

Bento - a single-portion takeout or home-packed meal common in Japanese cuisine. A traditional bento consists of rice, fish or meat, and one or more pickled or cooked vegetables, usually in a box-shaped container. Containers range from disposable mass produced to hand crafted lacquerware.

If someone were to take this much time and effort to create food pictures, I might actually feel bad for eating it...

English Advice?

I teach English every Friday and Saturday to adults, with an English-Japanese exchange every Tuesday and a monthly visit every first monday to a day care to sings some English songs. The day care is a bit of confusion especially when the teachers do not understand a single word of my native tongue and I only a few of theirs. But we manage together, which is very helpful. If they had left me alone with 30-something children under the age of 6 I... would probably not do so well, haha. (Actually, I'm not so bad with kids and when we can both communicate effectively I am fine supervising kids. It's that darn language barrier -shakes fist- )

There are some times, though, in the adult class when they ask me a question and it stumps me. I can easily look up a word in my handy English-Japanese dictionary that I pirate away from my husband on the weekends because it has an English dictionary for English people in it as well. But when they ask me the why questions, that's where I have trouble. One of my students even told me that he could understand every individual words meaning but he couldn't understand the sentence meaning. Sometimes in English news or books I will have to read it over again because I do not understand the point they are trying to make in the sentence, but 80% of the times it is due to the fact that I will have skipped an important word. The sentences I use in my classes aren't terribly hard to understand - At least from my point of view- But sometimes I forget that they are learning the language, and just as I have a billion questions every time I study Japanese so do they.

Although is it too much to ask for a vocal response from them when I ask Does everyone understand? Does anyone have any questions? Because when they sit there re-reading what I have explained I cannot tell if they do or they don't and my instinct says Well if they aren't asking questions, they must understand.

Repost- Best Useless Thing

Ever.

Repost- Evil Cats

Have you ever heard a cat fight? Not a cartoon cat fight. Not a TV cat fight, but a real cat fight? Liiah described it best when she said “What?! What is it?! Have my nightmares manifested themselves?! Oh… Oh no. It’s just thecats.”

Yes well. Have you ever heard alley cats fighting?? Or, or, or a hungry clowder of cats? (Oh yeah. I’m smart. I can use intelligent words. Even if spell check says I’m wrong) Y’see, here in the… whatever part of Japan you’d call the place I’m living. Town, Country side, village, you understand what I mean, right? Well here there tends to be stray cats. Not just one, not just two, but, like, ten or twenty. (Okay, maybe only six or seven, but after 3-4 you really don’t care anyway) And these cats like to meow (Miaow?) constantly. I swear they take rounds. First going to this group of houses, then the next group and so on until the repeat and come back here again. And it’s not just meowing. Oh no. They like to pick fights with each other too.

At two in the morning.

Ugh, seriously. I’m sort of glad I don’t have to get up early in the mornings because that there would just annoy me to no end.

Repost- Book Quotes

These are from the book that my friend Naru gave me for Christmas one year. I thought I should share my favorite parts. I enjoyed reading this book. I just wish it wasn’t in Canada right now… … with Naru… funny that xD

It’s called “Hitching Rides with Buddha” by Will Ferguson. Who also happens to be the author of “Beauty Tips from Moose Jaw”. Says so right on the cover! I’d recommend this book to those people who want to come to Japan.




In addition to Cherry Blossom Viewing, you have Moon Viewing, Snow Viewing, Wildflower Viewing, Autumn Leaf Viewing, and Summer Stargazing. All are formally engaged in, and all follow set procedures and seasons. As a service to readers, I have prepared a handy chart listing each phenomenon, the season in which it appears and the correct manner in which to observe it:

Phenomenon Season Proper way to view it
Cherry Blossoms Spring Drunk on Sake
Wildflowers Summer Drunk on Sake
Harvest Moon Autumn Drunk on Sake
Autumn Leaves Autumn Drunk on Sake
Snow on ancient temples Winter Drunk on Sake

Japanese lavish compliments onto Westerners. If a Westerner has mastered chopsticks he is complimented on his hand eye coordination; if he catches a lazy pop fly in left field he is complimented on his sports prowess; if he learns how to say hello in Japanese he is praised as being fluent, and so on. The phrase most often encountered in these situations is Jozu desu ne! Which means “Boy! You are talented!” But could be more accurately translated as “Not bad for a dimwit”

To make matters worse, I decided to go by thumb. … “Why would you want to do that?” they asked, genuinely puzzled. “There is no reason to hitchhike. That is why we built the Bullet Train.”
“But,” I would argue, “Japan is a very safe country is it not?”
“Oh yes. Very safe. Safest country in the world”
“So why shouldn’t I hitchhike?”
“Because Japan is dangerous”

“I am going to hitchhike the length of Japan” I told the man beside me.
He smiled and nodded.
“I’m going to follow the cherry blossoms”
He nodded.

“All the way to Russia,” I said.He smiled again, and soon after, changed seats.

“American” He said. It wasn’t a question.

I sighed, “I’m not American”

“New York? Chicago? San Francisco? Detroit?” He was evidently going to list every city in the United States, so I grabbed the next one that went by and adopted it as my home.
“So,” He said, “is it cold in Baltimore?”

“Very cold.”

“In Japan,” he said, “we have four seasons.”

“Congratulations”

“Thank you. Are you married?”

“No.”

“Can you eat Japanese food?”

This was Conversation by Non Sequitur, and I was thoroughly familiar with it by now. The trick was to answer with equally arbitrary statements until you sound like a couple of spies conversing in code.
…
Then- and I don’t mean to brag here- he assured me that when it came to speaking Japanese, I was pretty darned jozu.

“Do you know how Tanuki* make music?”
“Sure!” they yelled “They use their stomachs like a drum!” and then preceded to show me by repeatedly punching himself in the stomach. “Very good.” I said. But he kept going.
“Ah that’s fine.” I said “You can stop anytime now” He continued pummeling himself in the stomach even as his eyes watered. “Come on” I said, slipping into English, “I get the picture kid”
His eyes went wide with an audible boing. ”English! You speak English! Say something, say something in English!”

”Wayne Newton is the antichrist”

“Wow! What does that mean?”

“It’s a poem. Kind of a haiku”


I fought hard to keep my lunch (pork rice and a raw egg) from making an unexpected encore. We came to the parking lot just in time and I bolted from the car and bent over, gulping down fresh air and trying not to faint. The littlest boy came up and punched me in the stomach. “You’re not tanuki!” he said.

”I’ll kill you, you little shit”

“Hey!” He called to his dad, “He’s talking poetry again!”

*Tanuki are creatures of folklore in Japan: raccoon dogs with huge bellies and giant testicles who roam the forests drinking sake and trying to seduce young maidens by passing themselves off as noblemen.

I told her and her brothers about the mythical, far-away land of Ka-Na-Da, where children didn’t have to go to school on Saturday or wear uniforms or even have to learn anything, and they sighed with understandable envy.

It sure is great being a Canadian. You get to share the maternal benefits of living next door to the United States, yet at the same time you get to act smug and haughty and morally superior. You just can’t beat that kind of irresponsibility.

You know how Godzilla is turning up to stomp on Tokyo? The filmmakers churn those movies out like clockwork, and tokyo tower has been destroyed so many times that you’d think they’d have given up by now. Rebuild it? Why bother? Godzilla will just come and knock it over again.
Sometimes he’ll destroy other cities just for a change of pace, but he mainly sticks to Tokyo. The smaller cities in Japan have complained about this. They’re jealous. In Fukuoka city they went as far as circulating a petition asking -nay begging- the producers of the Godzilla movies to have him come destroy their fair city instead. Thousands of people signed, and after years of pressure, the producers relented, saying “All right, we’ll destroy Fukuoka. Quit whining.” Newspaper headlines were out “GOOD NEWS! GODZILLA TO DESTROY OUR CITY” So don’t tell me that the Japanese aren’t a weird bunch of people.

“I am Professor Takasugi of Tokyo University.” … He smiled modestly. “Thank you. My wife, Saori. She is also my assistant. We are in Kyushu for research. We are studying the social life of wild plates.”

“Wild plates?”

“Not plates, monkeys.”

“Ah yes.” I said. “That would make more sense.”

The word for plate (sara) and monkey (Saru) sound similar in Japanese and for some reason I can never keep them straight. And like many Westerners, I also get confused by “Human” (ningen) and “carrot” (ninjen), which once caused a lot of puzzled looks during a speech I gave in Tokyo on the merits on internationalization, where I passionately declared that “I am carrot. You are carrot. We are all carrots. As long as we remember our common carrotness, we will be fine.”
On another occasion I scared a little girl by telling her that my favorite nighttime snack was raw humans and dip.

Repost- Sad Pokemon

Repost- ...Fish

(After being asked if we wanted to go out for dinner)

Me: "Uh.... maybe?"
Husband: "Not maybe. Yes, or fish?"
Me: "... Fish?"
Husband: "That means yes."

Repost- Toothbrush Turtle

Repost- Monkey Center

I am a lazy bum. There has been and still is quite a few things I want to upload and talk about here but I just haven’t felt like doing it. Oh well.

Today I met up with a friend of mine that I met while working in Alberta. It was really great to see her again, and nice to know she’s still the same ol’ silly girl I knew then. Only… skinnier and with double the hair length. Aaah, why can’t I do that? Haha

The Boy and I had trouble figuring out what to do with her. The first idea we all had was to get together with a mutual friend of all of ours who lives just a few hours away from us. But he failed with the communicating, so at the last minute we had to change plans. The Boy, this week, works nights so I was only mildly surprised to be woken up by my extremely loud cell phone jingle (I still haven’t figured it out completely… There will be a post about my cell phone some time in the distance future about it. Because you’re all interested in hearing about my cell phone, right? But if I say it’s a super advanced cell phone from Japan that’ll get your interest, eh?) at three am and then shouts of “MONKEY CENTER” in my ear. But I was majorly confused, being half asleep and dreaming about giant chobit robots with laser eyes bent on destroying Japan. (My dreams are awesome… some days.)

So I text my friend at 3am saying the plans have changed. I assumed that she wasn’t sleeping (My knowledge of the girl from Alberta was that she liked to party and stayed up super late talking with people and alcohol) but even if she was the plans had changed once again (The second plan had her come to the station near this town at 1pm, and the third had her wait at a station in a different town at 11am.) and she needed to know so that she wouldn’t oversleep.

Fast Forward through the happy greetings and small talk. Again, because I’m a lazy bum, and it wasn’t all that interesting anyway. Broken bones, Potatoes and Gay couples eloping in Mexico. Boring stuff, you know?

The Monkey Center is located on Awaji Island, if you want some more info, here’s a website (Don’t worry; It’s in English)

My friend has been to Awaji island before but she never knew there were monkeys living there, so it was a new experience for her. Which was a good thing, since I wanted all of us to have a good time.

I geared up with my touristy sunglasses, my stylish hat and expensive camera and decided before I left the house that day that I would become the best Photographer ever for one day, and like magic, it happened. I took some super awesome photos.

But because one day I will sell these photos to super rich snobs for thousands of dollars I can’t upload them here, you understand right? Hahaha.


Okay, maybe just one photo.

You can’t deny the monkey baby it’s cuteness. :3

After we saw all the monkeys it was time to head back home. It was a long drive there (100KM one way) so, obviously it was going to be a longer drive home.

Unfortunately my friend wasn’t wearing her seatbelt (A common thing in Japan for those sitting in the back, I’m guessing… since everyone I know who sits in the back never wears one). And the police caught her. We were driving on the bridge connecting the island to Hyogo when the police drove up beside us and started yelling at us through a megaphone. I couldn’t understand, but the two native Japanese people could and were confused (at first) why we were being asked to pull over (After getting off the bridge).

When we did, a policeman with the face similar to a bulldog tapped on The Boy’s window and asked to see his license (I’m assuming he did) then asked him to get out of the car. He said something to my friend as well before leading the Boy into the police car.

Now where I come from the police make you sit in your car and the only reason why you are asked to sit in the police car is if you were going to Jail. (I don’t think I know of any other reason why you’d be in the back of a police car) So I was panicking for a moment or two because my mind was telling me The Boy + Back of Police Car = Big Trouble. But then I remembered Oh yeah. I’m in Japan. Everything is backwards here.

So my friend and I were talking about things while she kept apologizing for not wearing her seatbelt, so I pointed out to her that there was no buckle for her to use. This was another small thing that made me think that not wearing your seatbelt in the back seat was okay. The fact that our car hadno buckles. But our car was sold to us from another person, and the interior was covered in some sort of foamy leather thing. The buckle is probably underneath it. Yet the fact that there is a cover that has no holes for buckles sold in Japan, and that it is being used just made me believe all the more that it was a rule kind of like how bicycle helmets are supposed to be worn all the time when you bike, yet 80% of people don’t and because of the sheer amount, the police turn a blind eye.

All my life I’ve been told to buckle my seatbelt, so it became ingrained that I had to get it done before the car started moving. So when I came to Japan and saw people not doing it I thought Okay. It’s Japan. Everything is backwards. And just when I was getting used to it, this happens. I guess not everything in Japan is backwards.

Repost- A Job?

I may have… a job.
Maybe, I don’t want to jinx it. But on the other hand I’m not so sure I qualify for it. Here’s what happened: I was taking my weekly Japanese lesson when my Japanese teacher said that the town’s English teacher has to leave at the end of May. He’s also from Canada. She wanted to know if I would like to visit him and see how he teaches lessons. I agreed because, hey, I need all the pointers I can get if I want to teach English some day, right? But at the end of the lesson she explained to my husband’s mother (Who was picking me up) that she was going to take me to meet him because he needed someone to take over his job as an English Teacher.…Waaait a minute. Why wasn’t I told this? I mean, (a) really cool but (b) No qualifications and minimal outside classroom experience.I’ll just have to wait and see. But having money would be a really, really nice thing. Since, you know, I have none. :)