Friday 5/7: Best Day in Japan Thus Far

So first off, I am now more awake than when I was doing the other journal things last night, so I remembered some stuff I forgot to put in:

1. It is possible for Japanese families to never know what the dad does for a living, without the dad working for the government or the yakuza. Its one of those topics that is like asking someone how much they earn- its ok for them to tell you, but its not something that you ask someone. Siroccos host family has no idea what the dad does for a living.

2. On Thursday the family stopped by a market area downtown to get some food for a luau. I found several over-priced foods: $30 for a melon? $26 for a mango? Its kinda ridiculous. Oh, and really expensive cherries that did not look good at all (its not even cherry season!)

OK, onto Friday...

Today my class went to an elementary school to help the kids learn english and to have a ton of fun :) I was put with a class of 2nd graders, that were all super-adorable. I introduced myself in Japanese, and they asked me questions that I had to answer in Japanese. Luckily the questions were fun and easy- instead of "how do you want to use Japanese in your future career?" it was "whats your favorite animal?" Everyone had to come up to me and say "Hello, my name is (insert mumbling here). Its nice to meet you" and then shake my hand. They were all nervous- it was pretty cute lol. Then I played a game with them where they had to learn color names in English. Everyone got a sheet of paper with a different color, and then sat in a circle, and someone in the middle would call out a color and everyone with that color would have to run to a different seat. Then we played Bingo in English, and I led a game of Simon says, which was pretty hard with the language barrier. I also got a samurai newspaper hat- You cant get much better than that!

My host family also put on a Hawaiian BBQ. My host moms massage teacher cooked up a ton of delicious food, much to Levi Paulks joy. It was very, very nice to have good American food, good BBQ is always a good thing :) The massage dude also got fed up with my posture and did like a total back-straightening thing, which was very painful but probably good for me.

Thursday May 6: Gold Leaf

Thursday I was a little sick (nothing like stomach pains to dampen ones day) and Im still a little sick, so Ill try to relay everything, though I dont recall too much

For Thursdays cultural activity my class made gold leaf designs on chopsticks. Turns out this is a very difficult thing to do. For one, you first cut tape into the shapes of the areas you dont want to cover in gold and put them on the chopsticks, meaning you have to translate a 2-d design onto a 3-d surface. Then you had to very delicately cover the chopsticks in rosin, then carefully roll it in the gold leaf, then tear the tape off. For those of us with terrible dexterity, this was a hard activity, but I am happy with the design

After class I met up with my host parents, who had just picked up the host moms Hawaiian massage instructor. Hes way cooler than I could ever be, and I think he finds me a bit terrible to look at because of my awful posture (made worse by the stomach pain). We had good ramen for dinner, which was delicious though Im looking forward to American food.

Wednesday 5/5: Childrens Day

On Wednesday morning Sirocco and her mom took us on a walk to this Buddhist Temple that our class will be visiting in a week or two. The place was truly amazing. The thing was surrounded by a ton of graves, and small statues of Buddha (?) where people would leave offerings. All the statues were wearing red and white bib-like things. Apparently red and white are the colors of children (the word for baby is akachan, which means red cute thing) and so wearing those is kind of a warding off of evil spirits with the innocence of children. The temple was really beautiful, but what surprised me most is that it had posters, letters from buddhist leaders, childrens drawings, etc.- the type of stuff youd see at any other house of worship- but the temple was built centuries ago.

In the afternoon we went back to downtown kanazawa- Sirocco went to the art museum and I sat in the shade and read ENDERS GAME and did homework. I was hoping to see some Childrens Day stuff going on, but alas there was nothing around the museum (I think most activities are at elementary schools and such). I did go to some of the tourist shops by Kenrokuen to get some presents for people. It was a very good day overall :)

Tuesday 5/4: Lunch at Levis

Today I left my house at 10 to take the bus to Kanazawa station, to meet up with Sirocco and go to Levi Paulks host familys house for lunch. Traffic in downtown Kanazawa was a mess- a lot of people from around Japan come to Kanazawa, and Kenrokuen, the big park in the center of town, is the main attraction.

Lunch at Levis was a nice break from speaking Japanese all the time. There were four of us W&L Students there- me, Sirocco, Levi, and Alex. The family made tacos for us- real tacos! Or at least close enough. I had the option to put octopus on it, thereby creating a certifiable "tako taco," but I decided against it. They also had Cherry Coke- my favorite soda! The host family had spent the weekend in Kyoto, and had brought back a ton of delicious sweets that we got to snack on :) Along with being able to speak English with a bunch of people, and just being able to sit on a real couch (my host family doesnt have any couches) and watch kids anime shows was relaxing and made me almost feel like I was back in America. Both Levi and Alex had younger siblings in their host family, so we went to a nearby elementary school and played badminton and played on the playground. I think its interesting that most of the playing area for the elementary school was just dirt, with no grass on the baseball or soccer field. I suppose it might be too expensive and impractical to maintain, but it did look a little empty and run-down from my view.

Ill be spending tonight at Siroccos, and tomorrow I think we may go back to visit Kenrokuen and downtown Kanazawa. Tomorrow is Childrens day; I would like to get some Koi flags if I can (theyre a symbol for childrens day like a jack-o-lantern is for halloween). I hope everyone is doing OK in the US- I just read that Boise got some pretty strong winds recently, so I hope everyones houses are safe there.

Monday 5/3: My Venture in Japanese Teen Culture

On Monday, I went with Sirocco, Siroccos host sister, and a friend of the host sisters to the downtown "Korinbo" area. Since Were in the middle of Golden Week, a huge vacation season, there were a bunch of teens around. Up until this point, I had only seen high schoolers in uniforms with their only means of expression being the random stuffed animal keychains on their backpacks. However, yesterday I got to see the teen fashion that Cosplayers are constantly trying to imitate in the US. My favorite was someone dressed up as a panda, with their face even painted white with black around the eyes. The more girly girls would wear short lacey dresses, high heels, and carry lace parasols with them. There was also the more traditional "rebel" look with random piercings, strange-colored hair, and black boots or high heels. I would also like to note that while almost every girl was wearing high heels, I could still easily see over everyones heads :D

First we went to a "purikura" area on the second floor of an arcade. This 2nd floor was completely full of large photo booths, and there were people EVERYWHERE. 80% girls, though there were a few poor boyfriends dragged along. In the purikura you step into an area with a green screen, choose the backgrounds you want, and pose for the pictures like in a normal photo booth. Then we ran to another room in the booth where we could add stuff to the pictures: hearts, words, sparkles, etc. Finally, you print out the pictures as tiny stickers, which you can attach to whatever you wish.

After that we went to the Art Museum, which was pretty cool. Sirocco the Art Major had a blast :). They had an open-air market outside the museum, where i bought some origami crane earrings. We then went to a "Mister Donut" where once again Japan outdid the US at fast food. The donut and vanilla shake were both very delicious, though I feel like with Japanese food it kinda loses a bit of its soul. Its like they used computers to create the perfect food- it seems a bit... sterile I guess, like too beautiful to actually be eaten.

Finally, we went to a place that looked like a hotel, but instead of bedrooms it was full of karaoke boxes. After paying the $12 fee for an hour, we were assigned a room. The room had a couch, a tv and microphones, a song-requester-machine, food menus, and a phone where you could call for the food and where the head desk would call when your time was up. I stuck with the normal english karaoke songs- "Dont Stop Believing" is always a big hit, and Billy Joel and Frank Sinatra. Sirocco knew some Japanese songs so she did that- I wish i knew some japanese songs!

Oh, on a random note on Sunday religion came up as a topic of conversation between me and my host mom. I told her that I was Lutheran, and she said that she had gone to a Christian elementary school (I dont think she does anything religious now) and that the grandmother living in the house is Buddhist and has a big altar(?) in a part of the house that I have yet to say. I wonder if I would be allowed to see it... anyhow, before I left for Siroccos the host mom gave me a rosary, which I think she had made herself. Lutherans dont use rosaries, but it was very nice of her to give me one, and its the thought that counts, right? Its also kind of an interesting commentary on how people view religion. From what I can tell, for most Japanese religion is a somewhat secular thing, and generally only paid attention to for weddings and funerals. This would be something Id like to get to know more about.

Sunday 5/2: Lazy Sunday

Sunday I did nothing that was all that exciting. I finished A PEOPLES HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES and started ENDERS GAME by Orson Scott Card.

I did discover that my family had a room that I hadnt realized existed before that has a grand piano and a player piano in it, along with a TON of teddy bears (I think the mother really loves stuffed animals, theyre just generally popular in Japan I think). It felt very nice to play the piano again- I started learning the GODFATHER Love Theme, and "The Sound of Silence." Apparently the mom can play a little piano, and their daughter took some lessons (I have yet to meet the daughter, who has an apartment in the city i think)

I had been inside all day, so I asked my host dad if I could go with him when he walked the dogs. It was less of a walk than a try-to-keep-up-with-3-dogs-that-may-have-just-been-fed-3-espresso-shots. Its probably a good thing that I got a bit of a workout.

Saturday 5/1: Video Store

Saturday was pretty non-eventful. I got to talk to Tyson in the morning which was lovely as always, but then just chilled out in my room for the rest of the day, reading A PEOPLE:S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES by Howard Zinn. He makes some good points, and some very questionable ones. But anyhow...

After dinner, the family took me to a video store to rent some movies. All the anime fans would have been geeking out- about a third to a half of the room was anime. However, all you anime fans are probably very disappointed in me because I didnt rent a single anime. I would have watched TOTORO but they were all checked out. About a third to half of the store was american movies. It was interesting looking at them because a lot had different covers than in the US and some had different titles. For example, I think TAKEN was renamed something like 96 HOURS.

I have noticed something about Japanese food thats starting to get to me. There are three kinds of generic japanese food:

1. Rice

2. A bunch of stuff thrown on a fry pan and cooked, then served with rice

3. A bunch of stuff thrown in a broth and cooked, then served with rice

In the case of foods like ramen, this is totally fine. However, I am not such a big fan of this when it comes to random stir frys at my host familys house, I must say. She manages to work mushrooms and brussel sprouts into everything. But the food is still really good. I just am looking forward to Five Guys and Pizza when I return to the states.