Sumo Wrestler Photo Op

high


Yesterday, I was lucky enough to meet a real sumo wrestler.

On Fridays I always work at a local agriculture school. It is interesting. It is definitely the school that can be the most difficult for me to engage the kids. Then there are some English devotees. Out of 600 kids there are 3 that are in the English Speaking Society and I meet with them most Fridays. They write things in their notebook to read to me when they see me. It is really cute and funny. This Friday one of the boys read a paragraph describing the crane game to me. You know the crane that you can can try to operate to somehow pick up a prize, like a stuffed animal. I have never successfully maneuvered this machine. My student was able to pick up four stuffed animals out of eight tries in one day.

Anyway, this school graduated a highly ranked sumo player, Takekaze, who visited on Friday and I had a photo op with him. He is not very tall, as you can see in the pictures, but he is big. His visit was an ordeal. There were camera crews running around the whole afternoon.

I have noticed that there are many ceremonial aspects to the Japanese culture some of which I witnessed on Friday. For example, the sumo coach waited in a separate room while
Takekaze talked with the principal and two students while many photos were taken. Then the sumo coach was announced and he walked into the room in a ceremonial fashion with tv cameras following him.

Afterwards the school held an assembly. First the students gathered early to practice the school song. When Takekaze entered the auditorium he was led by a student holding a huge purple flag. Then there were speeches, bowing, singing and drumming.

It was a pretty interesting day. I have to mention that I like the ceremonial aspect of Japanese culture. I like how it celebrates the importance of events and seems so official. Although an aspect of the ceremonialism is that there is a RIGHT way to do things, and I am often caught doing those things wrong. Many times during these formal ceremonial acts, I have been nudged by a Japanese person to sit up straighter or uncross my legs or fold my hands differently. I comply and am reminded that I am an informal American.

Anyway, shaking hands with a top-ranked sumo wrestler was fun.

The Japanese Way

During the morning meeting two weeks ago at my largest school, many of the teachers were doling out accolades and receiving congratulations (the rugby team, cross country, etc.), when suddenly my friend Nomi pops up out of his seat and starts bowing to great applause. I was puzzled, as Nomi doesn’t sponsor a sport. He finally sat back down, and the meeting continued with the vice principal barking out the daily instructions through his megaphone (this school’s teacher room is enormous, so the VP either uses his megaphone or microphone to spread the morning message; he alternates between both, though it isn’t clear why he picks one over the other). When he was settled, I asked Nomi whether he won an award – and he acted like he had no idea what I was talking about, as if he’d been conked on the head with a rock and had blanked out during the last five minutes. After gathering himself, he said “Oh, yes. I won the gold medal in an essay writing contest. About school activities.” Wow. The Japanese really do compete at everything, I thought, including an essay competition about competition.

… fast forward to this week …

Nomi was AWOL for most of the day, which made for a boring afternoon for me. Japanese teachers typically have about three classes a day, leaving them with a lot of time to spend in the teacher room. Now, at schools like this, many of the teachers, who are forced to work on Saturdays for no extra pay, manage to look as tired and busy and put upon as possible, and in truth they do have a lot of work, but from my perspective, they have more than enough time to finish their work without all the theatrical moaning. Anyway, Nomi typically is very cheerful, and more than happy to chat away, even (or maybe because) it goes against the grain of the overall teacher room atmosphere. Just after lunch, he shows up wearing an expensive suit, as opposed to his school suit, and carrying two giant, framed certificates that, he tells me, he just received at and awards ceremony. He didn’t look all that happy.

Turns out, the winner of the essay competition not only received a couple of ho-hum framed plaques to hang on the wall, but two checks for 100,000 yen each, or about $2,000 (why there were two checks wasn’t clear). Only, Nomi had just found out that the principal had ruled against the VP, who said the money was Nomi's to keep, and decided the money belonged to the school, and not to Nomi.

“That’s bullsh---, you know,” he said. “I was thinking maybe a new bike, a vacation.
"Now, there is nothing.”

As if that wasn’t bad enough, the office manager walks up and hands Nomi two ornamental envelopes, which apparently held the prize-winnings checks. Nomi opened them, held them up to the light, and just to confirm the sad reality, notes they are “empty.” And next, office guy hands Nomi a single sheet of paper, of which is a photocopy of both checks. Talk about rubbing your nose in it. I’m told they are to “remind him of his achievement,” yet I suspect all they're going to remind Nomi of is how he got screwed out of 2,000 bucks. Nomi lets the photocopied checks sit on his desk for a bit, mumbles to himself some, and pulls out a three-ring binder. He places the photocopied checks on top of a stack of papers, and snaps them into place.

“It is the Japanese way.” I guess.

Those Markers are Washable

(these photos have nothing to do with anything, but I thought you all might enjoy them. Jonas loves markers. But he hasn't quite figured out how to use them. Or maybe he has).

A weekend ago, we used a three-day holiday to go skiing/snowboarding in a nearby prefecture called Iwate. We made reservations at a smallish, family run place called Rocky’s Hotel (here in Japan they’re called pensions – somewhere between a bed and breakfast and a regular-old hotel). Frankly, we were surprised there was an opening. Just about everything everywhere was booked, and this place looked pretty sweet. We get there, and the owner, Sato, says he doesn’t know anything about our reservation, but that he’ll find a room for us. The same thing happened to an Australian couple who booked using the same Internet service, hostelbookers.com, an English website that books hotels/hostels all over world. Initially, Sato explained the discrepancy by saying his Internet had been spotty the last few days. Later that night, after much sake, the truth came out.

“Speak English -- OK. Read English -- not OK,” he said.

“I get email from hostelbookers.com. I don’t know what it says.”

So, Sato signed his place up with this English website, knowing that all the reservations would be in English, and also knowing that neither he, nor anyone in his family, could read any English whatsoever. I think this pretty much summed up Sato. He thought this was hilarious. He thought most things were hilarious. His told us his favorite actor was Eddie Murphy, and he constantly cracked jokes that were frequently very difficult to understand. Here’s one that I did get, although it took me a full day to figure out.

Sato drives a Jeep Wrangler. He also wears Wrangler jeans. At the bar (he ran the place, and also the bar – sort of a Japanese Sam Malone), he pointed at his brother in the kitchen and said that his brother loves American trucks.

“He has a Dodge Ram – I have a dodge wife,” he said, falling over himself with laugher. Then he said it again. The next day, I figured out that he has a dodge wife – or, he avoids getting married. But who knows if that’s the real joke.

Another one. As his mother, a sweet, tiny woman, walked up the steps toward the kitchen after cleaning the downstairs rooms:

“Here comes my uncle – I mean my mother.” He repeated the joke again. He repeated all his jokes two or three times. His uncle, I mean his mother, just smiled.

Some shots of the area. I swear, it snows so often here that I feel like I'm living in one of those snow globes, and that every few hours, someone just shakes it up.

As you might expect, Sato was my kind of guy. As we were leaving, he demanded that we all get a picture in front of the building. And so here we are.

The highlight of the weekend, beyond even the skiing, was the food. Both meals were, hands down, among the best food we’ve eaten in Japan, and at $30 apiece, Tricia thought maybe the best meal for that prices she’s ever had. Sato’s brother studied French cooking somewhere, and before the first dinner, Sato claimed that a meal like this would cost $100+ per person at the main ski lodge further up the mountain. I figured he was boasting, but after dinner, I ‘m not so sure.

An example of one meal (I don’t think I have the order correct):

First course: a salt-incrusted, smoked Japanese trout, baked on a stick over an open fire.

Second course: a green salad with a thin layer of tofu, which gave the salad a real kick.

Third course: garlic and something (the menu was in Japanese, so I don’t know) soup.

Fourth course: pork medallions in some type of sauce, topped with a soft-boiled egg.

Fifth course: a slice of chocolate cake with ice cream, with “Thank You” spelled out in fudge sauce (wait, I thought they couldn’t read any English!).

Here is the breakfast spread.




These dudes were from Tokyo. The night before, they passed around a bottle of 60 proof sake for everyone to try. It tasted awful, and they were awfully drunk. But also very nice. They loved Jonas, but come on. Who doesn't.

The best thing about the ski mountain was the sweet play area for kids. We switched off skiing, while the other watched Jonas here. He loved it.

No PJs, No Sleep

The other night, when Tricia was out doing one of her many weeknight activities (honestly, it's hard for me to imagine that she would be as busy as she is considering we have, like, two friends in all of Akita, yet she still seems to having something going on at least two-three nights a week, from yoga to whatever else she does) I was left alone to put Jonas to sleep. I couldn't find any pajamas, so I grabbed a pair of sweat pants and a T-shirt, figuring that would do. Hey, it's what I sleep in. It should be good enough for Jonas, too. So I dumped him in his crib and sat down on the couch. Only he didn't go to sleep. I noticed a lot of noise coming from his room. And I mean a lot. Also, nearly 45 minutes passed, and I could tell he still wasn't asleep. He wasn't crying; just jabbering away. So I finally decided to peek in and see what was up. And what was up was this: he had tossed every blanket, pillow and comforter out of his crib and onto the floor. He had taken off his T-shirt, removed his sweat pants, pulled off his diaper, and thrown all of them to the floor. That left him sitting there, in the middle of his crib, completely naked, just talking to himself. I guess when you can't speak in full sentences, it takes some creativity to get your point across.

Snow Festival Month

If you haven't heard from of us in awhile, don't worry. We are just spending our weekends enjoying the snow, so that the cold Akita winter is fun, not just cold. Last weekend we were lucky enough to be invited to spend a weekend at an icicle festival with a group of Japanese, Australians and Americans. We enjoyed eating meals together, the beautiful onsen, and the snow. Here is a picture of Jason and Jonas after playing in the snow.


I don't think Jason and I have had a couple pic taken in a long time...too bad I am wearing that ridiculous hat. You can see the frozen icicles in the background--they were lit up with huge lights.

Jonas having fun in the snow.


This is one of our friends, Mary Ellen, in this picture with us. I think Jonas looks much older here. I think the fact that he is creeping up on two years old is apparent in this picture.


February is the month of snow festivals in Japan. More to come later...

Curing Rubbish in Tokyo

Some more shots from Tokyo ...

This shrine/temple (honestly, I can never remember which are which, and that's pretty lame on my part) was just a short walk from my hotel. They lit the sucker up at night, and it was very cool to walk around and check out for 30 minutes or so on my way back to my room. The thing about Tokyo was, you would just be walking down the street, and something like this would just pop up out of nowhere. I didn't make a point of seeing this, or arrange to have my hotel near it. It was just there. And there was a lot of that going on in Tokyo.

I think that's an Edo-period gang sign he's flashing.







A note about the subway system in Tokyo: on two different occasions, a random stranger approached me and asked whether I needed help as I stared and stared at the complex subway map up on the wall. One guy was with his wife and two kids, and they had this patient look on their faces that told me he had done this before. The other were two giggly girls. I noticed them looking at me, and when I looked over at them, one of the girls pointed at herself and said, "Me?" I said, "Yeah, sure." And she helped me to the point of pulling aside a train worker to make sure I was going where I needed to go.

These are just a couple pics of the crazy electronics/magna area in Tokyo, Akihabara. The one picture is going up the escalator, and notice, that not a surface is spared of advertising. Even the tiny space in between the wall and the escalator itself gets a tiny strip of adage.




And this is Harajuku, where teenage girls (and one boy) dress up in odd outfits and pose for western (and, without a doubt, plenty of Japanese) tourists. Also there were, as the picture indicates, kids giving out free hugs. And my favorite was this guy dancing very passionately to U2 while someone with a very professional-looking camera filmed it all. And lastly, the crowd, which seemed pretty typical for Tokyo. Just an unbelievable amount of people.

And finally, my favorite picture of the weekend. There were many street-corner bands in Tokyo, but this one stood out for its music, and most of all, for its seriously-cool name.

Get out the vote

Jason and I were talking tonight about the election tomorrow. We feel excited by the possibility that Obama might be the Democratic presidential candidate and I can’t wait to find out how the voting goes on Tuesday.

This is just a quick post to remind people to vote in the primary – which is Tuesday for many people. One of the things that I love about Obama is that he cares to lessen the widening gap between rich and poor. I admire that he spent a few of his pre-political years as a community organizer, working with low-income residents in Chicago. I think this gives him a unique perspective on class issues that most presidential candidates do not have. In the Senate, he has helped pass legislation that helps working people, like increased subsidies for child care.

I came across a letter that Joan Baez wrote to the editor of the San Francisco Chronicle. I like what she wrote, so here it is:

Editor - I have attempted throughout my life to give a voice to the voiceless, hope to the hopeless, encouragement to the discouraged, and options to the cynical and complacent. From Northern Ireland to Sarajevo to Latin America, I have sung and marched, engaged in civil disobedience, visited war zones, and broken bread with those who had little bread to break.

Through all those years, I chose not to engage in party politics. Though I was asked many times to endorse candidates at every level, I was never comfortable doing so. At this time, however, changing that posture feels like the responsible thing to do. If anyone can navigate the contaminated waters of Washington, lift up the poor, and appeal to the rich to share their wealth, it is Sen. Barack Obama. If anyone can bring light to the darkened corners of this nation and restore our positive influence in world affairs, it is Barack Obama. If anyone can begin the process of healing and bring unity to a country that has been divided for too long, it is Barack Obama. It is time to begin a new journey.

JOAN BAEZ

Menlo Park

In family news, we spent a fun weekend a few hours outside of Akita City. We will post some pictures later, but for now here are a couple of videos of Jonas sledding.