A Much Needed Update

Sorry for not writing anything for nine days.

My Father recently came to visit for a week... from the 5th to the 12th. I got to see him Sunday, Tuesday, Thursday, and then Saturday. Having classes that end at 5:30 made things a little difficult in visiting with him, though.

When going to see him at the airport, I accidentally went to the Osaka one instead of Kansai International. I think this is because I noticed that a monorail goes to Osaka, so I became all excited and focused only on how to use it, where to get on it... instead of where it went. It was fun seeing Osaka by monorail though! I ended up waiting around in the hotel for him studying kanji.

Tuesday we met in Hirakata Station and went to Kyoto. We got off at Sanjo, I think, and grabbed a bus to Kinkakuji. My Dad wanted to see the Osaka Peace museum, which was near Kinkankuji, so I got him to go see that as well, which was a good idea I think. I've been wanting to go see the Golden Pavilion Temple that Yoshimitsu built. It was gorgeous, with a picturesque pond in front of it. There were interesting mushroom and little bowls to throw money at along the path afterwards, but we unfortunately rushed through it to make it to the museum, so I can't really say what significance it had, nor can I about the little statue on an island in the middle of another pond.

The Osaka Peace Museum is great, if you happen to be Japanese or have near native reading-capacity. A few things were written in English, but only broad explainations of maybe 5% of what there was to see. Most of the museum focused on Japanese militarization and the horrors of the first half of last century, but had some newer conflicts and atrocities, including a bit on the Iraq war.

Thursday we just had a good chat over dinner and then went to a coffee shop. I haven't had coffee that good in months, I remember that much. Mostly talked about politics, the state of the world, job prospects for me...

Saturday we met again in Hirakata, and chatted some more in the Starbucks. I then showed my Dad around the department store for gifts and other interesting things. Japan really is a consumer paradise. So many wonderful, trendy, useful, useless, superfluous things. Following along this same route we took the train to Kuzuha for the mall and looked around there... My Dad was impressed with it and thought everyone at work would be too and took pictures. I suppose he was right - the brooding teens and "Joe six-packs" were abscent, it was clean, and classical music was playing instead of whatever crap MTV churns out. Everyone was well-dressed and there were no obese people. My Dad offered that perhaps since people don't have ridiculous car payments or because more people live in apartments, they have more exposeable income for fashion. That might be right, but apartments are probably more expensive here - that and there are probably other cost differences... But I like to think that the American way of spending money you don't have stays in America... Even though reflecting upon recent events, it affects the whole world eventually. Oh well.

We then went to the 100 yen store and bought a lot of stuff for gifts. I'm going to hit a bunch of these for dishware and the like for my apartment. I'll just box it up and mail it. Cheap and unique. We went to a good Chinese restaraunt (where they have chinese food suited for Japanese tastes - nothing you'd find in a chinese place in America if you're wondering,) and then parted ways. My Dad left his Japan travel / guidebook here, so I'll flip through it soon to find interesting places nearby.

Aside from his visit, I can't think of too much else that has happened. Last night I went on a good bike ride at night and found a good ramen shop across from the Fresco I shop at for groceries. I might go there more for dinner. I need to head back to Osake-dojo soon too, and try talking with the old guy there and maybe the customers if they seem willing. Old guys here are hard to understand, with that rough, guttural style of speech. It's awesome to chew someone out in, but scary if they're using it on you; thankfully I've only seen it on TV.

Anyway, I'm still loving the bike rides. I was thinking about maybe getting a good bike when I return to Gettysburg, but the cars would hate me, people would scream at me to get a job so I can buy a car, and people on the sidewalk would be baffled if I rode there (you should if you can here,) and for some reason it's illegal too I think. Who would have thought I'd be pro-bike after coming here? It's ridiculous to try it in America, but if the roads and transport system wasn't so car-focused... Why is the American train system so pathetic too? Two trains crashed due to a conductor texting. How the hell does that even happen? Set up a good system like in Japan, and the jobs it would make, and the cars it would take off the roads... It'll never happen.

But this weekend was mostly just relaxing in the dorm after rushing around and hurrying homework to spend time with my Dad. Working on new grammar and kanji (I need to do more, heh.) Today was a day off due to it being Health and Sports day. More relevant than "Columbus Day"... I studied in the Starbucks and got a lot done, then did some shopping where I got two more issues of Great Detective Conan and some food.

I want to find places other than Starbucks, but I've been reluctant to try them. I should fix this. One up the road from here, Petit Cafe seems to only be open at night. Coffee at that hour isn't a great idea, plus it might be sketchy... we'll see. On the way to Hirakata City there's a place called Mr. Pug Cafe with a pug's face on it for novelty. Today in the city I spotted one place that said it has "Bird Friendly Coffee." I really hope he just mixed up the noun and the adjective there, or maybe you're allowed to take your parakeet in for some espresso. From hearsay, Mr. Donuts has free coffee refills, but I don't want to study in a place where people scream "Irasshai!" (welcome!) constantly while little kids wail for their mothers to get enough donut points for a Pon deLion toy (I kind of want one too).

A funny thing comes to mind for some reason. This was outside the CIE student lounge one day:

The above is a bar-code message you scan with your cellphone. These are usually on ads or pamphlets or in stores or where-ever. Someone just hung it up, and I scanned it with my phone. The message (in Japanese) read: "Gaijin (foreigner) Aquarium: There aren't many, so please just pick one. Good luck!" Someone left a translated version beneath it. Then it was ripped down and only the barcode block was there. Then neither were there. A few other foreigners saw it and thought it was hilarious (I did too,) and I had my speaking partner Yukina scan it and she liked it too. I mentioned it to Lauren, a girl from my dorm and it made her angry. She said a foreigner did it too, which was unfortunate. The lounge has one wall made out of glass entirely, and foreigners hang out there, and Japanese come in a talk to them, or meet their speaking partners there. It basically is an aquarium. Funny stuff.

Those are all the fun stories I can think of.

Future plans include going to Hiroshima this weekend. I need to plan for that, but they are taking too damn long giving us information about it so I can get my shinkansen ticket. I may look for a hostel to stay in too, so I can see more down around there. It's definitely an important spot, plus our class will be getting to listen to a Japanese woman who was present at the Hiroshima bombing who will talk in English about it. We were told not to use flash when photographing her, due to the flash of the bomb being in her memory... I can see insensitive Americans doing bad things. It seems odd to photograph her too, in some respect.

After Hiroshima I'm going to eventually go to Nara and check out the deer park, the huge Bhudda, and take a bus to Horyuji, the oldest wooden temple in all of Japan, and I think the oldest wooden structure in the world.

Also I'm going to see when the cheap Kabuki and Bunraku (puppet theatre) are being performed, since I really want to see those badly. I'm avoiding Noh since I don't require an extravagant nap.

That's about it for now though as far as traveling goes.

I'm getting worried about job prospects for someone who knows Japanese in the USA. Over the weekend I spent several hours (2 1/2 tonight) being absorbed in reading my manga, Great Detective Conan. Figuring out what it says and understanding more and more is such a great feeling. Now I'm thinking about looking into translation jobs, so I'm researching that a bit. I am by far a manga / anime otaku (nerd, and bane of the Japanese Studies major, or at least should be,) so that might be a boon in the job interviews. When learning English as a kid, I read constantly, and devoured new vocabulary, and I loved to read and write. I still love reading if I can find the time, and I still love running into new words. Maybe I can try this with Japanese? And translating things other than manga, anime, and videogames. Novels and other books would be great; I'd love to get to read Japanese novels in Japanese at some point too, the covers of them just scream out at me in the bookstores. I don't know if I have a strong enough urge for this though. Searching for jobs online and finding nilch has me worried though. Living abroad isn't an option either... But I don't want to be working in some shitty retail position after school. I wouldn't last a week in something like that.

Well, I have a year and a half.

Studying and Laying Low

Nothing has really been going on lately, to be honest.

In Negotiation we had our Hospital vs Citizenry negotiation... Right from the start it was a disaster as the leader of the citizens was so hostile and unreasonable... But eventually things cooled down and the citizens got absolutely everything they wanted. This would not happen in real life, as in our mock negotiation neither side had real numbers to go by, such as budgets, income, population numbers, etc... So the hospital would naturally give in since they had no real reason not to. No money or other real worries to get in the way of the decision, unlike in the Commons exercise we are doing where grades are "on the line" (I think he's making it up to get us to care). Either way, it was interesting.

Also on Friday I got back and ran into Jesse and Joe, who were headed to Hirakata to see a travel agent about a Shinkansen (bullet train) to Tokyo for the Tokyo Video Game Show. I was originally going to do that but my Dad scheduled his trip here during it, and it would be rude to go to that. I tried to help them with the tickets at the agency but I was only half-listening... It seemed that they might have said that it was too close to the date to book the tickets, so they had no luck. Anyway, we also picked up James and Tiffany, two other people from our dorm who came here as a couple, apparently... Both studying Japanese at their home university. They're both really nice, but sometimes it's annoying to see people being lovey-dovey when your own other-half is on the other side of the world.

Anyway, after the agent's we went to look for a place to eat... We picked a small restaraunt and split into two groups, Jesse and I, and the Joe, Tiffany, and James... Joe decided to be the third wheel, heheh. The waitress used quite a bit of keigo, a more polite way of speaking Japanese that changes most of the verbs and has certain set phrases; I was a little confused at times. I tried to say that I only rememberd the bit of the name of the thing that looked tasty in the window, but that went nowhere quick. I just picked some udon (a thick noodle) set that came with a tonkatsu (pork cutlet) rice bowl, and a bottle of beer (for 500 yen... why?). This was the first time I had ordered real udon noodles, and they were delicious. So was the pork with egg ricebowl, and whatever the two smaller dishes of vegetables that I added to the udon. The beer was good as well and complemented the noodles very well, but the beer alone doubled the price of the meal.

Having eaten we went to Mr. Donuts (misutaa dou) and I helped Joe get a donut card so he can rack up points for various donut-related merchandise. I'm on the fence for this as it's about 120-130 yen per donut, but I do want a mug or a donut-animal (perhaps the donut-headed lion). We then went to the arcade, then the bookstore, where I bought another Detective Conan for 105 yen (manga is cheaper than toilet paper!). I was suddenly really tired, so I decided to head back since they were planning on karaoke or something else at some entertainment center. I think alcohol makes me sleepy; well, of course it's a depressant, but I just want a good nap after drinking a good bit of it. I slept wonderfully though.

And today I mostly just studied kanji. About 130 or so for Monday's test, then three or so grammar points. I have to review the grammar for speaking too, though. I never use it in what little Japanese conversation I have so I forget it or mix it up frequently.

Not having much Japanese conversation is troubling me, but Yukina and I are going to be meeting twice a week for an hour or so to help eachother in our languages, so that might help. I was thinking on joining a club before I got here, but it's hard to get into them as I've heard, plus your Japanese needs to be good unless it's the band or something... That and their meetings are sometimes during my later classes. Oh well. The only one I would have joined was the ballroom dancing one for swing dancing, but I'm really not that enthusiastic of a dancer anyway.

I don't really want to go to clubs (as in "clubbing") as I don't do that kind of thing anyway, plus it's too expensive. My roomie, Matt has been going to small music houses / cafes in Kyoto but the entrance fees and any kind of food or drink is pricey too... Too loud to talk anyway.

I can't really just grab a Japanese person on campus either to just talk too, haha. Ah well. Doing the INFES (whatever that stands for) culture expo would have been fun too, where each country has a booth and shares things about their culture... Only there are 250+ Americans here.

I realized early though that I shouldn't feel bad for not being able to connect with other Japanese in society here, since, well, it isn't easy for Japanese either. So many are lonely and don't even know who lives in the apartment down the hall. Social networking isn't as good as it was in the past either, and the local news emphasizes it with the recent arsons in a movie dive and a karaoke place. I've been thinking about looking for coffee shops, but the coffee is overpriced and people probably just go there to be left alone and read anyway... seating real-estate is valuable too. We'll judge it better after trying it anyway.

Anyway, I have to get back to my kanji. Tomorrow my Dad gets here and I have to get some work out of the way and really familiarize myself with the new grammar since I'll be trying to do things with him this week. Tuesday I have the whole day off after 10:00, so I plan on showing him around Kyoto, I think. I'm not sure what, yet though. Maybe Ginkakuji and Nazenji, and the Heian Jingu shrine that I somehow missed on both of my trips. Maybe Fushimi Inari too.

A Put Off Post...

I'm still alive!

Sorry I haven't posted in awhile. Classes and daily life have been so busy that I've been putting this (and other things that I should be doing) off.

Well, my last post was on Thursday... Friday, I believe was a normal day except I went out bowling with two girls from the dorm, Lauren and April, and three other guys; Sean, Ryan, and Justin. It only cost 200 yen per game with the student ID and the shoes were 300. Not bad at all. That was all we did since Ryan needed to get back to the dorm since a blister popped in his foot while bowling... I think I bowled a 76 then an 88. I'm so good.

Saturday I woke up at about 10:00 and biked to Makino Station and took the train in the opposite direction of Kyoto, to Osaka. My goal was to find Den-Den Town (Nihonbashi?), the electronics district of Osaka to see how that would be, and Osaka-jo, the castle. That and I planned on getting lost and finding other cool things.

I took an express train that skipped most of the local stops, but there weren't any seats left, so I stood. I didn't mind though since it felt like the train was just gliding over air, I've never ridden on anything so smooth, it was amazing. So quiet too.

After arriving at Kitahama station in Osaka, I followed the signs to the subway and eventually figured out which station I needed to take from there; it was pretty easy too... And I popped out right in the middle of Den-Den.

Den-Den is filled with old and new videogames, toy stores, electronics stores, and... porn. I popped into a few of the game stores to see if anything interesting was there, and they mostly had everything that was ever made.

The biggest electronics store, which was about 6 floors, they had everything... Robots for a few thousand dollars, robot / car kits, new laptops, old laptops (old ThinkPads for 300 yen, Dad,) and tons of accessories. I bought a webcam since I left mine at home, so I can video-chat with a certain girl over skype.

I went into some toy stores too. One it seemed like you can sell to them the 100~200 yen vending machine figures that you don't want and buy the ones you want. Typically anime, manga, or video game characters, or Japanese folk characters. I tried looking for a big bookstore too, for some manga that I wanted to buy, but no luck... The ones I want aren't popular since they aren't about giant flying robots piloted by teenagers with magical powers being chased by victorian vampires, or what-have you.

I did spot a sign for a Maid Cafe. Lonely dorky guys go to them to be served by girls in elaborate maid outfits (not the dirty kind,) and they be overly nice to you while you sip an $8 coffee. This is what I've read about them though, I don't have any desire to go into one... I doubt they would know what to say to me, haha.

After that I grabbed some food and then asked for directions at the Subway for Osaka Castle... with grains of rice on my chin. Oops.

It was a bit of a walk from the subway, but I first ran into an NHK building, with an old storehouse that was preserved outside of it. Was pretty cool.

First I entered the castle garden and marveled at the giant moat for a good while. I met a Korean guy and we took pictures of each other in front of it. I looked around at a shrine in another part of the grounds and then the Castle popped up over the trees... It was amazing. First I had to make it through some gates though, where I ran into the Korean again and we took pictures in front of a gate, haha. His Japanese was a little better than mine though.

The Castle cost about 600 yen to go in. When I got in, I was a tad dissapointed to find that it was a museum that looks like a castle... You couldn't tell that you were inside of this magnificent looking building once you got inside of it. It had some interesting artifacts and it recounted the many seiges that have befallen the castle... But I suppose I should've done my homework and gone to Himeji instead. The view at the stop of the castle was spectacular, however. You could see all of Osaka. I spent a good deal of time up there.

I should also point out that I took the stairs instead of waiting in line for the elevator (I would have done stairs were there no line,) and on the way down I counted 217 or so steps from the top. Phew.

I then went straight back as it was about 5:00 or so and getting dark... No problems on the ride back to Makino. When I went to get my bike though I nearly tore off another similar bike's parking receipt... And on my way out the parking guard noticed this, but didn't say anything... oops. My keychain also got stuck in the spokes and flew off into the road... luckily I found it, while confusing a few bystanders.

My bike's name is "Battle Home". Maybe the bike comes from a long line of strong bicycles, or maybe it picks on me and thinks that every time I try to bike home, it's a real battle... I'm not sure. It's a good bike though. I must say that I absolutely love biking to and from school, and to and from the grocery store most of all. Its just fun riding it around and now I'm not bad at all, so I can weave with other bikes and deftly avoid obachans (Grandmas) and the little metal poles that are sticking up everywhere. It's a shame you can't do this in America, since everyone HAS to drive due to how everything is planned out, and when they do implement bikes they do it wrong... Plus only the maniacs who bike ridiculous lengths to and from work who just drive everyone else insane give bikers a bad wrap... Oh well.

Sunday I mostly studied and rested my feet. Monday and Tuesday it just rained.

Today the rain finally stopped and it was great outside. I found the cafeteria behind the library that is less crowded... You go to two vending machines, put money in, and get a ticket for whatever food item you want... then you give it to the ladies behind the circular counter / kitchen and you get your food. Not a bad place.

In Negotiation we started a fun new exercise about a private hospital, where the white, middle-class people in the area are moving out and poor immigrants and minorities and just poor people in general are moving in. The residents want better access to the hospital and need more assistance, while the hospital wants to concentrate on research and their amazing open-heart surgery program. The hospital then buys land for a new research facility with nurse dorms and the citizen's group storms the office and does a sit in, and now both sides need to negotiate. Tracy asked who in the room reads Ayn Rand, Marx, or who is a hardcore Capitalist... and then made people join the side they most likely didn't want to join. It was pretty funny. He then had the hospital people go somewhere, presumably a classroom since he said that us concerned citizens could not meet in a private building, only public spaces. And then he said we'd negotiate on Friday and class was over, an hour early.

I love things like this, the smell of uncertainty, fear, and anticipated chaos in here, with grades precariously dangling on the precipice of it all... Our side went to talk outside of McDonalds and then eventually went into the cafeteria, scaring Japanese students away. Two leaders emerged (one who just wants people to shut up and get things done, and the other one, an obnoxious, uncertain chatterbox...) and we picked the one who wanted to get things done. We split into various factions such as local religious leaders, school board members, lawyers, etc... A Japanese girl, a girl from Singapore, and myself represented minorities in this... And they had some fun preconceptions about the USA since that's where this case is based. "No, not many Buddhists or Muslims... Yeah, Protestants, Catholics, all Christians..." That and the fact that our countries do healthcare differently confused them, and we had a hard time thinking of what other groups we could call on for assistance since they don't have issues like this...

And the last thing of interest concerns cooking. Last night I realized I had bread that was unused, and two eggs left. So I made Eggs in the Basket, or Toad in the Hole, whichever you call it. It was quite good. Good with the huge bread slices here too. Today I bought two 32 yen bags of noodles, more eggs, an onion, and a carrot, and 220 yen worth of bacon-ish beef. I fried it up in a pan with some paprika, a pepper mix, chili powder, and salt, and it was really good! I was surprised. I have leftovers now too... This is something I could easily make back in the US too, although I'd have to make my own noodles. Spaghetti is a bit different... So that made me feel better after the chili incident.

But that's about all for now. Check out new pictures of Japan here!

http://www.new.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2041799&l=1feff&id=19304454