Party Time! Excellent!

On a night usually spent enjoying the company of family in the warmth and hospitality of my grandparent's house, I was in Japan celebrating the end of the year with my co-workers at the annual "bounenkai" (忘年会). The Chinese characters in the word literally mean, in this order, "forget", "year", and "meeting". In other words, it's a party to forget the past year in order to ring in the new one. Since each school will have their own, assistant language teachers who teach at more than one school have a pretty busy (and expensive) couple of weeks ahead of them if they choose to go to all of them. Thankfully, I only had one for my middle school and one for my elementary school.

Popular venues for bounenkai's usually amount to large "ryokan" (旅館), or traditional Japanese

hotels. Since all schools in the immediate area hold their parties around the same time, the competition to reserve one of these places is pretty fierce. The fees per person can get pricey ranging from 5,000 - 6,000 yen and up (about 50-60 dollars). As traditional establishments, ladies dressed in kimonos greet you at the door to check your shoes (which you are required to take off) and guide you to your reserved meeting room. The room itself is a huge tatami (straw mats) room with low food trays and seat cushions lined up around the room.

There will usually be some traditional Japanese art behind the main row at the far end of the room where the higher-ups sit.

Your tray will already be loaded with food when you get there, but don't eat yet! After the bounenkai formally starts, there will be a few words from the principal. Everyone will then pour drinks for each other (never pour your own drink) for a "kampai"(乾杯), or toast. Then the eating begins.

During the 3+ hour duration of the party, kimono-clad ladies will continuously clear your dishes to make room for more and more food. It seems like a lot, but the portions tend to be small. If your drink gets low, don't worry- your neighbor will fill it up for you (and it's expected you will do the same for them).

The brown, ceramic-looking thing in the upper-right is actually a little pot set on top of a candle burner. At the start of things, the waitresses will come around and light your candle to start boiling
whatever's in the bowl on top.

Throughout the night, people will come sit in front of your tray to talk to you and fill up your glass and have their's filled in return. You'll probably hear the phrase, "What are you drinking?" about a hundred times before the night is over.

Next order of business is some sort of presentation of the year's top ten "big news" items. These can range from huge victories at competitions to recent marriages to snakes being found in the school entrance (unfortunately, I didn't get to see said snake...). A person related to each news item will make a short speech and recieve a small gift.

After another brief pause for socializing, a series of games begin. People are divided into teams depending on where you sit and either entire teams participate or select a member for each round.
Games can be just about anything, but here are the ones I got to play:

Hirasawa Elementary School Bounenkai:

Bingo- self-explanitory. Each bingo you got earned points for your team.

心の一つ (kokoro no hitotsu/ "one heart")　Each team recieves a laminated piece of paper and a marker. The MC will name something and end it with ～と言えば (...toh iebah/"Speaking of..."). For example, they might say, "speaking of mom's home cooking" or "speaking of sushi filling". Then each team member must write down an example of or something related to the theme without looking at each other's answers. When they've finished, the team will line up in a row facing the audience and reveal their answers at the same time. The team will then recieve points based on how many answers are the same. In other words, the team must become "one heart".


Nikaho Junior High School Bounenkai:


一流 (ichiryuu/"high-end" or "top rank") Each team selects a member to participate each round (we had four rounds). In each round, the participants are given two of the same food or beverage samples. However, one will be a generic brand and the other will be a fancy, high-end brand and each participant must guess which is which.


Gesture Roulette- pretty self-explanitory except when a gesture is guessed correctly, the gesturing person goes to the back of the line and the person at the front does the next gesture. Try to guess as many gestures as a team in one minute. This can get pretty silly with alcohol consumption (which there was plenty).

J-Song (Japanese song) Each group selects a singer who will recieve a list of songs to sing the melodies to (lyrics not required). The group must guess as many songs as they can within a time limit.

For some reason I didn't pick up, one team got penalized and each member had to recite a Japanese tongue twister. My JTE (Japanese Teacher of English) got "Boku Bobu"- literally "I'm Bob."

After all games have been played, points are tallied up and groups come up to receive their prizes. Everyone gets a prize; the games just denote who gets first pick.

If the reserved time is up, then closing words are spoken and the party comes to an end. Usually there will be a 二次会 (nijikai/ literally a "second meeting"). These after-parties are optional and usually have karaoke involved. People take taxis there and back.

While expensive, I think it's well worth the food, hospitality, and activities. You'll also get to interact with your co-workers in ways you can't in the everyday workplace. Japan being Japan, teachers work insane hours and are busy people. It's no wonder why they take the time to drink and unwind from a busy year and celebrate their accomplishments. ALT's, don't miss this opportunity to participate in a part of Japanese culture rarely seen by anyone else.

Cultural Perspective 2: Electric Boogaloo

I learned a very obvious thing after spending some time here. It's one of those things you've known your whole life, but can only truly understand after having experienced it. It's pretty simple: people are still people. Specifically, people that are foreign to you are still people.

Duh, right? Most of us are taught from an early age that people are people no matter where they come from. You've seen many on TV or even in real life. When you bump into someone on the street and exchange pleasantries, there's nothing strange or odd about it whether they're from here or there. It doesn't even matter if they speak English or not.

Or does it? Perhaps if you're in the states, speak native English and are surrounded by people speaking English. If you're in a familiar, comfortable environment and have no problems communicating in the dominant language, then the other person is obviously just some guy who bumped into you on the street. However, even if you parted on pleasant terms and you thought they were nice people, subconsciously in your brain, they were the nice Japanese or Indian or [insert ethnicity here] person you met on the street. We place these labels and their corresponding meaning on people without even thinking about it and put them in a group somewhere outside the social norm.

And what about the other guy? If he doesn't speak English well or quite know how to handle the current situation, how is he perceiving you? Even if they could sense your good intentions, you're also a source of anxiety. When you're in the extreme minority surrounded by people that don't understand and can't communicate with you, every interaction is terrifying.

Nobody can ever completely understand this unless they spend a substantial amount of time in another country. And I mean among the natives. None of this hanging around English speakers and westerners stuff. I'm a shy person to begin with, but then I went to Tokyo. There was a whole week I remember vividly in October of that year in which I didn't want to go anywhere (yep, a huge part of culture shock). For that whole week dragging myself to school was a chore because I knew that every minute I spent outside my apartment there was a chance I'd have to interact with someone. This wasn't because I didn't want to improve my Japanese. The fear was the possibility (perceived as high in my mind) that I wouldn't be able to achieve communication and in the end I'd be that weird foreigner that can't speak Japanese well. In that situation, I was that foreign person you bumped into on the street. I was a completely surrounded by a sea of well-intentioned people that couldn't possibly know or understand me. Communication is one of those invisible things we take for granted all the time, but would be screwed without (for a great read on this topic, I highly recommend Snow Crash by Neal Stephenson).

I don't know where I'd be now without that experience. I still have my share of difficulties and in some ways they're a bit grander in scale because there are few non-Japanese here and as a long-term resident with a job, I'm no longer the super-special student that's going to leave in a few months and never come back. Now, integration is key because the long-term effects of isolation can be disastrous (new ALT's, look forward to the speech from a former JET who new a fellow JET that went so crazy he ate paper in front of him...). This is now my life, not a vacation. It's my first-ever career and I hadn't worked with children in a long time.

When I first started, there was the usual wide-eyed fascination from students and teachers alike, but eventually it led to me developing the whole "stranger in a strange land" feeling all over again. They were strange, Japanese children who didn't (and in some cases didn't want to) understand me. Every day I felt a bit of apprehension when interacting with them.

Then one day, in one of my first-year classes, watching my students joke around and laugh, something clicked in my brain: they're all just kids. They love to laugh and have fun. They're snarky and clever. They each have something unique about them (which also helps me memorize names). The more time I spend with the them, the more the "they all look the same" cliche melts away. I was amazed just how much I was putting them in the outside "other" category without meaning too and they were probably doing the same to me. Every day I can feel the distance closing between us. This growing understanding not only makes life easier, it's also liberating.

It's the whole "this is my life" mentality that helped me with the integration. This is my apartment, this is my city, this is my office, this is my school, and now, these are MY students. There are still some that aren't so forthcoming, but now there is more understanding and I know how to interact with them.

I'd be very interested to learn why we put up these subconscious barriers between us. The phenomenon definitely isn't limited to culture and ethnicity. It's simply a reaction to those who are "different"- people that don't fit our mental structure of what is "normal". Perhaps it aided in survival to label people and make sure they were part of your social group.

No matter what the cause, I've learned that the most effective cure is spending a lot of time in foreign situations and with foreign people. I think this is one of if not the most important change in worldview. I'd like to think most people are decent human beings that don't want to build walls between them and other people, but there are way too many that deliberately ostracize people of other genders, ethnicities, and sexual orientations and fervently insist they're not bigoted or racist. They are the ones who need this change more than anyone. Spending time with others forces you to build a sense of empathy for them which in turn results in understanding.

I think this experience will continue to have a positive effect on how I interact with other people who are "foreign" to me. In fact, I think this is part of the purpose of the JET program and ALT's in general. Maybe this is the "internationalization" that they're so adamant about. I firmly believe this is a major life change that everybody should experience at least once in their lifetime. Many people think all college students should be required to go abroad at least once and I agree. With globalization moving faster and faster, we're going to need to start realizing that at the end of the day, "people are people".

Happy Gratitude Day

Today is my favorite holiday. Well, my favorite Western holiday anyway. My favorite Japanese holiday is the Akita New Year's where ogres come down from the mountains and scare the crap out of children.

"HAPPY HOLIDAYS!!!"

One might wonder, "why is Thanksgiving your favorite holiday?". Glad you asked. Simply put, it's basically Christmas without the presents and baby Jesus. The former is a stressful annoyance and the latter is an oft-debated hot-button issue.

The only thing I'm going to say about the religion thing is that it's something I realized our family didn't need to enjoy the holiday together. We used to go to Nativity plays and church on Christmas Eve and all that, but eventually we stopped going simply due to lack of interest. I was surprised the first time it happened, but eventually I figured out that, like Santa, it may add a certain flavor to things, but wasn't strictly necessary.

Which brings us to the presents. I don't remember exactly when, but there came a time in my life when I started to have to deal with the reality that you can't be just on the receiving end the rest of your life. One year, my parents gave me a certain amount of money and told me that this year I had to start buying gifts for other people. Don't get me wrong, I was actually pretty excited about it. I finally had the opportunity to make other people feel the way I did when I got something awesome from a person I loved.

However, I soon realized what a daunting task this is. In my young child brain, I learned that I had to factor in the following:

1. Budget- something I never really had to deal with before. How much should I spend on each person? Can I consolidate my brothers or grandparents together?

2. Extended family- it's easy to forget the people that you don't see on a daily basis. That magic household number of 5 becomes 8-10 depending on who's coming to Christmas that year and in the end somebody's going to get jilted because you barely have anything left over.

B-but, it's a spatula...of LOVE!

3. Individualism- everyone has different tastes and this is made more difficult by the fact that, as mentioned above, you don't seen certain family members all that often. The good news, if you're completely lost, you can ask a family member who's a bit closer to them. It also helps to have-

4. Wishlists- this is something I have to keep a running tab on all year because I'm the kind of person whom if you ask what they want on the spot, their answer will always be, "Um...". If I see something I want and don't write it down right away, I will forget. This has made for some interesting birthdays.
Of course the problem here is communication. If two or more people buy the same thing for the same person, the universe will explode.

"I SHOULD HAVE BOUGHT HIM THE LOAFEeeeeers...!"

This is why I have a huge fondness for White Elephant and Secret Santa. The gifts don't have to be cheap or even brand new and it doesn't matter if the recipient loves or hates it since in the former case nobody knows what they're getting and in the latter you don't have to reveal who's santa you are if you completely blow it.

Totally wasn't me...

5. What's in stock- there have been times when I knew exactly what to get somebody, but I just couldn't find the damn thing. The nice thing is if you do manage to find what you're looking for, you feel like a big, damn hero. Especially if you avoided getting trampled to death to get it...

On the flipside, if you don't find it, your feeling of failure is directly related to how long you searched for it. The same goes if the recipient doesn't actually like it.

Which gets to my whole point: it feels like a huge social test or competition. I remember the disappointment I felt for the first time when I bought something for someone that I thought they would love and it turned to out to be the opposite case. Holidays should never be like that.

In the end, what you have left is a great day where you eat tons of the best food you'll ever eat all year, chat and play games with your family, and watch parades on TV.

Thanksgiving is literally never give you up,

never gonna let you down...

Except for the actual giving thanks part. It's important for people to stop and reflect on their lives every once and a while and it's probably a safe bet that the majority of people these days don't take the time to do it. It's part of the reason why I blog. Thanksgiving forces people to sit down and be grateful for the wonderful things in their lives and share them with others.

And so as I sit here in this office with my sleep-deprived, caffeiene-hungover brain, I can't help but express my gratitude to the people that put me here in life and made me the person I am today:

Pictured: still me.

-My parents. All four of them. I literally have two moms and two dads. Of course things are never perfect, but I wouldn't be who I am without you. From you I learned love and compassion, practicality and common sense, creativity, and the value of hard work.

-My parents-in-law. Thank you for your continuing encouragement and support.

-My little brother and twin brother. Couldn't have asked for better companions and friends growing up.

-My big brother and sister. Thank you for being good role models and friends.

-My husband. My best friend and constant companion. Some of the best things in life are unexpected and outside the norm. Thank you for reminding me to laugh and think outside the box.

-My old fencing instructor and his family for rounding up us misfits in high school and giving us a place to feel welcome.

Pictured: me in high school

-My old orchestra teacher in high school. I never knew a another teacher who believed in and loved her students more.

-Everyone at the Milwaukee School of Engineering and MAGE for making me feel like a part of something awesome.

-My Japanese professors at UW-Milwaukee. They're great people and advisors. Not many students are so lucky. I wouldn't be here without them.

-Everyone at the Japanese Consulate of Chicago for giving me this opportunity.

-All the teachers here for having the openmindedness and patience to accept me into their fold.

-All the ALT's I've had the fortune to meet. Thank you for your support and the constant reminders that we're all in this together.

Pictured: every ALT who ever lived

-All of my friends, old and new, here and everywhere. I may not get to see very many of you, but I cherish every unique and varied relationship.

Happy Thanksgiving to everyone, everywhere.

Your culture board is so jelly of my hand turkey.

***oh yeah, this is a blog about Japan...um...they don't celebrate it. At all. Sometimes they call it
感謝の日(Kansha no hi- "Gratitude Day"), but they never celebrate it. They don't get why turkey is a huge thing or what stuffing is...um...so...Happy Gratitude Day!***

Cultural Perspective

One of the things I think many people often ponder about is the subjectivity of time. For example, it's been almost 4 months since I've been here and yet there are both times when it feels like 1 day and others when it feels like a whole year. This creates a paradox when I reflect on my future because even though it may feel like I have all the time in the world, I know that it will all rush by in the span of a day if I let it.

This is amazing to me when I consider where I'm living which is, let's face it, the middle of nowhere. With so little to do in this small town, I wonder what on earth I've been doing to pass the time so quickly. I realize the answer is simple yet complex- living well. In a secluded, small town in the middle of a vast country and even prefecture, things are boiled down to the necessities of life where one can settle into a repetative yet comfortable routine. One of the great improvments to my life is that I have a stable job that starts and ends at the same time every day and fits the expected societal work-week (usually...).

www.readthesmiths.com

This was me the week of our school culture festival

It's well-known that Japanese people work long hours (one of the great challenges to the rising number of dual-working parent households which I've written a whole research paper about). In fact, people dying from overwork is such a problem that it has it's own word in Japanese, 過労死 (karoushi). However, here lies an example of how fixed worldviews can cause cultural misunderstanding and it's something every person on earth is guilty of at some point even if they don't realize it.

And then there are the ones that do...

 

In this particular instance, it's the subconcious thought that all of Japan is Tokyo (on the flip-side, most Japanese think all of America is New York and LA). When most non-Japanese think of Japan they conjure up images of bright lights, awesome trains, and buildings that reach the sky. In the same way, people that are conscious of Japanese work ethic think of trains stuffed to the gills with tired, black-suited men on their way to some office job hours away. And this image can be accurate when you're talking about Tokyo. Going from the city to the countryside, I was surprised once again at how the same culture can be so different within the same country. No, the train won't get me to work, but it's less than 5 minutes by car and I have the freedom to drive anywhere I want. Yes, we wear suits at school, but only in the winter when it's not boiling hot. Yes, they work ridiculously long hours, but the office environment is so relaxed and relationships so friendly yet professional that I myself don't mind staying a an extra hour or two even though it's not required of me (my contract stipulates an 8:30-4:15 work day with a 45 minute lunch break. Hah! My classes start at 8:35 and I eat with my students at lunch). You're treated as a person with things to contribute instead of a number in a machine.

Being that this is my first experience in the Japanese countryside, I was surprised by my own cultural ignorance when I started talking to my predecessor about what to expect. "What do you mean the train only runs once an hour!" (I laughed just the other day when I had to stop at a railroad crossing and saw that the train was only a measely two cars long...). "I'm going to need a car???!" "You use a kerosene-powered heater???"

"What do you mean there're no ninja trains?!!!"

 

Unfortunately, my expectations were also jaded by what I was told by Japanese people in Tokyo. It's amazing how many countries discriminate against their own people. Every Japanese person I talked to in Tokyo had a very negative view of the countryside. I even knew a teacher at Seijo University from Akita who spoke against her own prefecture vehemently. She spoke of a secluded place full of "hikikomori" (recluses and shut-ins afraid of society). When I heard that I had been placed in Akita for the JET program I panicked a little inside thanks to these prejudices.

After doing some research and talking to other ALTs in Akita, I began to wonder what she was talking about. The ALTs I talked to seemed very happy with where they were and I was surprised to find some newbies had actually requested it. After arriving I was stunned and I'm quite convinced that this is the most beautiful place I've ever seen in my entire life. I learned a valuable lesson in that sometimes you have to take what people say about their own country or culture with a grain of salt and I suspect that's true about any country.

Even if Japan has it's share of inter-cultural prejudices, I can definitely say that they do not take their country for granted. My Tokyo friends will even admit that even if they don't want to live in the countryside, they hold a very high opinion of it's natural beauty. The people that do live here in Akita place great value and pride on their prefecture for it's scenery and traditional culture (a lot of which those in the urban cities have to go quite a ways to see). They enthusiastically will point you in the right direction to famous places and events. As I mentioned before in a recent post, you can see Mount Choukai from our office window and whenever it's visible (a rare instance in the winter time), people actually stop and take the time to take in it's majesty while it's there.

Almost like a gigantic strip-tease...

 



That isn't to say that I don't miss the big city. I'm enjoying my time here, but all the while I'll be resisting the strong urge to run to Tokyo or Milwaukee where life seems to be happening without me while I sit here in the temporal bubble that is Akita. I miss my friends and being able to see them almost any time I want. I miss burritos and real pizza. I miss not having to own a car. By the time I finish my term here, I'll be so ready to jump back on that train of life.

The Office

The reason I applied to be a CIR (coordinator of international relations) instead of an ALT was because I wanted to get some office experience. What I failed to remember is that Japanese teachers work in an office  too. In the States every teacher has their own room and sometimes departments have their own small offices. In Japan, there is one huge office where all teachers have their own desk. At the beginning of the year (typically April), students are assigned a classroom where they stay the whole day for their non-elective classes. Teachers go to the classrooms when it's time to teach or direct club activities.

The atmosphere (at least during summer vacation) is very relaxed and low-key. Besides helping children with work and coaching clubs there's not much to do. Speaking of which, yeah, kids go to school during summer vacation. That is, the serious ones do. Which is a good deal of them. However, it's important to note that summer vacation for them is mid-school year. The first two days of this semesters consists of tests to make them study over the break.

At the beginning of each semester, there is an opening ceremony. As far as ceremonies go, it's pretty strict. Almost military strict. Don't get me wrong, the teachers are very open and friendly to their students and the kids come and go freely from the teacher's room. But when it comes to ceremony and tradition, they know when to show a lot of decorum. Teachers eat lunch with the students in the cafeteria which is fun since I can get to know everyone better.

One of the nice things about the office is that it's not a cubicle farm and one of the walls (the one directly behind me is the front wall of the building with wall-length window looking out onto the front lawn and parking lot. We do have fluorescent lighting, the the natural sunlight is a great boon. I have a feeling it'll help naturally warm up the office when the infamous frigid winter gets here.

Like most non-public buildings, there is a genkan to take off your shoes and put on indoor-wear. Because of the Fukushima accident, Japan has been promoting energy conservation. As a result, buildings are no longer as warmed or cooled as they used to be. To compensate for the decreased climate control, the government has instigated "cool biz"- that is, a slackening of the dress code to allow for cooler clothing such as button-down polos, lack of suit jackets, sandals, and short pants. Many teachers that coach sports clubs will even wear their track suits in the office.

The atmosphere in the office is very positive and surprisingly relaxed. Coworkers are extremely friendly to each other all the way up to the vice principal (the principal's nice too, but nobody ever really sees him). Like I said before, students walk in and out at will looking for help from teachers and they're never ignored. The structure of the school adds to this since the hallways are large and spacious and rooms are usually never closed (most are sliding doors) and are lit by natural sunlight. The feeling created is one of openness. Most teachers get to school extremely early and stay ridiculously late, but the overall atmosphere creates a sense of comradery and you don't feel the need to bolt out of there as soon as possible.

It's nice to finally work in a place where people seem to genuinely care and you can do your work at your own pace.