The end of the rainy season, and various other musings

I've never noticed it in the past, but then again that might be because the past "rainy seasons" were vast disappointments. This year is the first year that the season lived up to its name with nearly non-stop daily rain showers. In any case, after the rainy season ended, the worst part of the East-Asian summer disappeared with the rain: the humidity!

I went to Beijing with Nina last month, and it was amazing! One of my favorite things about it, though, was the weather; it was quite hot, but not humid. Now, Japan's got a similar thing going on, and it is so nice! Anyways, Beijing was such a blast.. very cheap, the food was indescribably delicious (and with huge American-sized portions, not like the tiny amounts they give you here in Ye Olde Nippon), and it was quite foreign.

Foreign... that's a weird thing to enjoy about a place, I suppose? But when you're living abroad and you get comfortable, things stop feeling foreign. The Japanese lifestyle has in many ways become normal for me. Now of course, here in my apartment is a little piece of America, where I do things mostly American style (although I do still always take my shoes off as I enter.)

So for me to visit China, I got a refreshing blast of "oh wow a foreign country" again! It was really fun and super interesting to visit the capital city of China, since it has such a deep culture that goes back from forever ago and is likely shaping up to be America's chief rival in the coming century. That is, if America isn't in the descendant and actually will lose our superpower status...

In any case, I'm still sort of surprised about all the conflict I'm reading about back home. It seems like Americans are forever going to be in two camps, Conservative and Liberal, Republican and Democrat, and we're never going to get anything done without about half the country completely pissed off and making threats of impeachment. If anything, this would indicate to me that our power isn't going to remain what it was in the previous century.

Not that that's necessarily a bad thing. Without a global threat like the USSR (which was bad because it was an aggressive authoritarian regime that wouldn't hesitate to use military force to expand its territory, not because it was supposedly "communist"), I feel like America as a superpower causes more harm than good. We alienate the rest of the world with our unilateralist policies, and often mettle in countries that frankly we have no business in. And the whole idea of a "preemptive war" that was Bush's justification for invading Iraq... well that scares me to my very core.

Regardless, I really enjoyed my trip to China and so decided to start trying to save more of my paycheck while in Japan and spend it on a few more trips abroad (well, abroad from where I'm living) before I leave East Asia and the same trips would quadruple in price and time necessary. I'm off to South Korea with my friend Jake in about two weeks, then we'll come back and both finally go take a look out Tokyo-way. A week after that I'll climb Mt. Fuji! Then, yet another week later, Nina and I will take an as yet undetermined trip abroad. (Maybe Taiwan?)

Speaking of Taiwan, I noticed a very interesting thing while I was at the airport in Beijing. It was a huge, brand new international airport that had just begun operations and was very impressive... and I noticed on the signs when we were boarding our return flight: "Domestic Flights" on one sign, and "International Flights, Taiwan, Hong Kong" on another sign. If you're familiar with the politics at play, then you might share in my amusement at this clever bit of propaganda.

All in all, I can't express how much I've loved working here in Japan, and am very sad to think that in a few short months I'll be leaving it all behind. Nonetheless, my experience has been a bit unique and I'm quite thankful for my job at the Multimedia Center of my company, where I've taught on web-cam instead of face-to-face. Lessons are a lot more enjoyable in-person, but the best part of the Multimedia Center is that all of my co-workers are from all parts of the world.

It is like a cosmopolitan crash course: I now know appropriate cultural jokes, references, and slang for New Zealand, Australia, Wales, England, Scotland, and Ireland. I can also mutter a few jokes in Mandarin, greet people naturally in French, can fake a pretty convincing Italian accent, have had many chances to butcher my high school Spanish, and I've even learned about exotic foreign cuisine! (A bit close to home, that one; surprising that I hadn't heard of it before. Then again, I'm from West Virginia... maybe not so surprising.)

The opportunities and experiences I've had here in such a diverse office has really been worth my time, and I can walk away from this without feeling like I wasted three years of my life. That is something I was worried about at first, but I now feel quite content with my decision and so happy that things worked out well.

I can almost taste that Thanksgiving Dinner.

Teaching(?) English in Japan

Japanese society.. a mysterious enigma, for us gaijin.

I spent years in college studying cultures, learning how to critically consider foreign ideas, remove myself from my biases, etc. I do believe that this has helped me to be more observant, though I still feel woefully inadequate at trying to understand the Japanese mind.

Nonetheless, I've been reading a lot of books on the subject, and feel like I do have some bits of understanding.

Japanese society seems very stressful, a tightly buttoned machine in which you don't have a lot of chances to really relax and be yourself. Quite the opposite of English cultures.

I've long believed that students can only get so far into learning English before they start understanding the culture as well.. I believe that our languages are intricately tied to our culturally-biased interpretation of the world. We speak the way we think, in other words.

Westerners are individualistic, and our speech reflects that. We're a speaking based society, in which the burden of communication is placed on the speaker; you must make yourself understood by choosing correct wording, etc. Japan is a listener based society, in which the burden falls on the listeners to be able to guess at the meaning of the speaker. In fact, many Japanese can seemingly read each others' minds, communicating through the barest use of words and relying mostly on body-language and intuitive knowledge of their friends and family.

That too sounds quite stressful, to be honest.

The following is entirely based on the collective anecdotal evidence of various English teachers, as taken from numerous conversations with myself. We believe that the role of foreign language teachers in Japan, for many students, takes on a far different meaning than merely providing authentic instruction in the language... we represent some sort of freedom from the burdens of Japanese society, an "exotic vacation" in which they can immerse themselves in the more individual-friendly English culture.

Note: I'm not saying that there's something inherently better about English speaking culture, nor that individualism is better than collectivism. Indeed, many a day I curse my selfish, pig-headed brethren for being less capable of a bit of collective consideration.

But what I am suggesting is that Japanese society, with its focus on the group, is inherently more stressful than English culture, due to our emphasis on the individual. You don't have to worry about anyone but yourself, and that must be attractive to people dealing not only with their only daily stresses, but with having to accommodate everyone else in their daily lives as well, through group-centric thoughts and actions.

So basically, what I'm trying to get at, is that many times as foreigners, we tend to act as a sort of counselor, or at the very least, a sympathetic ear, for our students. Every English teacher has had a student book a private lesson, come in and immediately begin the conversation with some sort of tragic news; a death in the family, their current depression, or troubles at work.

We then proceed to do absolutely no English lesson for the entire time, merely listening and consoling as we would a good friend. (I mean hey, we're getting paid really good money for what we have to do, so most of us can be bothered to act the part of a good friend, even if we're not genuinely sympathetic.)

This seems really weird to us, as we would generally want to confide in our close friends and family, rather than basically a stranger.. but then again, perhaps that isn't something that the Japanese feel easily able to do. Opening up in Japanese society, as I understand it, is something that's prohibitively hard to do.

Anyways, it is always quite interesting to live in Japan, though usually in the most unexpected ways.

Saikiin wa taihen desu ne!?

Lately, I've been very busy!

I'm working two part-time jobs in addition to my full week at NOVA, and have some private students on the side as well. To be honest, I probably couldn't handle this if I was teaching lessons constantly at my main job... fortuitously, however, I actually do not usually teach as we don't have enough students. Mostly I develop new lessons, though I've also been learning some Chinese in my spare time.

I've recently made quite a few friends on the Chinese language team and am starting to really desire to see China next. I feel like Chinese in many ways have a lot more in common with Americans than Japanese ever will. And although I'm not done with Japan yet and am still really enjoying myself, I am beginning to chafe under parts of Japanese culture that I've come to understand and now recognize daily. Everything is so subtle, so very subtle... and being American, it is basically the direct opposite of my native culture.

Interestingly, the more I learn about Japanese culture, the more I learn about American culture as well. It is so hard to understand our culture from the inside, but by living abroad, mixing with "foreigners" and living in a foreign country, I feel like I can finally begin to understand what being an American actually means. This was one of my original goals in coming to live in a foreign country, so I am happy.

By the way, response to (dad's?) question: I am indeed working in the same building, although the work floors are a little bit jumbled now and we are compacted into half the space in order to save on rent. Scuttlebutt says that we're supposed to relocate to another area someday soon, but they've been saying "any day now" since I've been back.

An interesting note, however, is that after November 2008 there probably won't *be* a Multimedia Center for me to work from anymore, as this company (rather ingeniously) is going to open up teaching centers in actual foreign countries; they can pay high school kids minimum wage to teach English lessons from North America, England, New Zealand, Australia, etc instead of paying us what I'll laughingly refer to as "the big bucks".

I wonder how one knows when its time to move on? I have a financial goal that could act as a rough barometer, I suppose. Save up enough money and then it's time to go to China? Coincidentally, the other day I was visiting my host family and they taught me some Kanji, which really whetted my appetite for learning the Japanese alphabets. After a year and three months, I'm finally wanting to learn how to read and write!

In any case, things have been hectic here as always (I'm slowly beginning to realize that this is what people refer to as being an adult), and I need to get some sleep.

Every day is surreal, but only in the little ways.

It isn't the big things that get me. All in all, the big things are similar to any large city in the world. One of my favorite college professors believes that there is an emerging global culture, such that in 50 years or so, the differences between being Japanese or Russian or American will be more like the differences between being West Virginian or Californian or from New York... (New Yorkian?).

I disagree with his theory, although I can completely understand where it comes from; truly, all the large cities of the world are so very similar, or so say people who have been to many. I've seen NYC and Osaka City to any detail, and can attest that said similarities do abound.

In any case, as I was saying, waking up in Osaka is just a place; it is like waking up in West Virginia now, in so much as it is my current abode and I have grown accustomed to it.

There are no waterfountains in Japan. Absolutely none. Vending machines, however, are EVERYWHERE, and offer a large selection of both heated and chilled beverages. Trashcans are very difficult to find in public places, and often only allow the disposal of plastic and aluminum bottles/cans.

The ladies' sense of fashion can be over the top, at times. My Vietnamese-American friend and co-worker was telling me about the cultural differences between East-Asians and how blunt they can be with criticism of physical appearance, especially family members talking to/about each other, so I can sort of understand why girls strive so hard to be trendy and flawless.

Still, as I said, from an American perspective, it exhausts me (mentally) to just walk down the street because my mind plays through each outfit, the amount of shopping and the hours of preparation necessary for various women to meet for a brief lunch or whatever.

The other day, while waiting for my turn to play Gundam in the arcade, an adult man walked by wearing a pink "fairy god-mother" costume, complete with wig and wand. This was met with absolutely no reaction from anyone save myself. I was with two fellow Gaijin friends. Japan changes people, and I am afraid... afraid that someday I too will fail to react upon seeing this unusual site in a public venue.*

Of course, to be fair, arcades are not the children's playgrounds of America. Nor are they ancient and uninspired.

The Gundam game, for instance, involves climbing into an actual pod (valued at $100,000 per pod) complete with individual controls for both of your hands and both of your feet, along with an IMAX-like view that fully replicates the feeling of being inside of a giant robot. When signing up for a round (approximately $5 for two rounds of 500 seconds worth of battle, being fought against other gamers at other arcades), you must approach a man (an adult, mind you) who is fully dressed up in the (ridiculous) costume of the Gundam officers. Apparently it is inspired from a cartoon or vice versa, but regardless, there is canon which is adhered to.

I was the youngest person waiting in line, aside from a fellow Gaijin who is 22. Our allies, as it were: businessmen every one. "Salarymen" in Japanese-English, whose meaning can be described as "corporate wage slave". Japanese-English is actually quite common. "Pah-tay" for "party, "barry" for "very", "bai-bai" for "bye-bye", and so on. These businessmen do not even bother returning home after work for a quick shower or a bite to eat; all of them still wearing their suits, still holding briefcases and laptops.

All in all, the effect leaves one feeling somewhat awed by the idea that somewhere in the world is a country full of men who, much like myself, have no problem embracing the boyhood desire of controlling giant robots through the means of modern technology and a decent amount of disposable income.

*-I went with a friend to grab a drink at a local bar (near work, that is) before I caught my last train. While sitting at the bar, someone behind me began massaging me. I naturally assumed it was another friend from work, who I didn't see enter. Turned out, after I enjoyed a good five minutes of massage, to be a 40-year-old Japanese man with dyed blonde hair and beard. He was the owner of the bar. We had never met before, nor had we as yet spoken other than a brief introduction from the friend who brought me.

This experience failed to startle me at all, as this type of unexpected and ludicrous event is somewhat par for the course of living in this country... And this is what I fear, my slow acceptance of insanity.

Being a foreign minority

I have never before in my life felt like I was a minority, until Japan. It is an interesting experience, and I think that it speaks a lot about Japanese culture. You see, being foreign, you get a lot of stares. And for a nation that produced ninjas, Japan has a lot to learn about being subtle.

I had fully researched the pros and cons of living in Japan. I actually expected the stares and such to be much worse. I generally do not even notice it, and it never has bothered me, but last night I went out with some friends after work and my friends were venting about how tired they were of the stares and whispers and pointing. Given that I usually don't pay attention, it took her pointing out a specific table before I noticed how blatantly rude some Japanese people were being.

It is interesting to me, that for a culture that places so much emphasis on politeness, that they can be so incredibly rude. Granted, it is stupid to put any large group of people into a category and be surprised when there are some who don't conform to that category, but it is my impression that Japanese people "lose face" if they are rude. That it is shameful. I was trying to bridge my understanding with the fact that these Japanese people were being extremely rude, and I came up with two possibilities:

Perhaps they were just drunk. It was 11pm on a friday night, and Japanese generally love their alchohol. Another possibility occurred to me, however: maybe the "rules" of Japanese society only apply to Japanese people. Perhaps it is totally acceptable to be rude to foreigners? It certainly would make sense given some of the outright rudeness I have experienced. However, and it says alot about such a homogenous nation, that the rudeness I've experienced (noticed?) has been the vast minority compared to the Japanese people who have been extremely kind to me. I have had many experiences of complete strangers going out of their way to help me or show me kindness, and this has helped my enjoyment of Japan immensely. Just knowing that there are some people, just like everywhere else, that are kind and giving... its nice.

It seems that being awed by foreigners isn't merely racism or xenophobia, but rather, it is a facet of being Japanese. By being completely awestruck by someone that is different, that is not Japanese, they are reinforcing what it means to be Japanese. I think that Japanese culture has long prided itself on how it was different, special, unique. The modern xenophobia that is so prevalent in Japan is simply a manifestation of how Japanese are still so desperate to be different. (And I bet most Japanese wouldn't stop at different, but would say "superior".)

Now, this might sound like an overly critical observation, but I would like to state that this is all (at least, attempting to be) from a detatched, scholarly point of view. I daresay that arrogance and the idea of superiority is by far a bigger problem in the West. I think every culture, every group of people, wants to think of itself as the best. Nothing new there, and ironically, nothing unique.

All in all, Japan is definately a foreign culture, far more foreign than I had ever before realized. The glimmers of understanding that I thought I had gained in college are actually just the tip of the iceberg. So now I sail onward, into the unknown future, and hopefully find a gradschool scholarship at the end of my voyage... I just have to watch out for those icebergs.