Fantavista!

Hello again!

Wow, two posts within 4 days, how lucky you are. Well, let's dive in, shall we?

Last night (Sunday Night) was the Towada Fantavision Festival. I'm not sure what part of it was in Fantavision, but it was very fun. When we got there, we did the most important thing, eat some food. Then, we began to enjoy the festival. We ran into Paul and his girlfriend, Maki, there by surprise, so they joined us for awhile.

The first thing we did was sled. They had a small hill set up with lights and snow steps. It was wicked cool! We raced each other, and taught Natalie (a Singaporean who hasn't done much pertaining to cold weather) and Paul (who is afraid of going fast and can't ride a bike- on account of fear, not for lack of trying this year) how to sled. It was so much fun.

Then.

So, there was a small group of American children, probably from the military base. Well, these kids thought they were cool enough to race me. Now, you might not know much about me...well, hopefully you do if you are reading this, but I think it's really fun to make (fun, not anxious or dramatic) mountains out of molehills. So, when I heard this kid say he was THE BEST. I had to turn around and enlighten him on the truth. He claimed he could flip will sledding. I told him I he could flip all he wanted, ain't no way he's getting in front of my sled, I'm winning no problem-o. Tina's mom was there (she's visiting for the week) and she helped the kid out, telling him that I was as fat as an elephant. It didn't matter, I could take all of their trash talk and dish it back. I knew I would win, and no 5 year old, or Tina's mom would tell me otherwise.

So, we got on our sleds. The epic sled race of 2009 was going to begin. Now, my track record wasn't the best, I'd lost to Tina but won against Maki, but I was feeling confident that I could take a 5 year old. So, we climbed on our sleds. Tina jumped on the back of mine because we were going to make it a doubles race...but the kid was sooo cocky that he didn't need another person on the back of his.

"GO!"

Wind was rushing through my hair and face. It was cold, the snow stinging my eyes. I could barely see. Was he in front of me? Was he actually going to take me down? What about my pride? How will I ever look my future children in the eyes?

We made it to the bottom and saw the kid had slid off of his sled. VICTORY WAS MINE.

We got a picture with him, and I'm looking forward to getting it up here. In my victory pose.

And that is how I (we?) beat a 5 year old in a sled race. Maybe I shouldn't be so proud....

Onwards!

After the epic race/battle, we slid into an igloo that was also an ice bar. It was cool. In both senses of the word. I got a ginger-ale since I was driving. After we finished our drinks, we threw the glasses (because they were made of ice!) against the wall of the igloo and went our merry way.

We went our merry way to the banana boat. Which drove us around this cool snow track. It felt like we were on a watertube or something. It was wicked fun!

Then, we had to drive the 2.5 hours back.

Saturday, we actually tried to go to the festival, but they close one of the routes during winter, and when we got to the gate, we instead decided to go to Ogata and eat some Horse as our Valentine's dinner. It was actually pretty awesome, and the place was hoppin'. Who knew, Valentine's dinner at Ogata.

Oh, it's time to get it off work, so I'm going to end here. Have a great day you all.

The end of September/beginning of October

Hello Again.

Things are going well in Japan. Tuesday the 23rd was another national holiday. The night before, I went to a restaurant called Bon with some Misawa JETs. Here’s an interesting bit about Japan, they have tons and tons of small restaurants. Hmm, maybe you’re not understanding me, some restaurants only hold one or two tables and about 5 bar seats. Ah, now you understand, much better. Anyways, Bon is fairly renowned among the JET community in this area. So, I went with pretty high expectations.

And they were fully delivered. The owner, Kappa, speaks pretty good English, and he has decorated his restaurant with really cool Indian art. There are a few scrolls with pictures of Shiva, a few statues of Ganesh, and some great mood lighting. Another very interesting part about Bon, you never ask for a specific dish on the menu. Ignore the menu and just ask Kappa for a “Dinner Plate.” This sends Kappa into a frenzy of slicing, dicing, and cooking that (from what I’ve heard) always ends in something delicious. That night was no exception. Kappa whipped up some sort of spicy curry thing, quail eggs, rice (it’s Japan, of course), lamb in a red wine sauce, and green things (vegetable are not my forte, nor are they important for you, kiddies). Oishii (delicious)! After some good political conversation (JET participants are mostly liberal so far) I went back home and skyped some friends.

For the actual national holiday, I picked up my friend, Nick, from the Hachinohe bus station (he spent the weekend in Tokyo) and we explored Hachinohe all day. Unfortunately, on the way home from Tokyo, he put his backpack on the wrong bus, and we almost had to drive to Towada (about a 45 minute drive away) to pick it up. Luckily, the Japanese are extremely helpful in these situations, and his backpack somehow (I’m going to go with Japanese Shinto Magic) made it back to the Hachinohe that afternoon. That gave us more than enough time to check out the exotic city of Hachinohe.

In the mall at the bus-stop, we spent some time wandering around the Fantasy Dome. We played a few arcade games. The shooting game based on the Silent Hill Videogames was actually all in English, including the voice acting. The game where the music actually mattered, a Taiko Drum rhythm game, didn’t have a single English song. Too bad.

In downtown Hach, we found a variety of cool things. There was a very cool bakery called Sweet Pea that offered small set meals for lunch. It might be a chain. There were also a few people staring at us, as usual. We also passed by a mural outside a hair salon that was pretty damn cool. It had a space-station in the background with this long-haired Viking God in the front and a small earth in the corner. It made me want to get a haircut.

We also passed by a pachinko parlor named “Concert Hall,” that I confused for a real concert hall. Pachinko is a whole post in itself, so I’ll just leave it as this: I should have known what it was from the façade, multicultural posters, and the look of ennui on the old people’s faces.

Afterwards, we went to an arcade, which I will now refer to as The Segadrome. Ok, you’d think that, if Sega owned this place, it would have at least one game with Sonic. Nope. I even saw Mario in there, but no cute blue hedgehogs. It was actually really cool to see how something can take off so much in one country, and totally flounder in another. This emporium of games was filled with people. And things that you would never see in America! For instance, there was a woman (somewhere in her 30’s-40’s) who was just watching her boyfriend/husband playing a driving game. She was standing there, stroking his hair and encouraging him, game after game. I can vaguely sort of see that in America, but only if I stretch my imagination and try to suspend the stereotypes that we’ve grown up with.

Their arcade games are so much more advanced than ours are, too. Remember Magic the Gathering? That card game from awhile ago that still lives on today? Well, they’ve taken that about 4 or 5 levels past what we’ve got. You can actually buy cards, put them on this gridded table in front of you, and the monitor you are staring at actually picks up which card you put down and creates a 3D visualization of it, the battlefield, and everything that is happening at once. Spells are flying all around, and as you move your cards in real time, so the monitor shows what happens. Your dragon was kicking so much ass until the computer summoned that huge magic eye, that you tried to counter but couldn’t, that paralyzed the dragon that was attacking the sprite who was casting haste on the… Yeah, all of that in real time. Wicked cool.

One more thing about their magical arcades. They are training children to gamble. There are many games where you slide in your tokens in order to mess up this order of tokens that might push down other tokens which you will get. It’s pretty basic, but it prepares them for pachinko later in life.

That night, I went to my coworker’s house for dinner. Shimotai-san has a great family. They were really nice and I hope I can get dinner with them again soon. They made sukiyaki, where they get a lot of vegetables and various kinds of meat, throw them in a hot plate-thing with a lot of soy sauce, and let it cook on the table while everyone uses their chopsticks and dips in. It doesn’t end there, though. You then dip whatever it is you picked out into raw egg. It was actually really good and, hey, no salmonella yet.

After Tuesday, it was just regular work for the rest of the week and activities after work.

Here’s the story for this past weekend. On Friday, the 26th, I went with Erin, Seth, and Wade to an izakaaya. It’s an all you can eat and drink place. Yes, you can keep ordering for two hours. It’s amazing. Plate after plate of appetizers, pitchers of beer, and as many cocktails as you want. We had some good palaver, and at the end of 3 hours, Erin, Seth, and I took a taxi to my place. Seth and Erin stayed the night so that we could wake up early and go to the Takko Garlic and Beef Festival the next day.

And go we did! We made it to Takko and ordered our raw beef and garlic. We then proceeded to one of the many outdoor grills and grilled our meat. There were a lot of other JETs there, and even more Misawa military folk. Even in the midst of all of these white people, one Japanese man still snuck next to Seth and tried to get a picture without “that white person knowing.” Well, we noticed this weird man posing behind Seth, and Seth joined in with his peace sign. I’m pretty sure he made that man’s day. We also got a few pictures with the high school students who were cleaning the grills, they were funny.

Ok, enough of Takko. Back into the car we went, all the way to Hachinohe University to hang out with the university students. The event was billed as an anime/manga exchange, but we really just talked and hung out. Afterwards, we all went to an Indian place for dinner. It was cool hanging out with the students, it’s just unfortunate that I don’t speak enough Japanese yet to carry on a long conversation. Regardless, it was cool hanging around them.

Afterwards, Seth, Erin, a Japanese woman named Etsuko, and I decided to hit up an onsen. You may remember my feelings towards onsens from my first post. Well, regardless, we still went. Yep, time to get naked. I had my modesty towel in hand and went from pool to pool, soaking in and relaxing as best I could.

Sunday, I cleaned my room a little, ran a few errands, and met up with my friend Grahame in Oirase. We went to Shimoda mall very quickly so I could check out electric pianos. Afterwards, we drove to downtown Hach, met up with Tina, Mark, and Wade, totally by accident sat down for a drink in the outdoor ramen/bars. Since I couldn’t drink since I was driving, I opted to eat the random sea animal. It looks like a really intense heart with spikes growing out of it. That’s about all I can say. The waitress chopped it up, and I began to eat a pretty gross whatever it was. General impression? In the words of Grahame:
“I would eat it if I were starving, but I’m not starving.”

Afterwards, Grahame and I got Ramen at another outdoor place, and I drove him back to Oirase. Another weekend done.

Yesterday, Tuesday, after Japanese classes, I got dinner with Wade and all of the Japanese teachers, many of whom speak English. There is one teacher who is hilarious, and she’s even on facebook! She kept asking Wade and I to come up with a trendy American name for her. She couldn’t pronounce Gertrude, which was a tragedy. So we gave her the name Rachel. I got lunch with her and another teacher (who happens to work in my building) today. It was a lot of fun. Now, I’m back in the office, about to talk to with supervisor. That’s about it for this week. See you.

Quick Update about after work today.

I went to Hibarino Sports Park in Gonohe to prepare for the soccer tournament this weekend. Seth and I were wandering around the fields looking for a team that would take us in and let the weird foreigners play. We found a group of middle-school kids who let us join their practice. Yeah, you know when you and your gaijin (foreigner) buddy are huffing and puffing while the Middle-School kids are barely breaking a sweat, you aren't prepared for a soccer tournament. I felt my age already, at one point Seth and I just looked at each other and said, in unison "I'm so out of shape." Dear god, and I'm only 22.

The students were really nice, though. Too nice, almost. One time, I was on the halfway mark of their field, and everyone spread apart (now I know what Moses felt like) and just shouted "Shoot! Shoot!" Really? Now? Ok, well if you're all going to spread before me, then sure. Other times, they would pass to Seth when there was no good reason to pass to him. The other team would move away from him and let him dribble up to the goal. It was like they were just playing with us. It didn't matter though, it was so much fun. We got some practice in, they were having a great time playing with the foreigners, and we even have an open invitation to join their practice whenever we want! It was so cool, and to me it was another example of how easy to put yourself out there and get taken in by the community, as long as you can take the first step.

After soccer, I went home, showered, and headed to a Brazilian restaurant downtown for dinner with a friend. As expected, the dinner was good. I had some sort of corned beef hash and fried rice thing with a sunny-side down egg. I'm not sure how Brazilian that is, but it tasted good enough. The only problem is, halfway through the dinner, my entire Capoiera class came in and caught me playing hookey! Dammit, why did I have to choose the only Brazilian haven in the city and have the Brazilian Martial Art club come in that night! Ah well, it was all good fun, anyways.

Shigga Shigga

Hello Everyone. Well, I had a great weekend to write about, but first I'm ticked off right now, so you have to read about this first. I was teaching at an elementary school today, and one of the 5th grade students comes from the US (mom is Japanese, dad is American, they divorced) and has been here a year. He's causing trouble at home and crying every night, and they want me to talk to him and find out what is going on. Ok, I can do that, I was a "Big Brother" in High School, I majored in Psychology, I read about therapies for fun, and therapy is sort of what I want to do with my life.

So, they take me to the principal's office and everything goes to shit. First of all, another JET comes and wants to watch me talk to the kid. Then, the teacher wants to sit in and watch as well, like all it will take for the child to open up is the presence of another American, and that PEOPLE STARING AT HIM won't be a problem at all. The teacher got the hint to leave, and I start talking to the kid. I'm just talking to him in the beginning, trying to find out what he likes, trying to build a rapport, joking about how Japanese can't pronounce words, etc. Well, I get a few giggles out of him and I'm sort of making headway, regardless of the limited time I have to figure out all of this child's problems.

Then, the principal comes in. He walks in, says a few words, and sits at his desk doing work.

Oh, you've noticed the kid is nervous and sweating profusely? Well, Mr. Principal, I'm glad you thought that the best thing to do would be to rub the kid's shoulders and tell him not to worry. Yeah, that was really helpful. Hey, while you're at it, why don't you tell him not to be sad and solve all of our problems in one fell swoop?

Now the kid, still sweating profusely and not even giving occasional eye contact anymore, is totally shut. One-word answers and everything. I decided to give him my email and phone in case he wanted to hang out sometime, but I'll probably initiate the first step next week if he's willing to see me. Just as I'm wrapping up, the teacher from the beginning comes in because she decided it would be best if she was around to watch too. Great job with the emotional-understanding deficit, Japan. Do you wonder why your suicide rate is ridiculously high?

So, I wasn't able to magically help out the child like they wanted, and they asked what I suggested and how they could help and how the mother could help. I told them that there isn't much they can do, with the recent divorce and subsequent move to another country (where he has to pick up the language, which he can speak but not read and write), there's a lot going on with him that they can't help on their own. I suggested a child psychologist. Really, if they are going to treat him the way I watched (talking about him but not to him etc.), he's never going to get better.

Afterwards, the JET apologized for being in the same room, and we talked about what was happening. He enlightened me that the whole "emotionally helping other people" thing is not something Japanese are good at, preferring to do things such as a quick massage and daijoube ("don't worry"). Part of it is the cultural thing of keeping everything inside instead of any outbursts...hence the high number of suicides. It's not that their hearts aren't in the right place, it's just that they have no idea on how to help or empathize.

Ok, now that that is off of the chest, I can fill you in on everything I've been up to lately.

Friday night I met up with some friends who were on their way to Hokkaido (the northernmost prefecture) for dinner and to drop them off at the ferry. We went for yakiniku- a restaurant where you cook small slices of meet on a grill at your table. We had some great conversation about how Palin is the scariest woman alive (unless you were friends with her in High School), how McCain totally changed all of his stances post-campaign (check out this link for a great Daily Show segment on the life of McCain), and pretty much everything politics.

After dropping them off at the ferry, I went downtown to meet up with some Hach JETs (Big Mike, Paul, Mark, Tina, Erin, and Wade). I met up with them at a restaurant and we went to another bar with darts, pool, and nintendos. I couldn't drink since I was driving, but it seemed like downtown Hach would be a lot of fun to explore next time, when I'm not driving. I did pretty well at pool, and Wade and I won both games.

I got home around 2:30 and I'm getting into bed. Around 3 am my phone buzzes:

“Hello?”
“Hey Greg, it’s Paul.”
“Oh, hey…What’s up?”
“Dude, someone’s hand just reached in my window and I’m freakin’ out.”
“What?”
“I was sleeping and I woke up and this hand appeared above my head, it was coming through my window. I screamed “OY” and whoever it was ran away. I think I was dreaming it, but I couldn’t have, it seemed too real.”
“Whoa, that’s really creepy.”
“Yeah man, I can’t sleep anymore, I can’t believe that happened. What if someone is still out there? I thought it was a woman, I saw a pony tail, but I don’t know…it could have been Yakuza or something. Sorry to wake you up and everything, I’m just freaked out”
“Hey, don’t worry about it.”
And so the conversation continued. He called again at 5am and we talked some more. He also called about 3 or 4 other JETs too, so some of us didn’t get good sleep. The next day Paul and his supervisor checked his window, someone broke the screen and everything. They fixed the window and got a lock for the glass part, but I think Paul is still a bit shaken. Luckily I’m on the fourth floor, so no one will be reaching their hand through my window, all that can happen is the voyeur with the binoculars across the way.

The next day (Saturday), I went to an all-you-can-eat Yakiniku place with many of the Hach JETs. I couldn’t read the signs for what each meat was, so I just piled them all on my plate and began the grillin’. After a few refills and some ice cream, I was pleasantly stuffed. Afterwards, I went to Lapia Mall (home of the infamous Fantasy Dome, surely you’ve heard of it) to watch a Brazilian festival. Paul’s Capoeira class was doing a performance, and I got to meet them backstage. Capoeira is a Brazilian martial art that is dance-like, and instead of sparring in the traditional sense, they sort of dance together, attacking and dodging to make a dance-like sparring match. The people really cool, and I’m going to a class tonight to check it out. It seemed like a very chill group.

Afterwards, I got some Mos Burger (ridiculously small burgers, but they have different flavors like the ebi-burger, tonkatsu-burger, and so forth), and headed home to clean the apartment. Exciting, eh? Well, I taped up the bottom of the entranceway to my shower, where I suspected those pill-bugs were coming from. Oh, I haven’t mentioned this, but lately I had a small pill-bug posse in my apartment. After taping up their suspected entrances, they haven’t made a return, so I think I took care of them. After cleaning, I saw my friend Saki online and we talked for awhile, then I headed to bed.

Sunday I tried surfing for the first time! It was wicked fun. Grahame in Oirase brought two surfboards, so Brandon and I went to Oirase and began learning the venerable art of surfing. We only lasted about an hour in the freezing water, but Brandon was almost standing up, and I was able to catch some waves lying on my stomach. Sadly, we won’t be able to go surfing again until Spring, but I can’t wait until we do. The beach itself was surprisingly ugly. There were tons of concrete jacks to protect against tsunamis (which the Northern Part of Japan doesn’t really get…it’s just a way for the government to stimulate economic growth by paying for construction).

After surfing I saw Wanted, which is great for some mindless action, then headed home for some sleep.

The next day, Monday, was a day off (Respect for Old People’s Day), and I went to a festival at Yawata shrine near the outskirts of Hachinohe city. It was really cool, there was an archery competition for the middle and high schools, and I’ve got some great pictures from that. The shrine itself was gorgeous. I also paid 100 Yen to get a card with my luck and advice on it. My luck is “Good,” so I think I’m pretty set for awhile.

A young woman shooting in the competition. Japanese traditional archery is called Kyudo.

A place to pray at the shrine.

We really just walked around the shrine that day, eating festival food, doing festival things, and in general having a good time. Afterwards, we went to the coolest pizza place ever in the uptown development of Hachinohe New City. Brick oven pizza is already awesome, and the place itself had great ambience and music. At night, it appears that there will be live music, so I really want to go and check out the bar.

A monk walking through the shrine.

After driving home, I rested for a bit, cooked some dinner while watching The Office online, and went to sleep. It was a really good weekend.

This week in Random Japan:
I have a coworker who I think is hilarious. About once a week, when I’m going on a trip to school or something, everyone will say some incomprehensible Japanese as a goodbye. Not him. He stands up and does the “get some” signal, his arms pumping in and out from his hips and his bottom half gyrating back and forth. Does he know what he’s doing? I don’t know. Is it hilarious? Of course! It’s a middle-aged Japanese salaryman signaling me to get some action, saying something that sounds like “shigga shigga.” I am pretty much crying every time.