I walked into class today, and a kid I didn’t even recognize looked up from his origami, and called out loudly, “Haaannnaaaaaaah!” 😀
Later, when talking to a teacher whose classes I no longer teach, I was informed that her male students miss seeing me and my amazing fashion sense in their class.
There are some parts of my job that really are amazing and filled with love, and that I definitely will miss. 😀 ❤ ❤ ❤
Post-a-day 2017
Today, I met the other half of my new students at my base school. It being their first lesson with me, the bulk of the lesson was designed around a sort of self-introduction on my part.
We did some fun warm-ups, – I must say that there is nothing quite like watching a group of girls suddenly start waving their hands in the air, shouting, “Money! Moneyyyy! Moneyyy!” over and over again – followed by a PowerPoint of ten fun questions about me. No, these kids don’t know me or much anything about me beyond what can be seen, but that’s the whole fun of having them decide answers to questions about me. I set it up, of course, in a natural flow of easy answers in the beginning and complex ones by the end. So, things like my height, my eye color, whether I can eat natto (a local specialty that foreigners typically not only hate, but cannot even manage to eat), pets and siblings, places I’ve lived and languages I speak…, those sorts of things. It does a rather good job of giving me a feel for the students’ abilities and comfort levels with English, as well as allowing them to have and understand a somewhat well-rounded background for me (even if it is a rather well-rounded background that only tells them that there is a whole lot more to me than could be expected, and that I’m totally awesome and utterly weird compared to what they’re used to having in their daily lives here).
That being said, – this is a kind of long set-up, I know, but bear with me – one might think that students would have all sorts of questions to ask me about me and my life. And they actually do, really. However, they all have a desire greater than wanting to know more information about me, something they want to do first. And that desire is the point of this set-up.
This afternoon, after school, I was walking across the outdoor walkway, heading to pick up something across the school grounds. One of the students from one of today’s classes happened to be walking in the opposite direction on the walkway. As our paths began to cross, I greeted him, as I usually do with my kids, and he responded happily. However, he had an air of hesitation about him, and so I paused with raised eyebrows to see what was up.
He stood silently at first, but soon began, “Could you…,” mumbles in Japanese, then mumbles, “… show me…,” before coming out with the full sentence, “Could you show me… your eyes?”
I kid you not – this is Japan. Being accustomed to the never-ending desire my students all seem to have to gaze into my blue eyes, I smiled brightly, granted him an, “Of course!”, and opened my eyes wide. The sun just might have given them a bit of a sparkle for this little guy to enjoy. For a good, true five seconds, he stared, amazed, at my eyes. Then, having verified the truth of my blue eyes, he thanked me and said his goodbye, heading off on his original path.
Adorable. Just plain adorable, these kiddos.
Post-a-day 2017
Tonight, I learned that Japanese has its own version of French’s verlan. For those unaware, verlan is, for the most part, splitting a word in half, and then putting the second half first. So, the word l’envers, splits to l’en and vers. Keeping in mind the pronunciation of each part, you switch them to vers+len, and then alter spelling to keep the same sounds, giving you ver+lan, verlan. Thus you have the word for backwards, l’envers, in verlan. As I mentioned, I learned tonight that Japanese has its own version of this same concept.
The sentence I was given was the following:
I ate sushi with a woman in Roppongi.
Onna to roppongi de sushi wo tabetta.
That is the original, normal version. The slang version was then as follows:
Naon to ginroppon de shiisuu tabetta.
ナオンとギロッポンでシースー食った
The funny thing to me about this slang, is the users of it. The friend who was informing me of this slang mentioned later that “[h]igh school students don’t say that. Elder people may understand. Remember this.” And so I have learned the slang of the current 30+-year-olds in Japan. We think, anyway. He told me to test it out, so I could see who understood it. We’ll see how well that goes over – I had a fancy Japanese word to use at the hanami (Sakura-viewing picnic) this past weekend, and everyone just assumed a mishearing or misunderstanding had taken place on their side, because why would a foreigner know such a fancy word, hmm???? 😛 But I think this one has better potential for fun. 🙂
Post-a-day 2017
This week has been quite busy for me, and I have found myself working on various artsy projects, producing some very neat results (e.g. I’ve made one and a half pair of legwarmers in the past day and a half. And I’ve already worn the one pair today.). However, I have had a strong experience of being unaccomplished at the end of each day.
I sit at work, wondering what I can do with this desire, this need to do something… Anything, it feels like. I just need to do something productive. Or so it feels. However, as I have gone to bed late each night, after working on these various art projects, I have still felt rather unaccomplished. This has happened to me before, so I started wondering what I’ve done in the past to handle such uneasiness of mind. As I’ve thought about it this evening, in the middle of working on my legwarmers and rain stick, I’ve begun to realize that the sense of accomplishment desired is not the one connected to producing physical results – it is more of the emotional sort. That is, I long to be accomplished emotionally.
When I take into account the fact that I have had very little communication with others at work this past week, it only makes all too much sense. I’m around people all day, but I do not interact with them much with words, which leaves me emotionally lonely, and emotionally unaccomplished. And so, what do I do tonight? I speak these words aloud to my phone, instead of typing them, so as to experience a sense of telling a story to another, as though I were speaking to you right now, instead of merely writing, and your reading it at another time.
I suppose this is one thing I shall not miss come August.
Post-a-day 2017
Today, I met someone who has lived so far what I consider to be an awesome life – one which I quite envy. While the specific locations were different than my own desired locations, the situations all beautifully aligned with a growing-up that I at least want for my own children, since I didn’t have it for myself.
In an odd way, I was grateful to find that this person had a girlfriend, and so was unavailable for consideration. Why is that, exactly? Well, a good chunk is the usual part of just wanting to be friends with an awesome person, without the hassle of dating potential getting in the way at any point, as is usual when meeting awesome guys. (for me, anyway) However, upon further inquiry, I discovered within myself something surprising. I wouldn’t want to date him, because he is so awesome.
See, as I was thinking about all of these things he has done and all of the accomplishments he has (and how there are likely plenty more of which I have currently heard nothing), I noticed that, if he were available, I wouldn’t actually want to date him. With all of his awesome background and talents and such, I would feel so below him in a daring situation, so to speak. As friends, I’m okay with his awesomeness. But not in dating.
What’s with that, huh?
I have begun to see that, perhaps – just perhaps – I not only do not want to date someone superior to me, but I want to date someone to whom I feel superior. If I were to date someone who had done all the awesome things I have done in my life, it would take away a huge portion of my pride from my uniqueness of experiences and talents. Does that mean, then, that I am actually looking for someone to whom I look down, despite my conviction that I want to be able to respect my partner in a somewhat-looking-up-to sort of way?
This then leads me to a question of whether this 1) is something I actually want for my future partner, and 2) is playing a role in my having been unable to find someone.
I feel almost as if a whole section of my perspective and being has just been shattered, and sh**’s about to get real, you know? It is time for some true and genuine reflection on an area of myself I never even understood to exist. Yockers, this’ll be interesting, for sure!
Post-a-day 2017
These next three weeks will be huge in determining my satisfaction and fulfillment with my job for my remaining time here in Japan, however, based on how things look with the new setups and the new teachers at each of my schools, I have a feeling things will continue to improve for me at work. That being said, it is therefore almost safe to say that I have entered that happy phase that always seems to accompany a rough situation.
Just as Jane Austen expresses in Pride and Prejudice, as Jane and Elizabeth are ending their stay at Netherfield, how everyone was so delighted at their departure, that their civilities returned so much so that Miss Bingley was actually pleasant toward Elizabeth, and even shook hands with her – I feel that bothersome situations allow us to experience a sense of gratitude and delight in them when, at long last, they are finally coming to a close. It is as though we are finally able to appreciate the situation, once we know that we are almost through with it. I do not mean simply that we are excited for whatever it is to be over. Not at all. I mean that, because whatever it is is about to be over, it is as though we see it for the first time through new eyes, and we see all the positives of the situation, so much so at times that we start to wish that it wouldn’t end.
In most any job I have held and found bothersome to some degree or another, all of the annoying bits seemed to be suddenly tolerable in my final chunk of time at the job. Once I knew that the end was near, that all of this would be gone and finished soon, it was somehow okay that people did things that pissed me off or totally didn’t work… I even would have thoughts of my departure not being a good idea anymore – that perhaps it was worth it after all to stay in the job. Fortunately, my senses and logic took care of me, and held me to my original intention to depart each time.
Now, I am not quite at that point, as I am aware of this situation and its regular occurrences in my life. However, I certainly notice this change of mentality for myself. Yes, I still find an absurd amount of things that I dislike about living here, but they are losing their hold on me. As I notice that I have so little time remaining, I am suddenly excited by all the things to do before time runs out, and I even have desires to look for another job, so that I could remain living here. I even found myself fascinating the other day about finding a job in a year or few, and moving back to Japan. I know that another situation like my current one would be dreadful for me, but I have thought through many of the details, and found ways that I could enjoy living and working in Japan from the start. The question that continues to rise, then, is whether I actually want to pursue such an idea. Though my brain does what it will, I think I will leave it ’til December, when I have had a good amount of time back in my own culture and language, and the initial adjustment period is over, before I make any choices regarding returning to work in Japan.
For now, I will continue in my pursuit of awesome Japanese things to do and see. I notice for myself how much I want a break, but that I am not ready altogether to leave yet. I would love to have a couple or few weeks back home in the US this month or next, and then to come back to Japan for my final few months. For I long for the comforts of home, but I am not ready to give up Japan entirely – to pack up and ship out, with no intended return. But, this is what I have, so I’ll do my best to enjoy everything here, and to appreciate this part of the world now. And, in less than four months, I’ll be finished with my job, and will be able to do those final travel bits around Japan, before saying what I expect to be a heartfelt, resistant, yet grateful goodbye to the place.
As an almost tangent: I wonder if this is part of a mental health care action from within the body, in order to allow us to appreciate our past experiences, and therefore remain feeling useful and successful in our endeavors and whatnot. Something like that, anyway. Hmm… whatever.
Post-a-day 2017
**Beware: There is a good amount of reference to genitalia in this one.**
Today, with a Canadian and a Japanese friend, I went to the Kanamara Matsuri. It is a festival to celebrate fertility, only found at the Kanayama Shrine, in the area just south of Tokyo in Japan. From what I understand, the story/legend goes to a young, beautiful woman whom a demon fancied. She denied the demon, and so, he decided to hide inside her vagina, in order to prevent her from having any man. On her wedding night, the demon bit off the penis of her now-husband, preventing them from consummating their marriage. On her second attempt at marriage and consummation, the same event occurred. So, for her third marriage, the woman worked with a blacksmith to fashion a metal penis. Upon insertion, the demon bit the metal phallus, broke all of his teeth, and left the woman. Said phallus is now enshrined at the Kanayama Shrine. People go to this shrine to pray for fertility, protection from STDs and the likes, family, safe pregnancy and delivery, and blacksmiths.
So, every year, on the first Sunday of April, right at the usual time for the Cherry Blossom Season (though it is a bit early for the blossoms this year), the Kanamara Matsuri (Kanamara Festival) takes place at the Kanayama Shrine in Kanagawa, Japan.
Originally, when it started back in 1969, it was Japanese people. However, after a foreigner university professor attended the festival, that professor shared about the festival enough to bring it greater attention – so much so, that the festival is mostly foreigners now. It actually felt like a sort of adventure outside of Japan for a day – Japanese scenery, customs, and decorations, but very little spoken Japanese, and very few Japanese people.
The festival is very popular for the trans-gender, homosexual, etc. community, and so many of the attendees today were visually part of that community. Kimonos were offered to borrow free of charge to visitors to the festival, and so my Japanese friend and I went and allowed the ladies at the kimono place to dress us up. When I asked for a men’s kimono, the lady gave a slight chuckle, and then rushed back to the fabrics and picked out one for me, clearly comfortable with the request. It was the same with my Japanese friend and her dresser, so this clearly was not simply because I’m a gaijin (foreigner) and am, therefore, weird – I imagine it is because of the Kanamara Matsuri that the ladies were so comfortable with the requests. I noticed several Japanese men wearing women’s kimonos, and everyone was fine with it. And so, we got to be dressed as Okappiki, old-timey Japanese police men. It was great.
For the parade, the gods from the shrine, as usual, are summoned to the mikoshi, the portable altars, so to speak, in a little ceremony with bells and music and other traditional details, just before the parade begins. Usually the mikoshi are not phalli, but this festival is all about the metal phallus made by that blacksmith way back when, so… there are three large penises that are carried around the neighborhood. The first is a smallish wooden one, with the metal phallus on the front of it. The second is a large black one, possibly made of stone (I couldn’t quite tell). And the third is a huge, Pepto-Bismol pink one, carried each year by men in drag. The three altars seem like floats in US parades, but, instead of being on top of cars to have them move, they are carried by groups of people, typically men, though also women. So, as the parade moves along, you have a chant of “Ka-na-ma-ra!” going, while three incredibly different and large floating penises bounce along the crowded streets.
One of the hits of the festival is the penis pops. While there are chocolate-covered bananas, 
and meat-wrapped sticks of rice, 
carved wooden penis whistles (which actually had a rather high, unappealing pitch), 
and t-shirts galore with cartoon penises and the name Dankon, a term for penis (literally “man-root”), 
the reason people will stand hours in line is for the one-day-only penis lollipops. 
There were even some vagina ones, too, but the main thing was the penis pops. I had read up on the festival a bit ahead of time, and so I knew to arrive at 9am, and to go straight for the lollipops.
A really fun bit for me was actually the penis candles and the daikon carving. Just after saying our prayers at the shrine, we found the daikon radishes, but the carving was finished. However, the old ladies who seemed to be in charge of it were quick to hand us already-carved daikon and ask for our cameras. They even helped us with the correct way to pose with the daikon penises (I was a bit unsure initially, but they made it quite clear what was “the way” to do it.). 
The candles were quick and simple – a table covered in small and large penis-shaped candles in various colors. I wanted a pretty purple one for myself, but the guy next to me snatched up all the purple ones for some reason – guess he just really wanted them. So, I found myself happy with a blue-ish purple one instead, which seemed to be the only one of its specific hue. (Naturally, I loved that.)
Now, I really expected this festival to be completely against the Japanese style of things, however it was really beautiful seeing how many Japanese people were there, not only participating in it for themselves, but embracing it as part of humanity’s culture. Though it is essentially a fundraiser for HIV research, and thereby a grounds for self-expression in the LGBTetc. community, there were many people, families even, who seemed to be 100% heterosexual, white rice, Japanese folks. And yes, there were plenty of families, which includes small children. One of the best moments was coming across a group of four little girls all sitting on a curb, casually and delightedly enjoying their penis pops, while their parents stood nearby. And the parents were completely okay with people photographing their kids, a concept often somewhat foreign to Japanese people. Today was just filled with openness and acceptance and joy on the part of everyone, and it was fabulous.
When we were heading out from the festivities, we discovered even more food stalls and other standard matsuri stalls in an area with another shrine and temple. We said some more prayers, tossed some more coins, and poured water over a statue in thanks for the blessing of blooming flowers each Spring. On a final walk down a way-cool traditional street of shops, we found loads more penis pops (along with standard regional treats), gifts, and tokens. 
There were even life-ish-sized crystal quartz, rose quartz, and aventurine statues of penises, which were about $120 a piece. 
I got myself a small crystal quartz necklace, and it is quite beautiful, actually.
As a final fun note, while we were initially heading down that last street, a group of Japanese who were around our ages, were walking right near us (with no one else nearby), and so I found myself laughing as a few of them were goofing off, dancing to no music while one of them recorded the fun nonsense. When one of the guys stopped and posed with some statues, all three of us laughed. No one, however, had had a camera out, and the guy hadn’t expected a photo to be taken. But, when one of the girls joked with him about taking a photo, he asked if he should go back. His friends were a bit hesitant to answer, but my friend was quick to tell him to go back really quickly, because she wanted a photo, even if they didn’t. When he squat back down with the dogs(?), holding his pink lollipop, he told me to get in the photo with him. He tried sharing his lollipop with me, but one of the girls decided it was better for the photo if we each had our own, and so she lent me hers. And so, a random guy and I posed on the ground with dog statues and colored penis lollipops. 
Normal day in the neighborhood, right? 😛
Anyway, that’s about all I have to say about that right now…. Go check it out for yourself, if you’re ever in Japan in early April! It’s one-of-a-kind, and it’s delightfully wonderful! 🙂
Post-a-day 2017
Today, I had a driving lesson. Though it wasn’t so much a driving lesson as it was my asking questions to a friend while he let me drive his car. Japan drives on the left, so I wanted to have a practice session before going off on my own on the roads. Not that I even have a car or anything, but I’m thinking about getting at least a scooter, to help with exploring better, as well as getting around to places with significantly increased ease.
Anyway, it was fun. It’s magical how our brains can so easily flip-flop the physics for us, allowing me to be on the opposite side of the car, yet still drive well and safely. Way cool. 🙂
Post-a-day 2017
Today, a friend and I, kind of for her birthday, went up to Nikko (a city in Japan). We did several neat things, saw some beautiful stuff, and we had a very good time.
However, the most odd and somewhat amazing part was when we pulled down a small road in the middle of town to get to the parking lot behind the city information center. What to our wandering eyes did appear, but a band of monkeys playing in the road!
I halfheartedly attempted a photo as we pulled nearer, but they wandered off as the car got closer to them. When we walked into the information center, I stopped at one spot next to the wall and hovered my hand over a specific spot where I had seen one of the monkeys perched a few minutes beforehand.
“A monkey was just sitting here!” I declared. “A monkey’s butt was right here,” I happily exclaimed. “I want to touch it, so as to have been on the same ground, but I’m not going to touch it, because a monkey’s butt was just here, but how cool is that?! A monkey was just right here!”
So I was five for a minute there. It was splendid. 😛
Post-a-day 2017
Today, I went to a sort of workshop day for students in the international studies program at a very high level high school in my prefecture. There were nine other ALTs (Assistant Language Teachers) helping with the day, as well as myself, and we are all currently part of the JET Programme (Japan Exchange and Teaching Programme) in my prefecture.
The ALT who works at this particular school, John, happens to be from Texas, and is kind of what one might describe as a blonde babe. He now has a handlebar mustache, but that in no way changes the fact that he almost always looks like he’s in a sort of advertisement, usually of a sort of Calvin Klein style, but with clothes. He is tall and lean and fit, dirty blonde hair, tanned skin, and bright, bright blue eyes. AKA he is like an unreal dream for Japanese people.
As we were hanging out together this morning, we ALTs, before the workshop day was starting up, one of the guys asked John how students had reacted when he first showed up at the school, if they hadn’t just swooned at the sight of him, and if they didn’t still go gaga whenever he walked past them, wishing they could have class with him for all six class periods in a day. While things weren’t quite that dramatic, John assured us, it seems that all the girls certainly were and still are in full-on fangirl love with him and his beautiful eyes and hair, and everything else.
Later in the afternoon, that same ALT who asked John about girls being in love with him, turned a similar question to me. Are students not totally in love with me at my schools?
Now, I certainly do not see myself to be of a similar quality of model perfection as our friend John, so I asked about the background to his question. Well, he explained, when I had walked in a bit later than everyone else that morning, for our opening ceremony, the entire population of girls in the room had turned full attention to me, casually finding my spot at the front of the room, facing everyone. He continued, saying that the gazes that were following me were of a specific nature that suggested young girls looking up to their older sister, who is their own personal embodiment of womanly perfection… Wow. Wasn’t expecting that one.
“Well, students are still amazed whenever they look right at me and see that my eyes are blue – they announce it to all nearby students, and get all of their friends to gaze into my eyes for a few seconds.* I also get a lot of love from kids. Boys and girls alike tell me on a regular basis, whether passing me in the halls, or saying goodbye after we’ve been chatting, say to me, “I love youuu!” So I guess they kind of are totally in love with me…”
I wonder if I’ll ever be able to go back to being plain white bread after this adventure. I mean, I still totally am plain white bread. However, I’m plain white bread in a place that doesn’t really do plain bread in the first place.
*How odd is it, that I am totally comfortable with this now? Seeing as how it has happened consistently for the past seven+ months, how could I not be?
Post-a-day 2017
hannah ananas 