The Weekend, Part 1

OK so first off, Friday was the speech contest, which I had been dreading for a few weeks. I mean, not only was my speech almost cripplingly elementary, but I had yet to memorize it the morning of the contest. It was at the point where, when my teacher asked me to present during third hour (keep in mind: around 11:30, just two hours before the speech contest), I couldn’t remember past the first two paragraphs. Anyway, it didn’t help that the speech contest was surprisingly legitimate. I was kind of expecting a little room just big enough to seat the families of the participants, but it turned out that all of HIF was required to come. Plus, the contest was held in one of the banquet rooms of the international hotel, with a stage and judges and everything. On top of that, we were expected to dress “semi-formal.” Now, I’ve decided that I hate this term, because it seems to mean different things to different people. So I showed up to the contest with a button up shirt, sleeves rolled up, and some cargo pants. First person I see: Juan Miguel, sporting a suit. You know the expression, “when the going gets tough, the tough get going”? Yeah, definitely not me. I’m more of the “when the going gets tough, quit” types. This trait does come somewhat in handy, however; it helps dull most of my nerves. So I was pretty together, compared to other people. Mikia and Pedro, who were at my table, were freaking out, worrying about remembering their speeches and appearing professional. Of course, I figured there was no point in worrying – I already looked the least prepared, so I was ready to go up and bomb. Anyway, the contest was split into two groups, essentially the kids who were good at Japanese and those who weren’t. The not good group went up first, and order was:
Juan Miguel –Linguistics of Japanese
Dan – Privacy in Japanese families
Jeremiah – An Important Dream
Me – Life in Japan and America
Mikia – First impressions and prejudgements
Pedro – Culture Shock
Group 2, the good kids:
Bryce – Something about multinationalism
James – Something about music and education
Elliot – News broadcasting in Japan
Joseph – Something about politeness in Japan
Chien-Wei – Something about photography
Jackson – Something I understood very little of
We were judged on both the fluency/correctness of our speech and our ability to answer 1-2 questions from our teachers. I think the Q&A is what really showed how different the standards were for the two groups (compare my question, “What is the best/most memorable experience you had since coming to Hakodate?” to James's, “Do you have any recommendations for changing the way [insert translation of operative Japanese word that I missed] is taught? Why do you think it should be changed?”). Anyway, everyone was really good. Of course, I forgot chunks of my speech and ad-libbed a little bit, but whatever, I made it through.
So anyway, after both the groups presented, there was a little break while the judges selected their winners. It was basically a chance for all of us to be glad we were done and reassure each other that we had done fine. Anyway, after the judges returned, we were called up to the stage for the “awards ceremony” After they talked in Japanese I couldn’t understand for a bit, they announced 2nd place for the lower group: Pedro. I was pretty surprised, because I figured he was going to take first place. But everyone had done well, so it wasn’t outrageous. Anyway, the judges then announced the winner, which somehow turned out to be me. Now, before you react to that, I want you to realize that this is clearly a mistake. I’m still expecting them to come up to me and be like “Oh sorry, we counted your scores in the wrong column… added an extra 0 in there. Sorry…” But when the dude called my name, I didn’t immediately realize it, so I just started clapping along with everyone else. About 10 seconds later, Dan kind of nudged me and was like “Dude… they’re calling you.” And after that, I still didn’t realize I had won – I couldn’t understand anything they were saying (which, again, is a testament to the fact that it was a clear mistake) up until Professor Yamazaki handed me the little certificate, at which point I had the “OH” realization moment, which made him laugh. James won second in the upper division, with Jackson taking first. Can I just talk for a second about how Jackson makes me feel like an awful student? He’s like… thriving so much in this program, it’s kind of ridiculous. Like… he NEVER break the Japanese Only rule. Even outside of HIF. When we’re hanging out. Which is kind of inconvenient, sometimes. But seriously, he’s only taken a year, used the same textbook as us, and only actually covered the first volume of it (whereas we covered two), but still placed a full two levels higher than us. Anyway, after the speech contest, my host mom took me out to a congratulatory dinner. Chioma and her host family were going too, so we also invited her, Jeremiah, Mikia, and Austin along. It was a fun time – we ate at an Indian restaurant called “Goa” (which was good, but made me miss home a lot) and just got to talk. Afterwards, we went to this concert that had been advertised since the beginning of HIF. It was called “Meet America,” and was supposed to be a musical representation of American history by this white guy named Michael Williams. Oh my god. This was possibly the greatest/worst experience of the trip so far. I don’t know if I can do it justice, to be honest. But I’ll try. Here were notable points in the lineup:
The Independence era
He marches out, summarizing America’s struggle for independence with “Yankee Doodle”
Ashok’s thoughts: Holy *** what is this?! He’s wearing a white blazer, a bright blue shirt, and red pants. And marching to the beat. Trying to make Yankee Doodle sound like a classy piece of music.
The Emancipation era
He had a gospel choir come out to back him up as he sang a song whose name I forget. He also had a Japanese soloist come up to lead the “prayer.” I don’t know if he realized that the crowd was pretty much as minimally Christian as it could get. Intense awkwardness. Plus, he tried to sing insanely high notes and… yeah.
The 1950s
Ohhhhh my god. He tried to sing “Hound Dog” by Elvis. So he comes out in this leather costume with an acoustic guitar (that he didn’t know how to play) and starts fake strumming. Like, not even trying to make it look like he’s actually playing the guitar. Oh my god. And just when I thought it couldn’t get any worse, he tried to dance like Elvis. He started out trying to do the slide, which was the most awkward and contorted thing ever. Like, he just shuffled his feet really fast, but he always hunched his shoulders when he did it, which threw off his fake guitar, making the entire thing really awful. And then he also tried to do some hip gyrations, forgetting the fact that he was almost… 60something? This was also just remarkably uncomfortable.
And just as a general statement, he SUCKED SO MUCH AT JAPANESE. Oh my god. Like, nothing in this program has given me as much of an ego boost as watching him try to speak to the people. He’s been living here for 17 years and has a Japanese wife. AND STILL CAN’T SAY ANYTHING. He would mess up things like “thank you” and try to blend casual speech with really really polite verbs, which confused everyone.
Anyway, Saturday was a pretty busy day. First, it was the last kendo practice, which was really sad – I’m going to miss having the ability to hit stuff with sticks. I still suck after the 6 weeks, but it was a good time. Ah – gotta run, but I’ll finish this up later.

Last week, part 2 - Super Shitsurei

So Friday I had my first really big shitsurei, when I was late to the dinner party for Peter’s rotary club. I thought my okaasan said that we were going to meet up at 6:30, so I decided to exchange my JR rail pass voucher and book my ticket back to Tokyo. Finished up at 6:20ish, so I felt pretty good about making it on time. But it turns out that the party was to start at 6:30 – my okaasan had wanted to meet up at around 6. I ended up being about 5 minutes late to the dinner, which might not seem like much by American standards, but is hugely disrespectful in Japan. I think I spent most of the evening trying to apologize to the people at my table in wonderfully broken Japanese (already suck +freaking out about offending everyone = amazing levels of retardation). Even though everyone said it was ok, I’m pretty sure it wasn’t. Gah. I felt horrible afterwards. I’m not sure if my host mom is still offended or not. Ahhhhh!!!
In other news, the independent study presentation is Tuesday. It’s going to be such a terrible time for everyone, but especially me. My topic is Shintoism and Jinjyas in Hakodate, but I have virtually no information. I did three interviews, one of which was my host mom. Plus, my project became significantly less ambitious as the weeks progressed and I realized both 1) how little Japanese I understood, especially when talking about God and the afterlife, and 2) how much work it would take to actually research it. I started out planning to investigate how Shinto was able to survive after Buddhism and Christianity came to Japan, especially focusing on how it blended with Buddhism (most Japanese people are Shinto, but practice Buddhist rites for deaths and such). As the weeks went on, however, I simplified it down to the point where it’s now a presentation about etiquette in a jinjya and the format of the service. It’s so terrible and unprofessional. Plus, I haven’t practiced my presentation at all. It’s going to be miserable. Luckily, most of the other kids seem to have BSed their projects to roughly the same extent, which is some solace. But there are the few kids who actually have really intense and legit projects: Max focused on the upcoming election, interviewing politicians and analyzing Hakodate’s governmental framework, while Victor did a cross-analysis of Hakodate’s agriculture in the literary realm and in practice (I think – I didn’t really understand his explanation). Gah. It’s going to be terrible.
Plus, the speech contest is Friday. Not only is my speech now twice as long (thanks to sensei’s edits), my okaasan invited a bunch of her friends to come see me talk. Now I can make a fool of myself in front of the entire town, yay!

Last week

So this week I had a bunch more really cool culture classes that made me feel really awesome at being Japanese, not going to lie. First was a lecture about Japanese linguistic structure (which might not sound so cool to anyone, but was actually pretty interesting) on Monday the 20th. Most of it was over my head and the question and answer session made me realize how many HIF kids are going to become the pretentious intellectual Ivy League stereotype. But the professor did talk about some cool things, like how the kanji system is possibly one of the worst writing systems Japan could have adopted. It was pretty cool. There were also some interesting history tidbits that were cool to learn about.
Next up was the tea ceremony class (Wednesday the 22nd), which was the most difficult thing ever. Soooo many rules, gah. Well, it wasn’t so bad (and again, with the episode of America’s Next Top Model behind me, I knew a good chunk of the stuff at the beginning. Yeah, I’ve accepted that you all will mock me. I’m ok with that), but there were a lot of things to pay attention to. Starting with opening the door and bowing. Before we entered the room, we got little fans (in true tea ceremony fashion) that we were to keep with us. Turns out those fans also have strict rules about where they can be placed and how they need to be held, none of which I knew. Every five seconds, one of the assistant ladies would come up to me and tell me I had my fan in the wrong place. There was just no way I could keep up with it; the fan seems to move before you do anything. For example, when you first enter, the fan needs to be placed between you and the host of the tea ceremony. If you don’t do so, you’re placing yourself at the same level as the host, which is a biiiiig 失礼(shitsurei – rudeness). However, before receiving the tea and the snack, you have to move the fan to your left side. It needs to be sufficiently back to be out of view, but it must not rest on one of the lines of the tatami mats. Before you eat, it should be moved behind you, again neither resting on one of the lines of the tatami mat nor touching your feet. Both big mistakes. Anyway, other than the fan, your own movements also have to be extremely controlled. When you enter the room, you have to open the door in a special way – you open the door approximately halfway with the hand closer to the intersection of the door and the wall. You then open it the rest of the way with the other hand. Before entering, bow. Then, stand up, walk straight till you are in front of the scroll. Bow to the scroll once, but without showing the fan. Look at the flower set up by the scroll for a second or two (not too long to delay the ceremony, not too short to dismiss the work put into setting up the flower), then bow again. Then, move to your seat. When the sweets come out, you always have to pick up the chopsticks from the top only – no fingers can be beneath the chopsticks. Place your other hand on the bowl, take one sweet, move it to your paper, and make sure to clean the chopsticks on one of the upper corners of your paper. If using your right hand, use the right corner. If left-handed, use the left corner. And that’s before you have to deal with getting and drinking the tea. And of course, this is when you have the easy job of being the guest. The host’s job is even harder. Whaaaa. It was insanely difficult, but really fun. We all sucked at approximately the same level, which made it ok.
Other than the culture class, the week was pretty uneventful. Wednesday was my birthday (unfortunately), which made me officially 19. Don’t want to think about actually being in my last year of teenagerdom. But Thanh did remember it was my birthday and brought me a whole bunch of food which I’m pretty sure cost a lot of money. She had cheesecake, mochi, two kinds of Japanese sweets, and rice puffs. It was really nice of her, but I really hope it wasn’t that expensive. But I think it was, because I saw the cheesecake in the eki, where it was being sold for like… 1700 yen or something. Ack, Thanh! Why?? But it was really nice, and she’s a good friend. Other than that, my host mom had a conference, so we couldn’t really do anything. She did make me a cake the next day, though, which was super nice of her. Plus, the cake was amazing – cream and strawberry. Deliciousness.

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Soooo short blog post today (actually today, Monday) – I decided to try and save some money by not renewing my train ticket to get to Hakodate eki every morning. The ticket is about 80 dollars a month and I’ve only got 3 weeks left, so I figured it wasn’t really worth it. So I’m now going in to the center by bike, which is really cool so far. It’s about an 8-9 mile trip each way, so it gets in a good amount of exercise.

Also, pictures coming soon - I have to bring my camera in tomorrow, and I have a lot of new pictures (somewhere around 300? - I've been really bad with uploading).

A week of lows and highs - Friday 7/17

So Japan has been really excellent so far, and I’ve really enjoyed everything up to this point. This last week, however, I really started to miss home a lot. I don’t exactly know what brought it about, but for some reason, I got very very homesick at the beginning of the week. I think it came from a combination of not having internet access over the semester break (and, consequently, being unable to talk to friends), not having spoken to my family in close to a month, and a kind of full realization that I’ll only have 12 days after I get back to hang out with my friends. I don’t know, something about it just made me really want to go back. I think it definitely reflected in my schoolwork, which I am pretty disappointed about. I like to think I’m good at separating emotion from my work, and usually am, but this time was a real slump. Didn’t do any real pre-reading for class, so I was lost most of the first few days (and sensei definitely caught on, after he called on me for approximately three different grammar points and I had no idea how to use any of them). Plus, the fact that the HIF kids are becoming vultures for internet isn’t helping. Towards the beginning of the program, I would almost assuredly get internet if I went straight to the computer lounge after class and ate my lunch there. Now, however, because our class gets out 5 minutes later than the others every day (our teacher is… blah), I get to the lounge and all the cords are taken. Which also is why I haven’t been able to update the blog in a very long time. Sorry, by the way. To all… 5 people reading this. But yeah, in any case, the first half of the week was a very trying time.
Luckily, I got over this phase pretty quickly, which helped out a lot. I don’t exactly know what did it, but it’s good that it happened. Because it definitely allowed me to focus on the positives of this week, which were pretty important (and definitely milestones of my progress): for instance, this week, another foreign student came to stay with us for the week. He’s from Holland, doing a program called “Lion’s Club” or something to learn about cultures around the world.
Unfortunately for him, he does not speak any Japanese. And my host mother does not speak any English. Problem? Solution: I “translate” for the two. This is actually something of a comically pathetic sight: see, not only is Holland child unable to speak Japanese, he is deaf. However, he was placed into normal school and never learned sign language, so he relies on reading lips. Maaaajor problem, especially at night or in the car. It’s a completely pathetic sight, due to a combination of factors: his deafness, my suckiness at Japanese, the fact that my attention span is shorter than Thanh, and especially thefact that neither Ryuko-san nor Peter (exchange kid) understand how to be polite in the other culture.
Exhibit A for our failure to communicate: in the car on the way back from picking him up-
Ryuko-san: “すしを食べますか” (Do you eat sushi?)
Me: “She wants to know if you eat sushi”
Peter: “What? Sorry, you’re going to have to speak up..”
Me: “Do you eat sushi?”
Peter (thinking I asked what he wanted to see): “What do I want to see? Oh, lots of things – the mountain, the morning market—“
Ryuko-san (hearing “morning market”): “あ！朝市で食べたいの？” (Oh! You want to eat at the morning market?)
Me: “Wait.. no.. she wants to know if you eat SUSHI”
Peter: “What? But what about the mountain? Are we going to Hakodate yama?”
Ryuko-san (hearing “Hakodate yama”): “あ！函館山へいきたい” (Ohh, you want to eat on the mountain!)
Me: “でも、どこで食べ物を買って行きましょうか？” (But where should we buy food from?)
Ryuko-san: “すしに決めなかった？もう聞いたね？” (Didn’t we decide on sushi? I thought you already asked him”
Peter: “I’m so excited to see the mountain, I’ve heard a lot about it! I’m liking Japan so much so far!”
Me: “But wait, do you—“
Ryuko-san: “Peter… Japan. You... like?”
Peter: “What?”
Me: “She wants to know if you like Japan”
Peter: “Japan?”
Me: “Yeah”
***We arrive at the sushi place**
Peter: “Oh, sushi? I didn’t know we were getting sushi – are there vegetarian options?”

Yes, after all that, he turned out being a vegetarian. Anyway, despite the failures on all our parts, this venture has shown me that I have come a long way in terms of my Japanese ability – I definitely don’t think I could have translated for another student at all at the beginning of this program. Granted, we have many failures, but it’s better than nothing, right? At least, that’s what I’m telling myself.
So also, major high of this week. Yesterday (Friday), Ryuko-san took us to the 神社(zinzya – Shinto shrine) again. Now, when we last left off, Ashok had horribly offended the high priest of the神社because of his failure at Japanese: not only had he entered the priest’s consultation room walking (you must open the door while on your knees, enter), he had unintentionally used the snippy ”分かりました” as the priest explained Japanese history, and he had forgotten all polite ways to say goodbye as the priest left, using the offensively casual “また会いましょう.” In short, he had done nearly everything wrong while meeting one of the most important figures of the town.
But this time was the chance for redemption. And yes, that redemption came in the form on Michael Jackson music. But we’ll get to that later. First, Ashok entered the priest’s office the proper way, understood most (or at least the keywords) of the priest’s questions, answered (and even used some pretty good honorific/humble speech), and, when called out in front of the entire shrine membership, even managed to talk a little bit. Yes, in short, he seemed like slightly less of a retard this time. This was major progress. But the best part was yet to come.
The ceremony was followed by dinner, at which Ashok had his first alcoholic beverage (no, this is not the best part). The high priest handed him a bowl of sake, referring to it as “sake from God.” There was really no way out of that one. Moving on. At the end of dinner, a karaoke started up. Ashok enjoyed himself, watching the people he had just befriended sing Japanese pop, rock, and ballads (some well, others… spiritedly). However, as the hour grew late and the dinner neared its close, the high priest called on Ashok for one last performance. “An English song will do,” said the priest. Although he tried to graciously refuse, the shrine’s membership had been too tempted by the thought of a foreigner singing American music to let Ashok slide. And, as he walked up to the karaoke machine, a cry came out for Michael Jackson songs. So of course, Ashok had to oblige, performing a rendition of “Beat It” that made angels cry. Or maybe it was cats. One or the other. Either way, he performer a full rendition of the song (replete with dance moves) for the high priest.

I was very happy, if you can’t tell. Come on, performing a Michael Jackson hit, knowing the dance moves, to a high priest of Shintoism. He will never ever forget me. Victory is mine. Anyone could have talked to him in decent, functional Japanese. No, I may not know how to use every humble expression perfectly, but I can bust a mean moonwalk.
Hem. Anyway, other highs of the shrine – I talked to a really cool old guy named Nakano-san (中野さん) and actually understood most of the conversation. We talked about America/the differences between American culture and Japanese culture (specifically focusing on introductions – one of our class vocab words came up and I was ecstatic that I remembered it). Then, after I mentioned India, we moved on to Indian culture/specifically Hinduism. Granted, I may not have been contributing much to the conversation, but I was very proud that I could understand him and give a little bit of input here and there. Yessss. But clearly, the Michael Jackson was more important.

Yeeah, to be honest, this entire post was really just to build up to the Michael Jackson story, I don’t have much else to say. Good night!

Update, yay!

Soo, I haven’t posted in a while, so I figure it’s time to update everyone on the last week/bit. Last week, Stever sensei (one of our Japanese teachers from Yale) came for a site visit to HIF, which was both fun and really intimidating. She sat in on our classes and listened to us speak (which, of course, made me mess up and seem even dumber than usual) to evaluate the intensity level of the program. That night, she also took all the Yale kids to dinner – we had some pretty good stuff, ranging from fresh fresh sashimi to tofu curry. It was a great dinner, but also one that showed how many alcoholics are on this trip. Me and Malika were the only ones who didn’t drink anything. Since our teacher was paying, the kids went a little crazy with the alcohol. But anyway, getting the chance to talk to Stever sensei outside of class was really good – she’s super cool and down to earth, so she was able to give us some really good advice. Plus, she’s amazingly fluent in both English and Japanese, which is kind of the ideal for all of us (assumedly). Anyway, after that, classes continued in their normal uneventful turn. BUT, last week, we visited Asahi elementary school, a nearby school with K-6. It was perhaps the most adorable experience ever – the kids had “opening ceremonies” for us, which included teaching us some of their favorite games as well as their school dance. Not going to lie, their school dance is kind of awesome. And of course I still remember it. I want schools in America to have mandated large-scale dances like this. Can we make that happen? Anyway, some little kids delivered some speeches (also adorable) before we split up into individual classes. Each class was assigned a grade, in reverse correspondence to the level (1A got the oldest, 6th grade; we got 5th, etc., with the highest class getting kindergarteners). Anyway, in our classes, we were supposed to teach a game. We ended up teaching them the game “Big Booty,” but translated into Japanese – “Oshiri”
Ooooooshiri, oshiri, oshiri
Oh hai, oshiri
Oshiri ichiban
Ichiban yonban
Etc.
It was really fun, but my explanation of the rules in Japanese was really awful, so it took the kids a little bit of time to catch on. It was yet another humbling moment where I got closer to fully understanding how bad I am at this language. Oh well. We had a good time. And then, the kids gave little speeches thanking us (trying to use English whenever possible, which was also really funny). But I’ve decided – Japanese kids are just significantly better than American ones. They’re quieter, they dance, and they’re just adorable. I’m working on a plan to steal one before I return.
So those were the main highlights of that week. This week! Many an interesting/unpleasant thing. So first semester officially ended today (Thursday) with our semester end exam. Surprisingly, the test was nowhere near as bad as I thought it would be. I mean, his testing format is still not great (he asks very general fill-in-the-blank questions but expects specific answers – e.g. Because I drove _____, I got into an accident. My answer: Because I drove too quickly, I got into an accident. I got it wrong, as he wanted: Because I drove while talking on the phone), but the test went pretty well. But before the test, we had the annual speech contest. Now, this sounds much more impressive than it actually is – when they say speech, they mean a roughly 5 minute talk on a predetermined talk. Our class didn’t actually have a topic, though, so you essentially could write about anything. I completely made up a garbage essay about culture shock and the differences between America and Japan. I chose said topic because he stressed the importance of having a message in our speech. Now, this is a problem, mainly because I have the vocabulary of… a 3rd grader. But I was trying to write on a topic that was more my age. Which made the speech sound ridiculous. A fairly literal translation of part of my speech:

Since Hakodate and NY are very different, there is a lot to learn. For example, before coming to Japan, I had never seen a Shinto shrine. My host mother goes to shrines a lot, so after I came, we started to go together. I didn’t know about Shintoism before, but now I know a little more. There are lots of other things I did for the first time. NY does not have farms, so I had never done farmwork. But my host family lives on a farm, so there’s always work.

Yeah, it was kinda pathetic. Yesterday (Wednesday) was our in class contest, where we all delivered our final products while being graded by our peers. Almost everyone had really good speeches (Victor told a really intense story about being mugged and how every day needs to be appreciated), so I ended up giving everyone like... above a 95. I would be an awful teacher. Anyway, the winner from the class goes on to deliver their speech in front of all of HIF at the international hotel we stayed at for the first week. Annd, as (my awful, cursed) luck would have it, my sensei (for some reason that I do not yet understand) thought I did the best in my class and chose me to speak for our class. This worries me for two reasons. One, I’m concerned for our class’s image if my speech was the best one. I’m going to get up there in front of a bunch of Japanese people, not to mention the really advanced HIF kids, and be like:

I was born and raised in New York. There are a lot of people from foreign countries there. There is also a museum called the Met. I went there when I was 6. There was an exhibit about Japan, so I became interested in Japanese culture.

Our class will actually look somewhat developmentally challenged. Second, I just don’t like speaking in front of people. It will not be fun. Oh, and third, sensei also chose another kid from our class (for whom I voted to give the speech) who is super ridiculously amazing at Japanese and definitely should not be in our level. But he’s going to get up there before me and deliver his really complicated speech about being trilingual and adjusting to the challenges of studying abroad, only to have me follow up with:

Wherever you go, family is important. My family does lots of things for me. My host mother does a lot of things for me too. She’s not my real mother, but she does a lot of things my real mother does. She teaches me cooking and helps me with my homework.

Seriously? It’s going to be the most retarded thing ever. Anyway, that’s my mini rant. Annnd I’m going to go to bed because I’m tired and my computer’s about to die. Night!

Some frustrating things

I figure I have to include a post about the troubles/problems I've had so far, so as to keep some degree of objectivity here. So the main inconvenience so far has been the lack of internet at my house, coupled with my teacher's frequent decisions to have assignments due by email. For the first few weeks, not having internet access was ok - I could get whatever I needed done at HIF and then not have to worry about it the rest of the day. But for the last two weeks or so, we've been having graded email pen pal assignments. So he'd have us write drafts, bring them in for peer editing, and have the final copy mailed out that night. Or, in even worse cases, we'd email him the compositions by class time, he'd correct/email them back to us some time after class, and we'd correct/mail out the same day. For most people, this wasn't too much of a problem, because most of the host families have some form of internet access in their houses. But for me and a few other people, this has really been difficult - today (Saturday), for example - our speeches (for the annual speech contest) were corrected yesterday after school, and our next drafts are due today by 5. I had to take the train into Hokkaido and find a cafe that has free internet access. All in all, sending the one email took about... an hour of travel (and another one back). Granted, it's not too bad - I'm meeting Thanh and Juan Miguel to climb Mount Hakodate again. And Juan Miguel's going to try the ice cream challenge after that. So it's not horribly inconvenient. I just came in an hour and a half earlier than we have to meet.
Anyway, inconvenience number two: traveler's checks. These seemed like a great idea at the time we got them - can't be used if stolen, so little risk of having them around. Sounds really convenient, eh? False. Almost no places in Hakodate accept traveler's checks, so exchange is only possible at two places: the bank or the international hotel. The bank has a good exchange rate, but is only open weekdays from 9 to 3. Since HIF takes up most of my time between language and culture classes, getting to the bank (which is kind of far from HIF) is not feasible most days. The international hotel, on the other hand, is much closer, but is a complete ripoff (last I checked, exchange rate was in the low 80s per dollar) and is only available to hotel guests. So this last week, I've been pretty busy and haven't had the chance to get money from anywhere. Gah. Little frustrating. Mini rant. Sorry.

But that being said, these are really minor things - I hope it doesn't sound like these really matter. I'm living pretty low-cost, so I don't need to exchange that often anyway, and I've gotten my assignments in on time. It's really not that big of a deal, but I figure I should paint a somewhat fuller picture of my stay. Anyway, I've got to run and meet up with people for our mountain hike.

An explanation

So I just wanted to explain why my posting is so erratic/seems somewhat anachronistic. I don't have internet access at my host household, so I can't update the blog regularly. If something exciting happens, I usually write it in a word document and post it to the blog the next time I'm free at HIF. Which also explains the varied fonts and stuff. Yeah.

An awesome two days

Ok so I have to post about the last two days, because they were pretty darn amazing. Let’s start with Thursday (yesterday) – after class let out, I went to my first KENDO LESSON! AHHH! Kendo is so freaking cool! Plus, I’ve missed having some kind of martial art in my life. Anyway, the lesson was at a nearby high school, so as the 40-something group of strange looking “外人” (foreigners) walked in, most of the kids stopped to stare. I mean, it was kinda cool, feeling like a celebrity. Plus, they were all super friendly once they got over the shyness (for instance, a group of girls hung around us for a few minutes before actually working up the courage to say “Hi” – they were pretty surprised/amused when they realized that we could speak Japanese). But yeah, the kids were really cool. It’s kind of a cool experience to see high school life in another country, especially one as different as Japan. I mean, (and this is at least how I feel), it was tough to envision other people’s high school lives as being radically different from my own, I guess. It was cool to see how similar/different their high school life was from mine. Anyway, we got to the fourth floor gym, where we met this really old lady, who introduced herself as our instructor for the day. This woman is probably all of 5 feet tall, looks to be about.. 100 pounds? Really short (like, maybe about my length) white hair, and wearing sweatpants and a white polo shirt. She talked for a little bit about the tradition of kendo before having us do some stretches (pretty much a lot like track stretching?) and then arming us with the wooden swords. She taught us the three basic strokes: First is Mein (transliteration?), which is a powerful blow to the top of the head. You advance quickly, leading with the same foot the whole time (i.e. if I start the motion with my right foot, my left foot’s steps should only bring it to meet the right – the right should be ahead at all times) before bringing the sword above your head (so it’s almost parallel to the ground behind you) and attacking the top of the opponent’s head. Second, comes Ku-Toh (again, transliteration?), which is a sharp hit to the opponent’s wrists, the point of which is to disarm them. You advance in the same fashion, but the blow itself is much quicker. Instead of having the same sort of power as you get with Men, you go for a really quick attack. Finally, came Do – a sort of surprise blow to the midriff. Same advance, and you lift the sword as if ready to strike with Men, but you quickly bring the sword down in an arc that attacks the opponent’s torso. Then came the really fun part – she grouped us into four lines, two of which struck mannequins, which the other two attacked actual people (one was the instructor, the other was one of her students – they were wearing gear, don’t worry). I was in the line attacking the instructor, so I was feeling a little bad. I mean, come on, could I really hit an old lady in her 80s? But then I saw her demonstrate the attack formation on one of her students – damn, can that old lady MOVE! I was actually pretty blown away by how much of a beast she was. Plus, she’s incredibly loud when she attacks – it’s pretty frightening. Anyway, we did the attacks in sequence, starting with Men. The instructor was so intimidating! She yelled even as we hit her. It psyched me out the first time because I totally wasn’t expecting it. I advanced, and just as I lifted my sword to strike, she yelled insanely loudly – it threw me off, and I ended up missing. But after that, I got in the zone and did ok. She soon switched it up, though – she chose two students (Koh Kazama and Brian Ho) to be the strike dummies. Not going to lie, this was insanely fun. I can’t exactly tell you why, but hitting Brian was significantly more fun than attacking either the old lady or the mannequin. Oh well. But yeah, Kendo was AWESOME. And I fully intend to go back next week. It’s every Tuesday, Thursday, and Saturday. Tomorrow I can’t make it because of the Onuma park trip (which I’m also pretty excited for, but I’ll get to that later), but I think I’m going to do it next week. But I’m also wary of committing to too many things – I figure I’d rather just devote a lot of time to one martial art than doing all three (the program offers Judo and Kyudo, Japanese archery, as well as Kendo). So I’m signed up for Kyudo trials this coming week, and probably want to stop by Judo too, so I can make a good decision about which to do. Anyway, on to today (Friday) – after classes, I intended to go to Judo trial sessions, but then found out I was signed up for a culture class today: Kimono Culture and Etiquette. This and Kendo might be tied for my favorite experience of the trip so far. It started out with the instructor, Kosaka san, explaining the different levels of formality that can be conveyed by a kimono. For men, the most formal kimono would be black with a grey bottom. For women, it depended on marital state – married women could wear black, but with a little bit of color at the bottom, while unmarried women wore multicolored kimono. Any sort of formal kimono has to have the family crest on it – the most formal ones have 5, while semiformal ones have between 1 and 3. She also talked about the importance of kimono coloring and design – a fully black kimono can only be worn for a funeral, but black must be the dominant color in any formal kimono. You also should make sure that the flowers/animals on the kimono you wear are appropriate for the season.

Jan/Feb - Your kimono can have pine, bamboo, Japanese plum, etc

March/April - Japanese cherry, butterfly, Japanese wisteria, Seven Herbs of Spring, etc

May/June – Iris, willow, birds

July/Aug – Birds, rocky beach, fish, shells, water

Sept/Oct – Japanese silver grass, autumn leaves, geese, chrysanthemum, the seven autumnal flowers

Nov/Dec – Dry garden, snow

Afterwards, she demonstrated the different ways men and women put on yukata (very casual cotton summer kimono) and let us try some on!!! My yukata was pretty darn cool – it was a dark blue with lighter blue patterning and a large yellow emblem (not a crest – yukata are rarely printed with family crests). Anyway, we all got on the struggle bus as we tried to put the kimono on (I felt kind of bad for the girls – their method was so much more complicated than ours). I’m pretty sure we offended all the older people there by violating every rule of kimono etiquette. Luckily, afterwards, we had a crash course in kimono etiquette – namely, sitting, standing, entering a room, and bowing properly. A lot of these things are pretty important to Japanese culture, especially during tea ceremonies. I’ll confess something kind of sad – don’t judge me. I knew how to open the door to a tea ceremony because I remembered it was on an episode of America’s Next Top Model. I was a little sad for my life in that moment. But anyway, it was a very cool tutorial. I’m definitely looking forward to buying a yukata before heading back to America, but I need to find some cheap ones. =(. Yeah. But anyway, I loved the class – the whole atmosphere just made me feel like I was traveling back in time to Meiji Japan, when this stuff was like... the rule of social survival. But yeah. I’ll put up pictures later. I forgot to bring my camera to the actual event, so I’m probably just going to steal a bunch of other people’s. Yayyy.

So finally, tomorrow (Saturday) is our trip to Onuma Park. I went last week with Ryuko-san, and it’s breathtaking. There was a little bit of fog that made it look incredible. I’m really excited to go again – I’ll remember to take my camera this time, I swear! But I’ve got to get to practicing – our class is singing in the talent show tomorrow. We’re performing a song called “Banzai” by Ulfuls, a Japanese pop rock band. For those of you in Intro Japanese, it’s the same group that did “Ashita ga aru.” It’s pretty catchy, so it’s been stuck in my head. On the plus side, this does mean that I am no longer listening to Rock Star. Yeah. So I’m going to go prepare now. Yeah. Bye!

Randomness

So this is a random post, but I figured I’d talk a little bit about the daily HIF schedule/my schedule. I guess that’s kind of important. But first, a random insertion – I can’t get the song “Rock Star” by Prima J out of my head. For the last week, I’ve been singing it to myself and doing part of the dance. Yes, yes, I know, it’s the Bratz song. But come on, it’s catchy. Seriously, stop mocking me. I mean it. So the problem is: usually, if I want to get a song out of my head, I listen to it and then quickly follow with a better, fun-to-sing song – however, I do not have Rock Star on my iTunes, so the only way to listen to it is online. The only place I can get internet is the school building, in the public computer room. Should I just bite the bullet and listen to it in the computer room (without headphones), killing any reputation I might have, or should I suffer silently and try to get it out of my head gradually? Please, share thoughts. Side note number two – I’ve demolished about a full pack of “Uzumaki Karintoh,” these little cookie thingers. They’re slightly sweet pinwheels, sort of? But like… the dough itself isn’t sweet - it’s glazed over with some kind of light sugar. I was picking up some sweets for Ryuko-san (I figured I’d do something to honor the first week together) and the big pack was only 100 yen, so I figured I’d give it a go. And now I’m like… halfway through the family sized bag. I think I have a problem.

So anyway, schedule! I get up at 6:30 (well, my alarm goes off at 6:30 – I usually crawl out of bed by 6:45), pack up my bed, brush my teeth till 7, when I eat breakfast with Ryuko-san. Breakfast is usually brown rice, vegetables, and sometimes fish. Sometimes, she makes eggs. But yeah, it’s usually a quick breakfast (15 minutes), because at 7:15ish I change clothes, pack up my books, etc., until leaving the house at 7:20. It’s about a 10-15 minute bike ride (4 if I gun it, as I found out this morning when I was running late), depending on traffic/sidewalk problems. On the plus side, I am remembering how to ride a bike! I’m considering trying some tricks, but let’s not jump the gun. For now, I’m happy to be stable enough to use one hand to scratch my face while biking. Anyway, I usually get to Kunebetsu station (久根別駅, for those of you who were curious) around 7:30ish, park my bike in front of Yoshida-san’s barbershop, and wait at my track. It’s pretty unimpressive, but it’s a good time to do some quick review – between that, the train, and the half hour before class, I can usually do some good kanji studying. Elliot and Amanda, two HIFers (way above my level) also take the train from Kunebetsu, so we usually see each other in the morning. Plus, plenty of other HIF students get on the same train at different stops. There are also plenty of Japanese high school students on the train – it’s pretty cool to see how teenagers are the same/different in different countries. For instance, the girls always sit in group of no less than 3, phones or makeup out. The boys, on the other hand, sit there and look bored while (maybe) listening to music. Anyway, the train ride is about 15-20 minutes, so we arrive at Hakodate station at around 8. From there, it’s about a half hour walk to the HIF building. On the way, we pass by the morning market (朝市), where they sell fresh fish and seafood. For some reason, it’s harder to say no when a vendor holds up a crab and its legs move slowly as it tries to get free. Anyway, we get to HIF around 8:30, at which point I attempt to study more, but usually get distracted by the internet. 9:00, classes start. Oh, the joy. 9:00-9:10/15ish is nicchoku time, during which a preselected member of the class will give the weather forecast for the day, any announcements there might be, talk a little bit about something they did over the past week (you only go about once every 8-9 days), and field questions. After nicchoku is the daily test – the length and subject changes every day. Some days it will be a short 15-minute quiz covering just the kanji or vocabulary for the chapter, while others will see full out unit tests that take a little over an hour. So far I’ve been doing alright. So anyway, on short quiz days, we have three instruction periods of 50 minutes each (on test days, we only have two), broken up by 10-15 minute breaks. Afterwards, we have any cultural courses that we sign up for. Annd that’s pretty much it for this pointless post.

I made my bed. Now I've got to sleep in it.

So as much as this post sounded like it would be insightful and deep, the title should be interpreted fairly literally – in my host family house, I actually do sleep in a bed that I make every night and pack up every morning. But lemme start with the beginning of the week and the beginning of classes! I’ve been really busy, so I haven’t had the chance to update. So. Sunday. Thanh, Yiwen, and I went to Goryokaku Park, a former rebel hideout fortress. It’s one of the first Japanese pentagonal forts, built by the Tokugawa rulers who were fleeing and resisting the newly instated Meiji government. The Tokugawa hid out and fought against what technically constitutes today’s government for close to a year, if I remember correctly. I have a souvenir pamphlet with the information, but I can’t read any of the kanji. Owe. It’s kind of weird/cool/interesting to think about, though – Goryokaku is technically the site of treason against the current Japanese government, but it’s considered such a huge icon of Japanese history and culture. I don’t know, I think it’s an interesting tension. Anyway, the museum area was filled with different artifacts from the Tokugawa period onward, which was super cool – The relics ranged from cannons and rifles to tea sets and bowls – it was a pretty awesome look into how Tokugawa Japan lived as it was on the verge of collapse. Anyway, the park was also really pretty – I have pictures that I’m going to upload after this post. Unfortunately, pictures were not allowed inside the museum area, so I don’t have any of the actual relics. But ask me for the information brochure sometime; I’ll be happy to show it off.

So after Goryokaku, we walked around for a while looking for a place called “Bookoff,” where apparently books can be exchanged for ones of similar value. It seemed like a super cool concept, so we were all excited to go. But alas, our navigation skills were somewhat compromised by the fact that we 1) had no directions and 2) could not read most of the street signs (well, Yiwen could, but that’s beside the point). We returned to the hotel, fruitless in our efforts. Ah well. As the Japanese would say, “Syoo ga nai, ne?”

Okie doke. Classes started Monday! There are six classes offered (Intermediate 1A, 1B, 2A, 2B, Advanced, and High Advanced) for the different levels of proficiency – I ended up getting placed into 1B (which I’m still convinced has to be a mistake – my oral exam was really actually kind of a disaster. Don’t they see? I can’t speak this language!!) with Asaoka sensei. He’s very nice, but very intense and a little bit intimidating. I always feel really bad when I mess up in front of him. But he dresses so wonderfully! He reminds me of a cartoon character, with his bushy mustache, big glasses, and high waisted shorts. Oh well. The first two days of class were super intense, because we were supposed to be the “advanced” 2^nd year students. We covered 6 chapters of grammar and vocabulary and 12 chapters of kanji (equates to roughly… 360 characters or so?) in the first two days for our test on Wednesday. Which, by the way, was a disaster. Rusty/just plain bad Japanese + 360 kanji = a barely passing grade. Oh boy. Anyway, most of the grammar and vocab is ok, because I already learned it in first year. But the kanji is ridiculous. I had a hard time memorizing the 2-3/night we had in first year, and all of a sudden he’s asking us to do 180? What? And on top of that, the second day was my “nicchoku,” as my name came first in the alphabet. The “nicchoku” is a brief presentation in front of the class about the weather, the day’s announcements, and something about your day/life. Yeah. So all in all, the first few days could be aptly summed up as a definite struggle bus.

But on to some more awesome things! Homestay! I like my host (grand?)mother so much! Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh! That’s how much I like her. Ok, it wasn’t all awesome. There was the brief period of butterflies just before meeting her. HIF had all 60 of us line up in this hallway outside the little conference room where all our host families were waiting. Then they called us, one by one, and we walked in to the room full of Japanese families waving and smiling and waited for one to come claim each of us. Right before they called my name, I started kind of freaking out – what if she didn’t like me? Or expected me to be good at Japanese? Or was very strict? Or didn’t talk? But all was well! Ryuko-san (she insists that I don’t use to formality of her family name, Takasaka) is awesome! I was dreading some horrible awkwardness, especially during the car ride to her house, after reading some of the light fellowship blogs from last year, but she was really easygoing and talked to me about everything and anything (she was really into my Indian-ness, so we talked a good amount about that). She lives somewhat far away from the HIF center, so the ride was kinda long, but it wasn’t awkward at all! Yay! Anyway, she took me to Kunebetsu station, from which I take a train to Hakodate every morning, to buy a month-long unlimited pass. Not only did she basically fill out the form for me, she spotted me (I was short 2000 yen)! Anyway, when we got home that night, she made me one of the greatest meals ever – it was shrimp tempura with onion, egg, rice, and a whole bunch of other delicious stuff. HIF did an AMAZING job of setting me up with a host that suited me – we have the same exact dietary restrictions, she doesn’t smoke, and we get along really well. Over dinner, we talked a little bit about the program and the people in it. She told me a bit about other homestay kids she’s had (I think she’s been doing this for a really long time), all of whom sound really cool. I think it’s really great that she cares so much about all of them (she still stays in touch with most of them). Anyway, after dinner, she showed me the titular bed making process – my room is in traditional Japanese style (tatami floors, no bed), so I used two pads for a mattress and some sheets for cover. It’s pretty fantastic. I actually sleep much better on it than I do in my bed at school. Ah well. We were both pretty worn out from the day, so we called it an early night. Next morning, she gave me a bike that I could use to get to Kunebetsu every morning (for which I’m realllly glad – it’d be about a 40 minute walk every morning otherwise) and drove to the station slow enough for me to follow her. This was a poor idea for two main reasons: firstly, she had to drive like… just under 20 km/hr so I could keep up with her, angering other drivers behind her. Secondly, I hadn’t ridden a bike in years. You know the analogy “It’s like riding a bike! Once you learn, you never forget!”? False. I almost took down a group of 10 elementary school kids walking on the sidewalk. In my defense, it was a narrow sidewalk and the kids didn’t move aside. In their defense, there was plenty of room for me to make it by. Oh well. Somehow, I made it to the station without losing a limb (or robbing a small child of one) in time for my 7:45 train. Elliot is actually in the same town as I am, so we met on the tracks, which was a cool surprise. Anyway, it turns out that a lot of HIF students take the same train as I do. Fun times. So. Later that day was perhaps one of the single coolest experience of my life – Ryuko-san picked me up after classes that day and took me to a SHINTO SHRINE!!!! Not only did we go in, it happened to be in the middle of a ceremony by an important figure in Shintoism!!! He apparently knows Ryuko-san really well, seeing as he stopped the ceremony to find out who I was and have me introduce myself to the people who had assembled there. He then let me actually take part in the ceremony, which was pretty amazing. I don’t think there’s anything that can really compare. Like, I’ve sat in on non-Hindu religious events before (church sermons and the like), but this was completely different. I don’t know, something kept me awestruck at what I was actually taking part in. Anyway, after the ceremony was over, I helped clean the shrine a little bit, putting away some fruit, etc. But I’ve decided that Japanese people are the nicest people ever. Whenever anyone talked me and I like... responded with anything as simple as a “Wakarimasita” (I understand), they got so excited and repeatedly complimented how good my Japanese was (clearly, they’re lying. But it still is a confidence booster). Then, they made me a special meal of soba, fish tempura, and a whole bunch of delicious stuff. This only led to more wonder and amazement, as they were blown away by my ability to use chopsticks “Nihonjin-mitai” (like a Japanese person). This is… also false. But I’ll give you guys the secret – During Japanese meals, there are several dishes of food set on the table, and everyone just takes what they want. The secret to wowing them as a foreigner is: when you take food from one of the communal plates, use the other end of your chopsticks. It’s done so that you don’t touch the food other people will end up eating with the side that’s been in your mouth. When I did this, everyone gasped and started complimenting me again. But yeah, it was a good experience. It swayed me so much that I decided to switch my independent study project (I was going to do Goryokaku’s history and significance) to Shinto tradition and its survival in the modern Japan. Ok… so not much else happened on Thursday, but Friday was another great day. Ryuko-san took me to a legit Japanese sushi restaurant. This is something I had been waiting for the entirety of my stay. She refused to let me pay for my portion and ordered so much sushi for me. For those of you who love sushi (I’m basically thinking of Erin right now), YOU MUST COME HERE. The restaurant is set up in a super cool way – there is no paper menu. The sushi chefs stand in the center of a large, circular conveyor belt, which bears close to 50 plates of different kinds of sushi that they offer. The price is denoted by the color of the plate it’s on – at the restaurant we went to, striped plates were 125 yen, green-rimmed plates 130, blue-rimmed 150, purple-rimmed 200, red-rimmed 420, and full blue 500. Granted, each plate has only two pieces of sushi, but it’s still amazing. Ryuko-san ordered us an obscene amount of sushi (I ended up with 9 plates or something) and refused to let me pay for my part. But let me focus of the quality of the sushi. The salmon! Oh, the salmon. Probably the softest fish I have ever had in my life. It had this amazing natural flavor and was sooo fresh. Gah! And then we had octopus and squid, which I enjoyed a whole heck of a lot more than I thought I would (the squid was a little tough to chew, but still delicious). Shrimp, clams, tuna, and several other plates later, we left, stuffed. Oh my goodness. I love sushi. There is simply nothing that compares. You guys can have your Miyas fusion rolls and stuff, but I will take legit sushi over it any day of the week. Aksdjfkasjdhfksdj SUSHI! JAPAN! RYUKO-SAN! JAPAN! AHHH!!!